Category: New Photo Projects

I’ve had a chance to play with some new ideas in photography this week, mainly, what might be classified as commercial photography. I’m working on how I can sell the fine art of listening through the visual art of photography!

Using a combination of strobe lighting and/or natural lighting through the ambiance of the space, I am working to create a mood that one might have as they fine-tune their listening skills via an experience in sound. Also, through photographs, pulling out visual cues that surround the space, adding to the anticipation of the experience.

The new venture is still under wraps. We’ll announce soon enough, but for now, it’s all about the photography and experimentation to get this new adventure off the ground.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the word entrepreneurial. Here’s what the dictionary says:

            Entrepreneurial: (adjective) characterized by the taking of financial risks (I’ll say!) in the hope of profit; enterprising.

            Enterprising: (adjective) having or showing initiative and resourcefulness.

Now, there’s one of my all-time favorite words – resourcefulness! I push that in my studio classes, constantly. I admit I harp on it all the time.  My students are told on day one (which, by the way, is Monday!), do not tell me there is “nothing to shoot” in our prop closet. First, bring your own props…be creative and second, if I see that #$%@! blue vase one more time…

For as long as I can remember, Randy and I have been talking about owning our own business(es). We made this happen just over six years ago with Spotted Dog Excavating. You really do just jump right in and learn as you go. As a friend of mine says, it’s like jumping off a cliff and growing your wings on the way down. Learning everything from taxes to general liability insurance to worker’s comp to marketing has been interesting and fun. Not to mention, I know a whole lot more today about underground utilities and infrastructure than I ever thought I would!

This next, new business adventure is going to give me another creative outlet and, I’ll work hard to populate that new website with creative photography, and who knows where it will lead. I have a preliminary sketch of the new logo, too! But, alas, I’m not a graphic designer so I’ll give the big reveal once it is polished nicely by a pro!

Creative vision, and all the great entrepreneurs who came before inspire me, and this week, we can celebrate one special entrepreneur, Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre. On August 19^th, 1839 his invention, the daguerreotype, was finally made available to the world. Step-by-step his process was explained. Can you just imagine all the new photography businesses popping up all over the world?

Two topics that peaked my interest collided this week – a discussion about the book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and architectural photography.

Last Friday, Randy and I had dinner with some of his audiophile friends and their wives. The conversation came to Savannah, and then to Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. If you have not seen the movie, don’t! Read the book first…then see the movie. It’s an intriguing story about Savannah, and true…mostly…depends on whom you talk to in Savannah. Than again, most Savannahians wouldn’t admit too much truth in the words that grace those pages. Southerners, specifically Savannahians (let me be more direct – the ones I grew up around) don’t cotton much to the trifling words of Yankees. Yes, the author, John Berendt, is a Yankee. The story revolves around an antique dealer, Jim Williams, and four murder trials, the last with an acquittal, in the murder of his assistant (male prostitute, lover, you decide), Danny Hansford.

Anyhow, as I recalled the story, and the wonderful Bird Girl statue on the book cover that could be found in a cemetery not a mile from my teenage home, I thought about Savannah and how I photographed the Mercer-Williams House (the site of said murder) when I was in college for my architectural photography class.

As I was pulling together my architectural photography class handouts this week, and getting sucked into reading articles and thinking about my own architectural photography course all those years ago, I decided to pull my photos of the Mercer-Williams House and see what I did 25 years ago. I have not looked at these specific images in a long time, but being reminded of the story and the assignments I give my students each fall, I decided to take a look.

Blast from the past

Pulled from my negative archives, I found two beautiful 4×5 images, each with exposure brackets. Now, with a 25-years-of-experience-critical-eye and my adjunct instructor’s brain to contend with, I decided…not too bad. I gave myself quite a critique. I listed all the things I’d mark off if I were my own student today, but I decided to scan them and share them here anyhow! 429 Bull Street…the site of a murder.

I shot these way back when on a Cambo 4×5 camera that my school offered, and used T-Max 400 film. The negatives were processed archivally, and were clean and beautifully preserved when I pulled them out of my archives. For my architectural photography students past and future (countdown…14 days), these views are a ¾ perspective, and a detail shot.

Like many homes in Savannah, the Mercer-Williams house is haunted, and many say the ghosts of Williams himself, and Danny Hansford walk the halls, and that of a young boy who died at the home in a tragedy that preceded Williams’ residence. Ghostly or not, it is a beautiful house with a wonderful history and I’m glad I photographed it for an architectural photography class assignment!

Oh, and the name Mercer…that would have been General Hugh Weedon Mercer, the great-grandfather of the legendary songwriter, Johnny Mercer. And, Johnny? He’s buried in Bonaventure Cemetery less than a mile from the house I grew up in!

This week, we remember a great photographer who died on August 4th, 1927. Eugene Atget was a Parisian commercial photographer by all accounts, who would have probably been left unknown to most of the public had it not been for the efforts of the American photographer, Berenice Abbott (1898-1991). While working in Paris as a young photographer, she was introduced to Atget by the great Man Ray. She became close friends with Atget, and upon his death, tracked down his negatives (glass plates) and prints to ensure their safety and his place in the history of photography.

Why do I ask the question, do I belong in the past? I was reading an excerpt about Atget by renowned photography historian, John Szarkowski. He described Atget, “To a casual observer, he might have seemed a typical commercial photographer of the day. He was not progressive, but worked patiently with techniques that were obsolescent when he adopted them, and very nearly anachronistic by the time of his death. He was little given to experiment in the conventional sense, and less to theorizing. He founded no movement and attracted no circle. He did however make photographs which for purity and intensity of vision have not been bettered.”

I thought about that word, anachronistic, describing a person or thing that is chronologically out of place. Because Atget used an earlier photographic process – one involving glass plates and a bulky large format camera at a time when he could have adopted much “easier” or “portable” processes (for timeline reference, the Kodak No. 1 handheld camera was released in 1888) he chose to work with a “dated” process thus dating him. Most of his work was produced after the turn of the century (1900-1927), and during this time, photography was rapidly changing. Much like today – digital technology continues to grow leaps and bounds. Cameras become smaller, lighter, and less expensive. The technology is truly astounding – think of HDR, or the ability to digitally remove someone in a photo, just because you might not like them. It’s not like the days of tearing a printed 4×6 in half when you break up with that trifling boyfriend.

I thought, am I anachronistic? I love my darkroom, more than my DSLR. I’ve been spending time this week, as a matter of fact, printing some new images to submit to an upcoming show, and testing my Second Amendment negatives to determine how I’m going to present this body of work. I was in my darkroom, making gelatin-silver prints and wondered, am I anachronistic?

I came across another great article to help answer my question. The title of this article is Film Photography Makes a Stunning Comeback. Okay, so you can guess what this is about! In the article, the author discusses why some commercial photographers choose to include film in their arsenal today, and why “everyday” film shooters love what he says is “…difficult to define, but easy to see.”

“Film has a quality that is unique; a beauty and tonal warmth that digital cannot match.”

He talks about the longevity of film versus digital files, and likens some of his argument to the popular debate of vinyl versus MP3 files (NO comparison in my book!). And, finally, he references a telling comment to sum up his discussion,

“The way people shoot has changed. Film has become a more considered approach; something people invest time in creating.” – Professor Steve Macleod

As for me, I’ll answer my own question. Do I belong in the past? No, I do not belong in the past. According to UK-based Ilford Photo in a survey of film users last year, 30 percent were under 35 years old! Seems I might just be hip again!

After watching a couple speakers during the RNC last week in Cleveland, and then Michelle Obama, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders in Philadelphia last night, I was moved to look back through my own images taken from the 2008 DNC in Denver. I remembered the electricity that night in 2008.

Now, mind you, this is no political rant, nor a blog post with efforts to sway you to vote one way or another. In fact in full disclosure, since 1988, my first presidential election, I have voted all parties and I don’t vote straight tickets. I consider myself a moderate, or as many like to classify an Independent. This applies no matter local city or county elections, state elections or national elections. Period. I vote for the person that I think best suits the job and aligns with my personal feelings on specific issues that are important to me. Period. I tend to be a big picture thinker…and look past just one person. Period.

As Rhett Butler might say, “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn…” who you vote for. It’s your business.

Back to the national conventions…I was lucky enough to get a press pass with a friend of mine and we ventured up on that last day of the DNC, August 28^th, to see what we could photograph. I remember being amazed by the energy and buzz in the air. The organizers moved the last day – Obama’s nomination acceptance speech – to Invesco Field from the Pepsi Center. Of course, it sat more than 75,000 people whereas the Pepsi Center just 20,000. Good move on their part

It was a beautiful late summer evening. No chance of rain and the sky was just amazing. I do remember that. And, it wasn’t too hot, or too cold. In fact, it was just right that evening. He got very lucky. I did get a spooky feeling when I noticed the snipers hanging out on the upper perimeters of the stadium throughout the whole evening. I snapped a few photos of them, nothing to write home about, just a document of my experiences.

So what did I notice, and why am I talking about this today? The excitement and the unity are what I noticed then, and that is what seems to be missing today from the conventions. I watched different parts of the RNC last week – for one, Donald Trump’s nomination acceptance – and what I felt was lacking was energy in the crowds. That same energy and buzz I felt in Denver. And, watching the DNC last night, same thing…Michelle Obama did her part to rev up the crowd, but it still seemed to lack the energy. Maybe television just doesn’t do it justice. Maybe you have to be there to feel the energy. But, for me, maybe it reveals something more…voter fatigue? Is that a thing?

What are the buzzwords this year? We all remember Hope and Change, but how about this year, Republican or Democrat? I’d say Unity is a good buzzword. Seems this has been a struggle for both camps what with the Cruz missile in the Trump camp, and those passionate “Feel the Bern” supporters in the Clinton/Kaine camp. Here’s an assignment for you all, look for signs of unity in your own neighborhoods and take note. If you have a camera in hand, create a great shot. When I look back through my images – overwhelmingly all Obama supporters – I see great swaths of people with the Red, White and Blue in unison. That is unity to me.

So, whether you are red or blue…or float in a state of purple…look for those signs of unity and see what you come up with. Maybe start with a combination of red, white and blue.

 

I just finished a wonderful book this past week and wanted to share it. This book is a memoir by the photographer Sally Mann titled Hold Still A Memoir with Photographs. Some of you reading will be familiar with Mann. Her photography is well known, and she stirred a bit of controversy with images of her children in the early 1990s. Not the kind of controversy that Jock Sturges was unfortunate to receive because of his works, but close. No FBI searches of her studio though.

The book is a memoir in photographs and words. She dives deep into her family history, looking for clues to her own roots, and the inspirations for her artwork. She describes her journey through tattered and yellowed boxes and her secret desires for finding, “…a payload of southern gothic: deceit and scandal, alcoholism, domestic abuse, car crashes, bogeymen, clandestine affairs, dearly loved and disputed family land, abandonments, blow jobs, suicides, hidden addictions, the tragically early death of a beautiful bride, racial complications, vast sums of money made and lost, the return of the prodigal son, and maybe even a bloody murder.” She found them all, and what a tale it is.

While she researches many of her, and her husband Larry’s, family members she comes back to and spends the most time on her father, Robert S. Munger, a physician whose first love was art. He had a fascination with death, and the symbolism of the macabre. She wondered if this influenced her work as well, and the further back she dug, the clues began to give her an answer, as do many of her photographic projects.

I enjoyed reading about her discovery process into her family history and the discussion of her own photography. She described over the course of the book how it evolved from the early images of her family – mainly her children, to her beloved southern landscape, and why she was drawn to capturing specific places in the south to include Civil War battlegrounds. Her desire to capture the southern landscape in the historic wet plate collodion process was of great interest to me as I have captured many southern landscapes and I am fascinated with the antique processes of early photography.

Discussing how much she enjoys aesthetic challenges by the “limitations of the ordinary,” it was refreshing to read such a successful and well-known photographer reveal personal fears about her work. She said, “…I get a little panicked when I have before me what the comic-strip character Pogo once referred to as “insurmountable opportunities.” It is easier for me to take ten good pictures in an airplane bathroom than in the gardens at Versailles.” And, this is how she is through the whole memoir; real and honest and oftentimes scared of her own successes.

Reading her stories, I felt a familiar place, something I could relate to as we both have a love of art and antique photographic processes, southern landscapes – the South in general really, and dogs. She does love her dogs as I do. But, I admit, she almost lost me in the end upon telling the story of a dearly departed pet dog…it wasn’t until page 447 of a 482 page book, and it was enough to give me pause. I won’t be a spoiler, so you’ll have to read or ask. The book was a fast read up to this point, and then it came to a screeching halt for me, but, that’s okay; I finished and thoroughly enjoyed her journey.

Her earlier comment reminded me of a wonderful Pogo cartoon that I had not thought of in years… I’ll share the link here, certainly a wonderful blog for another day.

My life has gone to the dogs. Well, I guess it’s been that way for a while. Now that I really think about it, my entire marriage for starters! We’ve always had dogs, generally two or three at a time. They get old, and slow down, and we love them for their personalities, character, that sweet and gentle way they place a head in your lap, and give a kiss. Then, we’ve had puppies and woefully say, “This too shall pass.”

This is where we are right now – two slightly older girls ranging from 2-3.5 years old, in human years they should be in their early 20s. They still like to chew, wrestle, play pretty hard, and destroy plants. I’m not sure I know too many 20-year-olds that like to do that, but okay. And then there is this 10-month-old…monster? Seems that’s been the word of the day for me this past week.

Randy was out of town for six days – lucky guy – and I stayed here with the pups. Brooks, our 10-month old Dalmatian realized pretty darn quickly that I’m not his daddy, and I’m no alpha. Really? Did anyone out there ever think I was an alpha? Brooks decided to go on a holy terror spree and drive me crazy. Starting with the wall in the upstairs hallway. He chewed a hole right into it. So, yes, I was upset but proceeded to show my own handyman skills and purchased some drywall compound and got to work. I even added the texture inherent in the original wall (this house is vintage 1978). Later I’m sitting at the bar (no, not a real bar unfortunately, my kitchen bar…should have been the corner bar down the street) and what do I hear…chewing. In the same #$@% spot! So, with everything I could muster I pulled that heavy 60lb puppy (8 year old child if you do the dog-to-human calculator) up those stairs and in my deepest, strongest, meanest voice I could muster I said, “NO!” and he trotted off wagging his tail. (My PPCC students are currently sending out LMAO texts at the very moment of reading this – deepest, strongest, meanest voice…yea, right!)

Really, wagging the tail? Can’t you at least bow your head in shame and give me that? Just a moment of surmised authority, a momentary glimpse of alpha status? Nope, on to the kitchen, lapped up a bit of water and out the back door to find something else to destroy.

Here’s a little more of that doggie destruction, but this is “okay destruction.” That’s what toys are for, right? I’ve collected this wonderful arrangement of heads. Yes, heads that no longer have their cute, cuddly, stuffed, colorful bodies. Sometimes, every bit of stuffing removed to just a flattened shell of a once squishy cartoon character. Or, just the crown of a once tall, proud, rubber chicken that wore a cool leather jacket! I even have the head of a snake from a toy maker that made the “indestructible dog toys” list. So, what does one do with such a collection? Why, a photography project of course! You knew I’d get around to photography at some point in all this. Consider a fun, off-the-wall project that allows you to cut loose and play. I loved the new texture of our freshly concreted driveway, and the beautiful mottled light coming through the trees on a sunny afternoon. Each time the wind blew the tree branches; it looked like a moving stage spotlight! Too much fun!

And, to the dog toy makers out there, if you want to test your toys and ensure they make the indestructible list, send them to my house. We’ll decide if they get that honor. I don’t think so!