philmorris

Yeah Dhiren. Cig Harvey's only the second photog I know of who turned the top of a radiator into fine art. Whichs makes her the first female I know of to have done this.

Ask me to think of a photo of a less than saintly santa and this one will always spring to mind. There's no wickedness there. Oh no. On the contrary, he seems a thoroughly likeable guy. Rather the wry smile, mildly cool pose with acoutrement implies a trace of life spent hanging round pool halls and that sort of thing. The predominant message is of comic irony. I've said it before but I'll say it again, your use of the beard as ciggie smoke was a stroke of genius.

 

Happy Christmas Doug.

Thanks. I like it. And I like that a gamble on a 60+ year old camera for just 4.99 GBP turned out such a bargain.

I think it overdone. The viewer is catapulted towards the darkness of her right eye and it is required viewing that right should be compared with left. The two don't balance up like I'd expect them to. They seem out of sequence and detached from one another. From the eyes one travels south. The mouth has similar peculiarities in that the seal of the lips seems jet black to (her) right side, graduating to gray to her left. The result is a somewhat brutal and serated opening through an otherwise soft, full mouth. This I fear damages the aura of purity one is encouraged to experience on an initial viewing, most evident in (her) lower left jaw bone, the bridge of her nose, chalked in eyebrows and the trail of material behind her.

 

I am happy to believe in her unsurpassed beauty but I find I must imagine it. I must overlook the imperfections born of the photograph and resist the pull of the darkened eye. The source of flavour is deceptive then. It's like that mint with the hole.

The negative is indeed rather thin, owing to my having overlooked that the light meter was set to read for ISO400. And the light which fired me up never really reappeared. As a composition I thought I did reasonably well by having the trees placed against sky with lines leading towards their base. But I would tend to agree that there is an air of 'flatness' in the sense that there is a loss of perspective and also the tones do not reach the contrastiness I would prefer (evident in my noticeably over zealous dodging). But I think it an inviting scene, and the best I was able to manage in the 30 minutes I stole from the family. My objective was the trees I recalled seeing in a beautiful photograph by Ron Rosenstock. Flick through his gallery. There's some awesome stuff.

1. I like this picture. I like the simplicity, tone and arrangement etc etc 2. I think the most important aspect of the background is the line created where back wall meets base3. Being finnicky, I'd like that line to be truly horizontal 4. I am aroused by what Dino had to say, because (inter alia)

5. It takes me back to what I said at 3.

For those who wondered in colour.

... an abattoir with rotating knives, to be precise. You sure about the epiphytic branches? I was expecting far more blood to be honest.

I like the white flecks and how they appear either side of the main trunk. I have this urge to balance those flecks more (lower left / upper right) with the main trunk surging through the middle. And owing to this affliction I suffer from, before I'm much older I've designed this square to fit it all in.

Thanks fellas. I reckon I got here a bit too late (like this response eh? - apologies to all). Ideally I'd be photographing the one behind because there's more of that exposed red bark. But the one behind lacked another behind it which prohibited the sort of composition I had in mind and which shows up in this one. The square format does not sit comfortably with photographing a tree as tall as the Wellingtonia. Something like 3 6x17s stitched together comes nearer the proportions. So the picture was a semi-abstract arrangement where the viewer was provided with the texture and colour and allowed to use his/her imagination as to the shape and size of the tree. Plus, I had to get down real low anyway to limit the appearance of that dirty tarmac drive.

Neat book analogy there Dave. Thanks.

 

Thanks Kaspars (aka Alfreds). About that wing, I see where you're coming from. In fact the way the guy positions his right arm one could equally imagine him holding on to a bag of laundry or something.

 

About closeness. May be a little more headroom would be in order. If that bloke entering the bar doesn't duck soon he's gonna crack his nut on the lintel :)

 

About what's in and what's out and if it's in where to put it. I'm pleased to hear you reckon I'm doing OK in that regard.

 

And about my future in photography, so long as I have an eye through which to see I'll also have a camera (famous last words?)

 

Finally, thanks for such a nice long comment. I'm only sorry to have taken so long to reply to you. Sometimes you have to give PN a rest or else it will eat you.

Thanks. The green was very strong. I think had I used Velvia say, the saturation would have choked the subtlety out of the subject.

Thanks guys. I never knew this place existed up until a few months ago. Time before that when I was in here my (then and still right now brand spanking) new missus and I bought our very first ever bit of furniture together. That was 20 years ago. Now look at it. It's even got a funky DJ!

The red splash of clothing does it for me. And to a lesser extent the darker upper and lower bands. Plus the obvious path ahead. But that red is so tempting. So very exciting. That red is a killer. Love it.

The colours threw me too. But what you see is the real article; flat scanned and unsaturated. I was on this crest of a hill with the sun coming in from the right almost horizontally with just a few more minutes to sunset. And after the sun had gone down the colours swung to the muted producing FE2. So neither FE1 or 2 display what you might call ordinary daylight colours. They're both morphs already I suppose.

The XA2 is about 20 years old and doesn't come with auto focus. It's a diddy camera the size of a ciggie packet. I own two and I have one with me at all times. (All times except right now!) One loaded with 400 ASA film for daylight and the other with 3200 ASA rated 800 for night / indoor. Sometimes though I forget to swap over and go out with the wrong camera in my back pocket.

The exposure here is about 2 secs with the camera sat on a beer glass - a handy tripod. Knowing the ass was a-shakin', I didn't focus on it.

That's a cool observation Matt. I remember I confidently let rip on a shot which came across as a model. (You've been the perfect gentleman). I've spent an age researching my comment and have just found it.

 

Here it is..

Thanks for checking out this oldie. As I recall the thinking was to have a post appear like it was and a wall to resemble one. And with everything in the middle to be cradled between the V. May be I shouldn't have burned in the far horizontal wall so much. I can't remember. But I bet my thinking was to give it a top defining edge.

Thanks Julien. The truth is I was photographing a busy ass.

The Holga is light relief from the serious work; never a replacement for it. You could always kick off with the GN model (which compared with most Holga images I've seen is pretty much as close to perfect as they come). Mine cost me 12 GBP or 30 AUD.

The photograph of the woman is beautifully rendered and a pleasure to look at. On the basis it was posed I wonder about the placement of the mirror and how that impacts on interpretation. Held and angled as it is, there is a line over the reflected nostril which serves to suggest it is enlarged. And I think the eye might have been placed so as to reflect fom a less flawed bit of glass. Eyes are important and act as points of focus, so just the real pair of eyes may be preferable in order to avoid over-interest in a reflected eye. Whether to or not would be the photog's call and here the eye is half obliterated, diminishing the connectivity between real and reflected. Intentional?

Then there's the costume. I don't think it's "conservative". Those buttons, poppers, studs, call it what you will, down the sleeve, suggest they are designerly and ornamental. And if that's designerly and ornamental then so is the hood. The hood ain't for hiding in. Those clothes were expensive. There's no backwards clock on the wall or other such symbolism around her or her reflection. Or her expression to suggest we're looking at some time warp illustration. At least none that I can see.

 

More to the point, I see a closer bond between the mirror and the room. The two have more linkage than the mirror and the model; the model seems a stranger to the mirror and the room. Though it is possible to imagine the beautiful, well dressed model has returned (say) to her humble beginnings / alternatively that the viewer is invited to contemplate her future surroundings. But in either case how might that be convincing, based upon the material in the picture?. Nothing of the model's expression overtly suggests that she herself is in a contemplative frame of mind. Her expression (to my way of thinking) suggests her head is empty / alternatively concentrates on empty in order not to wrinkle her perfect complexion.

 

I like the bright right edge for it reveals the light source. May be a black core matt board? Just be careful not to matt it in pure white. My only disappointment is the presence of the tiling in the lower left corner, viz, the dark grouting. I'd sooner see something peeling, or more honestly, an area of nothing particularly recognisable.

 

So I interpret the picture as simply a model holding a mirror to her face because she was asked to by the photog, that the photog intended as much and that we should therefore view the picture literally without narrational connectivity between model and mirror. Just get off and how fine it looks in light and shade. It's a well produced picture of a girl. And she's a goodlooker.

 

Incidentally I think this far superior to the colour version. The colour version lacks the window shroud shielding what might be a private moment.

Thanks again Colin. Well cock ups and disasters certainly do add. I wouldn't have it any other way. So long as you can see something.

 

Funny you should mention your attraction to pre-war cameras, coz 6 months or so ago I got myself a Voigtlander Bessa 6x9 folder circa 1931. I was delighted with the camera, particularly that it came with the orginal 6x4.5 mask, which caused me to figure it had come from a good home. I thought I could safely trust it to be a good boy. The only defect was that it didn't shut tight. So instead of putting it to bed at night I'd lock the bellows open and display it upright on a shelf for peeps to see and allow myself the pleasure of gazing at it longingly from the other side of the room as well as close up.

 

This is where the cock up comes in. Coz (I subsequently learnt) every other visiting bugger was attracted to the camera. Only they got a bit too close up and didn't limit themselves to just gazing longingly. For reasons I can now well understand, they imagined the camera was purely ornamental and thus amuse themselves with all the levers and knobs. May be cock the shutter. May be take a sneaky look inside. May be try the winding on lever.

 

The camera requires a guestimate for distance and of the first six pics I'd shot carefully measuring distance with a range finder, selecting aperture and shutter speed, waiting for light to match my previous reading; all that had been in vain. My mates (actually mainly my wife's mates' dozey husbands) had thoroughly knackered the first roll.

 

So the camera's still on the shelf. But sans film. And I've nothing to show as of now. though this litle discussion has served as yet another reminder. So watch this space.

 

Thanks John. I was looking forward to your hopefully paying a visit. They're fun inexpensive tools and I thoroughly recommend the way you can use them with an almost empty head; thinking only of suitability of subject.

ta very much

Peter you're most welcome. Please be my guest.

Hi Behel. See how that top left window makes a wonky dash for the corner? The sea sickness effect is achieved by throwing a large bucket of water at the camera during exposure :)