Archives For Photography

 (And now for a little bit of self promotion…)

“All the Light Projection prints are 8×10″  handmade, unique and one of a kind silver analog prints. Light is projected through an optical lens onto silver black and white photo paper and then developed in the darkroom via my entropic processes I have developed over the years to bring out certain varied aspects of the print grain by the manipulation of the silver metals in the paper using a variety of darkroom re-development techniques, brushes, bleaches and toners (and in these images a dash of Solarisation).

The prints are camera-less and film-less images – but they are not Photogram’s (nothing was placed on the surface of the paper). So I call them Light Projections. I am still trying to figure out if these have ever been made in the history of photography – in quite this way – as the circles are purely optical in nature and are really thoseBokeh like” Circles of Confusion that a lens can produce.”

Light Projection Variation #2 46×66″  edition of 5 (from unique silver gelatin prints)

Light Projection Variation #1 40×95″ Edition of 5, (from unique silver gelatin prints)

Light Projection #4  36×46″ Edition of 5, (from unique silver gelatin prints)

via www.studio-4a.com  The Light Projections of Thomas Brummett

 

Nice interview with Hiroshi Sugimoto about how he works and more importantly thinks about photography and especially time and memory.

The Photographs of Sarah Schonfeld

I love this series by Sarah Schonfeld. She basically decided to see what kind of chemical effects drugs would have on film. The results are beautiful yet mirror the troubling aspect of introducing chemicals into anything human or otherwise.  See the similarities between speed and caffeine and ponder how drugs effect not only humans but the visual aspects of film as well.

 

All you can feel 

“Since the 1950s, we in the western world have increasingly come to understand our most intimate desires and
experiences, as the products of a so-called “chemical self”. We are able to explain moods, angers, and diseases
both physiological and psychological through an imbalance of substances in the body. All of this, of course,
takes place against the backdrop of a constantly shifting legal and political climate regarding the regulation of
different types of mood altering substances.

 

What all these substances actually look like when their essence is visually depicted?

Sarah Schönfeld squeezed drops of various legal and illegal liquid drug mixtures onto negative film which had
already been exposed. Each drop altered the coating of the film. Much like the effect
of some of these substances on humans, this can be a lengthy process – sometimes one that can barely be stopped.

 

She then enlarged these negatives including the chemical reaction of the particular drug, to sizes of up to 160 x 200
cm. All of the substances behaved very differently: the shapes and colors that appeared showed unique characteristics
and revealed unique internal universes. Schönfeld explores the possibilities of photography at the frontiers of what
can be visually portrayed– the interface between representation and reality.”

 

via http://www.sarahschoenfeld.de/en/works/all-you-can-feel-2/

The nudes of Nadav Kander exhibition titled Bodies 6 Women 1 Man at the Flowers Gallery in London is maybe the best exhibition of nudes I have seen since Irving Penn did his wonderful series of Odalisque women.

via http://www.flowersgallery.com/exhibitions/flowers/nadav-kander-bodies/works#2927

Shutterstock and the End of Getty Images

By all accounts Getty Images who is owned not by folks with a passion for photography (but basically bunch of accountants) will see its market share erode daily from now on given the explosive growth of Shutterstock. Jon Oringer who is a kid who just happens to love photography (and happens to be very smart) started one of the first photography subscription services that essentially shook a decades old highly profitable photo stock industry to its knees. (Shutterstock is now valued at 2.5 billion and growing rapidly).  The old equation was that pro photographers could make a very good living selling images through Getty or Corbis web sites working in tandem with their editors to make sure the right images were being made for the market place. It takes a village to make a great stock image as its both a conceptual problem coupled with eye catching content.  (Yours truly made Getty Images around 4 million over the years I was working with them). Microstock destroyed this profitable Industry by driving prices down to absurdly low levels that were economically impossible to compete with for any pro photographer with an actual studio/business overhead. At this point the big players have only one choice:

Buy Shutterstock or face getting eventually run over.

What I have never understood about the business decisions in the current stock industry playbook is what industry constantly undercuts and devalues its products from $500 to a $1 sale per unit.  The diamond industry for example could flood the market and give us very cheap diamonds. They don’t for a very good reason…

“The emergence of microstock—the low-priced, generic images that customers don’t want to shoot themselves—knocked the photo industry on its heels. Shutterstock and a competitor, iStockphoto, were selling im­ages that once cost $500 for $1. Incumbent Getty Images ended up acquiring iStockpho­to for $50 million in 2006 and then took itself private in 2008 at a 65 percent discount to its pre-credit­crisis high. “All the trends line up with what Jon’s doing today, but he saw it when others didn’t—he saw it 10 years ago,” says Jeff Lieberman of Insight Venture Partners, which invested in Shutterstock in 2007”.