aplumpton

<p>Hi Skip, WD-40 is a penetrating solution. I don't know what other gunk is already inside, but what David and I mention is a solution meant to attempt to remove it.<br> But I cannot answer your question directly. Hopefully someone here has already crossed that bridge and can answer it. </p>

<p>Someone once said that responding positively to a work of art is strongly related to our latent desires or our past experiences and which the work of art triggers while viewing it. Perhaps it is the same feeling as that of the artist or photographer who is strongly moved by a subject or his perception of it. It is indeed like Joel Meyerovitz's recognition of beauty in a partial glance at a woman who appears briefly before disappearing yet interacts strongly with his inherent concept of what is beautiful or what is desired. I think that those situations allow a great freedom and can induce creative response, even if the pieces fit partly into an accompanying pattern of determinism that we have to burden.</p>

<p>As there is nothing inside that can be contaminated by oil (like optics or electronics) why not try a thin lubricating oil like WD40 (used sparingly) to see if it will help. It might seep into the part of the ball not visible and loosen any rust or dirt that might be causing the stiffness. </p>

<p>I don't add everything to my PN portfolio, but in regard to my overall "oeuvre" or home based portfolio, I guess it is around a hundred retained images each year. It would be nice to shoot a subject each day, but my time for photography is less regular than that, although I tend to photograph during a half or full day which means a dozen or more images. I imagine that doesn't differ all that much from others who are not full time photographers.</p> <p> </p>

<p>Or an October foggy morning this year in a neighbouring riverside village </p><div></div>

<p>Leslie, here is one from a few days ago, autumn in a local public space (as my next two days are otherwise occupied). </p><div></div>

<p>Fred, you speak of emotional response in viewing an abstract image (my italics) "Whether the photo is big blocks of shapes, or series of random lines and slivers, or amorphous textural meanderings, my seeing those <em>leads to an emotional reaction</em>. Colors themselves, without being part of a representational picture, have emotional effects on us."</p> <p>An abstract image is often intended on a mainly intellectual (that part of it which is non-emotional) level, being a construct that resolves a spatial problem or creates a harmony or equilibrium of various building elements (colour, forms, space, etc.).</p> <p>You do not address that. Do you not think it important? Do you not accept that abstract images can exist without emotional content but simply create other intellectual qualities?</p> <p>Of course, you may choose to consider everything presented as an intellectual exercise will evoke some emotional reaction, like that of feeling (experiencing) some emotion upon denoting beauty in a non-representational image. Creating emotion in the viewer's mind is I believe not always the objective of abstract art. The image itself is independent and exists as it is, often with no intent or property to generate emotions. Some cry upon hearing a music of Back or Strauss or Britten. Others may assimilate what they hear much like a mathematician considering the form of a complicated construct, well before he or she is in a position to react emotionally to the result of it (or of a Bach fugue, or the Strauss poem written in Germany while war rages around him).</p> <p>We are known to react to images by relating them to our own experiences. Those, of representational nature, are often associated with emotion. The abstract image is less well equipped to seek that response, and I think mainly exists without that need (or "albatross", in some cases).</p>

<p>I think it was Freeman Patterson in one of his books who said that some of the most interesting pictures he made were within his own backyard, at different times under different weather and seeing what is there rather than just looking.</p> <p>Mostly I leave the "looking" part to my occasional tourism vacations, where I have more interest in seeing and living what is different rather than in merely photographing it. I've just completed the first phase of a "sense of place" or "spirit of place" series on my beautiful local community, in which I have researched images within a 10 mile radius of where I live. There is plenty there to see and to allow creative photography for a lifetime, ultimately of more satisfaction than "wow" nature or landscape images from faraway places, or even those captured from the recognized monuments of my country' tourism.</p>

<p>Many are technically very strong, others unique moments of capture, each laudable quests, but most appear to be too perfect, aseptic, over focussing on detail, and lacking enigma. No doubt that was in many cases their purpose, but I feel there is something more to be said for more imperfect and casually natural images.</p>

<p>Clive, good luck. My own long standing heritage house restoration has no fixed finish date, which accommodates a bit of time for occasional photographic follies. As long as there is a roof over our heads,....</p> <p>Robin, yes, previsualising benefits from more than just perfect equipment, and the chance is usually there to work around any small shortcomings in that regard. </p>

<p>If two or more mechanical levels are in agreement with each other and disagree with the electronic level, I would tend to put more faith in the former and seek to calibrate the camera level.</p> <p>A level will not assure you of minimal so-called perspective distortion when using a very wide angle lens. Better to position your camera at an optimum point to minimize that and to trust your eyes in interpreting the play of receding lines of linearly contained surfaces.</p> <p>The same practice holds for horizons that you can alter the placement of visually by your point of view, while remembering that many but not all horizons are horizontal.</p>

<p>Anders, just to clarify, the comparison was not of the quality of the works of Bach versus Chiarenza, but simply the question of the number of works, which seemed to be what you were referring to. I imagined, without going into detail, that you would have understood that distinction.</p>

<p>Anders, my apology if I misquoted your appreciation. I just wanted to show my enthusiasm for seeing abstract photography that I thought (subjective opinion, of course) applied well the concepts of abstract art formalism, at least to the limited extent that I can appreciate them (I sold abstract art at my seasonal gallery for ten years and questioned the artists).</p> <p>Abstractions can of course be done with or without those formal qualities. Not sure what you meant about the quantity of production of someone like Chiarenza who was apparently active over several decades. J.S. Bach's BMV list is also quite extensive (several hundred compositions).</p>

<p>Carl Chiarenza's works (I have looked only at his 1970 folder to date) are to my mind the most successful abstract photography cited or shown to date.</p> <p>His balance of light and the various elements of composition is first rate and convincing and many of the images also have a rare capacity to evoke curiosity and emotions of pleasure. Abstact art formalism applied with a fine sense of beauty. I would go well beyond Ander's appreciation of very good.</p> <p>Julie, perhaps you feel that I have avoided your questions, but I am quite happy with the postulates of my answers and think they may represent the Achille's heel (in addition to lack of abstract art formalism) in many of the attempts to make abstract photography.</p>

<p>Julie: "Does it make a difference that other forms of art start from non-figurative, non-illusion and have to struggle to get to figurative/illusion; while photography starts in figurative/illusion and has to struggle to escape from it? A viewer's starting assumptions about photography are different from those of other forms of art. So?"</p> <p>Q.1 Many painters seem to use photographs of a subject or paint on its site, thus their creation is based at least in part on figurative input. If we are talking about abstract painters (thus not aiming at a figurative result) as I assume you really refer to, they would seem to have little need for figurative input, except in some cases where they may be inspired by it to some degree (or some aspect of it that will be completely transformed in anon figurative work. I agree that an abstract photography approach has to escape from the impulse to render the creation figurative, if only because it is based on figurative elements which are difficult I think to render non-figurative, or by doing so a liberty of expression may be compromised (wallpaper type images that seek tension or punctum through other elements, play of light or material).</p> <p>I think that abstract photography seems to be doomed to creating works of hybrid nature, figurative versus abstract. Nothing wrong with that, and it probably works to advantage in some cases.</p> <p>Q.2 I think that a viewer seeking an expression of art comes to a photograph in the same way he or she would consider a painting or other art form. Formalism in art transcends media.</p> <p>Not sure I am adding anything or responding to your questions, but I must leave for a while. My local figurative reality in these northern climes suggests that I had better get out quickly and buy a new plastic vestibule now shelter for the main entrance. The white stuff is not far off, waiting to blanket the environment and facilitate Chinese style winter images and Yugen minimalist compositions. I almost added that I hope you do not receive an early winter next week, but then restrained myself from such abstraction. </p>

<p>Maybe some of the photojournalistic approach of Lirolla is embedded in the well-worn and well used camera. The photos of the former owner however (excellent transfers from color to B&W) seem more convincing though and worth a visit to his site. Jacobsen is certainly a positive spokesman for Leica, possessing many of the modern jewels of optics and cameras of that company. The M9 has become like the M2 of its day the basic workhorse of the Leica photographer. I wonder to what degree the aspherical 50mm or M240 Safari or M260 have added value to his photography? <br /><br /></p>

<p>The reputable seller in question in Japan is Astrosmith22 and their site (Sakai Camera) has several hundred cameras, but maybe not the Bronicas you are looking for. Maybe worth checking though or asking questions of him. </p>

<p>Fred's examples (except perhaps the image of O'Keefe, but please read on) and that many other "abstract" photographs are simply composites of two elements that the viewer responds to, the (what one may term) abstract and figurative elements. One or the other may be predominant, but both act on the viewer.</p> <p>Purely abstract does exist, and more easily in painting than in photography I think, but I wonder if not all photography is a priori and unequivocally abstract, as it's figurative or other elements are not as the subject was at the time of viewing (who can claim to accurately capture a figurative subject, even a microscope image)? They will never exist again as captured, are history once they are made, and are evidence of only a minute slice of historical time, hence only fractionally representative. The subject and its photographic image are divorced from each other. Perhaps we might say that the purpose of the photo is to render a subject in a figurative or even abstract sense, although the product of photography lies to us to some extent .... and can only exist as an abstraction of what existed at the moment of capture.</p> <p>Thanks to Julie et al for some great examples to pave this forum, including Roland Fischer's architectural abstracts. Munkasci is also a great and overlooked practitioner of photography.</p>

<p>Thanks, Steven. No doubt a good approach. As my use is only occasional, I might not want to invest in extra equipment like the Vello (Also, I don't presently own an iphone, but I may be able to use my mini ipad in this case together with the Sony software). </p>

<p>The series may communicate more or something different than its individual works and therefore may be a work of art in itself.</p>

<p>Good recommendation, Michael.</p> <p>Perhaps I could do a short (one minute) exposer of the light painted elements of my subject, and then bring out its otherwise dim background or non lit elements through multiple similar exposures, then all blended in post.</p>

<p>Clive, are your VC optics for Leica also in the same bottle bottom category?</p> <p>The Zeiss finder may top the Leica and VC finders somewhat, but the differences appear to be small and how important are they? Rangefinder cameras have never allowed perfect framing of a subject, which in any case varies with subject distance, and part of the pleasure of the process is in imagining the final result in any case, which is the general case in most photographic reproduction. That is also true it seems for most SLR viewing systems (not sure about DSLRs), which do not have 100% coverage of the frame. </p>

<p>Ditto on Japanese eBay sellers, or rather one seller from whom I have bought MF Mamiya 6 cameras and optics (I would have to go back on the Bay to find his name), each time the description of mint or mint - was at least that, both cosmetically and functionally, and the price including shipping at least competitive or more so than most NA sources. I buy only from those with 99.9% or 100% positive ratings.</p> <p>Makes sense from one aspect - there are or were many Japanese MF cameras in Japan or the East, possibly more than here.</p>