d._kevin_gibson

"I too am think the work of Nachtwey is exceptional - His work in Indonesia and the work in Chechnya are quite good. I am interested to find out more D. Kevin Gibson's missive about 'war porn'. How about it? Care to enlighten us as to how your arrive at that description? I am truly interested."

Nachtwey (along with others) consider themselves not really to be war photographers, but rather anti-war photographers. There seems to be a belief held that their (oft times horrific) photographs bear witness and will ultimately make a difference - change things. Yet there is little or no evidence that this ever happens. As someone once said - hoping that war photography will stop war is like hoping pornography will stop the abuse of women (which is in part where the phrase "war porn" comes form - though it has a simpler more visceral meaning. As nice and sincere a guy as Nachtwey might - he and has (often brave) compatriots are often addicted to this form of work. In many senses the "I hope it makes a difference" statement is in good part a justification for them to keep doing what they are driven and obsessed to do. They are doing it because they enjoy doing it, get paid to do what they enjoy and, in the end result, the pictures look great.

Which arrives at another strand of the "war porn" issue - these photographs printed beautifully and presented either on the gallery walls or in luscious big "coffee table" books. Art, decor, coffee table books... maybe the pictures show up first in Time or The Sunday Times or whatever - in between pieces on celebrity news, read over a morning coffee while we move on to the homes and lifestyles section or the business report. A little moment of mea culpa, self flagellation, our society is so terrible isn't it dear - then we move on.

In the end result they almost never change anything - but they certainly are beautifully photographed and look lovely on the gallery wall (btw Delahaye is the current master of this, now he has stated his wishes to be known as an artists rather than a photojournalist - and his photographs of Taliban dead are printed several feet wide and sell for high gallery prices...).

Call me cynical - I've been to war and experienced it first hand. None of the pictures I ever saw of it a) came close to the reality or b) changed any of it.

For a slightly softer approach would be the sentimental voyeurism that Salgado has been accused of:

"Of course his photographs are exploitative. Most good photojournalism is. As Cartier-Bresson once said: ''There is something appalling about photographing people. It is certainly some form of violation. So if sensitivity is lacking, there can be something barbaric about it.'' Mr. Salgado chooses to sentimentalize his subjects -- all those beautiful children staring back at us and smiling despite their horrific conditions -- to avoid seeming barbaric and to demonstrate his sensitivity toward them. He is conveying some essential faith in humanity, too; in that respect, his work is sentimental voyeurism and unabashedly manipulative (but not hectoring, which is important). And that is why people respond so strongly to it, for better and worse... Michael Kimerman (who ultimately tries, unsuccessfully, to debunk this)

Beautification of tragedy results in pictures that ultimately reinforce our passivity toward the experience they reveal..." Ingrid Sischy

"I'm partial to James Nachtwey." gotta love that war porn - on which note (though he works little at it these days) I am still in awe of Don McCullin.

As for others? If you are talking of still living/working - Sternfeld, Misrach, Peress, Towell, Lynne Cohen, Shore, Basilico

Of the past and gone - Atget and Evans

I came across this commentary on Pinkhassov which feels pretty close to the mark:

"Pinkhassov's images come across as restrained and analytical. He takes risks, albeit measured, and is frequently pushing the envelope in terms of form. He has heavy Modernist leanings, but of a post-apocalyptic nature.

Look at the universe he has created in the wunderkammern of his cameras. The colors are intelligent, and often disaffected emotionally.. There seem to be hints of Cubism and many near-abstractions in is work. Human interactions are rare, and almost always related to the perfunctory and typical ones related to consumerism. People often look alone and isolated in the crowd, lost, not in thought, just lost. Many have their identities truncated by framing, others by light and shadow. There's a touch of sanitized Blade Runner in his cities, a hint of Constructivism, and these are counterpointed by the dissolving effect of reflections.

His is a stark, dystopic vision, where people are caught in a trap of their own making. It is a failed Modernism, one without hope, reduced to a commercial/intellectual exercise....a simulation of its former self. In a very odd way, the work reminds me more than a little of Robert Adams, but in a far more analytical, less passionate/detached, less humanist vein."

jonathan - are you familiar with the book Austerlitz?

Although it may perhaps be the opposite of what you describe as your working method, it strikes me there may be a similarity of apprach in the way you use your writing and your photogoraphic style.

(I also happen to think Austerlitz is one of the more important books of the last few years - certainly a very evokative document - especially so in it's use of word and image).

"If any of you had lived here for a long time you would know that most of the images that are supersaturated as so because IT LOOKS THAT WAY!. I have stood in front of glowing rocks that looked like they were 4000deg. Mesa Arch comes to mind as a prime example. you can reach out and touch a piece of rock that looks unreal and in 2 minutes it is gone."

I think that is part of the issue - that's 2 minutes - what about the other 99% of the time. All we seem to get are these so called highlights. No one seems to bother exploring what can be done outside of the time (perhaps Friedlander, maybe Misrach) - which may well be more interesting at a sustained level?

"must say though that most people come in the absolute worst season photographically speaking"

Again - what is the "worst season"? What does that mean? Surely there is no worse season for photography? If one can only make photographs when the light is pretty, that doesn't really say much

"Aren't images from both locales enhanced the same by the same film?"

Again - enhanced? why does it need enhancing? What is wrong with exploring it perhaps more closely to how it is, un-enhanced, un-prettyfied - it's much easier to photograph the abnormal, the unusual, the overly dramatic. It is possibly much harder and usually more interesting to find what is there in the undramatic, even the ordinary. It's what we more often just walk by and ignore. I have a feeling that this is what is at the heart of(the perhaps tongue in cheek) criticism of the Fuji Velveeta "look" - it is the need to enhance, punch up, dramatize rather than seek something deeper. Plato's critique of colour was that it was mere surface - superficial - he said like paint on a statue or makeup on a prostitute. To him line and form were more substantial. These photographs seem to fall into that trap. A more subtle, perhaps truer and more skilful approach to colour, one with a deeper understanding of colour beyond just the cosmetic, might reveal more substance.

Actually I rather like them - a nicely ironic, tongue in cheek use of typical portrait studio kitsch to emphasise the smiley, plastic Mr Nice Guy feeling of both the article and the whole "real life" event of politics in america - high kitsch at its best.

Even online they certainly look like LF to me - possibly even a wider lens - I really like the look you get for portraits using a 250mm lens on 8x10. Though these are probably something longer - or Kerry's chin would have looked like something out of Harry Potter - you can't push irony too far into caricature.

I'm guessing the cut-outs aren't showing on the online version as opposed to the print? Either way, the cut-outs would be on the top and bottom of the two longer sides - so you would normally have two on the right with he horizontal format - top and bottom. But if the Ad flipped them or the photographer is left handed, they could also be on the left... Where are they on these?

(P.S. rather like A. Adam's for landscapes, Karsh is really the high priest of a sort of romantic/nostalgic studio portrait kitsch)

Here you go:

http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/v26/msg01289.html

actually, he got the Linhof tech and the Noblex later...

A friend of mine got one and didn't like it in the end (and felt it was somewhat overpriced as well).

While it was well made, he felt that in the end the concept didn't work. The complete lack of movments etc really lost the pint of using 4x5 in the end , for him. After a short while he sold it.

He previously used a Graphic (which he still has and uses) for some hand held "street" type photogorpahy, as well as a Rolleiflex and felt the Littman really didn't offer any great advantages over either in the end. Basically, it sounded good on paper, but in reality he didn't find the concept worked - especially at the price.

He's now moved on to a Noblex.

I'll se if I can find the post he wrote about it.

7-8lbs for the Benbo, depending on the model

http://www.photobooksonline.com/gear/benbo.html

http://www.patersonphotographic.com/tripods/benbo.html

uni-loc

http://www.uni-loc.co.uk/

twist it like a pretzel to whatever setup you want - though dependant on the weight of the camera (the only prople with the F1 is it is so top heavy and unweildy comapred to a similar Arca Swiss say). And setting up the tripod at first can feel like wielding an untamed set of bagpipes... But especially if used low and wide, these may well do the job. They aren't the most rigid of tripds (though fairly rigid) but they are the most flexible. I've had the standard classic for 20 years and at least a couple of times or so a year it's the only tripod that lets me get a particularly awkward job get done.

They are also cheaply priced for what is a good tripod.

The majestic will probably support a small Japanese car hanging off one side, but will require a Humvee to carry it....

this was the sort of Mapplethorpe I was talking about, for example

http://www.photography.net/assets/duplicate1/maple005_Hnew.jpg

is that what you were looking at?

Yes, and of course Jock Sturges - an absolute master, working in 8x10 B&W and colour

Don, do you mean only the sort of faux romantic painterly look?

Otherwise, I'd second Mapplethorpe, among others. There are actually lots and lots of folk shooting nude "very tasteful but sexy portraits of women" out there in at leats 4x5 and some in 8x10. The main problem is, most aren't really done that well that anything draws you to a particular image, and rather like a lot of landscape photogorpahy, much is merely copies of (insert... Weston, Cunnigham or whoever) rather than inspired by and building on the work of....

That is, there is lots of "classic" nudes still being photographed, but little of it does it any better then the best that's already been done.

btw - this is one of my all time favourites<div></div>

"Yeh, but good high resolution drum scans are not cheap - $80 to $100 a pop. And don't let anyone fool you that can get it with a flatbed scanner. Furthermore, scanning with drum scanners is more of an art than a science. I have sent my work to the same lab and have gotten mixed results depending on what individual was doing the scan."

Yes, I'll grant the initial cost of a scan adds to things, but $80 - $100 only if you are getting massive sizes - how big are you printing? And of course, the prints are then repeatable once the work is done to the scan.

"And don't let anyone fool you that can get it with a flatbed scanner."

Again, it depends what you are doing, but I think you'd be surprised. If you are only printing up to 11x14 or so, many flatbeds are just fine, and without taking a loupe to the print, you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference - differences that really don't matter. And if you are scanning 8x10 on a flatbed, it's easy to go up to 20x24 without seeing any noticeable difference in most case. I have gallery prints and prints in collections made from flatbed scans which people (myself included) are completely happy with. As they say, it all depends.

"Furthermore, scanning with drum scanners is more of an art than a science."

Well so is Ilfochrome printing, and even R type printing - I think I got many more bad prints than good over the years from either process. Skilled operators/printers has always been a requirement.

Really, the detailed controls that Photoshop allows in colour now - details contrast masks, all sorts of other colour control, saturation and hue control masks allow you far rt better and more detailed control over the process than almost nay of the traditional printing methods. It takes colour to a completely different level (of course, there are still very few photographers who really know and understand colour, so maybe it's not important!)

"It simply doesn't get any better than this...

http://www.radekaphotography.com/"

well... as nice as they are, I think it does actually.

(btw, if I see one more swirling motion times exposure of running water there's a good chance I might gag!)

Michael, you really might want to do a search on the archives on Ken Hough in that case then.

He seems to have a double sided reputation going by past discussions.

Excellent workmanship and oft times very helpful, but periods of inexplicable delays (perhaps cofounded, by his own admission, by various life crises?).

Anyway, while many people seem to have been very happy with the work he has done, many have also been verry frustrated by the delays. That said, most people seem to have got their camera back in the end...

I think most people found they have to be persistant with the phone calls and emails if it gets to that stage.

Just do a search on here for "Ken Hough" and you'll see the cross section of responses

Yes, it's quite easy by comparison to put together a message-board for very

little

money. But that's not all that photo.net is. Tha'ts only a fraction of what

photo.net is,

and it's why funds are needed to keep it going, and one source of funding is

ads."

Ha haa - it doesn't need the funds to keep it going - there are hundreds of extremely good, extensive sites on the web with lots of bells and whistles run for free by volunteers. Photo.net needs the funds to help it turn into a very profitable business - in part based on the free donations of it's contributors. That has always been the plan.

"I don't mind an ad or two if they help pay for the website, but I thought that was why I sent a $25 contribution in this year - to avoid ads."

Ha - you got suckered. There's one every minute. You sent $25.00 to provide cash flow to help out with someone elses business plan. Simple as that.

So now there is some link to google? Could be fun, maybe it's a Leica take over. One of the head honchos at google runs his own leica list - maybe it's a takeover... :-)

You guys should do what the LF List has done. Like you, they were forcibly relocated here. Now they are back in their own home again - vibrant and lively, civilized discussion, no ads and the LF Forum on photo.net is ever so lame oh. Dead as a doornail.

"IOW you are using qualifiers such as "close enough" and talk about how you

doubt DaVinci or Van Gogh could not have "reproduced" an "identical" piece.

Perhaps you are missing the point, since that is exactly my argument, no matter

how hard you try a hand made object is impossible to replicate identically,

much like a print made in the darkroom. Mechanical reproductions are exactly

the same from one to the next, much like an ink jet print (if no variations are

consciously introduced)."

No - you are completely wrong - mechnical reproduction is nowhere near as mechanical as we would like to think - it depends hugely on the operator/craftsman. A printer who does his job - as was said in another post - with more love for the work, will produced a better inmage - even if he is running off a hundred. As was said early, if it is "simply" mechanical - why does Michael Smith spend so much time money and effort to find the BEST printer for his books? - because it is not "just" mechanical - even when it's someone making 2000 copies of a book for you.

"Your argument is based on the "ease" to reproduce a second or third piece, not

the actual results. Conceivably Van Gogh could have made 100 paintings of

"Sunflowers" the same or "close enough" to use your term if people had

requested them and label them 1/10 etc....I am sure he would have though it a

PITA, but not impossible or improbable and to quote you "close enough to the

same to make little real difference in meaning."

BUT - and this is the important point - they didn't. Now, did Ansel?

"SO I don't get your point, on the one hand you tell me a good printer can make

100 prints that are not the same, but "close enough" (which BTW is a

peculiarity of hand made objects) and on the other hand you are telling me that

the minute variations introduced on each printing should be disregarded in the

case of photography but not in the case of other mediums.....No David, I think

you are missing the point."

Because those 100 prints of Ansel's Moonrise ARE essentially (that is in their essence) identical. They are all copies from the one orignal negative - none of the slight (or even less than slight) variations in the printing make any serious change in the meaning of the image.

"Well folks lets pack everything we are all done here, the only photographic artist in the world is Jerry Uelsmann, since he is the only one using the "element of time and hand" and making decisions under time on how his work is going to come out, the rest of us are craftman. "

Of course not - you forgot David Hockney - his "joiners" do just that :-)

"But wait! could it be that while artist on other mediums make their decisions as they go along we make them before we complete the piece, and photographers are after all artist?....nahh...those actions are no different than those from the guy at Kinkos who slides the contrast lever up or down to make better copies."

That's like Monet saying that what was most important was how long he took arranging the apples in the bowl and setting up his easel - not how he actually painted the apples - which, of course, is as absurd as it sounds.

"Funny tho, when it suits photography is nothing more than a craft mechanically reproduced, but if I am selling ink jet prints photography is an art and it should not matter how it is "reproduced," "content is all that matters"....I am outta here folks, on my way to comp USA to get a coolpix and the other stuff, I always wanted to be an artist."

which of course, we are free to do. It's what we do when we make "limited print editions" or when we say it's a hand-made platinum print, with cutesy brush marks to prove how hand made; or we make 5 foot wide prints, because if it's big it MUST be art etc - but it's marketing. By all means do that - Richard Bateman has made a fortune selling (massive) "limited edition prints" of his "wildlife art" even though it's really nothing more than wonderful formulaic illustration. Photographers have spent a long time trying to convince the art buying world, the museums and the general public that photography is art, so please pay top dollar for it (and all power to them/us for it) - but of course we become all insecure and fight tooth and nail when someone says otherwise. But perhaps true artists aren't always so easy to convince?

Maybe we should just be happy being "photographers" and pursue our work and explore ways to break out of the bounds our medium presents, rather than just doing the same old thing that's been done a thousand times before?

Jorge - aren't you missing the point completely (and I also think you are perhaps not understanding the terminology of "mechanical reproduction" - I come from a background that includes stonecuts and hand printing - but it's still a "mechanical reproduction process" even if everything is old wooden presses and done by hand)?

Most art forms I can think of require the hand of the artist to be at work on the piece of art created, over time - a photograph does not in the same way.

Moreover - the end product of the photographic process - usually the photographic print - is a copy - a "mechanical reproduction" (whether you print it on an enlarger "by-hand" or on an inkjet printer). Any competent darkroom printer can make 100 copies from the same negative and they will all be close enough to the same to make little real difference in meaning.

To use your own example - there is only one Mona Lisa, one David, one "Sunflowers" etc. I doubt Michelangelo or Van Gogh or whoever could have produced an identical copy of them (or would have and considered them "art" and not just a copy). Van Gogh may have painted several versions of his sunflowers, but each one is different and unique and created as such (and even when they seem very similar - we come to the time and hand idea as I have always understood it - Van Gogh obviously chose to give different parts of similar paintings more time in one than in the other - my teacher always told me that "art always requires the thumb and forefinger in it's production" - whether you are holding a brush, a pen or a hammer and chisel).

In contrast each of the many prints of Moonrise over Hernandez is just a copy - perhaps with slight variations, and beautifully made - but they are just mechanical reproductions (no matter how much care and craft was put into each print) of the same image. No other creative art does that, that I can think of?

A good rule of thumb - any work which has to edition itself isn't really art. Do you see the Mona Lisa 6/15? or Poppies, Near Argenteuil 3/45? or even Beethoven-Symphony number 9 (12/26)?

Inkjet print? Ultrachrome? Silver-Gelatin? Platinum? Carbon print? It doesn't matter - they are all copies, mechanical reproductions, not originals. Which isn't to say we shouldn't take pride in our work, but perhaps more as craftsmen/women, artisans - like a potter or a weaver or a printer. We use our creative vision, but it is ultimately limited by the medium we chose to work in. It remains a craft, until we find a way to break out of those limitations in our medium - as has happened vary rarely and occasionally.

"Seeing or previsualization is the skill of being able to do what you just did

now, BEFORE

you take the picture. It can be learned through practicing and lots and lots

of mistakes."

So if that's pre-visualisation then at what stage do you actually get around to "visualising" it...

Pre-visualisation is just a load of bunkum thought up by the zone geeks to try an mystify what they are doing.

It's like saying - "hey I'm just thinking of eating a marmite sandwich - but no, waith, first I'm going to pre-think eating it"!

You don't pre-visualise something - you visualise it.

I understood there were two versions of Velvia 100 in Japapn - 100 and 100F, with only the latter coming to the West.

BTW I recently shot some 4x5 sheets - quite nice, stronger saturation, but not overly so - certainly not as much as in 50. More shadow detail, but not as much as the E100G I was shooting side by side with it. Probably about the same as Provia 100 (which I happen to detest..) - "nicer" colours than Provia, but a touch more contrasty.

http://www.sallymann.org

not her homepage though - at least I hope not - if she's using those yukky colours and cutesy fonts she's definately dropped down in my estimation...

"There are lots of very well known fine-art and commercial large-format photographers with web-sites. They don't seem to have a problem with their work being viewed on the web, in the limited sRGB color space."

I'm having trouble finding the personal websites for Gabrielle Basilico, Joel Sternfeld, Sugimoto, Stephn Shore, Geoffrey James, Robert Adams, Andraes Gursky, Nicholas Nixon, Richard Misrach, Jock Sturges, Thomas Struth, Lynne Cohen and Sally Mann - could you point me to the URL's?