connealy Posted March 18, 2004 Share Posted March 18, 2004 My inclination as a photographer has always been toward documentary work, and my main tool in this has been street shooting technique. In the late '60s I put together a documentary presentation on New York's Chinatown. The photos were done over a period of a few weeks while I attended a short photo school course in lower Manhattan. The negatives from that are probably long gone. The pictures in my "<a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder? folder_id=219679">Chinatown Hip Shots</a>" folder are reproductions of the remaining prints done with a point-and-shoot digital camera.<br> I basically took a thirty year vacation from photography, and I only got back to it a couple years ago, first with digital, and then back to film with a collection of old folders and rangefinders (plus my 30-year-old Pentax). In the past year I have undertaken a new documentary project using similar techniques as in the first, but this time focusing on the border communities of El Paso and Juarez. Since I live eighty miles north of those towns, I have only been able to work on the new project sporadically. I hope to become more concentrated on the topic soon as my wife and I are becoming more free to travel. I am excited by both the similarities and differences in the communities portrayed in the two projects. At present, my "<a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=328355">on the border</a>" folder is no more than a loose collection of street shots. As I accumulate more images, I feel I will be able to identify a variety of themes as I did with the Chinatown work, and to focus on a few of them which are of interest to me.<br> Comments on my work and my current plan are welcome, but I would really be most interested in seeing what others are up to in the documentary vein. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted March 18, 2004 Share Posted March 18, 2004 The collections you present are interesting and engaging, and if you want to show some connection between them, you might consider a side-by-side presentation of one image from each in a more book-like (or even an online slide show) format. <p> Juarez/El Paso is a frequently photographed area - one of the best documentary works I have seen on it is David Perry's <i>Bordertown</i>, now out of print but available from David at his web site. You can see a selection of images from Bordertwon at <a href="http://www.davidperrystudio.com/">David's web site</a> by clicking Enter/Galleries/Bordertown (Bordertown is the first link in the images at the top). Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
connealy Posted March 18, 2004 Author Share Posted March 18, 2004 Thanks for the link; great bunch of pictures. I'll send off an order for the book in the morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ray . Posted March 19, 2004 Share Posted March 19, 2004 Some nice photos Mike, especially the Chinatown stuff. I guess the most important thing is to just keep shooting! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andrew_somerset1 Posted March 19, 2004 Share Posted March 19, 2004 Mike, I've just started a border project of my own, but on a different border -- the U.S.-Canadian border. The idea is to document what the border divides. No pix to show yet as it's still in the research stage (which is just a pretentious way of saying that I'm just thinking about it and haven't done any real work yet.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gerald_widen Posted March 19, 2004 Share Posted March 19, 2004 Mike some very nice photographs in the Chinatown folder. I like your style, also in the border photos. Too bad the CT negatives are gone. How are the quality of your prints? Maybe if you could get to a flatbed scanner they might show up better for the web. Still very nice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
connealy Posted March 19, 2004 Author Share Posted March 19, 2004 I'll probably run my Chinatown prints through the scanner some day. I may even poke around out in the shed to see if I can find the negs. I'm reluctant to spend much more time on them as I feel I really ought to be moving on thirty years later. It was kind of fun putting the old stuff on line, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now