tuscany # 101 ~ don't be a tourist - do the hurty thing

Some time in the past ~ Valiano, Tuscany • click to embiggenHot on the heels of yesterday's (a) life in pictures entry wherein we brought up the idea of eye-contact adverts, my attention was grabbed by a series of tv commercials that are airing in the UK for the Olympus EP-1 camera. While the commercials are light on the eye-contact idiom, they are heavily invested in the idiom of celebrity endorsement, in this case, Kevin Spacey.

Now it should be said that I like Kevin Spacey as an actor and I am a "dedicated" Olympus man (my father was a Studebaker man). So, right outta the gate, I am inclined to look kindly upon these short & sweet espistolary-like and seemingly "personal" communiques.

The commercials are packed with little witticisms such as in the "Drive By" piece when Spacey tells us, "Point and shoot? That's a crime. Stay away from point and shooting."

There is also a bit of humour (Brit spelling) in the "Camera Guy" bit wherein Spacey tells us, "I don't want to be the camera guy. Ya know, Mr. super-zuper, 8 pocket camera bag, 15 lenses, 3 tripods, flak jacket ... I don't wanna be that guy."

Each of the 5 commercials ends with the spoken tag, "Don't be a tourist", which seems to derive its tagline status from the "Tourist" spot in which Spacey says that, "I just want to write my number on a life's arm and say, 'hey, you know, call me' ..." which seems to imply a certain level of involvement beyond that of a "tourist".

All that said, Mr Spacey ain't gonna influence my camera buying decisions but I must admit to liking the commercials ... especially the "Like A Memory" one wherein Spacey asks the question:

Do you ever take a photograph that looks like a memory? ... To take a photograph that hurts every time you look at it?

The script writers may have gone a bit too far and got a bit toooo cute with the word "hurt"* and the phrase, "it does that hurty thing"* but, that aside, I have been thinking more than a bit about pictures and their connection to memories. A line of thought that was greatly accelerated by my recent Tuscany POD booking making exercise.

Specifically, I have been thinking about:

Since the advent of photography the photographic image has been regarded as an aide-mémoire. The very act of taking a photograph signals the moment as worthy of remembering and, while objects break, landscapes change, and people die, the photograph endures, allowing it to be used to remember ‘what has been’ .... Some 20th-century theorists ... have disputed the photograph's role in aiding memory, claiming instead that it actually serves the process of forgetting. Roland Barthes believed a photograph can do little more than confirm the existence of an object at some other time, in some other place, while Susan Sontag suggested that with the passage of time a photograph loses its specificity to become a purely aesthetic object open to multiple readings. Ultimately, both Barthes and Sontag argued, because the photograph only records the surface appearance of what has been, and not the complex meanings associated with sensory experience, it cannot rightly be called a ‘memory image’. The iconic properties of the more durable photograph will inevitably replace the myriad details of the experience represented in the image; in the end it is the photograph itself that is remembered.

The picture - a picture of a picture - posted with this entry is quite possibly a very good example of a picture that has "lost its specificity". While I have no idea of the age of the picture, it does appear old enough that many, if not most of the people pictured therein, people to whom there would be specificity associated with viewing the picture ... well, I'd put my money on the idea that most of them are dead and gone.

In any event, when I was viewing the picture, none of them where around to give the picture any specificity. What that left me with was a very non-specificity viewing experience wherein the picture did become a "purely aesthetic object open to many readings."

Or did it?

AN ASIDE One reading that I had when viewing the picture is, "Where the hell are all the woman at?" Other than 2 young girls in the float, there are only 2 woman visible in the entire crowd. Any Italians out there who might give us some "specificity" regarding this issue?

That aside, aside, what I have been wondering about is that when one views a picture, one brings a wealth of personal memories to that viewing. No matter that those memories may not be connected directly to the specific referent in the picture, those memories will quite obviously influence what meaning(s) the viewer will intuit (from amongst the multiple readings) from his/her viewing of the picture. So ....

I tend to think that once a picture has become a purely aesthetic object - every picture I see in a photo book / gallery instantly becomes a purely aesthetic object to me because I certainly have no specific memory connected to it s making - and when that aesthetic object has "the iconic properties of the more durable" type, the readings / meanings can be very closely related to the those of the people involved in the picture and/or its making.

Once again, consider the picture in my picture. Without going into great specific detail, I was once one of kids on the float in that picture. OK, OK, not actually one of those specific kids on that specific float, but I am certain that I know something of what they were feeling and experiencing at the moment of the picture's making. Based on that shared experience, I am certain that one of those specific kids would have a very similar reading of the picture as I have.

I am also reasonably certain that, if one of those specific kids was at my side viewing the picture with me, we would not only share specific readings but also upon relating those readings to one another, we would discover that we shared an similar and somewhat specific experience(s) of the human condition.

Consequently, I am not so sure that I would agree, at least not in an unconditional manner, with Barthes and Sontag that a picture that has become a "purely aesthetic object" loses all of its specificity. In fact, I am not even certain that a picture can become a "purely aesthetic object" at all.

*cutting the script writers a bit of slack on the word "hurty" and phrase "hurty thing", truth be told, they are really not all that big of a stretch from Barthes idea of punctum - that quality in a picture that denotes the wounding, personally touching detail which establishes (with a viewer) a direct relationship with the object or person within it.

fyi - act now, supply is limited

Click here to view this photo book.

I didn't make an entry yesterday because I spent the day making the POD book pictured above. Xmas presents, don't you know.

While the book is not intended as my "definitive" statement, re: my pictures of Tuscany, it is a very good first look. The book is 12×12 with 49 pages and 44 pictures. I could easily see taking that out to 90-100 pages with 80-90 pictures, which would make for a fairly expensive POD book.

However, this book was no so expensive because of a current offer from Shutterfly - full price for the 1st book, a 50% discount on all copies ordered at the same time. By ordering 4 books, my per-book price - including tax and shipping - was a tad over $80US. Or, looking at it another way, the 1st book was approx. $120US and the next 3 were approx. $60US/ea.

So, that said, I have one extra book that I am making available for the low-low price of $60US (+ the buyer's shipping method of choice). What a deal. If you are interested, send me an email. If more than 1 person is interested, I can order more at the same discount (at least for as long as the Shutterfly deal lasts).

I would also be open to a POD book swap for those of you who have one to swap.

BTW / FYI - clicking on "Click here to view this photo book" will take you to Shutterfly where a full screen version of the book can be viewed.

And, as always, comments are welcome and appreciated.

(a) life in pictures # 1-3 ~ I can't get no satisfaction

A life in pictures ~ Bell Centre, Montreal, CA • click to embiggen
A life in pictures ~ Madison Square Garden, NYC • click to embiggen
A life in pictures ~ W34th & 8th, NYC • click to embiggenDuring my October time in NYC, I began to notice advertising pictures on billboards, posters, and displays - especially those which were made with a person / persons looking directly into the camera, AKA - the viewers eyes. I became aware, especially when viewing the printed results, of a very visceral and affective sensation that accompanied the experience of looking at / being looked at by the eye-contact person(s) in question. A sensation of discomfort / ill-at-ease that was both physical and emotional.

Now, it can be assumed with a very high degree of certainty that a strong reaction (of a more positive kind than I experienced) to these advertising pictures themselves was exactly what the creators of the pictures / advertisements had in mind. And, quite obviously, the desired reaction to the picture/ advert is to create in the viewer a desire to buy whatever it is they are selling.

One could state quite accurately that the pictures / adverts are the fuel that drive the engine of our consumer economy. The things that fuel / flame the desire to spend and get.

The more I look at and think about these pictures of pictures, the more I am convinced that the pictures of the pictures are infinitely more powerful than the original picture / advert is when viewed in situ. At the very least, the pictures of the pictures seem to make the creator's intent much more obvious - the people in the adverts look much more like seedy carnival hucksters than fine upstanding friends / confidants / opinion makers or whatever else it is that the purveyors / inflamers of desire would like us to see them as.

Quite obviously, at least to me, the camera's power to isolate / the picture maker's ability to select and frame are in large part responsible for this more powerful effect. It seems to me that the veneer of "respectability" that the people in the adverts are suppose to have has been tarnished by the camera's cool stare.

The other aspect of the pictures of pictures that strikes me in a very powerful manner is the "Big Brother is watching" feeling that comes across - the Band of Brothers / Sisters in the adverts most definitely seem to have their eyes on us. They are checking us out to see if we are living "right", telling us - in case we've let it slip our minds - what all the right stuff for living right is.

Because, after all, as we all know, if you don't have the right stuff, you can't get no satisfaction:

.... When I'm watchin' my TV
And that man* comes on to tell me
How white my shirts can be
But he can't be a man 'cause he doesn't smoke
The same cigarrettes as me ....

In any event, I'm intrigued by the possibilities of a pictures of pictures body of work.

AN ASIDE: It has been opined, here on The Landscapist, on a number of occasions that this blog has a decidedly anti-free market and/or, if you will, an anti-spend-and-get slant / bias - an accusation that, quite simply, is not true. The anti-free market moniker is the one-size-fits-all disparaging label that the no-brainers in the crowd apply to any and all persons who criticize in any manner the excesses of the free market. To the no-brainers, the free market should be just that - free to do anything it wants. Period. No restrictions, no interference, and, of course, the biggie - no regulation, especially by that demon socialist entity known as "big-government".

That said, have no doubt about it, these pictures are intended as a look at / think-about-it critique of our consumer-based spend-and-get culture / economy. However, it is not intended as an anti-free market scree. Rather, it is intended to incite thinking and awareness about how ubiquitous the efforts of the Purveyors of Desire actually are in our everyday lives.

*that man on TV ain't gonna be Tiger Woods any time soon.

civilized ku # 293-95 ~ small is beautiful, but, unfortunately, not necessary

Some, but, by no means, not all of the banners ~ Montreal, CA • click to embiggen
Hockey heroes ~ Montreal, CA • click to embiggenThe wife and I spent last evening in the company of 21,271 Canadians (+ us), although a few in the crowd were most likely good 'ole Americans like us.

As is always the case when we visit our neighbors to the north (all of whom have healthcare, BTW), a good time was had by all. That was especially so on this visit since our team, the Pittsburgh Penquins, beat the Habs - one of the most long-lived (100 years and counting) and storied teams in sports history - in a closely contested 3-2 game.

It was also very interesting and entertaining to hear most of those 21,273 hockey fans moan, boo, howl, cry and whine after a potentially game-tying late 3rd period goal was disallowed by a ref who just might still be hiding in fear for his life somewhere in the bowels of the Bell Center. Yes, very entertaining, indeed.

An interesting non-hockey side note, re: the recent small is beautiful entries - here in the good 'ole US of America, getting anything looking like a "professional" camera into a sporting event is virtually impossible. Given that fact, I went to the game armed with the wife's Canon S???? (whatever, who can keep track?) P&S. Much to my surprise, when I inquired at the desk in the Bell Center Admin. Office, I was informed that one could take any camera into the building "as long as it isn't one of those" (visualize desk person holding her arms about 4' apart).

So it was back to the car to grab the Oly E3. However, not wanting to push the "one-of-those" barrier, I did not grab the 50-200mm Zuiko. Once again, imagine my surprise when, once inside the rink, I spied any number of DSLRs sporting decent-sized zoom lenses, albeit none of "those". Unfortunately, at that point, there was no going back - no exit and readmittance allowed.

Nevertheless, I was able to capture the hockey heart throb (see entry below) in very satisfactory fashion with the lens I had at hand - a 14-54mm Zuiko. That's very unfortunate in as much as I was planning on using a poorly executed hockey heart throb picturing result (obtained by using the very "inferior" Canon S???, of course) as a key component in my most subtle and furtively implemented need-to-get-an-Oly-EP1 campaign with the wife - the logic / rationale being that I would have most assuredly been able to get that amateur-looking camera into the rink to get a much better hockey heart throb picturing result because I only want to make you happy, dear.

civilized ku # 290-92 ~ serious hockey fans, defined

2 Quebecois / 1 hockey heart throb ~ Montreal, CA • click to embiggen
Serious hockey fans / Pens take the ice ~ Montreal, CA • click to embiggenYou know that someone is a serious hockey fan when they drive to another country, get into the rink an hour and a half before the start of the game (fr., le match) so that they can get down to the locker room runway and get a front row position and stand patiently for an hour or so so that they can get a picture of a hockey heart throb.

As you may have deduced by now, that serious hockey fan (albeit, primarily Pittsburgh Penguins' hockey) would be me making of picture of that other (the wife) serious hockey fan's hockey heart throb - # 25, Max Talbot.

civilized ku # 289 ~ a faceoff

A faceoff ~ Montreal, CA • click to embiggenWe had very nice seats at the end where the Penguins shoot twice, where we could clearly see some nameless guys dressed in red sweaters trying to win a faceoff against Crosby, Rupp, Talbot, Eaton, Letang, and The Flower.

civilized ku # 288 ~ small is beautiful pt. 2

Xmas wreath / 1st snow storm ~ Au SAble Forks, NY • click to embiggenYesterday's civilized ku # 287 engendered a few questions, 2 of which are related:

1. Dennis Allshouse (no link provided) asked: how do you carry your equipment?

2. Mary Dennis asked : Why can't you just keep the cameras in a bag on the floor Mark? ...

re: camera bag - I usually carry my cameras (Oly E3 / Pentax K20D - both with battery grips) hanging from from my shoulder. They rarely see the inside of my camera bag, which is a Lowepro Off Trail 2.

I chose that bag because it is quite adaptable - it can be slung from a shoulder or belted around your waist. When I am walking / hiking around for extended periods, I use both methods together which makes it quite secure and giggle-free. In addition, both side lens pouches are removable for those times when I want to travel really light. I also like the fact that I do not have to open the main compartment in order to access the 2 lenses that I might want to change to most frequently.

I rarely bring the camera bag into a "fine" restaurant. The tables are usually rather small (for marketing purposes say, "intimate") so there is very little room on or under the tables. My fear is that a camera bag placed under the table will, inadvertently, make its way at least part way out from under the table with the result being that a server with a tray full of expensive wine and caviar .... you get the idea.

Mary Dennis also asked, re: camera bag-wise:

... Is it just too much of a hassle to pull them out when inspiration strikes? Or do just shoot like you breathe? Constantly and naturally?

Her question contains its own answer - the "inspiration" strikes way to often for me to be yanking the suckers in and out of the bag because I do indeed "shoot like I breathe ... constantly and naturally."

Mary also wondered if the wife ever gets tired of the constant camera. I can't speak for her but I do believe if she ever saw me without one, she might faint.

On the other hand, she does get tired of my new-ish hat - a black baseball-style cap with the Consorzio del Gallo Nero emblem on it. The wife seems to think that the constant-baseball cap (and tight jeans) are not age-appropriate for me.

However, perhaps the hat is deflecting attention from the constant-camera issue.

civilized ku # 287 ~ small is beautiful

Simple Teasures Thrift Shop window ~ Au Sable Forks, NY • click to embiggenI'm curious - does the camera that you currently use determine when and/or how you make pictures?

In the case of DSLRs, does size / bulk with your usual lens of choice, discourage picture making under some circumstances. Is it too cumbersome to have with you at all times?

Would a smaller camera encourage more picture making?

I am not particularly adversely dis-inclined to take both of my DSLRs just about everywhere I go but there are times when it is a bit awkward. As an example, when dining in a "fine" restaurant, there is often very little space on the table for even a single DSLR, much less 2. This situation mandates the use of a stand (for the wine bucket) which some restaurants don't have and 2 obviously very expense cameras on the table tends to make a server very nervous.

For me, a smaller camera would not encourage more picture making in as much as I already make pictures everywhere I go, but .... a smaller camera would most definitely be less socially awkward in many situations.