ku # 455 ~ 0 - 255

Cold,snowy and grey • click on photo to embiggen itOne thing that I have always disliked about Ansel Adams' photographs is that, no matter the weather or conditions, every day was a full-range day, tonally-speaking. There was very little visual difference between, say, a photograph created in the full light of day and one created in the indirect light found in a shaded canyon. He had 10 steps in his Zone System and, by god, he was going to use each and every one of them.

Now, there is no denying the radiant beauty of Adams' prints. They just seem to glow. But, that said, the reason that many of us feel a little "grey" on a grey day is because ... well ... because it's a grey day. On grey day, things are not all bright (literally and figuratively) and cheery. In fact, most things are rather leaden and cheerless visually-speaking.

That being the case, why is it that so much landscape photography, no matter the weather or conditions, is so bright and cheery?

Very few landscapists seem to venture out in less than ideal conditions. When some do, the photographic results almost always, in the digital age, exhibit maximum 0-255 range snap and punch - for those of you not digital darkroom conversant, that means a print with a tonal range from black with no detail to white with no detail (in a perfect Adams' world, the detail-less whites would be limited to small areas [specular highlights] of the print and the detail-less blacks would also be limited to equally small areas).

IMO, photographers who always print to the full-range, 0-255 standard are not making photographs which are true to the spirit of fact. Instead, they are making photographs which are true to the spirit of Adams, which, in my book, is a whole other thing.

publisher's comment: a good case in point

Joel Truckenbrod asked, "Do you have have some examples of other photographers who follow this train of thought?" - Joel, which train of thought - always using the full range, or not using the full-range?

FYI - a notion about landscape

I am appalled. embarrassed and somewhat depressed by the refusal of the government of the US of A to stand in support of organizations which call for swift and decisive actions on man-made global warming activities. The fact that our fearless leader has finally accepted the scientific research that points to the hand of man in global warming (with 90% certainty), yet still refuses to even consider any mandatory restraints/constraints on a a free-wheeling American lifestyle which results in a greater than 25% contribution to gobal warming effects, is mind boggling in the extreme.

Although, to expect anything more from a free-market extremist, who believes that the "invisible hand" of the marketplace is the fix for everything, is rather delusional in the extreme. Not even Adam Smith believed that - while much attention is paid to his The Wealth of Nations, very little is ever mentioned about his earlier work, A Theory of Moral Sentiments, a work on ethics and human nature which provides the ethical, philosophical, psychological and methodological underpinnings to his later works, including The Wealth of Nations.

IMO, the administration's refusal to declare war on global warming, which just might be the ultimate "weapon of mass destruction", makes it and the majority of the American public (who "vote" on this subject with their foot firmly planted on the "gas") global terrorists of the first order.

Where's the "shock and awe" campaign, when we really need it?

Featured Comment: Trevor Hambric wrote: "There is absolutely room for debate about man's influence on climate change--not in the eyes of people who've made this issue a blind religion, but in the eyes of people who care about truth. The earth has a long history of climate change. Mars, itself, is hotter than it was (are we to blame for that, too?).

To behave as if the world was given to us in some devine eternal stasis (never daring to inconvenience us with things like climate change) is an act of spectactular hubris.

We don't know to what degree man is influencing climate change because people (yes, even scientists) are driven by their 'religious' zealotry, rather than any quest for truth."

Jaap Bijsterbosch ~ respect & curiosity

Dutch forest #4 • click on photo to embiggen it
Dutch forest #3 • click on phot to embiggen it
Dutch forest #2 • click on photo to embiggen it
Dutch forest #1 • click on photo to embiggen itJaap Bijsterbosch writes - "I am a Dutch photographer, with landscape as one of my favourite subjects ... I live in a suburb of Amsterdam in one of the most densely populated parts of the world. Also one of the richest parts, so that means a lot of cars, pollution, traffic jams etc. We also have something we call woods. It's not really natural but more or less cultural. Often woods were designed for hunting grounds for the rich, or as a wood production area for for the paper factories ... Still, walking in our woods I sense a lot of magic, the mysterious power of nature.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but sometimes it looks to me that taking photographs for you is almost a sacred thing. I as a photographer feel related to this idea. Respect and at the same time feeling a connection with the subject that one's photographing is an essential condition for a good picture. Photography is not about entertainment but about getting to know the world better and expressing respect for the subject.

There's one aspect about my photography which I did not mention in my earlier mail to you. It's curiosity which often drives me. Curiosity about the world, and how the world looks photographed (I know I'm quoting Winogrand now). And having a camera device around one's neck is a perfect alibi to get involved into situations and places, where without a camera I wouldn't dream to come. And often passion for a subject or a theme arises, and I know I am at the right place. If that passion doesn't come up, I know I'm wrong.

publisher's comment: See more of Jaap's photography. The blog is in Dutch - use babelfish or another web-based translator.

FYI - thank you, Frank

In a recent comment on urban ku # 22, Frank Winters wrote; "Mark's photos sometimes look to me as if no camera was used -- they look to me like snatches of the world ripped out of a viewers mind. Like prints from a dream of the woods or a lake or whatever. This one has that look."

Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki wrote: "If one really wishes to be master of an art, technical knowledge of it is not enough. One has to transcend technique so that the art becomes an artless art growing out of the unconscious."

Although I never knew it by that name, I have been a devotee of artless art for quite a while. In the medium of photography, Walker Evans is considered a, if not the first, master of artless art. I would have to say that, when viewing his photographs, they "look to me as if no camera was used -- they look to me like snatches of the world ripped out of a viewers mind."

Thanks, Frank. I take your comment as high praise indeed.

Featured Comment: Frank Winters wrote (in part); "...I think the key is to separate technical study from practice. When making images forget that you are at a given stage of imperfection technically -- just make images without thinking too hard....Is that what you do?"

publisher's response: Frank, I don't use the "auto" setting on my camera(s), but anything I do, techincal-wise, is all rather "automatic" to me (I keep my "kit" simple in the extreme). That may be easy for me, with 30+ years of very demanding commercial photography experience under my ever-expanding belt, to say....but...when it comes to photographing, I really don't understand at all the phrase, "a given stage of imperfection technically". No sir, I don't get it, no sir, not at all.

What does that mean? I mean, ya got yer aperture, ya got yer shutter speed, ya got yer ISO, and ya got yer focus. How fricking confusing is that? Now, if you want to talk about "processing" photographs in the digital darkroom (or analog for that matter), there is a bit more room to move under the "imperfection technically" banner. But even there, while I am definitely well into the Photoshop power-user/pinball-wizard category (again because of 15+ years of very demanding pre-press type Photoshop experience), in my personal photography I use the same small set of PS tecniques over and over and over and over and over and over.....

I mention all of this, not to boast about my absolutely awesome and incredible technical prowess and expertise, but rather to let those of you out there who are struggling with "a given stage of imperfection technically" to forget about it. As the great American artist and teacher, Robert Henri, wrote; "The greatness of art depends absolutely on the greatness of the artist's individuality and on the same source depends the power to acquire a technique sufficient to express it."

Translation = if you follow your individual passion to discover what you want to say, that same passion will also help you develop just enough (you don't need any more than that) technique to express it.

urban ku # 23

Behind the stores on Main St., Au Sable Forks, NY • click on photo to embiggen Recently, I've been encountering quite a few half-lit trees. Figured that I better start photographing them.

I have also been feeling the urge to revisit still-life photography, a genre in which I toiled (commercial and editorial) for decades but never really explored Art-wise. I have no idea where this will lead, It's just another redux itch I need to scratch. Keep you posted.

Like father, like son, like grandson

Hugo and a krappy kamera • click on photo to embiggen it It runs in the family. Hugo even has his own flickr space where he displays (with dad's help) his photography.

Although I didn't realize it until after his death, my paternal grandfather was an avid amateur photographer. I don't think he had any "art" pretentions, he just liked to photograph family. However, he did proccess and print all his own photographs, including color (slides and prints) - which was no small feat in the forties and fifties. I have the bug. Both of my sons are in the early stages of serious captivation. And now there's Hugo.

He started showing a serious interest in pictures at about 18 months of age. The interest was aided and abetted by the digital domain - take a picture of Hugo, or anything, and he immediately wants to see the LCD. Interestingly, when he first started messing around with cameras at about the same age, he thought the LCD screen or viewfinder was like a tv/computer monitor screen. He would look through a viewfinder and keep his head stationary, waiting for his subject to I wander into view. If he wanted to photograph me, I had to walk into his field of view.

He's beyond that now (at 29 months). There's no doubt in my mind, that Hugo's displaying a peternatural disposition for things visual (I saw the same thing in his dad), so I gave him his own 6mp camera for Xmas (the wife simply said, "you're nuts"). But his young life is saturated with imagery - my photographs, his dad's (aaron posts here) photographs, television, the computer/internet world (he loves to sit at the computer and watch movie trailers)...

I wonder what effect that phenomena will have on Hugo and future generations of photographers.

Featured Comment: Mary Dennis wrote (in part): "...I too wonder about how today's fast-paced, blurred-reality-lines, image bombarded, you- toobed, whirld we live will effect future generations of photographers. Will it all be video pleasure with the PRINT (paper) becoming a quaint thing of the past?...And will these future generations, with their re-wired, morphed brain circuitries, have the patience and ability to concentrate enough to sit down and look at photographs in a book?"

I know what I like, and, art is in the eye of the beholder, right?

similar, but very different • click on photo to embiggen it Yesterday evening, while I was sitting on the throne (in the room pictured here), I had an epiphany of sorts.

The epiphanalyptic experience was triggered by the leis-like thing (seen in the right-hand photograph) that was then hanging on the powder room door knob. What struck me was how visually disturbing I found it to be in the total visual context of the monochromatic scheme of the room. Not at all like the visually soothing sensations I get from my more permanent "installation art" broom arrangement(left-hand photograph).

I am completely serious about this - in the context of the room, I find the leis visually, hence emotionally, disturbing and the broom visually, hence emotionally, soothing. Not run-out-and-jump-off-a-cliff disturbing, nor, all-is-well-with-the-world soothing, but strong visual/emotional triggers, on a "gut" level, nevertheless.

Now, there's nothing particulary revelatory about that - as an example, we all know that we like or dislike particular colors. Not, like-or-dislike, as the result of careful thought or deliberation, but seemingly because they do or don't strike our fancy. However, both science and art have discovered that individual colors have distinctly different visual/emotional characteristics. Some colors emerge, some receed. Some incite passion, some coolness. And so on.

But my experience in the can was not just about color, rather, it was about the total visual experience of the room - a feng shui kind of thing. I knew that I "disliked" the leis hanging there, but I almost immediately wondered, why?. I don't "dislike" the leis any more as an object than I "like" the broom as an object. Why is it that every time I have encountered that leis in the powder room (it's been there for about month), do I feel like something ain't right?

Well, the epiphany part of the experience struck me in a flash - DNA, genetics, the preternatural ... call it what you will ... it's just a part of me, deep inside my bones. If I wanted to spend lots and lots of my health-care dollars, I could see a shrink and maybe figure it out. But a shrink might not really be interested in this regarding its implications for my photography and my appreciation/ understanding of Art in general, i.e., what I like, what i don't like.

That's what I really want to know/understand.

As I have mentioned before, I don't "compose" my photography with any conscious sense of the rules of composition. When confronted with a scene/subject, certain "arrangements" just seem to "jump" out and capture my eye. Most often, these "arrangements" are relatively complex in nature - I seem preternaturally drawn to the complex. Instinctively. Intuitively, and, Inexplicably.

Yet, for myself and others, my sense of composition works. However, if I were told that I could make millions by putting my compositional techinque in a can (not in the can), I'd be a poor man for the rest of my life.

One thing I do know for sure, though, is the fact that my predalitiction for the complex came fully formed along with my delivery. From a very early age, I was drawn to Shel Silverstein's illustrations - lots and lots of detail. I started my life as an artist (5 or 6 years old) trying to draw like him. Instinctively. Intuitively, and, Inexplicably.

But, nevertheless, I am also certain that that's why I create lots of photographs like this. Maybe it's not important to know "why". Maybe it's important just to "do it".

Pay attention, class

Yesterday was a banner day on The Landscapist stat-wise - record page views and return visitors, near record total visitors. Very nice....

....but, there were only 2 urban ku # 22 test papers handed in and one of those was from a smart-ass (the wife, although she did have a point of sorts).

Are you still pondering? Have you given up? You do understand that I'm just kidding about the "test", "grade", "teacher", and "class" things, right? I'm sincerely looking for feedback on what you think it means.