December 2009 Archives

© Scurlock Studio - All Rights Reserved

The Wedding Story by Merry A. Foresta

Popular fiction, especially in the new form of the sentimental short story, increasingly included allusions to photography.

In many stories a hero, usually a young professional man adrift in the big city, sees a cased daguerreotype in a studio's storefront display, falls in love with the image, and becomes obsessed with meeting its "original."

After several exciting adventures fending off brigands and thieves he finds his true love, and in a daguerreian love-at-first-sight happy ending, marries the girl.

The true and noble character of both hero and nation are perpetuated, all thanks to the photograph.

Merry A. Foresta

© Keith Cooper - All Rights Reserved

Review of Nik Color Efex Pro V3 by Keith Cooper

There are lots of built in filters and effects in Photoshop, but combining them and trying out different options can be a bit daunting if you are not familiar with them all.

The Nik package combines a large collection of filters under one simple interface, allowing their effect to be applied to whole images or just parts.

Keith Cooper

© Jay Maisel - All Rights Reserved

The Candid Frame #87 - Jay Maisel by Ibarionex R. Perello

Based on his principle, "Light, Gesture and Color" he brings a sensibility which allows him to produce amazingly beautiful and revitting images from the unpredictable city street.

He is in all regards, the photographer's photographer.

Ibarionex R. Perello

© Marcel Duchamp - All Rights Reserved

Taking Duchamp's legacy for a spin by Sebastian Smee

This was, from the perspective of today, a pivotal moment in the history of art.

Duchamp's influence - specifically, the notions that anything can be art and that ideas are more important than images - is everywhere today, and lurks behind much of the canonical (and not so canonical) art of the past 50 years.

Sebastian Smee

© Gilbert Garcin - All Rights Reserved

Gilbert Garcin

Gilbert Garcin spent most of his life managing a lamp factory in France.

At 65, he retired and took up a trick photography workshop.

For the past ten years he has been creating comical, surrealistic photographs which warmly highlight sometimes cold, existential questions.

Garcin inhabits this strange world and ponders it together with the viewer; with Garcin you have a dedicated, but perplexed, guide.

Sughra Raza

© Takeshi Murata - All Rights Reserved

The Work of the Moving Image in the Age of Its Digital Corruptibility by Daniel Rourke

The cinema can, with impunity, bring us closer to things or take us away from them and revolve around them, it suppresses both the anchoring of the subject and the horizon of the world... It is not the same as the other arts, which aim rather at something unreal or a tale.

With cinema, it is the world which becomes its own image, and not an image which becomes world.

Giles Deleuze

© Zoe Strauss - All Rights Reserved

Recommended PhotoBooks in 2009 by Douglas Stockdale

I have been thinking about my list of Best PhotoBooks for 2009, and I am in sort of a quandary.

The implication is that this list would be for the books that were published in 2009, but the fact is that many interesting books published in 2008 took a while before I could acquire them.

And I have not seen or read all of the books published in 2009, not by a long shot.

So I am going with what I would "recommend" instead, not presented in any order as to ranking of the best of those recmmended, but I think that these are the photobooks worth further consideration.

Douglas Stockdale

© Nick Turpin Publishing - All Rights Reserved

Publication

Aims to publish the best Street Photography we can find

Nick Turpin Publishing

© Harry Benson - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Harry Benson.

Jim

Oprah, The Beatles And Brad Pitt: A Photographer's 60-Year Retrospective by Claire O'Neill

Few photographers can say they've had the privilege of photographing The Beatles.

Even fewer can say that they had the opportunity, but didn't want to.

In January of 1964, photographer Harry Benson was packed and ready to leave for Africa on a news assignment.

The night before his flight, his editor called and assigned him to photograph "a relatively unknown pop group" in Paris instead.

Fortunately, Benson had no choice. "Unbeknownst to me at the time," he writes, "that was my lucky day."

Claire O'Neill

© Gjon Mili/Courtesy of Life - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Painting with Light.

Jim

A New Material For Painting: Light by Claire O'Neill

Welcome to the future, where you no longer need a surface on which to paint.

Actually, the process of painting with light dates back to Picasso -- and probably before.

But three art teachers -- two in California and one in Shanghai -- are using it as a teaching technique.

They are collaborating on a project for their students: urging them to paint with light to learn about exposure and light.

Claire O'Neill

© Lewis Blackwell - All Rights Reserved

Lewis Blackwell - A Green World by Cristina Luiggi

Our relationship with trees goes back to our evolutionary roots—way back to when our ancestors thrived in the green canopy above.

Perhaps that is why long after we have climbed down their trunks we still gaze at trees in awe.

Lewis Blackwell—writer, artist, environmentalist, and former creative director of Getty Images—celebrates this relationship in The Life & Love of Trees.

With a collection of stunning photography from around the world—from cypress enclaves in Tuscany's wheat fields, to the coast-dwelling mangroves of Indonesia and frozen skeletal structures in the Japanese tundra—Blackwell blends visual poetry with thought-provoking reflections on one of the most successful kinds of organisms and the ties that bind us to them.

Cristina Luiggi

© Ralph A. Clevenger - All Rights Reserved

Photographing Nature: Not Everything's Black-and-White by Ralph A. Clevenger

Reds make our heart beat faster, greens have healing properties, blues calm us, yellows give us hope, browns and grays make us sad.

Of all the visual elements, color is perhaps the strongest.

Often a spot of color is the reason a photographer stops to take a picture.

It catches the eye.

Our reaction to color is instinctive; it's wired into the brain, part of how we interact with the world.

Ralph A. Clevenger

© Bowens - All Rights Reserved

Keep It Cool; Fluorescent and LED Lighting: Alternatives to Hot Lights and Strobes by Jack Neubart

New fluorescent and LED "cool" lights are on the scene, making serious headway into the realm of digital photography.

Cool lights not only save energy, but they may be better suited in a variety of situations.

Jack Neubart

© Scott Kelby - All Rights Reserved

Scott Kelby - My Fourth Annual Gonzo Holiday Gear Guide (Part 1)

Anyway, it's here and this year I tried to include lots of affordable gear (which isn't as easy task when it comes to gear), but don't worry—I did keep a few items in there for the rich doctor or personal injury attorney on your Holiday Gift List.

Scott Kelby

© Erica Mcdonald - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Erica Mcdonald.

Jim

Erica Mcdonald - The Dark Light of this Nothing

This piece is meant as a tribute to those long term residents who have sustained the Park Slope, Brooklyn, New York neighborhood for generations and are now in an increasing minority.

The old guard is losing their sense of community.

A new, affluent population, drawn by Park Slope's popularity as one of America's best neighborhoods, is swiftly overshadowing the working class.

Erica Mcdonald

© Orson Welles (Citizen Kane) - All Rights Reserved

The 'film look' is a Crock, Shallow depth-of-field is Banal and Rack focus is Lazy. Would all you indie filmmakers please Get Over It..! by Mike Jones

But if we except this premise then we must face up to a distinct problem.

If a single aesthetic choice becomes so dominant and common and ubiquitous across all genre's of filmmaking, regardless of the creative problems posed by individual films, then it ceases to be grounded technique - it becomes stale, meaningless, banal, a default position rather than a creative choice.

Mike Jones

© Andrew McDonald - All Rights Reserved

A Pictorial Guide to avoiding Camera Loss by Andrew McDonald

Have you lost your camera recently?

Mislaid it somewhere in a national park?

Left it in a taxi?

Dropped it in the gorilla pit?

Anyone can be a victim of the thoughtlessness and/or sleepiness that can lead to Camera Loss.

Andrew McDonald

© Rick Scully - All Rights Reserved

One Year - Terrapin Garden Farms

Each clip was then converted to allow me to speed it up or slow it down.

I tried to slow the clips down when something "interesting" was happening, and speed it up to save final play time.

Rick Scully

umop 3pi5dn by h0p3y

People hung upside down by their ankles and photographed

h0p3y

Missing the Point by Colm Tóibín

From an early age, I have missed the point of things.

I noticed this first when the entire class at school seemed to understand that Animal Farm was about something other than animals.

I alone sat there believing otherwise.

I simply couldn't see who or what the book was about if not about farm animals.

Colm Tóibín

© Joseph Rossbach - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Photography's Problem: Representing What We See.

Jim

High Dynamic Range Done Naturally BY Joseph Rossbach

If you want to spark up a heated debate amongst a group of nature photographers these days, all you need to do is mention HDR.

I guarantee you'll hear every opinion under the sun, from those who feel it's the only way to truly capture all the detail in a scene to those who place it right up there with getting a root canal.

The truth of the matter is that HDR photography has been around a lot longer than most of us even realize.

Joseph Rossbach

© Adam Barker - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Cold Weather Photography.

Jim

Go B&W In Winter BY Adam Barker

Winter is a wondrous season for photographers, with its own unique challenges and triumphs.

For many of us, the landscape changes shape and character entirely, covered in a blanket of Mother Nature's finest frozen concoction.

While there are certainly fleeting moments of inspiring color, winter, it seems, is a season well suited to monochrome imagery.

Adam Barker

© Alec Soth - All Rights Reserved

ALEC SOTH – photographer

He also pointed out that most people tend to be stiff when they have their photos taken, but because the equipment he uses makes the process of taking a photo so long, the people become more comfortable and even unaware that they are subjects.

I love keeping that in mind when I look at his work.

Mom Culture

© Photovisi - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Make a Collage: 1 and 2.

Jim

Photovisi - Create a Collage From Your Photos!

© Andrew Ilachinski - All Rights Reserved

Andrew Ilachinski - Blurred Distinctions

The context, and lucky trigger, for my lesson, was my (day-job-related) physical and mental exhaustion that I've accrued over the days and weeks before the Thanksgiving break - which effectively barred me from going outdoors with my camera, as I normally do when on vacation.

I was simply too tired to go on any of my usual photo-safaris.

But not too tired to pick up a camera, of course ;-) I took the normal mix of family photos, and photos of my in-laws' garden plants and flowers.

Andrew Ilachinski

© Jordan Sleeth - All Rights Reserved

Professional Sharpening in Photoshop by Mark Fitzgerald

When I first begin to work with a new photographer, one of the first questions I ask is how she handles sharpening in her workflow.

That's because sharpening is one of the most misunderstood aspects of the postproduction workflow.

When it's done incorrectly, it can have a detrimental effect on the final image.

If someone is making this mistake, I want her to know before moving on to other things.

Mark Fitzgerald

© Bob Johnson - All Rights Reserved

Really Smart Sharpening by Bob Johnson

Current versions of Photoshop feature an improvement over the traditional Unsharp Mask known as Smart Sharpening.

Adobe also now lets you turn regular image layers into Smart Objects.

If you put Smart Objects together with Smart Sharpening and throw in some simple edge masking magic using the Masks Panel, you can get really smart indeed.

Bob Johnson

I like High-pass Filter Sharpening.

Jim

© Al Ward - All Rights Reserved

Creating a Hand-tinted Look in Photoshop by Al Ward

Some images require a bit more to bring out natural tones.

I'm not certain this tinting technique renders what you might call natural tones, however.

This technique is more in the style of methods used years ago to color photographs of their time.

Al Ward

© David DuChemin - All Rights Reserved

Also go to How to Become a Pro.

Jim

Making a Life and Living in Photography: Business and Finance by David DuChemin

Your business will not thrive because you're a photographic genius; there are lots of excellent photographers with failed businesses behind them.

Your business will thrive if you take it seriously as its own thing, subject to its own rules—and those rules include contracts, taxation, pricing, negotiations, and being wise with your money.

David duChemin offers some rules for dealing with the financial side of your photography business.

Peachpit

© Journal Of Contemporary Art - All Rights Reserved

Via Horses Think

Journal of Contemporary Art - Interviews

Since its inception, the JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART has featured conversations with and projects by a diverse international group of emerging and established artists

Journal Of Contemporary Art.

© Brian Ulrich - All Rights Reserved

Brian Ulrich - Ghosts of Shopping Past by Nozlee Samadzadeh

Landscaping overgrows, walls develop mildew, ceilings cave in—a building can be shut down, but that doesn't make it go away.

Brian Ulrich's photographs of closed-down malls and big-box retail stores reveal the potential ghost towns lying inside successful shopping complexes all across America.

Nozlee Samadzadeh

© M I Walker, Wellcome Images - All Rights Reserved

Gallery: The Most Amazing Medical Images of 2009

© SPL / Photo Researchers, Inc. - All Rights Reserved

Gallery: The Year's Most Amazing Scientific Images

© Bernd & Hilla Becher - All Rights Reserved

New Topographics: Photographs of a Man-Altered Landscape

A restaging of the landmark exhibition first seen in 1975 at the International Museum of Photography, George Eastman House.

"New Topographics" signaled the emergence of a new photographic approach to landscape: romanticization gave way to cooler appraisal, focused on the everyday built environment and more attuned to conceptual concerns of the broader art field.

LACMA

© Gina Levay - All Rights Reserved

Gina LeVay - The Life Underground by Lindsey Schneider

© Ian Plant - All Rights Reserved

The Goldilocks Equation: How to Get Things "Just Right" by Ian Plant

People get pretty darn excited when things go their way.

Nothing proves this more than the proliferation of colorful expressions used to describe this phenomenon, such as "hitting the sweet spot," or being "on a roll," "in the zone," "on the ball," "right on the money," or "in the groove."

Finding your way into "the zone" is dependent upon a number of variables that are summed up by what I like to call the Goldilocks Equation, named after the famous fable of yore.

Ian Plant

© Samantha Chrysanthou - All Rights Reserved

Frozen Waters: Capturing the Stark Beauty of Wonderlands in Ice by Samantha Chrysanthou

Tired of the usual summer, iconic mountain scene?

If you are prepared to go out in the winter chill, you can capture spectacular images in nature that are, literally, right at your feet.

Samantha Chrysanthou

© DxO Labs - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Raw v. JPEG.

Jim

With an eye to the future, try raw photos today Stephen Shanklanby Stephen Shankland

My initial regret was from the realization that raw photos, although taking up about three times the storage space as a JPEG and requiring manual processing, offer higher quality and more flexibility.

But what I've come to understand since then is a second advantage of raw: because processing software improves over time, raw photos in effect can get better with age.

Stephen Shankland

© Elizabeth Halford - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Baby Photography Tricks.

Jim

Piece of Cake: Best Practices for Photographing Your Children by Elizabeth Halford

Try these tips to get your creative juices flowing.

Elizabeth Halford

© Sotheby's - All Rights Reserved

The art market explained by James Panero

Warhol's 200 One Dollar Bills goes up in price by tens of millions of dollars.

Two hundred actual one dollars bills, meanwhile, become more and more worthless—just like the excellent art that $200, $2,000 or $20,000 can still purchase.

Take that to the bank.

James Panero

© PA - All Rights Reserved

Of course, student artists chosen for a reality show are not representative of art students.

JimArt? Even Tracey Emin said it was rubbish by Christian Adams

The judges were kinder to some of the other entries - one thought the hanging whistle was "simple, radical, with strong sexual connotations".

There was, however, a wonderful moment when an artist stumbling to explain the merit of some chairs he'd thrown on the floor was told: "This is the biggest load of bull---- I've ever heard."

Christian Adams

© Thomas Holton - All Rights Reserved

Thomas Holton - After 35 Years, Gladys Is Retiring

In 1973, Gladys accepted a job as a math teacher at the Gelinas Junior High School on Long Island.

Growing up in America as part of the "Baby Boomer" generation, Gladys strongly believed in the moral values of The United States and was forever optimistic about her future; a belief held by the majority of Americans in the 1950's.

Thomas Holton

© Platon - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Platon's Portraits of Power (NPR).

Jim

Platon - Portraits of Power

But the anxiety persists.

While political theatre went on inside the General Assembly, Netanyahu kept stopping by Platon's makeshift studio and repeated his request: "Make me look good."

New Yorker

© Michael Kenna - All Rights Reserved

Via gmtPlus9 (-15)

Michael Kenna - Rétrospective

© Wilson "Snowflake" Bentley - All Rights Reserved

Via gmtPlus9 (-15)

Also go to Snowflakes.

Jim

Wilson "Snowflake" Bentley - Vintage Snow Crystals

© William Eggleston in the Real World - All Rights Reserved

Movies about Photography by James Pomerantz

I haven't seen most of these, so feel free to add any reviews to the comments.

James Pomerantz

© John Lau - All Rights Reserved

Also go to Blind Photographers.

Jim

The Vision to Depict It Their Way by Chris Colin

Pete Eckert, who lives in Sacramento, planned to study architecture as a young man but gave up when his retinitis pigmentosa was diagnosed and he began losing his eyesight.

In time he found he could train his optic cortex to make images from his other senses.

Now totally blind at 53, he is particularly attuned to sound and the ways it bounces off or is absorbed by objects. He can see a stop sign in his mind, he said, from traffic sounds wrapping around it, like water flowing around a stone.

Chris Colin