Category: Pinhole

The f295 21st Century Opening Weekend!

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The f295 kickoff last weekend was a huge success!  Thanks to the over 150 people who came out to Saturday night’s 21st Century Photography opening!  The work and vibe must have been reminiscent of Stieglitz‘s old Camera Club openings!  Thanks  also to all that helped put the show together:  the artists who shared their work, The Camera Club of NY who gave their 500 square feet, David, Jennifer, and Amy on the B&H organizational end ~ as well as serving up a record amount of kosher wine!  And finally, Tom Persinger, who brought us all together and had one heck of a time trying to make letters stick on walls.

Wondering what camera to document the gallery opening with, I finally settled on using my trusty Panasonic LX-3, which is an advanced digital point and shoot.  The pioneering Panasonic has a little throwback feature, it has a pinhole scene mode!  See, I told you that pinholes were enjoying a renaissance!  For some reason the pinhole mode is limited to 3MP images while applying a vignette and desaturating the image.   I know it would have been better if the lens could have come off to reveal a real pinhole over the digital sensor but hey, I wasn’t going to get everyone to stand still for 5 hours for the group shot! All the images on the left were taken in this “pinhole mode” while the right hand side shows the packed house for Sunday’s presentation at the B&H Event Space.  For the second straight year over 80 people showed up to listen and learn about new ways to use older technology.

We all struggle with keeping our art and life fresh and new.  For photographers the terms wedding, portrait, landscape, pinhole, or even alt process can all pigeonhole and limit our vision.  Tom Persinger asks us to look beyond these stereotypes and empower the 21st Century Photography:

The 21st Century Photographer remains open to the exploration and use of a variety of processes, techniques, and technologies so long as the chosen method(s) most concisely articulate their creative vision. A net result of this paradigm shift is not only complete artistic freedom but also a palpable sense of empowerment. Historically photography has marched down the long path of process obsolescence – one in which new techniques replace old in a continual cycle of progress. In a 21st Century approach, however, control is wrestled from profit driven agencies -corporations, advertisers, and the marketplace all promoting a consumptive photographic model- and given to the artist/photographer. By virtue of taking the responsibility of control, photographers allow themselves to use a pastiche of tools and materials to make pictures. It is this freedom -which is new for many- that empowers and fuels the 21st Century Photographer.

Photography is a toolbox with many means to express your vision.  Some people choose one, others need multiple instruments to complete the vision.  This weekend I saw art that was in jars, painted on, waxed, dyed, and printed on anything from the latest digital technology to handmade emulsions on a variety of surfaces from tin, glass, and paper.  The photograph that I submitted in the show was originally a 6×9 slide.  I was deciding between two basic ways to present my print:
1.  Drop it off at a lab and have them make a negative copy of my positive slide and then a C-print
2.   Scan the slide and print at home on inkjet.
Now, my good friend and constant conscience, David Brommer, stood aghast when I told him that I  I was leaning towards the lab option;  mainly for convenience as I am still not 100% confident in my inkjet printing.  I’m still most at home in the B&W darkroom.  But he reminded me that I had to control the final outcome of my image.

And really, it is all about the process ~ from start to finish.

Now did I enjoy spending close to an hour digitally removing dust from my image?
No.
Is the excitement the same as flipping over the black and white image in the developer under the red light?
Nope.
But, seeing a project from start to finish is still pretty damn fulfilling.

21st Century Photography

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the sea

For those of you in NYC this weekend, make sure you come to the 21st Century Photography Opening Party on Saturday, January 17th, from 7-9pm at the NY Camera Club located at 336 West 37th Street, Suite 206.
The show kick starts a weekend of inspirational activities by the f295 group with a seminar at B&H the next day.  See my previous blog for the list of amazing artists!

In other good news, one of my Holga images made it into the Krappy Kamera contest that will open at the Soho Gallery in NYC on Tuesday March 3rd!  Now in it’s 11th year, the Krappy Kamera contest received over 1500 lo-fi images and mine was one of 50 selected!  The opening party at the Soho gallery is always a blast, so mark your calenders for that fun event!

Looking for a cool night photography workshop?  Interested in abandoned car graveyards?  Night Photographer extraordinaires,  Troy Paiva and Joe Reifer, are hosting their popular Pearsonville Junkyard Workshop on the full moon weekend of March 7th and 8th.  Now it is in California, but I highly recommend it if you are at all interested in Night Photography and especially Light Painting techniques.  Availability is limited to 10 people so sign up quick!

Finally, I’ve been wanting to blog about this one for a while.  Project Tandem is the story of two young people bicycling across the United States in search for the folks who help make the world go round.  Photographing and capturing audio along their journey, Alan and Morgan are already bringing us the incredibly inspirational stories of the day to day people they meet who make a difference.  Follow their blog and check out the tandem trailer and hopefully share in their story as they will probably be visiting a town near you!

Lensbaby Composer

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Good times are ahead in the world of photography as Lensbaby just revamped their entire line of creative lenses for SLR cameras.  I’ve been a big fan of these quirky looking 50mm lenses that create a sweet spot of focus and selectively defocus the other areas.  They’ve been described as bringing a very dreamy and ethereal quality to your photos and because of their unique look they are always an ice breaker when shooting.

So when my friends at Lensbaby asked me to beta test their latest incarnation, The Composer, I was very excited and had no idea what to expect!  I received it right before my trip to the Oregon Coast.  Not only did Lensbaby create the new lens, The Composer, but they also revamped their entire line by adding the Optical Swap System to all their revised lenses.  Now one Lensbaby can have 4 different effects!  You can easily swap out the standard 2 element glass lens for a more dreamy 1 glass element, or 1 plastic element (more holga-esque), or a zone plate/pinhole element!  Ingenious idea!  The Composer that Lensbaby sent me only had the pinhole/zoneplate optical element, so that is what I’ll be focusing on in this article.  Also please be warned that I used a pre-production beta lens and things might still change by the time you buy yours!

The Composer, is and will be the easiest Lensbaby ever to use.  I have owned all the previous versions, and have demonstrated them to thousands of people at photo events.  It takes most people a week of constant Lensbaby use to get the hang of it.  When you first try a lensbaby it  can seem a bit like juggling while taking pictures, and no one really wants to juggle cameras!  However, the new Composer will eliminate all the intimidation of how to focus as it uses a simple ball and socket configuration to smoothly and selectively focus.  The previous versions, now called the Muse and the Control Freak really need the use of both of your hands to focus, while the Composer can be easily adjusted/focused with one hand by simply tilting the lens to the desired focus/defocus. I found the option to tighten the ball/socket to lock the angle position very helpful.  It’s just like the friction control on a ballhead, you can simply adjust the tension for your tilt.  A barrel focusing ring located at the front of the lens aids in fine-tuning the focus.

The zone plate/pinhole optical apertures are f/19 for the zone plate and f/177 for the pinhole.  For those of you unfamiliar with zoneplates, they look like a black and white bullseye targets.  A zone plate consists of a series of clear and dark concentric rings that have very specific diameters to create the chosen focal length.  These specific targets are shot on a clear based film and then placed over the hole that now becomes the lens.  In the Composer the zone plate/pinhole were placed in a shiftable turret making it quite easy to choose which one you wanted to shoot with by sliding the turret back and forth.  To be completely honest with you, I had The Composer for 4 days and mainly used the zone plate setting, which I found the most interesting and easiest to use.  Remember you are shooting with either f/19 or f/177 so your other choices are raising the ISO or lowering your shutter speeds in order to get the correct exposure.  Sunny days and tripods are a must for using the zone plate/pinhole element though I did find the zone plate shooting to be very hand holdable .  Also, the zone plate was easier to view the focusing in the viewfinder of the camera as it was letting in more light.  I usually set the Composer on infinity focus while shooting pinhole.  I was using a hand held meter for judging exposures though the in-camera meter in the Fuji S5 did pretty accurate job.

The first two images are of the Oregon State Hospital, where the movie One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest was filmed.  Angus and I were given a hot tip that OSH was giving a one day only tour of the J ward, where most of the movie was filmed.  The Oregon State Hospital was built in 1883 and is in dire need of asbestos removal as well as other serious renovations.  The complete and total renovation of the J ward and OSH is to begin later this year and hopefully be complete in 2011.  The top image was taken with the pinhole setting on a tripod and the second image was hand held with the zone plate setting.  Notice the beautiful glow that emanates from most zone plate images.  The Diffraction of the highlights creates a very dreamlike look while still maintaining enough focus to make out details.  The pinhole looks sharp/soft and emulates a plastic lens look without the vignetting.  I personally do not like pinholes on SLR cameras.  I like hand made pinhole cameras or pinhole box cameras as there is usually a more imperfect look to them.  Heavy vignetting and bending verticals are usually what I like to see in imperfect pinholes.  Lensbaby creates a pretty perfect pinhole and I advise utilizing the long exposures that f/177 will give you as well as putting something strong in the foreground to heighten the pinhole effect. I found that the tilting or bending of the lensbaby with the pinhole/zoneplate element did not create any selective focus effects in the viewfinder, so I shot most of my images with it focused straight ahead.  I would like to further test this aspect as it would lead to a truly unique effect.

Besides the Fuji S5 with the Composer, the only other camera I had on this trip was the Wisner 4×5 camera.  So when we were led inside the Oregon State Hospital for the tour, I knew I’d be at a handicap shooting indoors at minimum f/19.  Just like any zone plate or pinhole, a tripod is necessary if you want to shoot indoors.  Outdoors, during the day, the Zoneplate Composer will make you incredibly happy as ordinary objects attain a certain glow.  The sunset Angus and I witnessed at Cannon Beach made my Top 5 Most Amazing Sunsets Ever list and I feel the essence of the memory was accurately captured by the zone plate Composer.

I reluctantly gave the Composer back to Lensbaby as they were preparing to bring it to the biggest photo trade show of the year, Photokina. I can’t wait to use it again as well as try the complete optical swap system. All the new Lensbabies, including the Composer, are due out in about 4 weeks. You can preorder and find out more information at Lensbaby.com or B&H Photo.

Photowalk, Sleepless, and I’m Published!

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Scott Kelby is hosting a Worldwide Photo Walk to celebrate the release of the Lightroom 2.0, probably the best image editing software out there. These Walks are taking place all over the world on August 23rd and I will be leading one in NYC! The Photo Walks are a social photography event to get you out from in front of your computer and behind your camera with a group of like minded folk. Each walk is limited to 50 people, my walk will take us over the Brooklyn Bridge where amazing views of the city and for now, the NYC waterfalls, surround you. We will then meander around DUMBO and end the adventure at the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory where we can share our work and have a scoop or three! The Photo Walks are 2 hours long and if you don’t see one in your city why not sign up and lead one? All the images will be uploaded and judged by Scott Kelby, with the winning image earning the photographer thousands of dollars in cool prizes! Again space is limited; so click here to sign up and find out more info on Brooklyn Bridge walk.

The International Guild of Pinhole Photographers just released Dark Chambers Volume 2, which features 3 of my images in it! These beautiful textured fine art books are each hand stamped and the produced in England. The name Dark Chamber originates from the Latin, Camera Obscura. This latest volume is over 175 pages and features 200+ inspiring pinhole images by 28 artists from all over the world. The book will be limited and produced in a small run. Dark Chamber volume 2 costs approximately $25 plus shipping and can be ordered from the Urban Fox Press website. or by contacting them directly at info@urbanfoxpress.com.

Also pictured is our newly decorated living room. The coffee table is an amazing wedding gift from my brotherman/groomsman, Angus. He created, crated, and accompanied this work of art out to us in April and assembled it in our house… now that’s what we call service! It features a hidden compartment which flips and reveals a ready to play cribbage board! Anyone game? Behind the table is Nancy’s chaise lounge that she has been transporting across the country for 10 years. 3 years ago she finally reupholstered the chaise with the luscious blue velvet fabric. Prior to the chaise, that same blue velvet covered Sandy on the Frozen Hudson seen below.

Pictured on the wall above the table and chaise is “Sleepless” by France Scully Osterman. Nancy and I fell in love with this image at the f/295 exhibit in Pittsburgh. It was a gift for Nancy for her Birthday and our 2 year anniversary. Sleepless is a 44×50 waxed salt print and was limited to a production of nine. This image is beautifully printed using the 150+ year collodion process. This gives it a lush and tonal depth that you can’t keep your eyes off.

Our Gallery Living Room in Brooklyn is open to the public by appointment only, and you better brush up on your cribbage game!

Anniversaries

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Today marks the 2nd anniversary of marriage to my lovely Nancy. I’ve only known her 1/4 of her life but can’t wait to reach the halfway mark! We were married under an arbor and when I came upon this one right outside the Woodstock area I knew I had to capture it. I used a combination of a zone plate and pinhole to take this image. My Zero Image 4×5 camera comes with a turret of 3 zone plates and 3 pinholes I can choose from for exposing. By combining the two “lenses” I was able to get the “glow” from the zone plate while retaining the sharpness of the framework with the pinhole. How much did I pre-visualize? Well a pinhole camera has no viewfinder but I’m used to “seeing” with this camera. I shot low to the ground and towards the sun and knew there would be flare, but the red and green light pouring forth is the most beautiful light I could have asked for.
Happy anniversary Nancy!

June 24th is also Nancy’s 1st anniversary of turning 40. Yes, she did put all her eggs in one basket but she’s a summer solstice baby and we both have strong feelings about midsummer eve. We celebrated the longest day of the year not at a baseball park, but in Upstate New York close to where we were married. During the summer solstice the sun appears to stand still facing the Northern Hemisphere. It’s a powerful day for telling the future as well as discovering true love, which we both are lucky to have. So the second picture featured is a reflection of Nancy taking the plunge! I know they say 40 is the new 30 but in Nancy’s case I’d have to say it’s the new 25! Happy Birthday my muse! You continue to inspire and understand me like no other. Let the summer good times begin!