Friday, September 28, 2012

(S)Praying To The Aliens

Mornin' playmates.
Well another weekend nearer to death is what I say.
We have had terrible problems with a great misunderstanding this week.
Mog (strangely) took umbrage with Mr.Sheephouse about his mention of spraying.
Now Mog was 'done' many years ago and he's a couthie cat, but he does take the hump about nothing, and this week he has done so quite bizarrely.
Yowls and tantrums is all it has been; wet whiskers; runny noses; yowling; growling; tail swishing - you name it, it has happened.
I can't be doin' with it.
It's no way to run a ship.
So when I threatened the both of them with a good old fashioned keel-hauling, and quarter rations for a month they stopped and made up.
Mog is now sitting on Mr.Sheephouse's lap and he is showing Mog some photographs of some very dull places.
Peace reigns.
All is good with the world.
But watch out for spraying anyway.
You've not lived till you've had a Circus Tiger spray out of his bars at you.
It takes at the very least a month of Sundays and scrubbin' with carbolic to get the pong out.


***


Sorry for the rather obvious Tubeway Army title for the weeks FB.
I remember being at school when Replicas came out - what an album and it still hasn't dated.
My friend Alan Currie bore more than a passing resemblance to Numan, and to say he was beseiged by the girls at Lockerbie would be an understatement . . . anyway . . .

Wot's This?
Pre-Blog Digression?
In a public arena??
A'll 'ave you arrested for loitering with intent to amuse . . .

Anyway, this week I think we are going to go all practical and try something that might seem like an anathema to some of you .  . though not all . . of course I am probably preaching to the converted, but you never know.
And I've been meaning to mention, if you've been referred from the Scottish Photographers site, welcome! We're Scottish and we're photographers - we need to stick together!
Anyway, you'll maybe know what I am going to be talking about here, because it is time to don the hair shirt and start whipping yourself with that thorny briar you'd been saving for just such a moment.
Forget normal Saturday morning routine.
Drop the bacon sarnie, in fact, chuck it in the bin, because it is for softies, and you have to prove you are hard . . . damn hard.
Today (no slouching at the back) could be a momentous Saturday for you.
If you had a mind to make some photographs today then that is great; what I am going to suggest might seem a bit severe, however keep going and you'll see that actually it isn't as severe as it seems , and it might actually be of benefit.
Now firstly, I am going to make one simple assumption about anyone photographically-minded reading this - you are probably not using film . . .

A little aside along a quiet country lane, where men looked dapper, ladies wore tweed skirts and the world seemed like a sunnier place.

As much as it saddens me to say it, film use seems to be dying on its feet.
Personally I feel myself being driven ever-deeper into a corner from which there is no way out except to get a bloody digital camera, and to be honest I don't want one. But that's just me. I don't know, there is something that just feels right about loading a roll of film into a camera and doing your stuff and processing your film. I definitely do not get it from looking at a screen, whether on the camera or at home. It just doesn't feel right. Am I mad? It seems to be perfectly fine for most of the rest of the world. I do question myself sometimes and often come to the conclusion that when the whole world seems to be heading in one direction, I turn right around and head in the opposite one. 
Curmudgeonly?  
Possibly. 
Definitely an innate sense of wanting to be my own man though. 
I find myself these days thinking back to the (almost) pre-SLR days of the 1950's and thinking how marvellous it would have been when all you had to worry about was whether you chose a slow film or a fast film, and whether your own mix of Stoeckler's Developer was still alright. 
As basic as that. 
And a nice place to be.




Anyway, this is more digression, so let's FFD to the sickly dayglo glare of modern times. 




If you are a digital user - welcome. I have no problem with that at all. I suppose image making is image making no matter what the medium.
What I am going to propose today can be easily done and achieved by anyone, with any sort of camera.
And unless you were the sort of person who always played the Banker in Monopoly and knocked your opponents hotels to the ground and whilst they were scrabbling around for them, helped themselves to hundreds of pounds from the Bank . . . hmmm . . . yes . . been there done that . . . (sorry Steve!) then you might find yourself being able to hold to this, because today we are going to be looking at something which whilst highly unpopular, will sort the men from the boys, the chimps from the apes, the dogs from the puppies . . . oh yes, ouch, ouch, oo-ya, ouch . . it's, ouch . . . 

Discipline


***


Whilst being an altogether top-notch album written by Mr. Robert Fripp and his jolly bunch of gnomes, Discipline photographically is something that you have to adhere to . . . well, at least for today it is. And if you are willing to be a lab-rat for a day, I can promise that there's a rather nice piece of Emmental at the end of this maze.
It might seem to be a very obvious to want to make one photograph count, but as far as I can see, these days the world has gone as far away from photographic Discipline as it possibly could.
It is now the case that, because people aren't having to pay on a frame by frame basis for processing, they have been given the keys to the sweety shop and are no longer photographing (rendering a moment in time as a single image) but merely spraying.
By taking as many frames as they can in a small space of time (because the technology will allow it) and picking and choosing from the end result they are firmly based in the photographic school of the elimination of all doubt . . . to wit:

I spray, therefore I have a good image.
The camera knows best and I will point it in that direction and it will help me.


For example, having heard tales from a number of sources in very recent times, it is not uncommon these days for the amateur wedding photographer (and professional too for that matter) to come away at the end of the day with anything between 700 and over 1000 images!
Now if they can't see that something IS NOT RIGHT about this state of affairs then they really shouldn't be holding a camera.
Up the frame rate and you have film making, not photography - do you see what I mean? Buy a video camera, don't pretend to make photographs, because all you are doing is spraying and hoping you'll get a defining image and then picking the best one from your gander bag of sliced-up time.
Personally I find it a simple thing to imagine that this state of affairs has occurred due to an extreme lack of (here it comes again): Discipline.
Technology has given photographers the ability to make as many pictures as they like and as such the normal human qualities such as thought and trust in one's own abilities have been thrown out along with the baby and the bath water.


***


Humans are resourceful and talented, quick-witted and lightning-reactioned, so how come so many people are so distrustful of their own abilities that they decide to spray and pick?
Such activities do not a photographer make.
And doing that, I don't even think you can pass muster as a happy snapper either.
You (not you . . him over there!) have become a lumbering leviathan who spends more time editing down this giant pile of STUFF into something that looks passable than you did at the actual even itself!
More time seems to be spent on photoshopping than is spent on learning the craft skills and the compositional nuances that could make you and your compositions a thing of lightness and air rather than a twin-tub washing machine filled with concrete and pig-iron and forever never destined to fly!
Gosh it's sad isn't it.
Such actions must be based on insecurity - does that make sense to any of you?
The roots of this mad behaviour rest firmly with the large camera companies and the press photographers of the late '70's (yes I know it was developed a long time before that, but that is when it really came to the fore) who demanded mechanisms that could pass vast amounts of film through their cameras very quickly, hence the motor drive and (ugh, I can barely type it) f.p.s. (frames per second).
Machine gun cameras captured every nuance, and that attitude is still there today, mowing down endless advancing ranks of subject matter.
Millions and millions of rolls of film.
Millions and millions of pixels.
When one photograph could say it all.
I hate to harp back to Mr.Cartier-Bresson, but God love us, could that man say more with one photograph than any of the industrial-strength press photographers (of course there were exceptions . . I do realise that). And how did he manage it?
Discipline.
And a canny eye.
An ability to read a situation, and the en-erring ability to predict a moment in time and make sure he was right there. But the key of these was Discipline.
See how I started that with a Capital letter and in bold and green and in a  different typeface?
I did so for the simple reason that it is something that you have to learn.
This is important stuff.
Simple as that.


***


For today's excercise, I am going to ask you to imagine something - it might seem hard but it isn't. Users of Medium Format Cameras are used to this, so get with it and stop whining.
You are going to imagine your camera can only expose 12 photographs.
If you have a film camera and a 36 exposure film, that means you have 3 films. For today's exercise I am going to ask you to imagine you can only use 12 frames or the equivalent of 1 roll of Medium Format film. The same if you have a 24 exposure film . .that is 2 films, and you can only use one today.
So effectively you've got 2 or 3 concentrated picture making sessions at different points of time . . remember it is just one session today.
Yes there will be a delay in getting your film processed, but that is half the fun.
If you are a digital user, you could expose millions of pictures, however please, for the sake of this article, be true to its spirit and just expose 12 . .
There - I really appreciate that.
Oh, and  NO CHEATING .
This is the hard bit.
You can't go back and check your screen, until you have made 12 exposures, just as the film users can't go and get their film processed mid-roll.
It's fun, so don't worry. No body will get hurt. Your camera will be able to sustain a bit of menu relief, and you might possibly find it of some benefit.
Now for all concerned I am going to get you to ask yourself a very important question every time you think you might be about to take a photograph.
Even if you are using a medium format camera and so only have 12 or even 10 frames anyway, this is still a pertinent question:

Is this the world's most boring photograph?

Be honest with yourself and your eyes and your heart. If you can answer Yes, then it might well ensure that you turn away from that really dull landscape, or that picture of some vegetable vendor handing over a bag of veg at a market! I have been there and made many many photographs of such stuff and Lordy are they DULL!
My other tip for this is that rather than standing well back and making a photograph, try and get in close. This is especially important with Street Photography, where being in the thick of things works, but random snaps of stuff going on in a street often doesn't.
Think of all the inspirational photographs made on the streets of the world you have looked at. I would say the majority of them were taken at close quarters, because a photograph generally has to have a subject . . even if that subject seems inane.
So get in close.
Fill the frame.
Depending on the lens you are using you might well find setting a hyperfocal distance useful, and certainly if you are using a slower Black and White film just average out a shutter speed of about 1/60th of a second with an aperture of either f8 or f5.6. You'll find the films natural latitude copes very well with any exposure mistakes - honestly . . the older I get the more latitude (the films ability to cope with varying lighting situations) amazes me.
Now get out there and make some photographs, but remember you can only take 12, so anticipation is the key.
It takes guts, and it takes Discipline to control your shutter finger, but it will pay off.
Good luck and don't annoy anyone
Landscapes are a little different.
Your subject is generally far away, so in order to avoid the it's-over-there-I'm-over-here style of landscape photograph (which unless handled by a Master, can be painfully dull) try isolating a nearer object and using that as a focal point within your landscape. It is OK to make a photograph of a tree, so long as it is an interesting tree!
Wander around with your eye on the viewfinder (but watch out for those rocks . . and that p

r

e


c


i



p



i


c


e



)



.
Ouch!
Quite often a composition will jump out at you. 
I would also ask that if it were possible, you over-ride any auto settings on your camera and deliberately underexpose parts of your landscape. This can lead to large areas of darkness within the photograph, but I personally feel that landscapes are quite often improved by such things.**
Landcapes obviously benefit beautifully from atmosphere too, so try and avoid a mid-day scene and get out early in the day or last thing, or even if there is inclement weather. In landscapes, it can also be a useful excercise to make a number of compositions of your subject . . oh and don't forget the old 180 degree turn. I've quite often found that strangely turning around can elicit a better photograph than the one I was photographing in the first place.
Anyway, this is digressing. I am not a guru, I just want to pass on some stuff I have personally found useful.
12 exposures is limiting, but you know what, I have often been out in the mountains with my Rollei and come home with less, simply because I have been concerned about what I was making a picture of. So it isn't really as bad as it seems.
Anyway, hopefully you will be able to get out and do some concentrated photography, and when you come back you can look at what you have, or if you are using film you can wait a bit, forget what you took pictures of, do it another twice, get the film processed and have a lovely surprise (or not).
At the end of the day, the one photograph that makes you go YES! is the one that counts. The whole point of this page is that if practicing this simple thing can help you to concentrate more and learn how to Discipline yourself so that the urge to snap away at everything is replaced with a more considered view, then personally I think a better picture maker you will become.
It is a simple practice and as such requires practice.
And it is hard.
And frustrating.
But ultimately rewarding.
Just remember to keep asking yourself:

Is this the world's most boring photograph?

If you can answer yes, then turn away and try and find something different.



***


These are examples of two photographs of virtually the same subject matter. They are a style of photograph I enjoy taking and often are records of our ever-disappearing urban environment, but boy are they DULL.





world's dullest photograph
Peep O'Day Lane, Sunrise
These toilets were a relic of a by-gone age in Dundee.
They were demolished about a year ago




The first whilst of interest probably only to me, is very dull indeed, and could well hold the record for being the world's dullest photograph
It shows no Discipline and was a random snap whilst out walking.




Stairs 3
Whilst appearing to be in a correctional institution,
these are actually nothing more than a staircase at
the Olympia Leisure Centre in Dundee
at Sunrise


The second I prefer because it has atmosphere and because it can set your imagination going. 
Has anyone just passed down these stairs? 
Where do they lead? 
Why are there bars on the window? 
It was a more considered photograph, and what I saw and imagined as a print, actually came to fruition.
Anyway, enough of my rambling. please give this a go. 
Trying to be a  Disciplined photographer is a very good way to be. 
Hopefully you'll get to the stage where you don't need to keep spraying all the time
Please remember, it's a terribly bad habit and often results in neutering.
God bless, stay dry and as usual thanks for reading.



Technical morass ahead:

** Obviously extreme underexposure can lead to lots of problems too, so unless you have a bit of experience and can predict what your film/sensor will register, I would point your meter at a shadow area and underexpose that by 1 stop. That means that if the exposure reads say 1/60th of a second at f8, you could either use 1/125th of a second at f8 or 1/60th of a second at f11. In other words (to be basic) set your shutter speed 1 speed faster, or set your lens aperture one number higher.
If you haven't been able to turn your meter off, then use the AE lock on your camera - point that little square (or whatever the metering area of your camera is) in your viewfinder at an area that is just slightly lighter than a mid-tone in your viewfinder. You can often do a basic tone scan by half-closing your viewing eye. This breaks a scene down into blurry shapes, but that helps you concentrate on which bit is lighter, which bit is darker, which bit is just right . . 
Make like Baby Bear in Goldilocks bambino
What we want is just slightly lighter than 'just right'. Partially depress your shutter button to lock the meter and then, still holding it down, recompose your picture and make the photograph. This makes the camera adopt the settings like it was making that slightly lighter patch the average for the whole scene. Amazing as it seems, all camera meters, even sophisticated ones, come from the premise that you want to expose the scene for an average reading. In black and white photography this means a mid-grey tone! So if you want mid-grey everywhere, then just use your average meter reading. Colour photography is different, but generally colour print film has a pretty decent latitude (after all it was originally designed for holiday snaps); colour transparency film is a little more finicky.

Friday, September 07, 2012

Photographing Nothing

Greetings m'Dearios. Well this week we seem to have been a sailin' round in a big circle. 
We set off on Monday with all sorts of waves and well-wishes and we found ourselves back on Friday in the same port with all sorts of puzzled looks and warding.
For 'tis bad luck to return to the port you set off from in the same week.
I have an idea how it happened, and I will blame it on Mog.
That cat.
He'll sleep anywhere, and given we'd been re-caulking a part of the foredeck this week, he managed to get tar on his fur, but, before we had him trimmed, he had a snooze in my cabin, and left some nice tarry marks on me charts.
'Twasn't good though.
I made it onto the dock and was immediately beset by Cap'n Mash.
After our usual sailorly greetings, he took me aside and the following conversation ensued:

'T'isn't right cap'n'

'You're right there Mash.'

He'd found out about Mog

'In my day ship's cats were considered ill-luck when they got tarred.'

'My day too cap'n - we're the same age remember.'

'Oh. Ar. Aye, so we are.'

'You're forgetting yerself there cap'n'

He looked a bit offended.
Anyways after much beard strokin', he said:

'So where are you going to nail it?'

I've risked offending many people before, and I wasn't going to let Mash tell me what to do, so I looked him in the eye and said:

'You've overstepped yersel' there cap'n.'

He took this like a slap with a bowsprit.

'But it is cap'n. Bad luck is what it is. If you don't then I will. That cat'll bring it all down upon us again.'

'Bring what down cap'n?' I asked
He looked at me in a weird way and said in a small voice:

'The Fear, cap'n, The Fear.'

This was mighty strange, but I asked him anyway.

'What fear be that Mash?'

He rubbed at his jowls and took out his cloute and wiped his forehead and looked me straight in the eye and said:

'It.'

This was getting stranger by the minute.

'It what Mash?'

'It!'

Mr.Sheephouse had appeared on deck at this time and was observing us - no doubt he wrote it up in his journals. He was holding Mog in a friendly manner and supportive of the cat's behind, just the proper way you hold a cat.
Mog was watching too.
I didn't know what to say, so I let Mash qualify his statement. He was looking swole now, his face had lost that steely look like he was going to stop me and he had more the appearence of a big babby.

'Haven't ye noticed cap'n? 
No matter where ye go, from the Southern shoals to the Northern rocks. 
From warm water to cold. 
From the lands of the sultry-eyed ladies to the lands of the blubber-eaters.
The sea, cap'n. 
The sea! 
That's The Fear cap'n.
The sea! 
It all be the same!'

We headed out on the next tide and I am happy to report that our charts are now fine.
Mog is sitting watching me write this up. He has a dish o'cream and his favourite catnip mouse.
It takes a lot to change a sailor's mind once he's set on course, but a ship's cat is a capn's best friend.
I've raised Mog since I found him half-drowned in a burlap bag as a kit.
There was no chance of me nailin' him to a mast.
No chance at all.


***



Definition of nothing
[pronoun]
·   not anything; no single thing:
    I said nothing
    there’s nothing you can do
    they found nothing wrong
·   something of no importance or concern:
    ‘What are you laughing at?’ ‘Oh, nothing, sir’
     they are nothing to him
[as noun]:
     no longer could we be treated as nothings
·    (in calculations)
     no amount;
     nought.
[adjective]
[attributive] informal
·     having no prospect of progress; of no value:
      he had a series of nothing jobs
[adverb]
·     not at all:
      a man who cared nothing for her
      he looks nothing like the others
[postpositive]
·     North American informal used to contradict something emphatically:
      ‘This is a surprise.’ ‘Surprise nothing.’



***



You know, looking back over contact prints and boxes of prints I have, I seem to have spent an inordinate amount of money and time and effort on photographing nothing at all.
One generally supposes that a picture needs to have a subject, but as I shall show dear reader my subjects often consist of nothing other than a piece of wall, or fence, or moor, or tree. Nothing you could really call 'subject matter', nothing even that you could really call a snap. So why do I continue on this fool's errand when the world and his brother wants pictures of something?
When I was much much younger and still finding my feet on a fingerboard, my Mother would urge me, even cajole me, to play something with "a tune to it."
At the time, John William's Cavatina was the piece of classical guitar music that everyone wanted to hear, but I simply couldn't play it. I could have made a half-hearted, fumble fingered go at it, but I couldn't just sit down in a room with Mum and Dad, Trevor and Olive, and Arthur and Evelyn and Dolly and Tom and Doug and play it. I could do a passable attempt at the opening bit of the Concerto Aranjuez, or a Chinese-whispers version of Smokestack Lightning, but Cavatina?
No way hose-pipe.
Not a chance.
And I wonder now why I didn't even try to appease them. It would have been simpler, would have won me all sorts of appreciation, maybe even an extra piece of God's own pudding (in case you're wondering, an Apple pie, with shortcrust pastry and a hint of the exotic with cloves added for spice) and custard . . . but I didn't. I prefered instead to mumble and do the hard rasquedo-ey bit from Concerto and that was it. 
I sort of realise now why I was like that - basically, I am stupid.
It manifests itself in many ways, but generally, at the hint of being able to do something that might in the long-run lead onto something, I stand in the corner and just say 'No'.
It has been the same with every single creative endevour I have ever been involved with, and to be honest I find it immensely irritating.
So how does this contrary motion manifest itself photographically?
Well, I must admit that when (and if) in a situation where all comers are photographing the view or whatever interesting is happening, I tend to find myself off in a different direction, or around the corner, or just plain photographing the people doing the photographing. When in landscapes of incredible beauty, I tend not to go for the grand view (though goodness knows I have) but more for the things in that landscape that I find attractive . . . and that is . . . usually . . . what you could call . . . er . . . nothing.
So why bother?
Well I find this a difficult one to quantify.
Apparently John Szarkowski wrote in a forward to one of Ansel Adams’ books, a quote from Fred Astaire in the film Funny Face. Astaire was playing a fashion photographer. Audrey Hepburn’s character asked him, “Why do you photograph beautiful women?” and he said, “Madam, you’d be amazed at how small the demand is for pictures of trees.”
I think that is an interesting quote, because in Mr.Adams' case, pictures of trees and the grand vista were what he made his name with, however my favourite Adams photographs are the ones where people are involved and where the non-obvious is the subject matter.
There is one of walls and buildings from Mexico (where the light is just extraordinary and a dog just pops into the frame and Mr.Adams makes the photograph) that I love very much for the fact that other than the dog appearing at the appropriate moment, there is nothing going on.
But there is also another, a portrait he made on his Zeiss Contax, of Georgia O'Keefe and Orville Cox at the Canyon de Shelly national monument.
I think he out-decisived HCB on this.
From my own point of view, it is full of nothing, and yet it doubtless has something.




Georgia O'Keeffe and Orville Cox, Canyon de Chelly National Monument
©Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust


One wonders what was said, or maybe even un-said. There can be so much read into this seemingly simple photograph, but ultimately it is a photograph of nothing where something is happening.
For my own bizarre ends, you name it I have photographed it, from cigarette stubbers to barren, rock-strewn hillsides, to pictures of mist (taken from inside the mist) to piles of earth and posters and bits of light on walls.
There is never any intended subtext of duality.
They are just plain photographs.
So why do I do it? Is there some sort of attractiveness in my subject matter. Something that might halt a viewer in their tracks and make them say (Hmmmmm . .. I see!) . . Well no not really. A large number of my photographs aren't just as dull as dishwater, they're horrendously boring too. But the thing is, I quite like them. I made them, and even if they are dull to you and you and you, to me they are fine. Not great. Just fine.
I don't make photographs of sports events or society photographs - those tend to be pictures of something. Mine are more like random observations from a chaotic world (isn't that a great book title . . so great I am going to copyright it now):
Random Observations From A Chaotic World ©  Phil Rogers 06/09/2012
There, that's better.
What I think I am trying to say (and regular FB readers will appreciate the fact that every week they're delving into the thought process of a Stromatalite) is that photographic subject matter is obviously entirely a personal choice, but (and here's the kicker) like my refusal to play Cavatina, it doesn't actually have to be of anything at all.
It's a weird way to approach a hobby, but it is my way and unless I change dramatically, I can't really see anything beyond my random collection of images of unremarkable buildings, trees in the middle of nowhere, ephemera and detritus, random mist, forgotten parcels of land and the occasional person passing through the edges of my viewfinder.
A photograph is a photograph is a photograph; be it masterful archival print handled by be-gloved curators in a museum, or a snap permanently pasted in a plastic sleeved album handed round at parties and family get-togethers. From the £20,000 investment on a gallery wall to the plastic-papered object you collect from Tescos, to the thirty billion random examples littering the ether. All photographs. All of them of subject matter that might be something, could possibly even be something, but mostly is nothing.
Hmmmm (rubs beard and re-reads again) this has all gone a bit . . shite. I've got away from what I was trying to say and wandered off again. 
That dear reader is part of how this comes together most weeks. powered by massive mugs of tea my brain slowly grinds into motion, but it doesn't necessarily grind in the direction it was grinding the day before. But please be ensured that, like a fleshy orbital sander, it will eventually get to some obscure point.
Yes, what was I saying.
Why do I do it?
I think it all stems from something Gary Winogrand said when asked why he photographed so much, and his answer was (to paraphrase him) that he photographed to see what the world was like photographed.
There is (strangely) something to this seemingly obtuse, mad and random statement.

Strap on a helmet - he's headed off in a different direction again . .this is the Winogrand by-pass:

Gary snapped away like a good'un; like there was no tomorrow.
On the surface, seemingly endless random shots of people and situations.
Photographs of, really, nothing.
Tiny slices of time, chaotic and juxtaposed. Fleeting moments that would at their time of occurrence have absolutely no meaning at all to their perpetrators. An arm lifted here, a conversation there. A laugh. A burden. A fall. A bag. A coffee. The movements of the world. Bits of time that you would never analyse.
But with crafted observation, transformed into art.
When you view his images there is something that hits you straight in the nose.
He was a humanist.
There is great feeling and warmth deeply inherent in his photographs.
There is pathos and a very refined sense of humour.
They're not gritty in the way a lot of photography of the 60's and 70's was.
They're honest and human, no set-ups, just lightning fast reactions to unfolding situations; anticipation to the Nth degree.
But ultimately photographs of nothing made into something.
Here's a couple of examples - they're mad and funny and strange all at the same time.
The first image is almost like something from a surrealist painting don't you think?




Democratic Convention, LA, 1960
© Winogrand Estate




It's bizarre to think that in photographing nothing: three people, at random, up close (with the incredible fact that none of them seem to be aware of the camera) Mr.Winogrand has, like Mr.Adams, made a photograph into which so much can be read.
My next example from him is probably one of my favourite photographs these days.





Untitled 1977
© Winogrand Estate




Again, a picture of nothing.
A boy and a sheep (?) in what looks like a stock shed, and yet, one wonders what is going on.
My own thoughts are (every time I look at it):

Who is looking after who?
Is that some strange alien and the boy is disgruntled because he is hogging the limelight?
Have they had a fight?

Again in photographing the mundane Mr.Winogrand has provided us with an image which raises more questions than it answers and with the added bonus that we smile and chuckle and then this great photograph is now our new best friend.
I call it genius.
Sadly Gary passed away in the 1980's leaving an archive of tens of thousands of unprocessed rolls of film. One wonders what other gems are in there.


Ok, we've taken a left and now we're back on Sheephouse Drive


At this point in time, I have decided to shamelessly shoehorn some of my own photographic nothings into the proceedings . . . and why not . . . FB is my little kingdom and I can do what I like.
Of course these images are in rather grand company, but I like to think that if either Mr.Winogrand, or Mr.Adams were still alive and came round, we could sit and have some tea and good old chin-wag, so I am sure they won't mind my paltry efforts.
The photos I have included below are essentially images of nothing.
They're random snaps (well the first two are) from random moments of time.
There's nothing going on and there's nothing happening.
The first two were made on holiday with my trusty little Olympus Trip 35:





Mersey Ferry, 2012
                         
      


Yes, that flag is on the Mersey Ferry - I dunno, it just seemed like a nice little bit of Britishness that I rather like - but essentially it is a snap of nothing. I was just wandering around the deck blazing through a roll of film and pretending to look:
a.) Arty
and
b.) Important
Nobody was fooled - my family remained in the cafe area and looked unimpressed.


Two days before we had been a-wanderin' in the rain around the beautiful and lively City of Liverpool, when I spied the next subject.
The man was drunk or homeless or just plain desperate, but his back and the way he moved caught my eye and I had to briefly follow him and make this picture.
I felt (and still feel) sorry for him actually.
He exuded an air of complete lonliness.
It was him versus the world and the world was winning, and it was raining.
I should have bought him a coffee in hindsight, but such was his air that he would probably have told me to shove it.





Man In The Rain, Liverpool, 2012




The third is the most mundane, but it shows how, sometimes, unplanned and strange things can happen.
It was a lengthy set-up involving a 5x4 view camera and a large tripod.
Nominally it is a picture of nothing, that somehow seems to have become a picture of something.
Something weird.
Just why I decided to photograph this clump of trees is totally beyond me.
It took about 20 minutes to set the camera up, a few minutes to sort out the meter readings and make the exposure, a few minutes take-down time; and then of course there's the lugging time, the getting back to the car time; the processing time (one sheet of film at a time) and then the printing time.
A large chunk of my life has been wasted on making an image of absolutely no consequence or worth to anyone . . at least that is what I thought.
However, somehow, light and rocks and leaves and their positioning in the landscape have led me to capture an image of a dead man's face. You can see it quite clearly, near the bole of the left hand trees. He looks like he has been trussed rather in the method of Bronze Age sacrifices, and, putting arms and legs onto everything as usual, I feel that maybe some of the spirit of this quiet clump of forgotten land has manifested itself in a natural apparition.
We are programmed for faces. Just look around you and they are everywhere in the natural world. Strangely, I just seem to have found one in a pile of rocks and leaves, in a public cemetery, early on a May morning.





The Drowned Man, 2010




I could have illustrated this FB with loads more images of total inconsequence, but I have spared you dear reader.
They are dull.
Maybe when we get to know each other better I'll reel them out and await your judgement.
In the meantime, don't fuss over your photographs, just go and take a walk and take a picture of something that you find interesting to look at.
For the sheer hell of it, why not follow Mr.Winogrand and just photograph to see what the world looks like photographed.
It might well be nothing in the eyes of the world, but it will be your something.
God bless, thanks for reading and (as usual) stay dry.



Friday, August 31, 2012

Bless Me Barnack (Les)

Morning shipmates - well yer Captain was a tad surprised and disgusted this week with the footage from the Mars Curiosity voyage. 
A mighty and dangerous undertaking across the seas of darkrness, and a solemn and important voyage, yet it was patently obvious those coves at NASA weren't into the music they had to play, but had to show willing. I wonder how many dubloons crossed palms for that . . .
Did ye see the Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young fan, trying to stomp his feet in time to some modern homogenised-rap? 

Why they say the sky is the limit
When I’ve seen the footprints on the moon
Why do they say the sky is the limit
When I’ve seen the footprints on the moon
And I know the sky might be high
But baby it ain’t really that high
And I know that Mars might be far
But baby it ain’t really that far

Let’s reach for the stars
Reach for the stars
Let’s reach for the stars
Reach for the stars
Let’s reach for the stars
Reach for the stars
Let’s reach for the stars

(let me see your hands up)
(let me see your hands up)


Can’t nobody hold us back
They can’t hold us down
They can’t keep us trapped
Tie us to the ground
Told your people that we don’t mess around
When we turn it up
Please don’t turn us down
We will turn it up
Louder than we was before
Like the lion out the jungle, you can hear us roar
When I lie in here, it’s like a sonic blaster
Flying just like nasa, out of space master


Hands up, reach for the sky
Hands up, get ‘em up high
Hands up, if you really feel alive
Live it up, live it up


Why they say the sky is the limit
When I’ve seen the footprints on the moon
Why do they say the sky is the limit
When I’ve seen the footprints on the moon
And I know the sky might be high
But baby it ain’t really that high
And I know that Mars might be far
But baby it ain’t really that far


Let’s reach for the stars (reprise)


Oh yus m'dearios, it fairly makes you want to jump into your spacesuit and head off doesn't it. 
I wonder how Cap'n Scott would have felt with an equivalent cranking away on his gramaphone?

And I know that the Pole might be far
But baby it ain’t really that far . . . .


Anyway, even Mog looked up from his plate o'shrimp and flicked his tail in disgust. **
We particularly liked the look on the face of the guy with the mowhawk who looked like he'd been asked to eat a plate of mealy-infested biscuits.
Why would they do that?
That is all I shall say.
Personally I feel a good shanty would have been more appropriate . . something like 'The Sailor Likes His Bottle-O'.
It's got a good beat and ye can tap your toes or haul rigging to it.

The Mate was drunk, and he went below,
To take a swig of his bottle-o
A bottle of rum, and a bottle of gin,
And a bottle of Irish whiskey-o

Chorus:
His bottle, oh, his bottle-o
The sailor likes his bottle-o


Tobaccio, tobacci-o,
The sailor loves tobacci-o,
A cut of the plug, and a cut of the Swiss,
And a cut of hard tobacci-o,

Chorus:

The maidens, oh, the lasses-o
The sailor loves the Judys-o
A gal from Liverpool and a gal from the Tyne
And a lassie so fine and dandy-o

Chorus:

A bloody rough house, a bloody rough house,
The sailor loves a roughhouse-o
A kick in the arse and an all-hands-in,
A bloody good rough-and-tumble-o

Chorus:

So early in the morning
The Sailor likes his bottle-o
A bottle o'rum and a bottle o'gin
and a bottle  o' Irish whiskey-o
So early in the moring
The Sailor likes his bottle-o


So early in the morning
The sailor likes his baccy-o
A packet o' shag and a packet o' twist
and a packet o' Yankee Doodle-o
So early in the morning
The sailor likes his baccy-o


So early in the morning
The sailor likes the lasses-o
The lasses o' Blyth and the lasses o' Shields
and the lasses across the water-o
So early in the morning
The sailor likes the lasses-o


There's a stoke o'sea-farers would agree with me.
Getting the feelings from the Capn's who'd put in that day, we all felt the NASA debacle was a disservice to the memory of the late Mr.Armstrong.
Anyway, in a curved-ball of strangeness, this week Mr.Sheephouse has gone plain off his trumpet, and has written a mighty ode to the legendary Les Dawson.

** yes, we do have a particularly nice and sea-worthy AV system on the Goode Shippe.


***


I have handled quite a few cameras over the years, Rolleiflex, Nikon, Olympus, Pentax, Praktika, Minolta, Kodak, Braun, Agfa, Petri, more Nikon, more Pentax, Sinar, Wista and so on, so really it quite unusual for me to be surprised by something, but I have been with a recent purchase.
It took a number of months of saving and selling, but after managing to hold myself back over all the tempting cameras there are out there, I recently purchased a 1954 Leica IIIf (Red Dial, Delayed Action) and to say I am surprised and knocked out would be an underestimate.
It is sitting just next to me as I type this, and I find myself looking at it and wondering about the life it must have had. 
It is in remarkably great condition for a camera that is 7 years older than me, so one can only assume that it was purchased and looked after by someone who wanted to care for their precious possession. It isn't in perfect condition like it has been kept in a cabinet though; no, rather it has the feeling it has been used. 
Back in their heyday and before the Japanese manufacturing machine got into its stride, the Leica was the camera everyone wanted. And it was EXPENSIVE. 
They were available in Britain right through the 1930's, until a certain Mr.Adolf decided to upset the world and then you couldn't get them for love nor money, and even when World War II ended, if you were a British photographer, unless you were professional (and could prove you needed to buy an expensive camera) it was virtually impossible to purchase a Leica. This was due to the post-war import restrictions:

Post-war foreign currency regulations and related import prohibitions made it impossible for amateur photographers in the UK to buy new cameras from other countries if the ex-factory price of the camera (that is, the price the importer or dealer paid, excluding freight charges) was more than a very low figure - from memory I think this was £5.
Only professional photographers, who could prove that they needed an expensive new camera for their work, could obtain an import licence to buy a Leica or Rolleiflex. This rule was the reason for the rise of the British camera industry during the late 1940s and early to mid-1950s, resulting in cameras like the Reid III (a virtual clone of a Leica IIIb), the Ilford Witness (which took Leica lenses), the Periflex (a reflex focusing camera that took Leica lenses) and the MPP Microcord and Microflex, respectively near clones of the Rolleicord and Rolleiflex of the time. Import restrictions were gradually relaxed in the late 1950s, so it became possible for amateurs to buy new cameras like the Retina IIc and IIIc, the Exakta Varex and the Rolleicord. They did not end until 1959/60.
After the Second World War, second-hand Leica prices were very high and few could afford them. In April 1946, RG Lewis advertised in Miniature Camera Magazine a Leica IIIa with f/2 Summar, then about ten years old, for £103 17s. This equates to about £2,650 today, which is a huge sum for a second-hand camera.
I have not been able to find a new price for a Leica IIIf for you in the time available, but to give you an idea, a new Leica M3 with f/2 Summicron was advertised by Wallace Heaton in October 1962 at just under £183. At that time, as an advertising copywriter aged 21, I was earning about £700 per year and was considered well paid, so you could approximate £183 then as being equivalent to about £5,000 today. The IIIf ten years earlier would probably have been in the same general area of price.

From a letter to Amateur Photographer by Ivor Matanle




In the rest of the post-war world there were no such restrictions, but even then, it was still a very considered purchase. For instance, in Germany, a Leica (with lens) was roughly above the higher (Doctors etc) median average average monthly wage which was approximately 300 Deutschmarks.
So, assuming say 325 DM in 1954 (roughly 166 euros) is equal to about £131 today (2112); allow for inflation from 1954 and you reach the staggering equivalent price of £2878!
This is for a light tight box, with a rangefinder, reliable film transport mechanism and a lens. 
In anyone's terms that is a hell of a lot of money.
I think you can safely assume you are looking at a precision piece of work.
I can only assume that mine was either purchased by a professional photographer, or was bought from elsewhere in the world by some enthusiastic amateur and ended up its life in a nice, pipes and slippers, cosy British pub-land where not a lot happens and you can take a few pictures every month or so.
Can you imagine purchasing such an item in the early 1960's?



Possibly the world's worst Leica picture, but it will have to do.
The box by the way is a lacquered Japanese tea box circa 1900.



Even in those days, the Barnack Leica's looked antique next to Leica's then new M-series and the Japanese rangefinders from Canon and Nikon.
So, whoever purchased my camera must have made a decision, and fallen in love.
And it is an easy camera to love.
I pick it up, and can feel the treasuredness of it.
It was made in a long-gone age where a large number of articles were 'hand-made' and robots were definitely not the norm; each camera was built by a human being from carefully made and sourced components. Each human was valued for their skills and abilities.
They took an average of 40 man hours to assemble, which I find extraordinary - basically a whole working week for one camera. 
They are over-engineered really - rather like the Nikon F, but that engineering was there for a simple reason - to make the cameras as robust and reliable as possible, and given the large number still around and in use (compared to their main competitor of the time, the marvellous Zeiss Ikon Contax) that engineering ethos has been proven right. 
Actually you can say the same for Nikon F's and F2's too - reliable brick outhouses is the expression I would use, and their adoption by vast numbers of professional photographers back in the 1960's and 70's (and the fact that many are still eminently usable) is testimony to that. 
So why on earth would I want to buy a camera that was manufactured before I was born? 
Well as previously detailed in FB's, I have a keen interest in mechanical things, even though I am no mechanic myself. My Father was an engineer, as was my Grandfather, and I suppose some of that genetic makeup has helped my fascination with mechanical cameras become a hobby.
Though the bar is raised very high for any newcomers into the Olde Sheephouse Home For Mechanical Marvels:
I hold the Nikon F2 as probably the best mechanical SLR ever made. 
The Rolleiflex range of Twin Lens Reflexes are the most astonishingly well-designed and built cameras. A Rollei's Synchro-Compur is always surprisingly quiet - just a snick on fast speeds and a tiny buzz on longer ones
Up till now though, the best shutter I owned was on a Minolta Autocord - it still functions perfectly (despite the camera having been made in 1958 and obviously having lived a very tough life) with a very quiet and accurate buzzing on longer speeds. 
I have a 1950's Prontor SVS leaf shutter on a Kodak Ektar lens and that too is wonderful considering its age - it buzzes like a fat Bumblebee. 
The Nikon F shutter is something else - quiet and efficient - the original F is actually quieter in action than the F2 or F3.
All of my cameras have buzzed and clicked and snicked and buzzed, and I love them all actually.
But I have to say, now that there is a new shutter in town - that of my Leica.
There are screeds of words written about Leica shutters. The whole field of candid photography was made possible by the invention of it, and the camera that encases it.
It is a relatively simple design, under-stressed and running on the two curtain principle (as do most film-based cameras) however there is just something about it that is so darn spot-on.
It opens and closes with a fluid mechanical sound, a precision burring culminating in a postive stop, rather like a door being closed firmly (but obviously, quietly).
1/1000th and 1/500th of a second have a reassuring positivity to them.
Get down to the slower speeds and the tell-tale 1/15th finishes its run with a good sound rather similar to some small ball-bearings being dropped and bouncing quietly on a hard surface - this is entirely normal for a Leica (and indeed a mechanical Nikon - early F's were essentially copies of Leica shutters apparently) and just indicates that the gear-train is returning and is working correctly.
One second opens and closes with a click-buzz-click, and T (or Timed) is delightful in the way it click-buzzes as the shutter opens, stays totally silent for the duration of your exposure, and then when you are finished and turn the low-speed dial, it does the whole thing in reverse and buzz-clicks as the shutter closes. 
In a word it is a miracle of ingenuity and precision.
It just feels right every time you release the shutter.
I like that.
And call me strange, but I feel like I have to live up to its abilities.
When I hold this svelt chunk of brass and cogs and gears and satin chrome and vulcanite and glass, I can feel the history of it seeping into my bones.
Pick it up and you can feel it.
Fanciful I know, but it is almost like you are being geed along; spurred onwards to be more daring, compose better, make better photographs, concentrate more, make better photographs!
Can inanimate objects be imbued with a soul?
Can they pick up some of the spirit of previous owners and add their own spin on it?
Well, again laugh me right out of the classroom if you like, but yes, I think so.
The 'mechanical' or 'man-made' soul is an airy concept which most people have difficulty with, but I have encountered it on a number of things:

My friend's collection of ancient weapons
A dagger made for a planned escape from a concentration camp
A Buddha made from mammoth ivory
A Victorian barometer
Ancient nails and stone tools and buttons
A Roman alabaster marble found on Dere Street
A Nikomat (early Japanese market Nikkormat)

So yes, my fancy has taken flight again, for I feel it in the Leica. 
There is a definite something there.
I nearly always don't feel this way about things I have purchased though; for instance to illustrate my point, many years ago I owned a Yamaha SG3000 guitar. It was a stunning example of the Japanese luthiers art, and nowadays an extremely rare and collectable guitar.
But you know what, it had absolutely no soul whatsover. I played it and played it and played it, but could I unlock what might or might not have been inside it? Could I hell, so I traded it.
So what is it? Why am I feeling like this?
Could it be my delight in my new purchase is making me lose all sense and rave on?
Well, people would tell you that on most things I am a fairly level headed person. And especially with cameras I can read them quite quickly, from having studied them and handled them and indeed repaired them.
But something is different this time.
Quite different.
Twilight is falling as I write this, and my wee Leica is still sitting there, looking at me, almost saying that I should load some film and go and use it again.
And I will.
It was made to be used, and used well.


***

In use:

If you are from an SLR background (and most people are) you will find using a Barnack the most antiquated, difficult, thought-provoking, hard-to-use camera you have ever encountered.
I'll state that again in different terms:
Unless you are prepared to immerse yourself in the depths of user-operated everything you may well find it a frustrating learning curve, but be heartened . . . whatever doesn't kill us makes us strong . . so be persistent!
Pick one up and study it.
It looks like a camera.
It feels like a (small) camera.
It has weight and solidity.
But what's this? Two dials for shutter speeds? No wind-on lever? A shutter button in a semi-awkward place? No batteries??
Yes. You'll feel like you are holding an antique.
Even loading the film (it has to be trimmed first!) is a tricky manouevre.
Believe me, peering at the very small range finder window, checking it, getting your focus right, then composing your photograph through a separate window, re-checking the focus again and firing the shutter, is not the easiest nor quickest of actions. In fact coming from the luxury of a bright split-image viewfinder on a Nikon, it is a downright pain.
In the various Leica manuals there is an excellent illustration of the correct sequence of events of using the camera. 




One thing that tends to get skirted over is the rangefinder 'telescope' (you can see its lever at the 10 o'clock position next to the knob in Steps 6 and 7 above). Basically this is a variable focus function of the rangefinder itself.
Focus the rangefinder telescope lever at infinity and you have infinity focus and then you can get the two rangefinder images to superimpose for accurate focus. However, what isn't said, is that for anything else up to infinity, it is possible to focus the rangefinder telescope on the object you are interested in.
If you are handling one, try this:
Keep the telescope set on infinity and turn it towards something close.
What you are seeing through the rangefinder telescope  is still visible, but it becomes unclear and definitely isn't in focus.
Adjust the lever backwards towards your face and your subject matter will snap into focus. Then you can focus the lens so that the two rangefinder images coincide.
You can focus very very accurately with this, but it rather makes the whole idea of the decisive moment even more of a marvel!
Fast it is not.
You have to use anticipation at every stage of making photographs with it, and yet, a large number of the most incredible photographs ever made were made with exactly this system.
It is the sort of camera that you need to adjust to, rather than for it adjust to you.
As an experienced photographer, I can honestly say that not one single camera has made me feel more all fingers and thumbs than the Leica, and yet, 6 or 7 frames in, it felt like the most natural camera to use in the world.
This machine, if you decide to go the route of acquiring one, will inspire you and frustrate you, but above all else, it will concentrate you like nothing you've ever experienced.
It could well be the boon your photography has been looking for.
Above all else, it is a wonderful and beautifully made tool.
I would say it is pretty much the epitomy of the camera builders craft.


***

Just to flesh this out a little more, the IIIf was almost the end of a long evolution of cameras designed by Oscar Barnack and built upon by his successors. They were made by the company of Ernst Leitz in the city of Wetzlar in Germany.
Basically Leicas popularized the whole concept of miniature photography, setting the photographer free from the tripod and the plate and the focusing cloth (although to be fair other cameras had done this too, but not with the same sense of style and purpose).
I won't write much about the evolution of the camera. If you find yourself interested there is a ton of information out there, but suffice to say that though the basic design of the Oscar Barnack Leica remained relatively unchanged from the late 1920's, in the 1950's it was looking decidedly old-fashioned. Especially when sat next to its children, the Leitz M-Series. After one last gasp for the screw-mount Leica with the IIIg, the Leitz company decided to concentrate its efforts on the M's and the rest is history.








The above was made with my Leica.
I rather like it.
What you don't see is the fact that I mucked up my concentration and caused the water's horizon to be squint! Lucky for me I can sort that out at the print stage . . .
It was made on Agfa APX 100 at EI 100 and developed in Kodak HC 110 Dilution G for 18 minutes at 21 Centigrade. Agitation was gentle. I used a water-bath to soak the film, poured that out, agitated for the first minute, and then on minute three and every third minute thereafter gave 15 seconds gentle agitation, making my last agitation cycle at 15 minutes. The grain is a bit mushy, and I feel something like dilute Rodinal would be a better developer, but the glow is there and the overall feel too.

A note about the lens:
The observant amongst you will notice that the camera is not fitted with the correct lens, which of course should be either a Leitz Elmar, or a Summicron.
Unfortunately for me, my finances cannot stretch to one of those at the moment, so I purchased a Russian-made Jupiter 8. It was made by the KMZ company in the good old USSR in the 1970's and whilst not the sharpest knife in the drawer it isn't the bluntest either. The Jupiter 8 is a grandchild of the mighty Zeiss Sonnar (my favourite lens) and indeed, it manages to impart some of that glow I associate with the lens, mostly found in the photographs of Mr.Walker Evans and a large number of pre-WII photographers. Apparently the master of the Leica, Mr. Henri Cartier-Bresson, also used Sonnars prior to his receiving a collapsible Summicron from Leitz.
The Sonnar glow can also be found in a number of the Japanese lenses also designed for the L39 mount (Leica 39mm screw mount) namely the Canon f1.8 and the Nikon f2.
The marvellous writer Dante Stella has a good run-down on the Canon line here:

http://www.dantestella.com/technical/canoleic.html

And the other notable writer Stephen Gandy at Cameraquest details lots of others here:

http://www.cameraquest.com/ltmlens.htm


***


Anyway, again, that's me - God bless and thank you for reading.
I'll leave the death of the screw-mount Barnack Leica to a comparison between the photographers from two different Leica manuals, for the IIIf and the M4.



Dig the crazy jumper Dad!
What's that you're shooting?
Snappy.
The Leica M4, because you never know when.


They're the same, yet totally different: cosy jumper for the 1950's IIIf; smart Italian suit for the 1960's M4.
I'm currently with the former, though a trifle beatnikish.


NO LES DAWSON'S WERE HURT DURING THE MAKING OF THIS PROGRAMME