Un-winter Tree

We are having what some locals are calling an un-winter this year. Sort of like an un-birthday I suppose in that it feels as unreal as Alice's Adventure. Normally we'd have lots of snow by now and January is usually the coldest month of the year. We have had some real cold, down to zero and even a bit below but it has quickly bounced back up each time and overall we are enjoying above average temperatures for this time of year.

This weather doesn't make for good winter photographs though. There is little snow and where there is snow under trees it is littered with twigs and limbs from the ice storm and wind. I went to town today and came home past this tree which I have photographed several times before. Since the last time I took its picture the town highway department cut all the shrubs that had been growing around it. In the process they broke a couple of limbs (a large one hanging on the left side of the trunk and the little one hanging off the end of a limb on the right) leaving it looking lonesome and forlorn. Coupled with the bare field and overcast sky I decided it needed to be rendered in black and white.

I'm fond of trees. They are a favorite subject, especially trees with character and this one definitely has character. Stunted with broken limbs, galls and missing strips of bark it continues to sprout leaves every spring. It reminds me of another tree, now gone (and I never got a good photo of it - darn) that continued to leave out every spring despite a gaping hole through it's middle. There was one narrow strip of bark up one side and that was enough, like some people I've known who keep going in spite of everything.

Tenacity

This photo was after the recent ice & snow falls. It is a small tree growing on a section of slanted rock in the middle  of the St. Regis River at the bridge on the Allens Falls Rd. The river bed here is divided into several channels by these layers of rock up-thrust at an angle. The cracks and crevasses provide just enough soil and water for some shrubs and saplings. It is a rough life though when the river floods in spring as this poor tree shows. I'm always amazed at the tenacity of trees growing in some of the most unlikely and inhospitable places. The Desiderata says that we should listen to others because even the dull and ignorant have their stories. I think trees have something to teach us too, even in their silence.

Lingering Ice

We  had two mornings of freezing rain followed by about 5 inches of snow and now we are "enjoying" sub-zero temperatures. It was minus 18º F early this morning, By the time I went out to fill the bird feeders and make some photos of the sun illuminating the ice on the trees we were having a -5º heat wave. The belated advent of winter here has been good for photography though. I went out yesterday on a photo exploration and fond several good subjects. The results are posted at https://picasaweb.google.com/113942839858347342814/IceSnowJanuary142012.

The trees in the photo above are in my side yard. The wind last night knocked off the snow but it is so cold that the ice is still hanging on. That will change in the next couple of days. The forecast is for rising temperatures with a Tuesday high around 38-40º. Maybe I'll go snowshoeing this afternoon while it's still winter. The way this winter is going, who knows if I'll get another chance.

Ice Storm

We haven't had much winter weather this year until last night. Normally we'd have snow in late November or early December. Occasionally we've had snow as early as Halloween that stayed all winter. So far this winter I've shoveled once and it wasn't really necessary then, only an inch and a half. Last night and this morning the weather was more like we'd expect in January, freezing rain followed by snow. All the schools were closed because of a half inch of ice on everything but when the snow arrived it was pretty.

The freezing rain made a lot of folks around here nervous though, a kind of PTSD from the ice storm of '98, five days of freezing rain that took out the power across Northern NY, New England and Quebec for anywhere from a week to a month or more. We were lucky and had our power back after only 7 days. Some communities in Quebec were without power for nearly 6 weeks.

I didn't take many photos back then. When I left for work in the morning it was dark and when I got home at night it was getting dark. When I wasn't working we were spending our time surviving, melting snow on the wood stove for water, living by candlelight, staying warm. Today I could afford the time to admire the ice on the trees. I'm retired so I had nowhere to go. The photo is from my side yard looking back at a neighbor's shed.

New Year - New Direction

I hate to complain but 2011 was a lousy year for print sales. The pits. Not just for me but for most other nature/landscape photographers I've talked to. Ebooks on the other hand seem to be taking off big time so for the new year I am going to be offering some ebooks starting with an iPad/iPhone version of my Blurb book (link in the left hand column) which is only $4.99 directly from Blurb.

For those of you who have Android or Windows tablets/phones I'm sorry to say that so far Blurb only makes ebooks for Apple products. Apparently they are working on expanding that to Android and other platforms but I'm not waiting. I have bought a program to do the conversion to Kindle, epub, and other ebook formats myself and am looking into the distribution. My new years resolution for photography is to produce a series of ebooks, both monographs like the B&W book and some instructional books. Stay tuned.

If you have an iPad/iPhone you don't need to wait for the Adirondack B&W book. Just use the link. The photo above is from the book. It was made at Connery Pond on an autumn day. The infrared look is actually red filtration that darkened the blue sky and evergreens but brightened the reds, oranges and yellows. If you look closely you'll note that there is another photographer in the scene, in the grassy area to the right.

A new year to make photographs, woohoo! Look out 2012, here I come.

Overlook by Whitney Point

We drove downstate to our daughter's for Christmas. The rest stop just before we turn off I-81 overlooks a valley and a ridge on the other side with farms dotted along it. I've always liked the view there and I shot several photos with my Canon G11 which I thought looked like paintings so I decided to heighten the effect.

I've been playing with Postwork Shop Basic which only processes images up to 800 pixels but that is enough for this blog. It works in layers which you can change the transparency of as well as manipulate the effects of each layer from the presets. I layered an Oil Painting effect over the original photo at 50% opacity followed by a Fresco layer at 35% opacity. I also altered the effect from the defaults.

I got the basic version (free) after seeing an ad for it in Photoshop User and have tried a number of the effects, mostly in combinations. 800 pixel images are fine for web use but I think I will buy the Pro version in which will let me work on full sized files because I may want to print some of them. The Pro version also gives you a lot more effects to choose from.

The final effect looks like gouache to me. The faux mat was added in Photoshop. I described how I do that in a post back in 2010. The "frame" uses the same filter as the bevel but set to "round" rather than flat with the added grey border selected and with the light direction reversed from what I used on the mat bevel.

Happy New Year.

Clarity VS Mystery

Brooks Jensen posted an interesting thought on LENSWORK DAILY today, interesting to me at least. The photo at the top of his post is a puzzle in that the subject isn't readily discernible and Brooks says that it is nothing you could guess no matter how long you try. He goes on to say that if he revealed what it was that the picture would be "dis empowered" because the moment we recognize something we move on.

This idea interests me because one of the early criticisms of my photographs as art was that "it isn't esoteric enough" and since that time I've had other comments that suggest that I should introduce more "mystery" into my photos. Brooks says that if he told what the photo was, our reaction would be "Got it. Next." so he doesn't reveal the subject in order to keep the viewer pondering.

In a sense that is the same reason I sometimes alter images, as in the one above, although not usually to the point of being unrecognizable, rather I do it to reduce the distracting elements and help the viewer focus on qualities other than the 'thingness' (if that's a word), to see the shapes, forms, lines and colors involved apart from "trees with snow".

Photos that so completely abstract the subject that they are totally unrecognizable are fun but hopefully they should also reveal something so that when we discover the actual subject we think about it in a new way. For me the world is by nature mysterious. What we see as we walk through the world is a superficial representation of pieces of a vast mystery, the mystery of life and the universe. For me photography is a discipline for trying to penetrate that mystery, first for myself and hopefully for my audience.

A Comment about Comments and What is Art (Yet Again)

I've been reading Kirk Tuck's blog, The Visual Science Lab. As a working photographer Kirk always has something informative to say but lately he has shut off comments so I can't respond directly to his thoughts. I gather from what he says in his posts that he got tired (irritated/upset/PO'd) at some of the rude and abusive comments to his posts so he just turned off comments for the remainder of the year in order to be in a better mood for the holidays.

I can't say I blame him. My little blog doesn't seem to attract that sort of comment (it attracts few comments at all). The closest I've come is a reader suggesting that I don't know what I'm talking about. That's fine. It's his opinion and he is entitled to it. I've been photographing for well over a half century and spend considerable effort trying to be accurate. I firmly believe that in the case in point I am right but I'm open to someone demonstrating to me that I'm wrong. I moderate the comments on this blog, meaning I get them in an email before they get posted and they only get posted if I approve them. I approved his.

My standard for approval is that they are not abusive and/or blatant self promotion. I've been fortunate not to get any abusive comments but occasionally I get a "Great photo. You should see my site" followed by a link to another site which when I follow it takes me to a site selling something, a low class form of network marketing, frequently not even related to photography or anything else discussed here. Word to the wise: If you submit a pseudo compliment as a ploy to get a link to your site, it will be trashed, not posted, not even the compliment part. Further I only post links to other photographers sites if I believe their work has something to offer my readers. I welcome (civil) discussion and I am not above accepting flattery admiration if it isn't a cover for commercialism. Call me elitist, but hey, it's my blog.

And now on to the subject of "Art" (again).

Kirk brought up the subject of what makes a photograph art in one recent post and while I don't entirely disagree I feel he is taking too hard a line in coming out against "applied effects". Those who have followed my blog are aware that I do apply effects to some images so they may feel I'm just being defensive and maybe they are right. There have been times I have expressed some misgivings here about the relatively limited controls in some of the effects I used. On the other hand I do believe that some photos benefit from more than just a 'straight' treatment in order to tell their story.

Take the two photos in this post. They are both phone photos, shot with an app called Pencil Camera. Both are very simple images that would most likely be overlooked in a instant if not for the "random manipulation" of the phone app and the border I painted in Photoshop.  Sometimes it is necessary to add some drama or at least a different way of seeing a common subject to get the audience to look at it long enough to see what you are trying to show them. I see it as being like the writer or poet who approaches the ordinary from a very different perspective, using words in an unusual way to help the reader see beyond the superficial.

As I noted I am occasionally bothered by the relative randomness that Kirk refers to, algorithms written into software by anonymous engineers whose code is applied to your photo. It is random, or at least appears so, but I note that it is different in every image, apparently responding on some level to the subject matter. It is true that I am not the one controlling it but is total control the appropriate measure of art?

Traditional Japanese potters would not agree to that. Some of their most highly prized Raku and wood fired pottery is the result of what can only be called fortunate kiln accidents, flames touching the pot in just the right place creating patterns hoped for but unplanned by the potter, a collaboration between the fire and the potter. In Western art too there is the example of accident accepted as art, most notably in the paintings of Jackson Pollock who (it is said) "learned to trust gravity" in creating his paintings. There are those who question his standing in the art world (I would be among them) but the fact remains that art, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. As one who has made Raku and has a couple of pieces that I can claim only partial credit for, the remainder being the product of smoke and fire that I could not precisely control, I have to accept that randomness in the application of technique can in fact result in art. Not always of course. But then I can't guarantee "art" even when everything is fully under my control. Nor do I know anyone who can.

In the end I think art is what happens when the 'artist' (if we may be so bold or pretentious to call ourselves such), the subject matter and the medium (whatever it is) come together in a fortuitous way that can be helped, but not assured, by long practice. At best it can increase the odds.

With that I wish one and all a happy holiday (Christmas, Hanukka, Solstice, Kwanza, or whatever you choose to celebrate) and the hope for a peaceful and prosperous New Year.

Not Exactly an Angel

I was going through Ellenburg, NY yesterday and stopped by a cemetery there to photograph the figures on either side of the entrance gate for my angel series. They aren't proper angels though and they are not carved from stone. They appear to have been cast in pieces using concrete. The figure above is over the word "Hope" on the left of the entrance. The one on the right side of the entrance is "Faith" and although I did photograph it, I will not be using it in my angel series. Both figures are weathered significantly as is evident in the above image where aggregate (stone filler mixed with the cement to make concrete) is exposed all over the surface. Also they appear to have been cast in pieces and then assembled but there are voids in the surface which results in a somewhat grotesque appearance when viewed closely. I have disguised one of the voids in the image above by burning down the shadows to hide the fact that there is a gap between her neck and her body. I like the facial expression though so it might become part of the series anyway.

The "Faith" figure however is nothing short of ghoulish. Pieces of her face have spalled off leaving gaps that open into the inside of the head looking for all the world like some horror movie character. Adding to the effect is her pose, head bent forward face down with her hands hanging limply over the arms of the cross in front of her. I'm not sure how the pose represented "Faith" even when it was whole. It certainly doesn't in its deteriorated state.

I wandered to the back of the cemetery to see if there were any other figures. There was a large Jesus figure at the back of the cemetery painted gold (free standing, not associated with any grave). The were two smaller cast figures on grave markers, A Jesus, the good shepherd with a lamb on his shoulder and one of Mary. I didn't photograph any of them because they don't fit my project and I have no interest in collecting photographs of more modern cast figures. They are too commonplace in appearance. The "Hope" figure is cast (I'm mainly looking for carved stone figures) but she is sufficiently unusual in her pose to possibly merit a place in the series. I haven't decided yet.

While at the back I wandered by the stone vault which stands in the center of what once was a circular concrete pad, now partly broken up and grassed over, overlooking a brook that flows behind the cemetery. From the back of the circular area I got the view below of a small stepped cascade in the brook, more my usual subject matter than the things I have been photographing lately and a nice counterpoint to the macabre "Faith" figure at the entrance.

Old Made New

I shot this back in 2002 with my first digital camera, an Olympus 4040Z. A friend has a copy of the original version hanging in his bathroom. I gave him a framed print in return for a favor. Yesterday I was playing with some old photos in Photoshop with the Topaz filter set and combined a couple of them (along with some basic Photoshop editing) to come up with this version which has the flavor of an old fashioned print.

I'm thankful for many things today including the ability to continue learning and growing, to take the old and make it new, to build on the past. As odd as it may sound I'm also thankful for the capacity to feel grateful. Lack of it, I think, creates much of the anger in the world on both sides of the equation.  I wish you all much to be grateful for. Happy Thanksgiving.

Review: "iPhone Art In My Life" by Dewitt Jones

A friend told me a couple of days ago that Dewitt Jones had published a Kindle book of iPhone photos. I immediately bought it. I have long admired his work and enjoyed reading his periodic columns in Outdoor Photographer. After looking the images I knew I had to do a review and asked for permission to use one of the images from it in my review which he granted. Then came the difficult part. Which one to choose? I settled on the one above but Plates 30 & 47 tugged at me too. There are 50 images in all, made with & processed in his iPhone and each is a gem worth pondering.

They are different from the work I have associated with Dewitt Jones in the past having only seen his traditional landscape photos. These are all processed in apps to enhance them as artistic creations with some effects layered on top of others.

The images that are lower in contrast don't work well in B&W on the original Kindle but will be terrific on the new Kindle Fire. I recommend viewing it on your computer or tablet using the free Kindle reader apps. It will be a permanent resident of my tablet for convenient and frequent enjoyment. As shown above (a screen capture) each image has a caption and below that (not included in the capture) is technical information on the image and the apps used to create it.

In the back of the book he lists his favorite apps, most of which (sadly) are not available to those of us using Android phones (maybe soon... please) and at the end there is a "Volume Two - Coming Soon" page. I'll be watching for it. "iPhone Art In My Life -Volume One" is available through Amazon for $7.99*.

* If the Amazon link doesn't work for you or you prefer to copy and paste the URL is http://www.amazon.com/iPhone-Art-My-Life-ebook/dp/B004YWSGGU/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1321932525&sr=1-1

As with past reviews I was not asked to do the review nor do I recieve any consideration for doing it. It was initiated by me and represents my honest opinion and hearty recommendation.

Another Abstract from Benson Mines

This is from my first visit to Benson Mines. It is a photo of minerals leaching out of concrete. I see this frequently on old concrete. Soluble minerals dissolve when the concrete gets wet and eventually seep out through fine cracks and fissures. The patterns are often interesting.

Note that I have added a link to William Neill's  ebooks in the column on the left. I have all of his ebooks and they are excellent. Both William and Guy Tal are photographers I respect for their vision and skill.

Heavy Metal Yin/Yang

Back to Benson Mines. Looking at the photos I took the first time I was there I realized that I had only scratched the surface. On my second trip I had just finished making my first set of exposures for a new HDR image when a pickup pulled up to the gate. There were no "No Trespassing" signs around but I wondered if perhaps someone was upset about me being there and decided the best course was to just introduce myself. It turned out to be a guy who stores a few things in one of the buildings and "no", my wandering about to make photos didn't bother him. In fact he was quite friendly and told me a bit about the place.

I spent about 2 hours searching out new images and this appealed to me along with some other details. The re were several rectangular blocks of scrap metal by one of the buildings, assorted metal that had been run through a crusher. The above is a detail of one of those blocks. The contrast between the heavily rusted metal & the white coated metal, the shapes and patterns of the folds and the Yin/Yang quality of it all appealed to me.

A single exposure with a Canon 7D on a tripod.

Traveling

We drove to Vermont today to visit my sister and her husband. Going through Rouses Point I spotted this building right where Rt 11 turns to avoid dropping into the Lake Champlain. I have a fondness for old buildings anyway and this one is particularly interesting with its multiple signs overlaid on one another with varying degrees of effort at removing the prior ones, none fully successful. I was tempted to philosophize about the resulting confusion and parallels to halfhearted efforts in life but I will leave that to my readers to ponder.