Getaway
Tickles the cat.
Canon G3/manual/RAW/natural lighting
Heidi is here with us now; she’s hacking and coughing but still going to the Smokies with us; she’s a trooper. We leave in the morning. I’ve just finished an assignment (at 1:30 a.m.) and just want to shower and collapse. Unfortunately, I’ll have to take my laptop with me and complete several assignments overlooking the mountains on the cabin deck. Lovely.
I’ve purchased our Ripley’s Believe It or Not oddities museum and Aquarium tickets and have printed them out; they’re tucked away snugly in my purse. Josh says we’re both “overpreparers”. I can’t disgree- we spend more time preparing for a trip than we do actually on a trip. Brianna won’t be able to come along because she has to work.
It’s way past my bedtime.
Next time I write, I’ll be in the mountains. I hope the sunrise out on the deck with be misty and majestic. I’m craving coffee just thinking about it. Man I’m getting old…
Photo Therapy [part 2]
Things are incredibly stressful for me today. Right off the bat, I had to be at a business meeting first thing in the morning. I have an egotistical flea (who happens to be the owner of an art website) biting my &^% to appease his ego. I’ve never known anyone so full of him or herself, honestly. The guy blasted me publicly- which is defamation- and you better believe I’m gonna blast back. I don’t take slaps lightly.
When I reach a breaking point, and I just want to hang everything up- shut my door- and “retire from everything”, I go take pictures.
It gives me a great sense of control to be able to compose my environment; even master the very lighting around me.
I think every person wants to feel in control of his or her own life, down to their very eternal destination- if one believes in such.
To be able to “design my surroundings” by manually adjusting the controls- it’s far more rewarding than simply “pointing and shooting”.
I would have little joy as a photographer if I merely pointed and shot. Manually adjusting my exposure in-camera is an integral part of the bonding process with my equipment.
For me, it’s a must.
My head feels blasted in about five areas.
Pain everywhere.
Nevertheless, I can’t simply sit around the house in pain and be pissed off.
So, I’m going to go out and take pictures.
Of what, I haven’t a clue.
I know of an online photo challenge and the theme is colour.
Perhaps I’ll go out and induct a spash of colour into my day…
The Light Show
I can’t explain my attraction to ugly things.
In my years of rubbing elbows with many professional photographers, somewhere along the way I grew tired of perfection. “Textbook”.
It bothers me that people starting out in photography are being told that their images need to be “crystal clear”. Digital noise is considered a big-time no no. As a matter of fact, if there is grain and noise in an image, it’s even considered amateurish. But I like to go against the grain. (Pah tah bomp!)
The majority of people I know keep their cameras in “P” mode (and no folks, that does not mean “professional”). So few people shoot in manual any more!
People ask me questions about my images; they’re wanting to develop their own style. I tell them to break every rule they can.
Somewhere along the way, I fell out of love with “picture perfect” and decided to do my own thing.
I’m going to muck up my images with digital noise and a deliberate high ISO field.
Above all, I want to express mood.
For me, this means speaking with the light. (Exposure, ISO, and so on.)
Instead of “finding the light” in the frame, I study the shadows.
I begin with the darkened shadows and work the light into my photo (instead of the other way around).
Very film noir.
Such as my kitchen chair.
How do you make a kitchen chair tell a story?
How do you make it express a particular mood?
By finding the ugliness in a subject- I find its truth.
I loved the way the lighting was wrapping itself around the lines in this chair.
It makes me uncomfortable to look at this. It’s edgy. Dark. Somber.
Who would want to sit in that chair?!
But I find it terribly beautiful.
Try as I might, I can’t get away from this style.
It’s become who I am.
And I’m alright with it..
Shot in monochrome/ISO: 50/Manual exposure f/2
Sh. Sp.-1/20th sec.
…
Recent Work
Public of your Past/Canon G3/self portrait
G3/self
G3/self
Lensbaby Composer Pro/Double Glass Ops.
Falls of the Ohio/Water
The Hiding Place/My daughter, Brianna-reworked(added film filter + mastered levels and hues)
Lensbaby Composer Pro/Double Glass
Thirty one Hours/ My daughter, Heidi,Reworked
Lensbaby Composer Pro/ Double Glass/Canon Rebel Xti
Times Square/New York, New York
Multiple Exposure/Sigma 17-70
Warhol/ Warhol exhibition (Campbell’s soup cans)
Museum of Modern Art- New York, New York
Multiple Exposure
Warsaw/ Abandoned Government Facility
Lensbaby Composer Pro/Double Glass Ops.
My daughter, Heidi/Lensbaby Composer Pro/Double Glass
He’s Leaving Again/Lensbaby Composer Pro/Double Glass
Interrogation/ My kitchen chair in natural window lighting (my favourite lighting)
Lensbaby Composer Pro/Double Glass
Self Portrait/Long exposure experiment/Canon G3/manual (8 secs.)
Shadows and Leaves/Harvest Homecoming/Canon G3/Manual
The Marriage of Black and White
I’m realizing only today why I’m so creative. Because I’ve had to improvize my whole life. Having next to nothing to work with, forces you to try harder. You have no choice but to experiment because you really don’t know what else to do. Over time, your style becomes defined, refined, and unmistakable.
Having to sell my rig, more than once, I was left with only my Canon G3. It’s a 4 MP dinosaur. Because I had nothing else, I decided to not only learn how to shoot in B&W + manual, but revel in it.
That was about two years ago. I’ve been shooting for about 7, but B&W rules me. I’m completely infatuated with the marriage between light and shadows. To me, black and white is already a story. The images within an image become the actors on the stage, or props, I suppose, but even if you have only one blank wall, and a cheap camera set up to photograph that wall, with a bit of natural window lighting hitting it (through parted curtains, say), then the clouds passing over the sun become the filters. The passing clouds increase and decrease the gamma and contrast naturally.
The story of B&W is one of masculinity and femininity. Life and death. Hot and cold. Love and hate. When stripped down to their very elements, they are in their most powerful state. I have little interest at the moment in HDR, filters of this or that kind- and while they’re great (and I have experience in those as well) I can’t escape the beauty of being stripped down to almost nothing, and simply working with what ya got.
That’s not to say I photograph things in the nude.
I’m experimenting with a new webcam I got. It’s a cheapie $18.00 Logitech. But it’s capable of shooting in B&W (Heaven……….!) and so I’ve been sitting here in my computer chair, painting shadow swans on my wall with my hands. When I move my hands back and forth to and away from my chest, the shadows become elongated horizontally. Such a simple action. But it changes the dynamics of everything.
And here are some snappies:
This is generally how I feel several times a week.
“Ahhh…..close the curtains!”
(Migraines make the light absolutely unbearable.) Oh, and I wasn’t faking it. I did indeed wake up with a migraine.
I intentionally bleached the lighting, and jacked up the gamma so the blacks would be double heavy.
Choppy, grainy, bleeding contrast, toasted exposure- what’s not to love?
(Yes, yes, I’m kidding.) But the shadows on my neck from my fingers are intentional.
It’s a fair statement to say that I am obsessed with shadows.
Perhaps I’ll post a video today.
Perhaps not.
m o n o c h r o m e j u n k i e † 