diptych # 199 / civilized ku # 3028 ~ it's beginning to look a NOT like Xmas

Au Sable River / tree ~ near Clintonville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
Supercuts Santa ~ Plattsburgh, NY • click to embiggen

As one Xmas song goes, "Oh the weather outside is frightful ... Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!"

Well, the weather outside is frightful. That is, unless you like 65˚F-with-rain-showers weather on Xmas Eve day. Personally, I don't, so, for me, the weather outside is indeed frightful. And, there is no let-it-snow in the forecast.

However, if that weather situation puts one into a funk, one can always take delight and get into the Holiday Spirit by watching and listening to a life-size mechanically gyrating Santa screech out Xmas Carols - - through crappy sounding speakers - at a local shopping plaza.

In any event, Happy Holidays to all and to all a good night.

ku # 1369 / civilized ku # 3021 ~ Trees submissions and news

Alternative Cameras exhibition catalog spread ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 1 ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 2 ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 3 ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 4 ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 5 ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 6 ~ • click to embiggen
In Celebration of Trees # 7 ~ • click to embiggen
Photo Noir # 1 ~ • click to embiggen

For every exhibition the PhotoPlace Gallery publishes a POD exhibition catalog. This morning I received a link to a proof of the Alternative Cameras: Pinhole to Plastic catalog* for review of my info and I was pleasantly surprised to see my accepted entry on the intro spread - and on a regular catalog page as well - of the catalog. Nice.

In any event, yesterday, was the submission deadline for the In Celebration of Trees exhibition. My submissions are displayed in this entry. And, as you can see, they are all B&W pictures. While I had many color pictures of trees which would have been very suitable submissions, I found that some were very well suited to B&W conversion as I mentioned in a previous entry. So, B&W it is.

While submitting my ICoT pictures, I came across a call for entries for the next exhibition, Photo Noir. I immediately thought that I had a few pictures which might be suitable for that exhibition so I went into my picture library and, lo and behold, I had 42 pictures that most certainly qualify as photo noir.

Once again, I have "discovered" a hidden body of work within the 6,800+ finished / finals pictures in my photo library. Makes me wonder what I will "discover" next.

*I believe anyone can access the proof here. FYI, there are currently 79 exhibition catalogs which can be viewed in their entirety. Just click on the View More link at the bottom right of the Author's Bookstore (which is just below the catalog preview.

diptych # 187-89 (trees) / kitchen sink # 31 ~ some thoughts on B&W

kitchen sink / dirty water ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
birch ~ somewhere in Connecticut / near Swastika, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
birch ~ Battery Park - Manhattan, NYC / Au Sable River near Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
trees ~ Lake Champlain shoreline/ Peru, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

As I have been making tree diptychs, which, BTW, are NOT my intended end product, it occurred to me after snooping around on the interweb that, when a tree is the primary visual referent in a picture, a B&W conversion is an interesting option.

I come to that conclusion because the overwhelming majority of trees, trunk wise, have no real color and what color they do have is primarily monochromatic. In addition, tree trunks usually exhibit a high degree of texture. Consequently, the combination of the monochromatic and textural characteristics of tree trunks is a fine referent for a B&W approach to picturing them. But, here's the caveat ....

.... not any old conversion from color to B&W will do.

Inasmuch as I have had a fair amount of experience, back in the good ol' days of B&W film, with using Wratten filters - green red, yellow, blue - to accentuate / de-accentuate the B&W tonal values of colors found in a scene, I am having a fair amount of success using the Image > Adjustments > Black and White color specific sliders tool in Photoshop. And Holy Digital Darkroom, Batman, the color based sliders are essentially infinitely adjustable Wratten filters.

And like so many advantages found in the digital darkroom, I can create a number of different conversion picture files using different color sliders and then blend the results into one final conversion file. That allows me to adjust the tonal values of multiple colors, something that was not possible in the analog film / wet darkroom days.

The net result of this type of B&W conversion can far exceed anything that was possible in the the good ol' days. I suspect Sir Ansel might have thought he had died and gone to heaven - he's most certainly dead but I have no idea were he might be other than in a box in the cold, cold ground - with the amount of control (Zone System on steroids) that he could have had in the B&W digital darkroom.

diptych # 186 ~ congratulations to my inner photographic child

juror's selection / "Alternative Cameras" exhibition • click to embiggen

The wait is over and the results are in (from last evening's mail):

Congratulations!

Thank you for submitting your work for PhotoPlace Gallery’s juried "Alternative Cameras" exhibition. Juror Susan Burnstine has chosen 35 photographs for the gallery exhibition, and an additional 40 photographs for display in the Online Gallery on the PhotoPlace Gallery website. It’s a wonderful collection of fine work.

We are very pleased to tell you that your work was selected for display in the Online Gallery.

Juror’s Statement:

Often perfection is a direct result of embracing imperfection. The term “happy accident” has become synonymous with wildly flawed alternative approaches including toy, pinhole and homemade photography, as they frequently rely on elements of chance and luck. But there have been some who have tamed these unpredictable, faulty beasts to yield purely poetic results by letting go of technical control and connecting with their inner photographic child. .

It was great joy to spend time with these wonderfully imperfect images and I applaud everyone who submitted. Having to narrow down a selection for the physical and online exhibits was an immense but gratifying task. In the end, the selected images seamlessly merged consistent aptitude with an element of unpredictable chance, thus creating lyrical results. I congratulate all the selected artists and sincerely thank everyone who submitted such fantastically flawed work. ~ Susan Burnstine

The juror's selections can be viewed HERE

an aside: I must admit that, after viewing the juried selections for the Alternative Cameras: Plastic to Pinhole exhibition, I feel a bit like a stranger in a strange land. Sort of like, what the hell am I doing here in this company of picture making strangers? Because, other than my long-past picture making affair with "flawed alternative approaches" and "letting go of technical control and connecting with [my] inner photographic child" - my decades long use of my SX-70 cameras and film - I have had only a passing interest in making "fantastically flawed work".

As mentioned previously, I have played around with a smattering of pinhole picture making but only as a matter of having a little picture making "fun" with no long term commitment to the process. Nevertheless. I have had, and still do, a continuing interest in viewing "crappy camera" pictures as they fall into my field of vision - meaning that I don't seek them out but instead encounter them on the basis of chance.

All of that written, I have yet to come to grips with my attraction to such pictures other than to note that I like the way "crappy" pictures look. As the exhibition juror wrote, the pictures are visually "poetic", "lyrical" and "dream-like", visual qualities which, in fact (contrary to my chosen genre of picture making - "straight" picture making), do prick my eye and sensibilities.

Perhaps, in an effort to come to grips with the genre, I have to think of alternative camera pictures not as photographs but, rather, as images made with the photographic process. Images which indeed create a "idiosyncratic and deeply personal visual landscape" but which stands in direct contrast to the medium's intrinsic and inseparable relationship to and as a cohort of the real.

I don't think it's a stretch to write that I need that bit of a dancing-on-the-head-of-a-pin rationalization - i.e. images, not photographs - to comes to terms with my like of the "crappy" pictures made with "crappy" cameras. That way I won't feel like I have betrayed and abandoned my long held picture making beliefs and M.O.

civilized ku # 3006 / diptych # 184 ~ more trees

bathroom cabinet ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
trees ~ Manhattan, NY / Mt. Jo - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

I am working out my trees editing by creating diptychs which place a picture of urban tree with a picture of a natural environment tree. Comments are always appreciated.

diptych # 182 ~ trees, trees and more trees

trees ~ Old Montreal in Quebec, Canada / Arezzo Region in Tuscany, Italy • click to embiggen
the mother lode / trees screen grab ~ • click to embiggen

Had an overnight stay in Lake Placid. Leaving LP shortly to get to Plattsburgh for a doctor appointment (scheduled checkup) so by necessity this entry is short and sweet.

pinhole submissions ~ the waiting begins

trees ~ Peru / Lake Champlain • Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
4 pinhole pictures for submission • click to embiggen

To pinhole or not to pinhole, that is the question. Now that pictures for exhibit consideration are submitted, I have yet to decide whether the pursuit of the making of more pinhole pictures is in my future. I have most certainly enjoyed making these pictures and I like the results. And, it would seem, that I have arrived at a certain understanding - but as of yet not comprehensive, of what the pinhole genre is about.

First and foremost, I am, without a doubt, drawn to the look of a pinhole picture, especially pinhole pictures made in color. I can imagine many of my recent pinhole pictures printed large and mounted on the walls of my house. Based on just the visual qualities and characteristics of the thing itself (the print), they most assuredly prick my eye.

Moving beyond the mere prick of the eye, I can also write that there is a corresponding prick of my sensibilities. That is to write, intellectual and emotional sensibilities (feeling and thoughts) beyond - but obviously related to - the visual characteristics a pinhole picture.

As best as I can describe it, feelings and thoughts wise, is that the soft / ethereal visual presentation of a pinhole picture, while adequate enough to create a reasonable representation of the realness of the picture's referent, denies the viewer a quick, easy and obvious "read" of the picture's meaning. Viewing a pinhole picture is, at least to my eye and sensibilities, much like trying to interpret / understand a dream.

That is to write that there is an actuality in the picture but it resides somewhere below / behind a murky fog created by the mix of conscious and subconscious thought which leaves me wondering and pondering as I try to grasp the reality of the situation.

Is all of this / my notion of the pinhole genre (for me) an overthinking rationalization - dancing on the head of a pin(hole), so to write - which gives me reason to make more pinhole pictures? A rationalization that allows me to make pictures which stand in defiance of my long standing belief in the power of straight photography?

fyi, you may have noticed that the pinhole pictures for submission are not square (as they were first presented here on The Landscapist). They are µ4/3 full-frame pictures. The reason for that is that I have come to the realization that much of the look and feel of a pinhole picture derives from the weird color and vignetting which resides outside of the center of the picture.

ku # 1365 / pinhole #9 (A) ~ the final stretch

red berries ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
red berries - reworked ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

As I move into the home stretch - the deadline for submissions is this coming Monday - of my pinhole picture making activities (for exhibition submission purposes), I am left wondering whether or not I will continue making pinhole pictures on a regular basis.

On the one hand, it's a somewhat enjoyable process and I like the visual results. On the other hand, it flies in the face of my preferred picture making M.O. of straight photography - it's straight but with a twist. And, I can help wondering if would be a distraction from my regular picture making activities.

So, who knows. The only thing I know is that, in the immediate future, I will continue making pinhole pictures until I have enough good pictures to make a 20 pinhole picture POD book. Maybe that activity will get it out of my system, picture making wise. Or not.

Update on Friday, November 6, 2015 at 03:03PM by gravitas et nugalis

Featured Comment: John Linn wrote (in part): "... And although technically speaking the pictures are "straight but with a twist" it raises the question, when does "straight" become "manipulated"? Does "manipulated" only happen in the computer or post processing?

my response: iMo, and for my straight picture making dictum, manipulation can happen at any point in the picture making process, as the picture is being made or as the resultant image is processed (or both). However, what I mean by "manipulation" is any activity performed during any part of the picture making process which is for the purpose of manipulating the reality / realness of what was in front of the lens (or in this case, the hole).

In the case of "straight" pinhole picture making, the manipulation happens as a native component of the process itself. That written, pinhole photography is by nature of its visual characteristics, a "manipulative" genre and aesthetic and therefore outside of the realm of straight photography albeit in its own version of "straight".

Re: the juried exhibit to which I am submitting pinhole images for consideration, even though it would be simple enough with the use of a host of filters / apps to attain the look of a pinhole picture, one made with a plastic lens / lens baby, et al in post picture making processing, the exhibit gallery director is interested in only the look of results attained by "straight" manipulative-process cameras, lens, etc.