Luminous Landscape Forum

The Art of Photography => User Critiques => Topic started by: cjogo on May 13, 2013, 05:25:20 am

Title: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 13, 2013, 05:25:20 am
Paris escalator
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: francois on May 13, 2013, 06:12:55 am
Wow, the man seems to be dancing!
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 13, 2013, 12:23:38 pm
Great scientific puzzle . :: ..   the speed of the pedestrian  X   the rate of the escalator  +  the ascent of the plane of delivery  in relation to the angle of the super-wide lens # and the speed of the shutter > = the perfect dancer
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 13, 2013, 01:38:59 pm
Never mind the ghost of the dancer - you have a great eye for geometrical shapes. HC-B would have loved you.

Rob C
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: RSL on May 13, 2013, 01:48:53 pm
+1
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 13, 2013, 08:29:00 pm
Thanks ///  I think working so many years on a tripod-- with only a few 4X5 sheets with you ...really makes one concentrate //every corner counts\\ you spend time honing your skills.  This a heavy Gitzo with a Hassy mounted SWC blocking the escalator for a few minutes .  It took some time to frame ( no screen )  /and of course the long exposures  .. with only one shot .
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: WalterEG on May 13, 2013, 08:32:04 pm
HC-B would have loved you.

Rob C

Who gives a toss Rob,

Old froggy geezer has been dead for donkey's ages.  Along with St Ansel.

LOL,

W
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 13, 2013, 08:32:44 pm
Never mind the ghost of the dancer - you have a great eye for geometrical shapes. HC-B would have loved you.

Rob C

HC-B would had had trouble with carrying around a large tripod and working the Zone System , out in the streets.   ;D ;D
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 13, 2013, 08:34:15 pm
Who gives a toss Rob,

Old froggy geezer has been dead for donkey's ages.  Along with St Ansel.

LOL,

W

St Ansel taught me to view nature more ... in this way ..  
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: wolfnowl on May 13, 2013, 09:42:54 pm
Never mind the ghost of the dancer - you have a great eye for geometrical shapes. HC-B would have loved you.

Rob C
Indeed!

Mike.
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 14, 2013, 04:34:55 am
HC-B would had had trouble with carrying around a large tripod and working the Zone System , out in the streets.   ;D ;D


To me, that sort of proves that Zone Sytems etc. are little more than holy games that photographers play in the hope of making their craft seem more mysterious, more 'divine' than it basically happens to be.

Photography has got to be one of the most simple processes around. All that counts is what you do with the thing, not which magic path you subscribe to as being the one with the shine. Hell, today you don't even need to know how to read a meter! Trouble is, the bit that counts is the bit you can't buy.

;-)

Rob C
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 14, 2013, 02:08:26 pm
None of the magic would happen for me > without the holy games.   But then again the images I post are from film days.   If the Zone system was not applied > so many hours & $ would had been spent,in the darkroom,  trying to "correct"the divine.
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: WalterEG on May 14, 2013, 02:22:15 pm
Cjogo,

I made use of the Zone system for quite a while until I became aware of Phil Davis's BTZS - Beyond The Zone System.

These days I use a hybrid approach, largely depending on whether I am using an incident or a reflected light meter.

Much of the need for Zone practices have fled me now because I have reverted to using Diafine to develop my negs.

Cheers,

W
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 14, 2013, 02:34:29 pm
None of the magic would happen for me > without the holy games.   But then again the images I post are from film days.   If the Zone system was not applied > so many hours & $ would had been spent,in the darkroom,  trying to "correct"the divine.


That was largely my point: A Weston was all it took to peg the lowest tone, decide if it was to be black or something lighter... developing was always to a standard time for any given film and invariably a bit longer than recommended by Kodak or Ilford. D76 1+1 was the witches' brew. (I swear I once found the trace of a sports broom in one of those blank frames you shot when winding on to the first numbered frame.)

If I had one problem, it was with 120 film in a Paterson tank: I couldn't avoid getting bubbles down the outer edge of at least a couple of frames every time.

I pre-wetted the films, controlled agitation carefully and nothing stopped the problem; no amount of bumping the tank made any difference.

Rob C
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 14, 2013, 02:44:03 pm
I really only got to a certain point with Zone / Weston /AA -- there are  lots of new methods out there, for sure. Really do not shoot anymore -- especially since the mid-90's.  So many images still yet scanned .. will never have to venture out with a camera again .  8)

Few times a year  :: for work  > I bring the 60d & a zoom out of the bag.  Portrait /convention here and there ...otherwise will sit in the case....
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 14, 2013, 04:30:50 pm
I really only got to a certain point with Zone / Weston /AA -- there are  lots of new methods out there, for sure. Really do not shoot anymore -- especially since the mid-90's.  So many images still yet scanned .. will never have to venture out with a camera again .  8)

Few times a year  :: for work  > I bring the 60d & a zoom out of the bag.  Portrait /convention here and there ...otherwise will sit in the case....


I hope you are joking. Don't throw away your ability. Old is old, and though scanning gives it new life, it can't give the buzz of shooting afresh. I know this only too well. That's why the sermon.

Rob C

Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: WalterEG on May 14, 2013, 08:05:58 pm
I have many more negs that remain unscanned than I am ever likely to process with a rigid work-day plan and possibly an assistant.  But it is the quest for the new and an unending curiosity with what the world presents to me that compels me to keep shooting.  I have either the Linhof or the Hasselblad with me every day whether I use them or not.

Maybe I am different, but I actually enjoy the process of photography in all its stages.  Chances are, if I still had a wet darkroom there wouldn't be much that wasn't printed.  But scanning is an altogether different process: one that does not appeal so compellingly as getting to work in the ruby glow.

Cheers,

W
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 15, 2013, 05:02:23 am
I have many more negs that remain unscanned than I am ever likely to process with a rigid work-day plan and possibly an assistant.  But it is the quest for the new and an unending curiosity with what the world presents to me that compels me to keep shooting.  I have either the Linhof or the Hasselblad with me every day whether I use them or not.

Maybe I am different, but I actually enjoy the process of photography in all its stages.  Chances are, if I still had a wet darkroom there wouldn't be much that wasn't printed.   But scanning is an altogether different process: one that does not appeal so compellingly as getting to work in the ruby glow.

Cheers,

W


I tend to agree with that; also, there would be far less shot were it still film. Money also brings focus.

Something I have realised: though I still shoot stuff, hardly anything has been printed in months. Literally, in months. I think it reveals the decline in valuable subjects that I find. I think it shows habit rather than love.

Rob C
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 16, 2013, 01:16:50 am
Photography became a art mode of only shooting for sale .  Not for sport.     My work was displayed in 5 galleries .. & I shot for the buyers.  I knew my market .     It was just too costly to continue in the field of photography for fun.  When you don't have a day-job to support your art side> you don't continue to shoot until a sale comes through > to provide the next cost for an image.

I will continue to scan through my 35 years of images -- always a new one around the corner .. :D
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 16, 2013, 04:19:00 am
Photography became a art mode of only shooting for sale .  Not for sport.     My work was displayed in 5 galleries .. & I shot for the buyers.  I knew my market .     It was just too costly to continue in the field of photography for fun.  When you don't have a day-job to support your art side> you don't continue to shoot until a sale comes through > to provide the next cost for an image.

I will continue to scan through my 35 years of images -- always a new one around the corner .. :D


If you chose to tell it, I think you would have a very interesting story. I, for one, would love to hear it.

Rob C
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: WalterEG on May 16, 2013, 05:51:45 am
And I would also.
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: RSL on May 16, 2013, 08:03:21 am
I'd be part of that audience too.
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 17, 2013, 01:28:44 am
Did not have my first real exposition > until about 1978.   By 1992 was well established in the galleries ( 3 in Carmel alone )

 But started working closer with the owners... learning what was selling > not what I felt like shooting.  You find the images/style that are selling in any given market.  I would pack up the cameras and head out to whatever was worth capturing > knowing I could sell.  When you don't have a day job to support your habit :: act responsible > shoot desirable images /\ not what you feel artistically incline toward.

I had plenty of images stacked up in storage .. that were costly ventures.  Beautiful 20 X images I thought were exquisite ;D but the public are the ones who pay your rent.
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 18, 2013, 01:54:23 am
If you follow some of my images ---  you will notice > for example :::  one year wrought iron was in .... the next few years doors --- etc.  I traveled around  for about 30 years ... every year another spot. Researched what was "hot" in the major galleries /media > and then packed up to points beyond.  

It was very difficult with color work  >:(   You had to be in the "know'  for next Falls' colour schemes ... Can't shoot a field of red flowers :: when pale blue is the future theme  :(
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: Rob C on May 18, 2013, 05:20:45 am
If you follow some of my images ---  you will notice > for example :::  one year wrought iron was in .... the next few years doors --- etc.  I traveled around  for about 30 years ... every year another spot. Researched what was "hot" in the major galleries /media > and then packed up to points beyond.  

It was very difficult with color work  >:(   You had to be in the "know'  for next Falls' colour schemes ... Can't shoot a field of red flowers :: when pale blue is the future theme  :(



In other words, you decided on your subjects just as a professional stock shooter does. Nothing wrong with that, and it could well be that galleries might even be more rewarding money-wise than sales via a stock agency. Today, I wouldn't doubt that for a moment, and the thought of spending money on travel ceased to make sense many years ago, even before digitial: simply too many guys shooting the same material just as well.

So what changed your mind regarding galleries and continuing to shoot for them? Change of company ownership/directors made huge changes to my commercial shooting, resulting in loss of contacts and their provision of work. Social mores also affected me: political correctness became a killer for calendars, as did rising paper and labour costs, of course.

A friend wrote recently that the entire face of commercial photography has changed... guess the face of everything has changed.

Rob C
Title: Re: Steps to La Defense
Post by: cjogo on May 18, 2013, 12:10:11 pm
It all has changed ...digital was the main game changer.  Several galleries have closed their doors ... One well-established Carmel gallery would like me to return > but only wants my color work.  :-[