pierre_fermat

<p>Hello All<br>

Thanks for all your views. I am also happy that my post triggered some introspection too... Having read the posts many times, I finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. A quick summary would be:<br>

1.Love - You cannot do such a project with tension or anxiety. Nothing else matters.<br>

2.Acceptance - Things will wither; so will people, and my memory and I. Accepting the inevitable brings clarity.<br>

3. Memory - Choosing items/places that are already imprinted in the memory help amplify remembrance.<br>

Thanks again for all your thoughts. I deeply appreciate them.</p>

<p>Cheers<br>

Pierre</p>

<p>Hello All<br>

I am graduating into my 30s next January. Recent events have made me ponder over an increasing realization of transience of people and places. While I accept the change as natural, I would like to remember the path , the memories and retain a sense of history. Towards that, I have started photographing my parent's home and neighborhood, where I spent all my childhood and teen years. I also plan to do it regularly to 'record' the changes over time.I has turned out to be more challenging than I imagined. I would really appreciate some thoughts from you guys.</p>

<p>The first challenge is 'artistic' vs 'documentary'. I don't know if this is a false dichotomy. I am constantly conflicted between choosing an interesting composition and an 'accurate' vision of what I 'normally' see. Have you been through such a conflict on choosing the composition for its individual or documentary merit?</p>

<p>I am also trying to see what will trigger in my mind if I see a picture after a long time. I don't mind if it triggers sorrow, but I am morbidly afraid of losing out on something that I remember now. It is causing tremendous emotional strain to figure out compositions that in their totality, 'complete'. How do you manage to evoke or record emotional triggers through a set of photographs? Can there be even a collection 'complete' in its emotional gamut?<br>

If you have gone through such an exercise (both personally and professionaly), please share your thoughts.It would be tremendously helpful.</p>

<p>Cheers<br>

Pierre</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Hello All<br>

I would like to share some revelations to my fellow beginners (which the experts know all along ;-) ) on tripods and compositions. Frustrated by limitations of hand-held photography, I got myself a gitzo+markins pair last week. It drastically changed the modus-operandi of taking pictures.<br>

1. Tripods force you to think about the POV and composition of the picture way more than when you do hand-held. It happens because you have to consciously set up the height/inclination of the rig, and you tend to think for a few seconds during that process. You sub-consciously hate to constantly fiddle with the tripod; in hand-held, your 'tripod'(body) moves at your finicky will.<br>

2.As your DSLR is off your hand and shoulder , once you set up the tripod, you tend to spend more time fine tuning the composition with your tripod head. You spend more time comfortably looking through the viewfinder.<br>

3.You are no longer constrained by aperture/shutter speed. You can easily execute your artisitic vision.<br>

4.You tend to take more shots of that composition with exposure comp, aperture/shutter speed variations - you will end up with more choice.<br>

5.You only move away from that scene once you are fully satisfied; again, the mind rebels against repeating the same tripod set up.</p>

<p>I suggest that beginners do get a tripod (refer to Tom Thogan's article on tripods) that will suite their need and budget. Even if you don't use it constantly, try getting used to it. You will start homing in on good compositions even if you do hand-held afterwards.</p>

<p>Cheers<br>

Pierre</p>

<p>All<br>

Thanks so much for your thoughts and feedback. Appreciate it. A summary of my thoughts:<br>

1. Capex and opex of digital vs. film. Opex of digital decays and storage/processing power is getting cheaper by the day. On a longer term, digital seems to be cheaper than film. But again, the 'velvia' look of landscapes or the nice BW portraits may be worth it :). I so dig the Kodachrome looks.. (yes, i know i am little too late for that)<br /><br />2. I reckon, if I have to switch to film, I have to learn/un-learn aspects of exposure. I guess thats OK. <br /><br />3. The processing bits bother me…<br />To quote Bebu<br />"But if you don't do the printing in a real darkroom and don't want to scan the negative yourself then you leave a whole lot of interpretation of your work to others. Would you want others to do the contrast, white balance etc.. for you when you shoot digital?"<br /><br />I do spend time adjusting my RAW files before exporting/printing them. I don't plan to process film myself anytime soon. If i get them processed even by a pro lab, it looks like I will loose some control over aspects like contrast/WB etc. Preliminary choices made by the lab would reduce or eliminate the latitude of adjustments that I can make on the scanned film. <br /><br /><br />I now have three options:<br />1. Continue digital; get a used FF. I may lose getting those unique film looks, but will retain full control over processing and will reduce opex.<br /><br />2. Just BW - I can get a cheaper camera and have more control (due to reduced variables) over the tonality.<br /><br />3.Take the plunge and try film for what is worth.<br /><br />THe heart says 3, but the head says 1! .</p>

<p>Hello All<br>

I have been shooting landscape and portraits with my canon 350D/50 1.4/70-200 4L IS/17-40 L. I also use ND grads and polarizers. As an amateur, my shooting style is the typical 'compose -> figure out exposure->shoot->check image/histogram->recompose/shoot' loop. It does take me few shots to nail the the image of my mind's eye. I typcially shoot at ISO100 as my 350D gets a bit noisy.<br>

The advantages of FF for me are obvious - ultra wide and nicer bokeh. However, I cannot afford a digital FF. Used EOS-3 type cameras have excellent features and are cheap. However, the possibility of shift from digital to film makes me nervous. I only find two kinds of articles in the web - digital to large format film and film to digital. I need your help in figuring out some of the following aspects:<br>

1.How do/did you transition from the 'digital loop' mentioned earlier, to a more accurate/tigher loop in film? Is it just practice, or did you use some interim techniques? how did you wean off the immediate gratification/verification mind-set? Did you carry your ex-dslr to shoot and verify soem basic exposure aspects,then record the image in film?<br>

<br />2. I understand that films deal better with highlights. If so, how did it affect your exposure techniques? I guess, for safety I can shoot 'to the right' and control the highlights later. Any specific do's and don'ts for portraiture and landscape ?<br>

3. Choice of film for a beginner - slide or print? Speed? Which ones for portraiture and which ones for landscape? Can you please suggest me something cheaper to start with, and progressively better as we go further. Some typical do's and don'ts for film purchase/storage/handling for a digital user...<br>

4. Lab - what should i look for when I drop off my film to a lab. I don't plan to invest in a scanner. I read that nikon coolscan does a good job.<br>

5.Post processing. I shoot RAW and do some basic processing (sharpening, white balance,curve) in aperture. Aperture is also my central repository of images. I occasionally get them printed. How did your workflow change with film? Did you now have to do something explicit, that you had taken for granted in digital? I realize that I have to import my processed film into PS , convert it to 'positive' and then start my post workflow. Any tips for asset managing the films?</p>

<p>6.Anything else i missed!!<br>

Thanks for the patient reading. I am a bit anxious about it, and just trying to come up with a detailed plan to cover things end-to-end.<br>

Best<br>

Pierre</p>

<p>All<br>

Thanks for the ideas.. two quick shots.. i am uploading the low res ones..</p><div></div>

<p>Rob/Doug/Kent<br>

Thanks so much for your insights and comments. I now started seeing things differently and discovering hitherto unknown possibilities. I do confess, I had some preconcieved notions in mind, and got stumped when I couldnt' capture them on camera.<br>

Tomorrow, I am going to scout the area with a fresh pair of eyes and hope to capture something nice.<br>

Thanks again guys!</p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p dir="ltr">Hello All</p>

<p dir="ltr">I've been staying in the southen indian coastal city of Chennai for the past few weeks and I am caught in a technique conundrum. I've been visiting the chennai beaches every morning to take some typical dawn beach shots. I approached via color, tonal and compositional aspects ... However, it is turning out to be a difficult exercise...</p>

<p dir="ltr">1.color - there are no typical dawn colours, being equatorial, the sunrise and sunset is 'rapid' .. very quick transformation from dark to sharp bright. I dropped the attempt to get some color in...</p>

<p dir="ltr">2.tonal dynamics (on greyscale) - this is even more painful..unlike places like goa, the colour of the water and the sky is dull grey! the transformation of the beach,sky and water appears to be : darkness -> uniform dark grey -> uniform light grey -> extremely bright ...little or not shadow play</p>

<p dir="ltr">3. the beaches are fully littered with garbage! any attempt to get the brown sand + water is resulting in a frame full of (literal) garbage...</p>

<p dir="ltr">My shots not seem to be limited to compositions/juxtaposition of items - garbage,stray dogs,people, shops in the beach...</p>

<p dir="ltr">I know this is a bit of whining, but this is quite frustrating... Am i missing something here? Could you guys/gals suggest me some techniques under these circumstances..?</p>

<p dir="ltr">I shoot with 350D, 17-40L, 50 1.4, 70-200 4L, B+W polarizers, formatt ND (2 stop soft, 3 stop hard) and a tripod</p>

<p dir="ltr">Best<br>

Pierre F</p><div></div>

<p>Let me introduce another dimension here. All of the thoughts posted before, fall into frame set by the dominant western theology around the abhrahamic religions. The dominant idea of that frame is to consider sex to be bad and something that needs to be done with ('lie back and think of england').<br>

However, in the ancient eastern lifestyle, sex and nudity were never taboo. In many indian temples, one sees nude/erotic sculptures. Most female deities are shown 'topless' or being scantily clothed. The interesting aspect there is, nobody there finds them offensive or questions the 'chastity' of the nudes. Phallus worship is common across the south/south-east asian cultures.<br>

Have we succumbed to the narrow framework of 'decency' and 'chastity' set by our religious notions, and have imbibed it deep within our psyche?<br>

regards<br>

Pierre</p>