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Author Topic: The Plantation at New Mills  (Read 16317 times)

stamper

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #60 on: May 30, 2011, 05:00:30 am »

Quote

But I also said that painting can control linear perspective and atmospheric perspective to a much greater extent than photography can. You can get lucky with atmospheric perspective on a foggy day, but you can't change linear perspective in a photograph. I also pointed out that you can control color in a painting in a way you can't even begin to control it in a photograph. And since you have to take what's there pretty much as is, though you can burn and dodge the way Ansel did, you can't make the kind of allegorical modifications you can make in a painting.

Unquote

I am heading out soon to try and get a meaningful image. There will be a lot of thoughts going through my mind when I am about to take a photograph, but not when I press the shutter. What won't be going through my mind is any of the above. If anyone is thinking about this when they are looking to get a good image then I think they should be thinking about something more relative? Are there any good painting forums where I can state that photography is the superior art forum? :)

John R Smith

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #61 on: May 30, 2011, 05:46:20 am »

And in case any of you wonders why this thread has been permitted to remain breathing, I’d suggest that it’s because Michael has been there, done that and understands the nature of the water.

Rob C

Rob

I very much doubt it. It's far more likely that he simply can't be arsed to read it  ;)

John
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RSL

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #62 on: May 30, 2011, 10:29:53 am »

Considering Henri was a primarily a street photographer then the connection to painting would be tenuous? A connection between landscape and paintings less so. What I won't do is go into a gallery and look at the paintings for a while and then go onto the street and look for scenes that resemble the compositions in the paintings. The world is ever changing and the paintings aren't. The paintings are a work of someone's imagination and the street isn't. Russ as you have pointed out in the past the street is the only ever changing subject. Painters are more likely to study photographs and use them in their imaginative interpretations rather than the other way around. I think you have reversed the logic?  ;)

Stamper, Here's a question upon which you might want to ruminate: Why do you think Henri Cartier-Bresson was such an influential photographer? Since it's obvious you're not exactly up to speed on the history of photography I'll give you a sort of negative clue: It wasn't because HCB invented street photography. Andre Kertesz, among others, was doing street photography before HCB came along. You might even say that in some cases Atget (whoever he was?) did street photography. Since he didn't originate the genre for which he was best known, what could possibly account for Cartier-Bresson's exceptional influence on his contemporaries and successors?

« Last Edit: June 01, 2011, 02:15:08 pm by RSL »
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stamper

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #63 on: May 30, 2011, 11:34:36 am »

I don't have an answer to that question but I am sure you will say it is to do with painting? If so then it is your opinion and if it is to do with painting then it won't affect my - if I have one - style of photography. :)

RSL

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #64 on: May 30, 2011, 11:48:58 am »

You won't even hazard a guess? What have you got to lose?
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Slobodan Blagojevic

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #65 on: May 30, 2011, 12:17:48 pm »

I think that, when it comes to crucial influence, inferiority of photography to painting is nothing compared to its inferiority to... music. Yes, music! Music rocks, baby! Ansel played piano at a concert-pianist level, Kodachrome was invited by two professional musicians... it's a long list of photographers with musical backgrounds. Take that, Russ the Painter!  ;) :) :D ;D

Rob C

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #66 on: May 30, 2011, 02:08:25 pm »

Bam! Slam! Slobodan!

Yes, music is very much more influential to the average Joe, including this one, who can neither sing nor play an instrument. It's the first thing I do when I switch on the computer, the essential companion to everything else. Always was. And it can bring back memories that surpass those of images, unless originally connected to image as in film or book/magazine and time.

I saw Jazz on a Summer's day in late '58 or in '59 (six times) and I always associate Chuck Berry with the stage act where he (appears) to be shunned by the higher egos of some of the jazz musos, excluding the drummer and clarinet who both chipped in and gave him backing and a break, too. (Ironically, Berry gets the best cheers of them all.) I also associate Jimmy Giuffre with Train and the River and the watery titles of the movie. So sure, images and music can make for magical combinations. I also remember sitting in a bar in Naples (Italy) in '57 and feeding the jukebox and getting Little Richard scream the place awake mid-morning.

We agree, Slobodan.

Rob C

« Last Edit: May 31, 2011, 03:45:50 am by Rob C »
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Rob C

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #67 on: May 30, 2011, 02:10:57 pm »

Rob

I very much doubt it. It's far more likely that he simply can't be arsed to read it  ;)

John


I wouldn't put money on it!

;-)

Rob C

degrub

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #68 on: May 30, 2011, 05:08:02 pm »

yeah and i fear no evil when i walk into the valley of death.....

musicians ? Isn't music just another language ? like mathematics ?

so really, they were just closet mathematicians !  :o

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RSL

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #69 on: May 30, 2011, 06:06:57 pm »

I think that, when it comes to crucial influence, inferiority of photography to painting is nothing compared to its inferiority to... music. Yes, music! Music rocks, baby! Ansel played piano at a concert-pianist level, Kodachrome was invited by two professional musicians... it's a long list of photographers with musical backgrounds. Take that, Russ the Painter!  ;) :) :D ;D

Slobodan, I'll certainly go along with that. Giacomo Puccini can absolutely knock me down, Verdi can sit me down, and there are others, Rachmaninoff comes to mind, who can mess with my emotions in a big way.

Yes, I was surprised to find out that Ansel gave up a budding career as a concert pianist to shoot pictures. I gather that even then he occasionally performed. I played the piano for ten years and wanted very much to be a concert pianist, but I simply didn't have what it took. I'm not a painter either, though my brother is a very good one. So here I am, making photographs.
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Rob C

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #70 on: May 31, 2011, 03:29:20 am »

Well, as I started off with paint too, and discovering that copying Impressionists' postcards from the art museum was nothing more than painting by numbers, I surrendered to my even earlier fascination with the mechanical toys that ads for Leica seemed to be offering in the pages of glossy magazines, the more little windows on the front the better: imagine my sadness when the M3 removed that effect! But, as I never owned any of the marque, academic.

So, painter manqué, almost certainly; but I did find an alternative love after all.

Rob

PS Reverting to music awhile:

Added to the list of memory jerkers could be Only You which brings back Amalfi and my girlfiriend-eventual-wife, a landmark originally commemorated on the number plate that currently sports my website, with the two lines Only You, Amalfi '57. Another tune of import was Always, that spooked past members of my family because it was an arbiter of movement to yet another place. Blueberry Hill is my American Graffiti moment because it reminds me of lost friends from school, it being 'their song'. It didn't work out: I met her years later and she didn't go into it, so neither can I.

Don't you just love this medium?

Some piano for Russ:

http://youtu.be/vB-WF4lvVhw
« Last Edit: May 31, 2011, 05:30:36 am by Rob C »
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tq-g

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #71 on: May 31, 2011, 08:20:10 am »

yeah and i fear no evil when i walk into the valley of death.....

musicians ? Isn't music just another language ? like mathematics ?

so really, they were just closet mathematicians !  :o


And the practical application of mathematics is engineering. Engineering, then, is related to architecture. Architecture to Frank Lloyd Wright. And Frank Lloyd Wright studied nature.

Therefore, you should study nature. Preferably while listening to Rachmaninov.

(Despite the obviously flawed logic, that's actually not a bad idea)
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Jeremy Roussak

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #72 on: May 31, 2011, 01:26:02 pm »

Slobodan, I'll certainly go along with that. Giacomo Puccini can absolutely knock me down, Verdi can sit me down, and there are others, Rachmaninoff comes to mind, who can mess with my emotions in a big way.
No Shostakovich, Russ? I'm shocked. I've found live performances of the fifth symphony in particular to be among the most emotionally draining experiences I've had.

One point which has drifted across the arid wastes of my mind when reading this thread is that you seem to extol painting for allowing the artist to do that which many landscape photographers regard as anathema: change the scene so that it looks as it "should" rather than as it is. I've never seen a problem with removing boulders, or wires, or even small and irrelevant mountains, in post-processing but some people regard it as heresy. Plainly you wouldn't be one of them, although your dislike of cropping had led me to suspect that you would be a purist.

Jeremy
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Rob C

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #73 on: May 31, 2011, 04:43:44 pm »

No Shostakovich, Russ? I'm shocked. I've found live performances of the fifth symphony in particular to be among the most emotionally draining experiences I've had.

One point which has drifted across the arid wastes of my mind when reading this thread is that you seem to extol painting for allowing the artist to do that which many landscape photographers regard as anathema: change the scene so that it looks as it "should" rather than as it is. I've never seen a problem with removing boulders, or wires, or even small and irrelevant mountains, in post-processing but some people regard it as heresy. Plainly you wouldn't be one of them, although your dislike of cropping had led me to suspect that you would be a purist.

Jeremy


Can't answer for Russ, but as I said before - possibly too ofen - the only real problem I see with landscape photography is the lack of control in relation to the subject. I don't see perspective and positioning of camera, waiting for the light etc. as creative per se, but simply making the best of what's there before you came along. Now, could you move mountains... not to imply that doing that via PS is creative either: that's just technical skill.

Landscape aside, this creative thing is a bit of a killer for my current muso shootings too, which are all the result of framing what's there. There is no control of where they stand, where they look or how they hold their musical instruments. There's not even much control of where I can stand, as people at seats are buying drinks and they are Top Dog. Quite rightly, too: they pay the bill.

One day...

Rob C

RSL

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #74 on: May 31, 2011, 06:07:54 pm »

No Shostakovich, Russ? I'm shocked. I've found live performances of the fifth symphony in particular to be among the most emotionally draining experiences I've had.

One point which has drifted across the arid wastes of my mind when reading this thread is that you seem to extol painting for allowing the artist to do that which many landscape photographers regard as anathema: change the scene so that it looks as it "should" rather than as it is. I've never seen a problem with removing boulders, or wires, or even small and irrelevant mountains, in post-processing but some people regard it as heresy. Plainly you wouldn't be one of them, although your dislike of cropping had led me to suspect that you would be a purist.

Jeremy

Jeremy, The only "other" I listed was Rachmaninoff, but there are many, many others. Yes, Shostakovich is among the others. A lot of Grieg. Especially "Solveg's song," which can immobilize me completely when sung competently. There's a lot in Mendelssohn, particularly his songs without words. As far I'm concerned, Mendelssohn understood the piano better than anyone except Chopin. And of course there's a whole menu of show stoppers from Chopin. Then there's a little aria from Boito's Mefistofele: "Dai Campi, Dai Prati" that brings tears every time I hear Placido Domingo sing it. There just isn't enough time or space to list them all.

I only extol painting for landscape. Not because a painter like Turner makes it look as it "should," but because Turner can play with linear perspective and color in a way that brings out the emotion and meaning that's hidden in a plain landscape. I've rarely seen a photograph that can do that, though I think Chuck's North Dakota series is an exception. The problem with trying to do that with photographic post-processing is that the modifications are obvious to anyone with eyes to see. I frequently remove wires (but not boulders or mountains), but that's a different kind of thing.
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Rob C

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #75 on: June 01, 2011, 03:57:11 am »

"As far I'm concerned, Mendelssohn understood the piano better than anyone except Chopin."

And if you go to see his pad in Valldemossa where he famously had that 1838 Mallorcan winter with George Sand, you'll understand why old Chops had the drop on them all: the thing he played on seems tiny and out of proportion. Who could ever understand what that may have done for his synapses? Not to mention the effect of the electrical storms up there in the mountains. You understand about electricity and early psychology and psychiatry... more weird than the Munsters, on this island.

Rob C

Rocco Penny

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #76 on: June 01, 2011, 10:13:43 am »

...
...
 up there in the mountains. You understand about electricity and early psychology and psychiatry... more weird than the Munsters, on this island.

Rob C

!!!
all (a few) brilliant people I know are so insulated from outside forces as to render themselves useless in all but a few pursuits
so try and take one of them out among the people, and they're farting in underground chambers, declaring their love for a woman met just hours/days/weeks before-half joining cults for the acceptance of their peculiarity-
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Rob C

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #77 on: June 01, 2011, 10:24:32 am »

!!!
all (a few) brilliant people I know are so insulated from outside forces as to render themselves useless in all but a few pursuits
so try and take one of them out among the people, and they're farting in underground chambers, declaring their love for a woman met just hours/days/weeks before-half joining cults for the acceptance of their peculiarity-



You know too much for a man of your age.

Rob C

stamper

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #78 on: June 01, 2011, 10:42:02 am »

This thread has progressed a long way from larch plantations and trees. :(

RSL

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Re: The Plantation at New Mills
« Reply #79 on: June 01, 2011, 11:05:18 am »

Right, Stamper. "Progressed" is the right word.
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