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© Copyright 2008, John Crosley, All Rights Reserved

Change Can't Come Soon Enough (For This Woman)


johncrosley

Nikon D300, Nikon 70~200 f 2.8 desaturation in in Adobe CS3 using black and white with color channels.

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© Copyright 2008, John Crosley, All Rights Reserved

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Street

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The movers and shakers of Reno, Nevada may be making

Reno 'GREAT' as the sign proclaims, but probably not soon enough for

this woman, sitting at the edge of the construction of what they

call 'progress' -- probably 'progress' for her would be a bed and a place

to put her things safely every night instead of new slot machines and felt

gambling tables with more parking places. Your ratings and critiques

are invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly or very critically,

please submit a helpful and constructive comment; please share your

superior photographic knowledge to help improve my photography.

Thanks! Enjoy! John

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Were you consciously or unconsciously thinking of the Margaret Bourke-White picture from the 30s with the "There's no way like the American Way" billboard of the white family driving in a car while a group of black people were on a line? Thematically, it's very similar.

 

It is a good image, although "it's been done," as they say. Of course, it's safe to say that making Reno great will involve removing people from the streets... preferably to another town.

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With the subtext of discrimination on the Bourke-White photo above, and its diminishment now, and in the context of the Great Depression, this meagre photo cannot hold a candle to the greatness of her photo.

 

Yes, I have seen it and maybe (or maybe not) been influenced by it; my mind however works along the ways of such photographic irony naturally and doesn't need the reminder of her photo to 'see' such irony.

 

This is only a 'moment' in couple of day's shooting, and certainly not my best (as raters have rushed to tell me, but not as bad as the raters have rushed to tell me, either.

 

By the way, the canvas or plastic behind the chain link fence was green -- the sign to her right (our left) was colored and not white, accounting for some unexpected tones, which I tried to 'fix' in rendering this with 'black and white' filter in Photoshop CS3, but it's still a mish-mosh in black and white, but in color you cannot see her features -- she's so black and dark. I had to use shadow/highlight tool on her to bring her features out to be recognizable at all -- which I think was permissible, even if it did have the side effect of 'lightening' her.

 

Otherwise, she was just a black lump sitting there, unrecognizable as a person at all, and more like a lump of coal, and I didn't want to make that my photo. Photographing black people on brightly lighted places under full sunlight or even shade when their blackness is not mixed (as with most North American blacks) is a challenge for the photographer).

 

This is one way to meet the challenge, and not necessarily the best.

 

I appreciate your effort in drawing my attention to the great photo again that you posted above. Any similarity to it and my meagre offering are thematic only, however, not in 'greatness' unfortunately.

 

John (Crosley)

 

 

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I like to post things as I take them, and this was a capture for the day, but it is not a top capture. Nevertheless it is worthy of being shown for a while and placed in a lesser folder, which is where it was intended to go from the start

 

I appreciate that you enjoyed it. Unfortunately I was very visible to the woman in my vehicle on a sweltering afternoon parked across the street from her and she was not involved in other behavior and never would be for me or I would have waited her out. Damn.

 

And nobody for blocks on a sweltering weekend day. (and no wonder, given the chain link fence, etc).

 

I always appreciate your analyses, and they're always thoughtful.

 

Thanks Adan.

 

John (Crosley)

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I never thought of that picture in terms of discrimination. It was a time that was very bleak for a lot of people, and the government was doing its best to put a bright face on a questionable future.

 

I'm sure there were more white people on soup lines in the city than black. To me, it's about promise vs. reality. The photographer was capturing the irony of the situation, as you did.

 

I think you did a great job on the detail here, you caught an angry expression well. She does not look happy with you. The "thank you" on the bag was one of the first things that caught my eye in contrast with the sign.

 

And I'll stick by my statement that she won't be included in what makes Reno great.

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Thank you for the compliment, although she is probably more quizzical since I was some distance away with a 70~200 and she cannot have understood me too clearly since this was one of the first of a burst of shots. I often take a burst with a VR lens since the image will jump around if it is hand held, if the subject cannot be replicated and framing is very important, as here (see the precise placement of the fence pole.

 

I do consider the Bourke-White photo an example of recognition of discrimination, though white folks suffered greatly also in the Great Depression (no white folks in that line but white folk driving that car).

 

And I agree that this woman probably won't be helped much by any gentrification of downtown Reno; things have a way of never working out for such people. She just needs 'three hots and a cot', but probably never will get them, if she even can accept them.

 

Best to you Ray.

 

John (Crosley)

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Another touching scene from you, John ... Your photos makes it harder to rate, as the "emotions" and "mood" factor of your photographs is always 10:10 besides whatever A:O rating that falls under your pictures. My salutes to you, sir ...
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This was a photo that 'had to be taken' after I spied it driving by.

 

I drove around a huge group of blocks with one-way streets and a river just to get back to this point, then parked across the street and stayed there not looking her way, studying and setting my camera, it was the only vehicle parked for a block on a weekend day in this construction zone, and she was very lonely there and isolated.

 

In a sense, this was a 'formula' photo -- one that 'had to be taken' because of the juxtaposition between the word 'great' and her condition with her shopping cart and her sitting there alone in the afternoon heat, but the fencing and the colors of the sign (multi-colored lettering) and the wind barrier (green) behind the fence, screwed up this scene for translation into black and white. Of course the ruined it also as a color photo.

 

I had to fool around in Photoshop CS3 with color channels to get any sort of viewable photo at all, the select the woman and apply shadow/highlight filter to her to lighten her/she was somewhat backlighted and completely black -- nearly racially pure African and that obscured her features and took away the meaning --she looked black as lump of coal. I hated to 'manipulate' this even a little, but it was necessary.

 

Aesthetically, this photo is just OK, in my book and the 1/3-2/3 geometry of the fence pole placement and the sign were essential for even that, and also including some light area below the lower fence line, but I couldn't sit and aim as though I had a tripod, either because of her awareness and sensitivity for her plight and 'being photographed' as an 'oddity'. I wanted to make the capture with as little disruption to her day as possible, but still not miss a good enough photo.

 

It was 'lift camera, with VR on, frame and shoot in two big bursts and watch the framed image jump around as VR first held then released the image from frame to frame as VR will do' sort of shot.

 

I shoot in bursts when I gotta get something, and that is why 'C' drive is valuable for the type of shooting I do, sometimes, but there wasn't much difference among frames, except for the framing.

 

I took several compositional variations in five or six seconds, then put my camera down and drove away, to review my captures a block or so away.

(no sense rubbing it in for this poor woman).

 

She may be the 'star' of this photo, but why rub it in her face. All she saw was five seconds of activity if that, and I was outta there. Whatever feelings she had for that brief period are now long gone as she searches for shelter and food.

 

I am glad this touched you; it certainly is not my best, and I am a little surprised it has drawn the response it has (maybe it;s my long absence after major theft of equipment. . . . . until I got some workable equipment in hand.. . . .

 

It's good to be back . . . at least a little bit.

 

Thanks for the kind words.

 

John (Crosley)

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John, bravo :-) You succeded on doing today something Burke White made then. Tell a story send a message. That it's another thing to live in reality and another thing to live in what they say you live :-) allegory? maybe. success sure
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For me this is decidedly a 'second tier' photo. It has a story and an allegory, sure, but as a photo, it lacks the greatness of Margaret Bourke-White's photo with all its majesty. The mesh fence and the colors of the windscreen plastic behind her didn't help to tell the story either, plus they cut off a view of the construction behind her which would have been instructive, I think.

 

I did an elaborate set of roundabout turns to come back to this situation, knowing that parkede across from her I had only one chance (exposed as I was) to raise my camera/lens combination to shoot her, and took my chances, with my camera's framed view jumping all over the place in this evening capture, due to V.R. first capturing a view then releasing it. I took advantage of that, framing and reframing the capture almost instantly, then quickly moving on, so she might have said to herself 'what just happened here' and 'who was that man?' and finally 'did he actually take my picture' (not numerous pictures as I did, with my camera turned on to 'C' drive as it is when I must get 'one' good one out of a tricky situation.

 

But the tonalities are not good by my view, and the framing is just average, and perhaps not even that.

 

for social commentary and/or allegory it is OK, but as a work of art, it leaves a lot to be desired. I have no qualm with raters on this one.

 

It's posted just because it should be posted because of the antagonism between hte sign and her condition, but just barely so.

 

My best to you Billy.

 

I always appreciate your insightful comments.

 

John (Crosley)

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the problem John is with the visual materials we have in our frame to name this as art. A logical view (and very close to yours) is to say this is not a work of art but rather a story told by a documentary photo. The visual materials here are a) a fence b) a sign and just one poor woman with a trolley bag. Nothing here can consist art in its nostalgic view we see in the masters because nothing THEN had the gruesome appearence of todays structures in the cities. Thats why the most expensive buildings today tend to have that classical style, the oldie feeling...anyway I guess you understand what I'm trying to say.

Its harder today to show something as art cause of the bad way things show up, power lines, dirt, cars all around and things to forget about art...

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You make a good point, but it doesn't help to make a 'great' photo if one has poor visual materials to work from. I try for a 'great' look, like Margaret Bourke-White made with her 'great' - 'absolutely great' and 'iconic' Depression/segregation photo that is shown in comments above.

 

She had a billboard then and billboards are mostly outlawed in most thoroughfares, but still do abound where permitted and are still big business, but no longer dot the Interstates or country highways reminding us of the need for 'Burma Shave' through repeating jingles, snuff or tobacco painted on the sides of barns or gambling in Reno, 'Harold's Club or Bust'!!!!

 

Look at the one I just posted, with a billboard and I think it is visually very, very good, and compare to this one. That one tells a different 'story', and I hope you can figure it out and like the composition, because it's not only about a story but also about composition (and tonalities as well) All in a day's shooting (yesterday).

 

Look and compare and you'll see, I think, the difference between a better photo and one that is just a photo that documents. This one lacks the 'better photo' element and is there only to 'document' and to 'represent' without any claim at being artistic.

 

One can make artistry of old buildings with power lines, billboards and all the accoutrements of neighborhoods, etc., as I think some of my other and maybe older work has shown (or could show). And some modern buildings are second to none (even if few),even if they lack classical detail. Maybe that's what has fueled the post-modernist architectural movement -- the barrenness and utilitarianism of the modernness movement since the building of the famed Lever Bldg in NYC (now torn down for a larger one in its place).

 

Best to you Billy. Thanks for stopping by.

 

 

John (Crosley)

 

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