man & nature # 29 ~ punctum

The Au Sable River, Keesville • click
to embiggenRecently, I been receiving a fair number of emails from Landscapist visitors. As time allows, I am trying to respond to each and every one. If you have send me an email and I have yet to respond, hang in there - a response will be forthcoming.

One email from a regular visitor and occasional commentor, Don / Scoop, caught my attention in a big way. Don wrote:

I have started another photo blog about my time in Vietnam. I have many, many pictures and slides to sort through. I know you are very busy but if you could take a look at my blog and let me know what you think it would be really appreciated.

I have taken a look at Don's blog. In fact, more than once. It is still in a fledgling stage - Don has only posted a very small number of what is apparently a rather substantial number of pictures he has from his days in Vietnam (March 1969-February 1970). Nevertheless, the pictures that are posted have struck me in a very powerful way.

Unlike Don who enlisted in the Marines, I was drafted (1966) into the Army during the Vietnam War. Unlike Don, I was not a combat infantryman. And, unlike Don, I did not spend any appreciable time in Vietnam. My time in Vietnam can be measured hours, not days, months or years.

Like Don, I also always carried a camera with me. Unlike Don, who carried his camera while he was doing his duty as a machinegunner, I carried mine while doing my duty as a photographer.

All of that said, Don's picture are amongst the most powerful I have ever encountered. For me, they contain a punctum - that accident which pricks, bruises me." It is the unintentional detail that could not not be taken, and that "fills the whole picture." - that reaches to the very core of my being.

The unintentional detail that pricks and bruises me in Don's pictures is the palpable sensation I have in the pit of stomach of raw anxiety and fear coupled with a nearly overwhelming feeling of there but for the grace of god ....

It's the exact same sensations and feeling that I experienced - very unexpectedly - upon seeing for the first time the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, DC - all those names, all those dead people, most of whom died horrible deaths coupled with the realization that my name could easily have been on that wall. I was emotionally overwhelmed. I was stunned. And I was struck by the notion of what could have been.

Don's pictures trigger the same reaction, but in different manner. They put faces and places on the names. I can't help but wonder which faces made it out alive and which ones had but a short time to live. Which ones would never see their family and loved ones again. Thoughts of children who would never get to know their fathers. And of Vietnamese children who would also die horrible deaths.

Although I did not face a bullet fired at me in combat, I still have a very vivid sense of "surviving" that war. I think there is more than little sense of "survivor's guilt" at play. Hell, while many of my generation were slogging through that war, some dying, others physically and emotionally maimed and crippled, some surviving, I was was mucking around in Japan, living with my (now ex)wife in a comfy little Japanese-style apartment doing my duty with a camera concerned with f/stops, shutter speeds, and focus.

So, Don - I love the blog and your photographs. They are a very powerful testament to what was and, for me, what could have been. I will follow the blog with intense interest and if you need help scanning please let me know.

Your pictures are a true and powerful embodiment of Diane Arbus' statement:

I really believe there are things nobody would see if I didn't photograph them.

Keep posting and showing us things that most have never seen.

You can see Don's blog HERE.

Shore Light ~ Book Two

Re: Book One, Kent Wiley commented that "I don't get the overall picture/concept of Shore Light. Does this make me a "zombie?" ... I think you've got a lot more going on than simply Shore Light. But that title confuses me."

OK. Perhaps a bit more information might be of help, like, say, the full title - Shore Light ~ Impressions of the Jersey Shore. And, let's add to that my intro / artist statement:

The barrier island of Stone Harbor/Avalon, New Jersey is a microcosm of the world at large. Within the confines of a tiny ecosystem, the forces of nature and those of humankind compete for space to live and, as the pageant unfolds, the place itself is bathed in a light that only a seaside environment can know.

That light sculpts and shapes our very impressions of the confrontation that is at hand. It is seductive and alluring, making both the natural world and the most banal and destructive of humankind’s effort seem alive with promise and beauty.

While I do not pretend to be a neutral observer in the confrontation between humankind and the environment, I present these impressions of the Jersey Shore in and around the neighborhood of Stone Harbor, NJ as a record of what was during the Summers of 2006-2008.

I want the viewers of my photographs to feel as though they were standing in my shoes, seeing what I saw. Not as dispassionate uninvolved gawkers, but rather as an observer / participant with something to lose or to gain. Something that lingers beneath the merely visible but to which the visible is a clue.

It should be noted that both the title and the intro are tentative at this point as is the fact that there are a total of 80+ pictures in the work which are divided into 2 books. I like the idea of 2 books but unlike the 2 seen here, I will most likely divide the pictures equally between the 2 books.

Why 2 books? that's simply because Shutterfly's page limit is 100 pages. The manner in which I have chosen to present the picture, 1 per spread, means that I can not fit them all into 1 book. My initial intent is to offer the 2 books as a signed and numbered limited edition of 25 sets.

And, since I will most likely continue to picture the Jersey Shore - I would really like to visit / picture in the fall, Book Three (or more) is a possibility.

Click here to view this photo book.

Shore Light ~ Book One

This is a test - While finishing up my Shore Light ~ Book One and Book Two POD books on Shutterfly, I noticed the ability to post this on my blog. It's little slow (if you use the "Play" button) and a little small in the window here but, if you click on "view this photo book", it will take you to Shutterfly where the book is bigger and faster.

FYI, the "Play" button starts an auto slide show. Using the forward / back buttons gives you control of page turning. Using the scroll bar / button lets you go through the spread thumbs to any point in the book.

FYI #2, I have added 20 more pictures - "re-processed" pictures from 2006-07 - to the Shore Light website. By nature of the alphabetical ordering (by picture title) of the gallery, the new pictures are sprinkled throughout the gallery. IMO, they blend seamlessly with this year's pictures.

As always, I would appreciate knowing your thoughts.

Click here to view this photo book.

man & nature # 28a - bigger is better

Lake Champlain moon • click to embiggenOK, I realized after viewing today's earlier entry that I was describing details in one the moon pictures that are probably too small to see easily. Here is that picture in a bigger size.

FYI, Lake Champlain - the lake is actually part of the Adirondack Park. It's a big lake - about 110 miles long. As the crow flies, it's about 15 miles due East of my house. The entire Eastern border of the Adirondack Park is the shore of Lake Champlain, often referred to as the Adirondack Coast.

The lake played an important role in the American Revolutionary War. If I had turned my camera just a tiny bit to the left, Valcour Island would enter the view. The waters around Valcour Island were the site of what is generally regarded as the first naval battle fought by the United States Navy. Under the command of Benedict Arnold, the Americans got their butts kicked (and sunk) but he had enough success that the British attempt to divide the colonies in half was delayed by a year. The later attempt failed miserably with American victory at Saratoga. The battle of Saratoga was the turning point of the Revolution.

In the first of the 2 separate battles that were The Battle of Saratoga, it was Arnold (dispatched to the scene by General Washington when he learned of an impending battle) and the men in his command that handed the British a decisive setback. For his efforts, Arnold was relieved of command and sent packing before the second battle by General Gates, who shared a bitter mutual resentment with Arnold. Gates' report of the battle never mentioned Arnold or his part in it. In fact, it was Arnold who directed the battle and personally lead several charges into the British position while Gates sat in his tent.

Hmmm .... I wonder why he defected.

BTW, the eventual turncoat, Benedict Arnold, is celebrated as a hero in these parts. Before his switch of allegiance to the British side, history considers him to have been the best general and most accomplished leader in the Continental Army. His many battle successes up and down the Adirondack Coast - at Valcour Island, Fort Ticonderoga, Saratoga, to name a few - are considered to be vitally critical to the winning of the war. He was such a pain in the ass to the British that it's amazing that they were willing to not only take him in but make him a Brigadier General, give him a very generous annual pension, and a huge "signing bonus" for switching sides.

man & nature # 28 ~ pictures in my head

Road, field and mist • click
to embiggenYesterday, at my normal time of around 3-3:30PM, I left the house for a round of golf. Arriving at the course - not my regular / home course - I was informed that it was closed for an outing event but, if I returned an hour later, I would have the entire course to myself.

So, uncharacteristically, I found myself teeing off a little after 5PM and finishing up around 8:10PM. In turned out that I did not have the course to myself - in truth there were no other people and most likely because of that fact, I was accompanied throughout the round by quite a number of deer (several mothers with fawns), one fox, hawks, terns, heron, and, how could I forget, about 10,000 mosquitoes.

As I have mentioned, we've had lots of rain this Summer so the mosquitoes are thriving in places that don't normally have standing water. My only problem last evening was that I could picture (in my head) my green bottle of bug repellent sitting on the counter in our back porch. But, it wasn't the only thing I could picture in my head.

After the round, less than a mile from the course, I could also picture my tripod leaning again the disconnected radiator (at about a 10 degree angle) in the upstairs hallway, just outside my bedroom door. Under the circumstances, the vision was particularly vivid and strangely alluring.

Now, that tripod must have felt out of place because its normal residence is on the back seat or floor of my car where, quite honestly, it languishes unused for weeks at a time. In camera IS and a relatively steady hand have not exactly rendered it superfluous but it's not the steady workhorse it used to be. It still comes in very handy from time to time - times like last evening to name just one.

Using the IS and f2.8, I did manage to get by with 1/8-1/15s SS for 3 of the 4 pictures you see here. August moon • click to embiggenBut a very short time and distance later, on Lake Champlain (the largest lake in the US of A that's not a Great Lake), the camera was asking for 1/2-1s SS. It was at that time that another picture appeared in my head. Under a clump of stuff on my back seat - a pair of long pants, a rain/wind golf parka, canoe paddles, 1 life vest, and extra golf caps - I saw (in my head) my seldom-used monopod.

Lo and behold, it was actually there. So, keeping it short and bracing it with my foot against a roadside guardrail, I managed to get the picture.

FYI, the mountains seen across Lake Chaplain are Vermont's Green Mountains. The big one on the left is Camels Hump. The lights on the Vermont side towards the center of the picture are from Burlington. I always refer to this as Vermont's best side - the one you can see from NY.

man & nature # 27 ~ superior idiots

Port Kent Amtrak "station"
• click to embiggenSometime last week there was "without doubt the most exciting digital photography announcement this year" - Phil Askey, DPReview.com.

The announcement was compliments of Olympus and Panasonic, co-conspirators in the development of the 4/3rds standard /format (along with Leica) of which I am an avid user. I bought into the Olympus 4/3rds format because it is an open standard - all lenses made any manufacturer are completely compatible with any other manufacturer's camera bodies. With the top 2 makers of optics - Olympus and Leica - involved in the standard, it was a no-brainer for me to get on board.

There was also the promise of tidy compact cameras with the 4/3rds standard and my first Olys - a E-500 and then an E-510 - were indeed rather tidy and compact. But after using them for a while, I came to long for something with a bit more substance and heft. They just seemed too compact and far too light in weight. This was especially true when fitted with something like my Zuiko 50-250mm f2.8/3.5 lens - it was like the tail was wagging the dog.

So, I eventually became the owner of the Oly flagship, an E-3, which seems to have careened to the opposite end of the spectrum, tidy/heft-wise. It truly is a flagship, with extreme emphasis on the word "ship". It's BIG and hernia-inducing hefty, especially with the battery grip attached. And tidy it's not - I've saw fewer buttons on all the tux adorned men at last weekend's wedding than there are on an E-3 body.

That said, after using the E-3 (and my Pentax K20D) for a while, I find myself longing for something with a lot less substance and heft. That's where the "most exciting digital photography announcement this year" comes into play. Oly/Panasonic are developing mirror-less compact camera bodies with full size 4/3rds sensors. The mirror-less part allows for the making of a small body and small lenses that should produce a 35mm rangefinder-like digital camera with dslr image quality. Exactly the kind of camera I would like to have had at this past weekend's wedding.

That said, this announcement has been greeted by the techno crowd with cries of "inferior image quality" - based on the "inferior image quality" of the 4/3rds sensor. IMO, these morons need to get a life. Or, more accurately, they need to get a life that has at least a small hint of what constitutes true image quality.

Now, I am not here to defend the 4/3rds standard because there is simply nothing to defend. It's particular image quality is just that - one of many flavors of image quality in the digital picture making domain. It is neither "inferior" nor "superior". It just is what it is.

Here is how I have come to look at the differences in techno image quality (IQ). There are, in fact, lots of differences in the results obtained from various sensors - most notably differences in resolution, noise, and dynamic range. In most cases these differences are a matter of relatively subtle degree, especially so when viewing a print from a "normal" viewing distance. Those who judge such matters at pixel level - 100% view on a monitor - are involved in something other than and very different from looking at photographs.

Looking at photographs is an emotional and intellectual experience - not a technical exercise - especially so if one wishes to see the real image quality - what a picture says. When will these equipnojerks understand that all their fetishistic caterwauling is nothing but an onerous distraction that gets in the way of seeing a photograph's true image quality?

To be clear, I am NOT saying that matters of resolution, noise, or dynamic range have no bearing upon the meaning / message that a photograph conveys. If your heart's desire is to capture every little detail and tonal/color nuance of, as an example, the forest floor and seeing every little detail and tonal/color nuance in the print thereof is important to what you have to say, then, by all means, save (as in "horde") your money and buy a Hassey with a 50mp back.

On the other hand, if you are more about capturing and conveying impressions about what it means to be human, you might be better served by saving (as in "conserving") your money and buying an Oly 420 or, for that matter, a Canon G9. Because, guess what? They are both perfect instruments for the task at hand.

man & nature # 26 ~ the 5 minute wait

Storm over Macs • click to embiggen"The National Weather Service has issued a severe weather warning".

Without exaggeration, I have heard this warning broadcast on radio and television 3 or 4 times a day, on average 3-4 days a week for the last 2 months. Yesterday's newspaper indicated that I am most likely going to keep it seeing / hearing it for another 2 months.

Sandwiched in amongst these weird weather days are some gloriously mild and sunny Summer days that are a pure joy. I don't really mind the weather roller coaster ride as much as some do. In fact, during some of the relatively brief but very violent rain and wind (and occasional hail) storms, I like to stand on the front porch under the metal roof and listen to the rain pounding like a drum, the thunder and the wind, and watch the cascades of water running down the street and off of the roof. They are amazing displays of nature's power.

Of course, I have been able to enjoy these displays because I/we have been fortunate enough to not have suffered any of the damaging effects of this weather. Unfortunately, many have not been so lucky - flashing flooding, downed trees and power lines on houses and roads, property damage from high winds, etc. are regular occurrences. But, because these storms are relatively short in duration and small in geographic coverage, the damage is not widespread during individual "bursts". However, cumulatively, there has been a fair amount of damage.

It has always been said that, if at any given moment, you didn't like the weather in the Adirondacks all you had to do was wait 5 minutes and it will change. That's never been more true than this Spring and Summer.

man & nature # 25 ~ time in a bottle

Rain drops on spider web on clogs • click to embiggenA notion that we have rarely discussed regarding the medium is that of time - stopping / freezing time, the past, the present, moment in time, etc.

In the recent Focus magazine interview with Joel Meyerowitz, he stated:

It's what photography can actually do best, to describe a moment in "the present", whatever that present is. It's the "eternal present". We sit here in 2008 and we pick up something from 1860 and we look at it from 2008 and it's in our lives. It fills us with wonder ... suddenly you're there and you forget where you are.

That is certainly one way of looking at it (time) but I also recently came across this quote from William Faulkner:

Time is dead as long as it being clocked by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.

I do not know the context of that little gem but I do very much like it as an idea when applied to the medium of photography. We (photograhers) do interrupt the spinning of the wheels of time. We stop the clock. We freeze a moment and make it come to life, grant it significance, and give it meaning in a manner that it never could quite have in the flow of time.

Do you ever think about "time" and how it applies to your photography?