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This blog is intended to showcase my pictures or those of other photographers who have moved beyond the pretty picture and for whom photography is more than entertainment - photography that aims at being true, not at being beautiful because what is true is most often beautiful..

>>>> Comments, commentary and lively discussions, re: my writings or any topic germane to the medium and its apparatus, are vigorously encouraged.

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Entries in triptych (28)

Tuesday
Aug092016

civilized triptych # 3 ~ the pool redux

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pool groupings ~ Stone Harbor, NJ • click to embiggen

This second picture making effort, re: civilized triptych is headed in the picture making direction I wish to adopt.

That is, to make 3 pictures each with their own visual / referent interest which seemingly compete with each other for the viewer's attention but, nevertheless, work together as a complete / integrated picture. And, I also prize a foreground element which draws the viewer's a eye from front to back (and back again) as much as that is possible on the 2-deminsional surface of the print. All the more helpful in causing the viewer's eye to dance and flit about the individual and collective surfaces of the triptych, creasing a visual energy which is found in most of my pictures.

More to come.
Monday
Aug082016

civilized triptych # 2 ~ the pool

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pool ~ Stone Harbor, NJ • click to embiggen

First attempt at determining my picturing technique for the civilized triptych picture making endeavor. More to come.

Thursday
Aug042016

civilized triptych # 1 ~ one thing leads to another

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kitchen table stuff ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

Later this afternoon I am once again off to the Boston area for a hockey tournament. On Sunday, at the conclusion of the event, Hugo and I off to the Annual Jersey Shore / the Wife's Family Bacchanal for the week. The weather forecast looks to be only moderately hellish so maybe I'll survive.

While at the shore, my intent is to begin a series of 3-picture segmented images. There was a time past when I created quite a number of triptychs but they were different than the above image inasmuch as they were comprised of 3 related pictures as opposed to 3 contiguous pictures.

I have yet to work out the precise technique - lens, camera rotation or straight line movement (that is, move the camera to the left and right of the center picture), my normal black edges (or not), etc. - so the first day or two will be a work in progress kinda thing.

I'll post pictures as I go. Comments always appreciated.

Thursday
Jul142016

triptych # 26-28 / civilized ku # 4007 (ku-ish) ~ neither Ireland nor Scotland

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before the storm ~ Mineville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
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porches ~ Mineville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
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porches ~ Mineville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
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various things ~ Mineville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

Lest you think that I have given up making pictures in my own backyard (so to write), there are these recently made (last evening) pictures to contemplate.

It is certainly true that I have not been out and about much over the past few weeks due in large part to the task of working my way through the Ireland / Scotland picture mound o' pictures. However, yesterday I sent out the files for the Ireland book which should be in my hands by next Wednesday. So, that's half a load off my mind and back. Hence, more time to get out and about ....

.... like yesterday evening when the wife convinced me to accompany her to a board meeting in the middle-of-nowhere Mineville (along Lake Champlain about an hour drive from home). Part of the deal was to include dinner at one of our favorite restaurants (it was my birthday after all) which is located about half way back toward home.

In any event, I had about 45 minutes to kill while the wife attended to business. She suggested that I bring a book. I countered with the idea of making pictures, of what I wasn't certain but, quite frankly, if you can't make pictures wherever you are, maybe you should take up finger painting. And, immediately after dropping the wife off, my eye and sensibilities was struck with a number of porches, all of which had flowers and some other decorative accoutrements.

So, even with the inclusion a 15 minute deluge delay, I managed to make picture making hay while the sun (didn't) shined. Next time I'm in the Mineville area, I would like to add another 12 or so pictures to the collection. Or, maybe it's time for a picture making specific outing.
Tuesday
Feb162016

diptych # 202 / civilized ku # 3053 ~ the destroyer of worlds, art-wise

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sweepings ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
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sweepings / sweeper ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

I continue to struggle - write, re-write, edit, re-edit, think, re-think - with the entry, re: the most beautiful and intriguing picture I have ever seen, so I have decided to break it into 2 parts.

Part I will deal with the craft to be seen in the print, itself. Craft, whether intention or the result of dumb unthinking luck, which is rather striking. Addressing this aspect of the picture has not been particularly difficult. Although, in fact, the craft does play a significant part in how the picture affects me.

Part II will deal with the picture's emotional / mental impact and affect on my feelings and sensibilities. My understanding of that impact - both how and the why - is where I struggle. That is to write, having the ability to connect to (understand) and to put into words what could be described as my complete fascination with the picture and why I consider it to be the most beautiful and intriguing picture I have ever seen. Or least, one of the most beautiful and intriguing pictures I have ever seen.
Thursday
Dec172015

civilized ku # 3025 / sports update ~ keep on moving

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sidewalk, trees and bridge ~ Pittsburgh, PA • click to embiggen
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Hugo / hockey ~ Lake Placid, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen

FYI, I did not make the pictures of Hugo's Player of the Game performance in a recent hockey tournament.
Friday
Nov272015

civilized ku # 3010 / triptych #24-25 ~ urban flora

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Red patio set ~ Pittsburgh, PA • click to embiggen
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urban flora ~ Pittsburgh, PA • click to embiggen
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urban flora ~ Pittsburgh, PA • click to embiggen

If I were in Pittsburgh for an extended length of time (7+ days without any pressing social commitments), now or in the future, I believe that the picturing project I primarily engage with would be that of urban flora. The reason is simple - most of the neighborhoods in the city of Pittsburgh are rife with the unfettered growth of chaotic scrub, most notably, but certainly not limited to kudzu.

The reason's for this phenomenon are many but chief amongst them are the hilly topography of the city with many steep uninhabitable ravines and hillsides and the spread of urban decay which accompanied the collapse of the steel industry and the subsequent loss of population - between 1970-1990 the city lost over 30% of its population.

In any event, I'm heading out to see what I can see with my eye and sensibilities attuned to urban flora.
Tuesday
Nov032015

triptych #26 (pinhole) / pinhole # 11-12 ~ more tiny little hole pictures

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rusting hulk ~ near Keeseville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
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yellow leaves ~ former AFB / Plattsburgh, NY • click to embiggen
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Pride of the Adirondacks ~ former AFB / Plattsburgh, NY • click to embiggen

As mentioned in yesterday's post, I have been making some pictures with what amounts to a pinhole lens cap mounted on a µ4/3 camera. The intended use is for submission to a juried pinhole exhibit "competition".

While I have dabbled from time to time with making pinhole pictures - usually with a 4×5 view camera and polaroid film - I have never really become fully involved with the genre. Over the years I have come across bodies of pinhole work and individual pictures which have captured my favorable attention. But, to be honest, I can't really articulate why those pictures appealed to me (or any pinhole pictures) other than to write that I like the way they look.

There is not much writing on pinhole picture making other a plethora of how-to-make a pinhole camera articles. It would seem that there aren't any photo critics who have taken up the subject in order to help define the aesthetics/ vernacular of the genre. In my search for such writing I did find this from pinhole picture maker Dave Clarridge:

What I love about pinhole photography is that it is MAGICAL. Without all the expensive gadgetry I am able to capture what I feel, more than what I see. One never knows exactly what you’re going to get with a pinhole camera until the film is developed. And what appears is something only a pinhole camera can see. It’s as though a parallel universe is opened up to us.

All of that written, what I am pursuing with my pinhole picture making, at least at this stage of involvement, is to make picture which, if nothing else, I find to be visually pleasing. Without a doubt, a primary element of "visually pleasing" in pinhole pictures is the ethereal / insubstantial nature of the pictures. A characteristic which might be likened to the appearance of a ghost or a dream.

That visual characteristic is the result of making an impression of the real as opposed to a true and accurate representation of the real. Some might label it a "poetic" impression, others might label it as simply an easy and cheap picture making effect.

In any event, at this point I am not weighing in on that subject. I'm just making pictures and seeing what happens.

Any thoughts, options or comments?

FYI, the effective aperture of my pinhole is somewhere in the neighborhood of f96-f128 which dictates an ISO of 1600 and a shutter speed of 1/2-1/4s, even in relatively bright sunlight. A tripod is nearly mandatory, although, kudos to the Oly OM-D EM-1 for its 5 axis IS which makes handholding at 1/4s a real possibility.