gabriel biderman ~ fine art photography

Saturday I fly out to Austin for the infamous South by Southwest Music and Film Festival (SXSW). I attended this festival last year with Amy and Angelia from B&H.

Boy, did we have fun!

Awesome live music, Nuclear Tacos, Salt Lick, movie theaters that serve beer and food… basically everywhere you turned, there was something trendy and fun to do.
So I pulled out the SXSW ’06 photos to relive, recharge, and get ready! The images were taken with a recently acquired, high end, point and shoot, ‘no zoom’ camera called the Ricoh GRD.

The folder I found them under was titled Food and Fun in Austin. I kept coming back to this photo. This was the fourth, and last, shot of these roof-top hipsters I took. It was easy to shoot incognito with the little Ricoh. I can’t wait to hit the scene again.

Stay tuned and get ready for the best BBQ review to date: the Salt Lick.

I’m not a flower guy.
I just wanted to get that out of the way first!

Friday afternoons I get off work at 1pm. Do I go to the Armory Show to get inspired by amazing photos or do I go home to create some? Well, a good friend and fellow photographer, Andre Costantini (who works for Tamron), just happened to stop by. He lent me one of the best macro lenses ever made – Tamron Telephoto SP AF 90mm f/2.8 Di Macro Autofocus Lens.

When I got home, the diffused light in the house was looking good. The paper whites, or narcissus, that Nancy always plants at the beginning of the year were in full bloom. It was settled – Macro assignment!

I’ve always liked macro photography and all of those digital ‘point and shoot’ cameras do a damn good job with that little flower icon feature. However, nothing beats a dedicated macro lens on an SLR camera! With a macro lens you get a 1:1 ratio, or lifesize reproduction, of your subject matter. You can move in super close to your subject and really select your focus. I chose to compress the depth of field and limit my focus from 1-2 mm.

I love how the green stem in the distance of the first image becomes so delicate. I shot for over an hour, with the slightest adjustments in focus, producing totally different images. The Tamron Macro Lens really was a joy to work with and a whole new way to interpret the world. I’m gonna have to think really hard about giving it back to Andre!

Wait a minute, maybe I am a flower guy after all.

dang!

Which baby do you like?

This is my little nephew, Ollie. I took these pictures on a recent trip to San Francisco. It was a week before his 1st Birthday and we had some serious guy bonding to catch up on. Lucky for me, Ollie likes cameras. He was very intrigued, as most people are, when I put the Lensbaby 3G on my Nikon D2Xs camera and moved in close. For those of you not familiar with what a Lensbaby is and does, it is pretty simple. A Lensbaby is a specialized lens that you can buy for any SLR camera, cameras that have interchangeable lenses, and it creates a sweet spot while defocusing the surrounding area. Lenbabies can add a very dreamlike quality to your images, and can be very addictive, as they open new doors of creativity…new ways of seeing. As a photographer, I can definitely appreciate that.

So my question to you readers is which picture do you like best:
Ollie eyes closed? As we try to figure out his thoughts and dreams…or
Ollie eyes open? The recognition of something/someone familiar…

Music: I have been waiting for some new inspiration in the music world; ie hitting the shuffle button on my ipod a lot. I did see a great 8 piece local band, Balthrop Alabama, last Sunday at Bait & Tackle. Their lyrics are full of humor, irony, and heart. Plus their Irish accordionist kicks ass. Their music reminded me a bit of a honky tonk They Might Be Giants meets Iron & Wine. Check out their website and download their new album for free.

Movies: Pan’s Labyrinth could be one of my most visually favorite films in the last few years. An amazing mix (labyrinth) of reality and fantasy that was so suspenseful it had Nancy clutching my arm from start to finish. Plus he really likes bugs.

Books: The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer: Close Encounters with Strangers by Eric Hansen. Don’t be fooled by the title, this is an amazingly spiritual book. Given to me by my pops, this collection of stories give new meaning to the word “journey” and shows by example how to truly travel with humankind

Photography: I have been a big fan of table top tripods that are not limited to the table and have loved my compact Ultrapod 2, however, the newly released Gorillapod series of tripods attaches to almost anything. Joby makes 3 different sizes of these cute, not cuddly, Gorillapods, I’ve used them all and I have to say that I finally found the perfect one for me! The Gorillapod SLR Zoom holds a whopping 6lbs of camera goodness almost anywhere you go. See the below picture of my Zero Image 6x12F pinhole camera attached to a tree in upstate New York. I highly recommend using a cable release or the self timer in your camera when it is attached to the Gorillapod as some immediate shake can happen from depressing the shutter. There is no doubt about it, tripods open up a creative door to photography. They help you increase depth of field, create long exposures, and immediately give you street cred. Find the right Gorilla for you and let the fun begin!