ku # 643 / man & nature # 255-57 ~ I've had enough of this crap

Tree trunk with lichen • click to embiggen
Weed + lamp pole • click to embiggen
Damp trees • click to embiggen
Weed + grass • click to embiggenThere's an entry over at TOP - a site that I don't read much anymore since it went to really focusing on gear - that addresses the fact that in the digital age ...

... mastery itself has become more fugitive. Where computer photography is concerned, everything has a time-stamp, a sell-by date. No matter what it is, everything seems to march past on a steady progression from cutting edge to mainstream to obsolescent to unsupported. As soon as you're used to something and begin to master it, it changes. It hardly matters what it is: sensor, file type, color characteristics, image editor, calibration issues, printer models, even papers and inks.

It's no surprise that, with TOP's increased emphasis on gear (which started, not coincidently,when the site started linking to camera stores), the entry has garnered responses along the order of:

... I find it a wonderful challenge ... it keeps changing, so I have to constantly be upgrading my skills. This massages my aging brain cells and keeps my thinking tack sharp.

A true gear-head response to which I would respond - hey moron, all that time you're spending to "constantly be upgrading your skills" in order to "keep your thinking tack sharp" could be spent making pictures. How about upgrading that challenge, asshole. You and your type - those who keep feeding the upgrade machine - are fucking it up for the rest of us.

It's a real shame that so many of the Johnny(s)-come-recently to the picturing making dance will never know the utter joy that can be had from having a long-term dependable camera (and a few lenses) that you know like the back of your hand with which to make pictures. And having a dependable process (both MO-wise and processing / darkroom-wise) that you know like the back of your hand with which to make prints. All of which allows one to just make pictures.

If I were to leave a comment it would be more along the lines of:

For the most part, the only people who are en-rich-ed by the constant stream of hardware/software upgrades are the makers and purveyors of such things. And most brain-dead, pavlovian, and slavish consumers (goods Americans all) lap it all up at the trough of piggish and wretched excess thus encouraging and rewarding the never-ending stream of "upgrades".

A pox on all their houses.

The most recent and egregious example is Adobe's latest Lightroom upgrade that will only work on Intel-chip Macs. Gone are the days of backwards compatibility. Now you need to drop $4-5k on a new computer/memory and other related software upgrades (Intel compatible). To which I have just a few words - FUCK THEM and/or KISS MY HAIRY ASS.

What I wouldn't give for a massive consumer boycott against some of these companies - a significant number of people who just stop buying this shit for a year or two in order to send them a message along the line of, I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore.

Update on Saturday, October 31, 2009 at 12:39PM by gravitas et nugalis

Featured Comment: "Honeybadger" wrote: "I'm a gear head and a darn good photographer. I love the improvements in technology, computers, and software. What the hell are you complaining about. If it weren't for people wanting to improve things, you'd still be stepping in horse shit or walking everywhere you needed to go. Forget about flying, forget about phones, forget about electricity, let alone fine grain films and a Nikon F5. Funny you should be writing your sour grape rant on a computer......and the WORLD WIDE WEB!

my response: Honeybdadger seems to think that I'm against progress or "people wanting to improve things". That simply is not so and nowhere in my "sourgrape rant" did I state so.

What I am against is as Greg H states, "upgrade addition" that is fed by constant incremental "upgrades" by camera / hardware / software makers primarily (not solely) for the benefit of their bottom line. And I would totally agree with Svein-Frode that "the world is heading for environmental armageddon as a result of all the useless shit we produce."

BTW, Honeybadger, where's the "sourgrapes"? - I lust for nothing camera / hardware / software-wise and, even if I did, there is very little out there that I can't afford to acquire. And, why no link to your darn good pictures? Come on, let us all have a look.

And, to answer Brian Willman's question - If ... some people to change more than they need to, so be it ... [W]hy do you care?

I care because in the name of "progress" and being good consumers, we are burying the planet in a sea of environmental shit. Svein-Frode is right on the money. There absolutely no sustainability in a lifestyle based upon excessive consumption and growth.

Hey people, it not only matters what you do, but also what others do as well that will "much affect your / (our) circumstances". It's all connected, folks. It ALL matters.

tuscany # 86 / ku # 642 / man & nature # 254 ~ poetry

Sunlight at the bottom of the steps ~ Viliano, Tuscany • click to embiggen
Sunlight on the side of the road ~ Wilmington, NY • click to embiggenOnce again Matt Dallos has offered us an interesting comment in his answer to the question, has photography failed you? (FYI, his answer was, "yes"):

.... I have just run into too many situations in the past 12-18 months when what I was seeing in the world and what I wanted to show about the world just couldn't be done with photography... I have found a new place for photography. It will become my poetry, showing what cannot and should not be explained.

I have always thought that photography was akin to poetry. Like good poetry, pictures can be lyrical, complex, and seemingly inscrutable with meaning(s) that requires delving into the feeling(s) they traffic in in order to "understand" their meaning(s). Good pictures, like good poetry, can open the door to many interpretations and, as such, they often ask as many questions as they pose answers. And, as is true of the best of Art, the more "experience" (in life, in the Arts, etc.) the viewer brings to the proceeding, the more can be gained from it.

That said, as I have mentioned on many occasions, in the medium of photography (unlike many of the other Arts), there is the tradition of the artist statement, which can be an invaluable aid in "interpreting" pictures.

Many of the simple-minded in the crowd object quite strenuously to the artist statement, most often on the grounds that they do not want to be "told what to think" or that a picture(s) that "needs" an artist statement is somehow faulty in as much as the artist has not made his/her intent perfectly clear. That, my friends, is pure unadulterated BS.

An artist statement is intended to let the viewers of an artist's work have a peek into the mind of the artist - what was on their mind as they made their work. It is not intended as a how-to-view-this-art instructional manual. One should take the artist statement for whatever worth the viewer judges it to have and the viewer should always do what people with a brain do - think for yourself when viewing a piece(s) of Art.

That said, let me be perfectly blunt - with one caveat: in my experience - those who object mostly vigorously to the idea of an artist statement, are generally those who could not write even the simplest of one for themselves.

BTW, I almost always read an artist statement after I have viewed any given work. That said, I always read an artist statement when one is available.

man & nature # 253 ~ raindrops

Raindrops at the drive-in ~ Pottersville, NY • click to embiggen

man & nature # 252 ~ why? I chime in

A pleasant late autumn afternoon • click to embiggenOK, I guess it would be rather unfair of me to have asked all of you to answer the question proferred in ku # 631 ~ chime in - why do you work in photography and how do the particular qualities of the medium affect your artistic decisions? - and not answer the question myself. So, I'll give it a try.

Without a doubt, I'll assume like many of you who did not responded (at least not yet), I am a bit tongue-tied and brain-seized-up by the question. At first blush, I am a bit stumped. It's not an easy question - I kind of find it akin to the notion of standing in front of the great adjudicator on judgement day and he/she/it says, "Explain yourself. You've got 5 minutes or I open the trap door".

I have to admit that the hair on the back of my neck stands up, my scrotum sack shrivels up and recedes into my abdomen, and that particularly stinky sweat that comes with being nervous starts to leak out of every pore on my body at the thought of that prospect. And of late, the idea of "explaining myself", re: my picturing seems like a similar and daunting gauntlet of agonizing self-examination prospects.

In any event, some background about the "why" part -

I was talking to Jimmi Nuffin - he's regular visitor to / sometimes commenter on The Landscapist and a longtime friend - on the phone yesterday and I mentioned to him that the wife and I were going to Montreal for the weekend. His immediate response was, "Take some pictures", which was more than a little bit like saying. "Don't forget to breathe." Hell, even my 5 year old grandson asked me over a year ago, "Grandpa, why do take so many pictures?"

I mean, for me, making pictures is like breathing - I do it all the time. Literally, I can not remember leaving the house at any time in the last 10 years without at least 1 camera - most often 2 and a camera bag - draped on my body. Really, not once. And rare is the occasion that I do not make pictures, quite often many pictures, when I leave the house. In fact, as if that weren't enough, at night I often dream about making pictures.

I have been making pictures with a serious intent as far back in my life as I can remember. Until I discovered photography (as a thing to delve into with abandon) at the not-so-tender age of 18, all of my picturing making was with pen and pencil - most deliberately not with brush and paint. This activity was aided and abetted by my parents (and teachers) who enrolled me in art classes at the local art museum starting at around 10 years of age.

Drawing pictures was never thrust upon me by my parents. The need to make pictures - as far as I can determine, a preternatural predilection - was always there. They merely gave me the opportunity and freedom to explore it. And explore it I did.

But, here's the odd thing about that - never once was it suggested by my parents, by my teachers, by my academic advisors that I pursue picture making (of any kind) as a career path. Nevertheless, I was making pictures, photography-wise, for a living (and have been ever since) by the time I was 19, albeit initially as a US Army photography specialist.

All of that said, I can state that I work in photography because, for as long as I can remember, I see pictures everywhere. From the time I wake up, to the time I go to bed. Light, shapes, colors, and the relationships thereof jump out the world that see around me like raindrops failing from the sky. They drum on my visual apparatus and consciousness like those same raindrops do on a tin roof.

So, it might follow that I work in photography just to try and figure out for myself what the hell all that drumming is about. However, I'm here to tell you that, after a lifetime of making pictures, hundreds of thousands of pictures, I am no closer to figuring that out than I was when I started. It is, just simply, how I "see".

And I respond to that way of seeing by making pictures. I suspect that if I did not do so, I might go mad.

That said, I can report that when I first started making pictures, photography-wise, I was interested only in appealing to the viewers eye. That was primarily driven by the fact that I was making a living making pictures for the advertising / marketing / communications industry wherein appealing to the viewers eye is the raison d'être for one's existence.

It was not until I consulted on the seminal book, the new color photography by Sally Euaclaire (there is a review here - note the date, 11/08/81, which puts the comments about Eggleston in an interesting perspective and FYI, a good clean used copy, it's long out of print, can be had in the $125-250 range), that I came to embrace the idea that pictures could also appeal to intellect. That set me to thinking about picturing and actually picturing in an entirely new direction - pictures with meaning beyond the visually obvious or, in the case of many new color photographs, the not so visually obvious, as in the oft heard comment, "why the hell did you take that picture?"

Consequently, I started working anew in photography. Born-again, so to speak. While I still attempted to appeal to the viewer's eye, my subject matter was selected by the desire to get beneath the surface of things by attempting to make pictures that encouraged the idea of getting beneath the surface of the print. To attempt to dig into, if the not the meaning of life, then into the meaning of the things that make up so much of everyday life. Indeed, the very stuff that makes up the background of daily life that is most often taken for granted or, perhaps more accurately, completely overlooked or ignored.

My picturing is mostly likely, at its very root, an attempt to appreciate everyday / commonplace things in order to live a more "connected" life as opposed to sleep-walking through so much of it as one waits for the next big thing.

And, as I have stated time and time again, particular-qualities-of-the-medium-wise, there is no other medium in the visual arts that is more suited for dealing with the real than that of photography with its intrinsic characteristic / quality as a cohort with the real.

man & nature # 251 ~ long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away

The soothing hum of the generator • click to embiggenThere use to be a time when going camping meant "getting away from it all". Today, it seems to mean getting away with it all.

3 room apartments on wheels with microwaves, flat-panel tvs, central heating and air conditioning, refrigerators, stoves and ovens, bathrooms with showers, and the ever-present hum of generators wafting through the trees ...

Ah, nature.

a mixed bag of f2.8

civilized ku # 229 ~ Refelction, NYC • click to embiggen
ku # 630 ~ Yellow leaves • click to embiggen
civilized ku # 230 ~ Railing • click to embiggen
man & nature # 249 ~ Car mirror • click to embiggen
civilized ku # 231 ~ 128, NYC • click to embiggen
civilized ku # 232 ~ Taxi, NYC • click to embiggen
man & nature # 250 ~ Picket fence • click to embiggenThomas Ruff stated in an interview:

I always want to take the medium of photography into the picture, so that you are always aware that you are looking at an image – a photograph,’ he says, before continuing, ‘so, in the picture I hope you can see two things: the image itself, plus the reflection – or the thinking – about photography. I hope it’s visible. I’m an investigator, and it is as if I am investigating the grammar of photography.

Since day 1 of The Landscapist it has been stated - righthand column, About This Website -that I am interested in .... photographs which, whatever their visual merits, instigate thought and discussion about the medium of photography. What interests me most about the medium is its unique characteristics amongst the visual arts, re: the vernacular (grammar) of photography. In other words, photography's characteristics as a visual language.

Or, to be stated even another way, photography that goes beyond pictures as entertainment.

Basic to investigating / understanding the medium on a "deeper" level - I might say on a more robust and richer level - might be to read the book by Steve Edwards, Photography - A Very Short Introduction. Chapter 4, What is a photograph?, and Chapter 5, The apparatus and its image, are especially helpful sections.

Chapter 4 deals primarily with signification - the notion of the construction of meaning as determined / influenced by signs. Think of "signs" as symbols - something used for or regarded as representing something else - and the idea of symbolic meaning.

In a very real sense a photograph is a sign in and of itself. It is something that is used for representing something else - it is not the thing pictured, it represents the thing pictured.

How a photograph represents the thing pictured (the referent), that is to say, how it attempts to suggest or construct meaning is very dependent upon how the picture maker uses the apparatus of the medium and also to a large extent upon the viewers understanding / interpretation of that apparatus and its application.

Apparatus implies technique, not only the technique employed by the use of equipment but also by the technique employed by the use of the medium's other characteristics (read Chapter 5) - its relationship to/with the real/actual, the detail - the facts of things, the frame or the act of selection, the vantage point or POV - what's in, what's out, and time - revealing what is otherwise concealed within the flux of movement.

I mentioned all of this simply because I am employing new apparatus in my picture making.

Equipment-wise that is a new lens with a "normal" field of view used with a wide-open aperture.

Other of the medium's characteristics-wise, this equipment apparatus requires that I modify my act of selection (the frame) from its previous wide-angle field of view MO which is not as easy as it might be thought to be.

Detail is also quite different from my previous MO in the sense that only a very narrow part of the thing pictured is rendered in detail. The rest of the thing pictured is, quite obviously out of focus.

My picturing POV (the vantage point), which was normally stand-up-straight, eye-level but is now much more bend-over, squat-down, look-up, and look-down in nature, has changed considerably. I am now considering a stretching regimen as a kind of picturing accessory.

An interesting and entirely unanticipated result of all the new apparatus has been to employ a framing device that is often quite cock-eyed in nature. Don't ask me why because it is a surprise that bears a bit of consideration that has yet to be undertaken.

BTW and FYI, it seems to be worth noting at this time that my picture's much commented upon black edges and corner vignette are apparatus that I have been employing to draw attention to the frame - the act of selection. It is also intended to emphasis the fact that one is viewing a picture - as Thomas Ruff states, looking at an image - and that the picture, as a thing, should not be confused the thing pictured.

All of that said, I am picturing my ass off with my new apparatus. Mostly because it's fun but also to try and get a handle on what the hell - and why - it is that I am doing.

Any thoughts?

man & nature # 248 ~ DOF

Rusty mailbox • click to embiggenOver the past month or so I have been pondering a picturing approach that now, due to viewing this interesting work, has got me to thinking it's time to do something my pondering. To be specific, what have been thinking about is the joy, picturing-wise, of out-of-focus backgrounds or, to be even more specific, narrow DOF.

Narrow DOF with a normal-ish lens - 45-55mm (35mm equiv.) - is usually obtained by picturing at a wide-open aperture - an aperture in the f1.4-2.0 range. Long story short, I don't have lens that meets than requirement.

So, as luck would have it, I'm off to Albany to see the Asylum Street Spankers tonight and then off to NYC to attend a lecture by Stephen Hawking. And, as more luck has it, where I will also pay a visit B&H Photo to check out a Sigma 30mm f1.4 lens that just might be the bee's knees for narrow DOF.

man & nature # 245-47 ~ golf course nature

Out of bounds, 12th fairway ~ at The Sagamore, Bolton Landing, NY • click to embiggen
Along the 13th fairway ~ at The Sagamore - Bolton Landing, NY • click to embiggen