‘Nuff Said
July 13th, 2008
Nurses
July 10th, 2008
I’ve had this post in draft for a while, waiting for the right time to post it. Something on Dave Swanson’s blog yesterday made me think now is the time. Watch the video to understand what I’m talking about in my comment.
t the main memory I have of that day, 42 years later, is of a young beautiful nurse sitting at the end of a corridor in her hat and white uniform with a very, very short skirt. A huge distraction for a 14-year-old boy.I’ve chosen to blur the faces in most of the nurse photos. For me that represents the anonymity that accompanies the intimacy of our interactions with nurses. And, of course, the surgical mask also contributes to that feeling of distance and mystery. When you see all those masked people you aren’t really sure if they are there to take out your appendix or to rob you. Then later you get the bill from the hospital and realize it was both.
More Chill
July 7th, 2008
Here are a couple more photos from that cold warehouse in West Virginia from back in December. I just mowed the yard and was covered with sweat, so I felt like something cold.
I had a busy, but very pleasant holiday weekend, spent visiting relatives. Saw some fireworks but didn’t get to experiment with trying to shoot them hand-held using VR. Maybe next year.
Now I’m spending this week getting ready for a trip out west. The truck is in the shop today…and will be for a couple more days. It needs a new “body computer” and they tell me this is a 2-3 day job because the old computer has to be removed and sent away where the programming (and the truck’s recorded mileage reading) are transferred to the new computer which is then shipped back to the dealership and installed. The truck can’t be moved in the meantime. So I’m stuck at home today trying to catch up on some things.
Tomorrow I’ll take my wife to work and hang on to her van for the day so I can go to the studio and get some other things done. I have prints to ship out to a collector who found my work on my web site and wrote to purchase prints and a set of framed prints to ship to a gallery in California that has been doing a great job selling my photos.
Also today I will work on getting the truck camper ready for the trip. It hasn’t been used since last summer, so I’m cleaning it up and making sure everything works. Well, the refrigerator has never worked, so I’m giving up on that after several repair attempts and just going to use it as a storage cabinet and take a small cooler along and just buy some ice when I need to keep something cold.
That warehouse was a great location. Lots of wonderful backgrounds and great light. But, boy, it was cold there in December.
Chillin’ at the old Warehouse
July 2nd, 2008
Old abandoned buildings can be fun photo locations. When you also have a brave, adventurous, hardy model they can be great. That’s what happened with this shoot. This was back in December down in West Virginia. Yes, those are icicles hanging down from the ceiling. It was pretty damn cold. But the model had found the location and wanted me to be the one to shoot her there. And she didn’t care how cold it was. So I drove down to West Virginia and we had a great day of shooting. Since then she has stopped modeling and removed all her photos from the model sites, so she will remain nameless. But she is a trooper, intelligent and very knowledgeable about art. A real joy to work with. I hope she’ll come back to modeling one of these days and I’ll be able to do some more work with her.
Life is busy as usual. I’m recovering from the trip to Michigan and getting ready to leave on an extended trip out west in a week and a half. I’ll be driving my truck with the slide-in camper. Just had my mechanic check it over yesterday and, as I suspected, it needs a new “body computer” that controls all the things like windshield wipers, door locks, dashboard, anything involving the body. Turns out it has to be done by a dealer and it takes 2-3 days. I’m taking it in on Monday. I don’t want to load the camper until that job is done, so my time to get everything sorted out for the trip is getting compressed. Plus, I won’t have my truck to run around and get stuff I need for several days.
I decided not to shoot anything new until I leave on the trip, but it looks like I won’t stick to that decision. A wonderful California model/photographer is going to be in the area next week, so she might convince me to pick up the camera for a while. Plus someone I’ve worked with a number of times may come in to the studio for some photos next week too. But those will both be short shoots that I won’t even think about editing until I return, so it won’t be too big a dent in my schedule.
I think this photo below is my favorite from the warehouse shoot. I love what’s happening with the color, the light and the blurring. I’m having fun regularly with the VR on my Nikon 18-200mm lens. It’s almost like having the camera on a tripod, but not quite the same. The VR compensates for camera movement, but not for subject movement…kind of like a tripod, except that it doesn’t always completely eliminate the camera movement blur and the results can be very interesting. It’s fairly unpredictable, but working with digital it’s possible to get instant feedback by chimping and adjust things to dial in something that works. I think this one works pretty well.
Farm Labor
June 29th, 2008
The past few days have been wonderful, exhausting, exhilarating, mind numbing, and most of all, fun. Thanks to the many wonderful models who kept jumping out of their clothes to help make photos. In the photo above you see Unbearable Lightness, Gaea and Spilt Sugar, who is a talented photographer as well as a beautiful model.
Others who helped make my Michigan trip a wonderful experience include Joe, who generously opened his studio on Saturday and was there helping and shooting the whole time. Great to meet you, Joe. I hope we get to do this again. And, beautiful models every one: sapphire stone, Willow Luna, and especially Mary40 who graciously opened her home to Gaea and myself and who does beautiful work on both sides of the camera.
So many beautiful naked ladies, so little time. Thank you all very much.
Working in the dunes
June 25th, 2008
I’m up in Michigan for a few days of shooting with friends. Today we went to some dunes on Lake Michigan to check them out and Joe Crachiola did a quick bit of shooting with Unbearable Lightness and Gaea to take advantage of a wonderful sunset. I didn’t take my “good” camera along, so I just shot some snaps with the little Casio that I always have in my pocket. More dune photos tomorrow at dawn. I’ll take the good camera then.
More R|J and some International Recognition
June 23rd, 2008
Here’s another photo of Bia T at Ash Cave in the Hocking Hills. A little different treatment of that location and situation.
And, there’s a new blog out of Prague that seems to be doing quite a few interviews with people around the web. I don’t know what brought them to me, but they asked me for an interview and I found a few minutes last night to answer their questions. The interview is now on line at their blog, so go check it out if you would like to read my addled meanderings about photography and art. http://nudeartworld.blogspot.com/
I had a great shoot today with Orixx at a couple local waterfalls. We went at dawn. That means I was up at 4 a.m. this morning. I’m tired now. So this is all you get on the blog today.
Into the woods
June 20th, 2008
Life is busy, as usual. Well, more so than usual right now. And I keep getting contacted by models wanting to do shoots. Not a terrible problem to have, to be sure, but I’m having a hard time finding time for everything I need to do and still fit in everything I want to do.
More NYC Dance
June 17th, 2008
Here’s another photo from Dario Vaccaro’s “Seguiti” performed in New York City in April. The dancers are Lex Cones and Heidi L. Kershaw in the foreground and Rosanne Ma in the back. On piano is Simon Mulligan.
Happy Father’s Day
June 15th, 2008
Just another day. To celebrate Father’s Day today so far I’ve finished painting the guest room and went shopping for porch furniture. Father’s Day doesn’t get nearly the attention that Mother’s Day gets, but that’s a good thing since the reason is that fathers don’t spend nearly as much effort inspiring guilt in our children.
The newly married daughter is coming over later to take me out to dinner, though…I must have gotten a little guilt going in her after all the work and expense for her wedding. My wife gave me a card, a CD and some sweets…I, of course, informed her, “I’m not your Daddy.”
It was a busy week, hence the lack of posts here. I had three photo shoots and then Friday night was spent gallery sitting at a new gallery that is showing my work in Dayton’s Oregon District. It was real quiet, as in no one at all came in, for the first couple hours, but then it started picking up as people wandered between bars and decided to stop in to see what was on the walls. And as the evening went by more and more people came in who seemed to actually be interested in the work that was hanging. The gallery displays work by a number of artists who have studios in the Front Street Buildings on Second Street not far from the Oregon District, so there is a wide variety of work on display.
The highlight of the evening at the gallery for me was a surprise visit by the former director of the Dayton Art Institute, Alex Nyerges. He was in town visiting and came down to see what was happening with galleries there. I greatly enjoyed his time as director of the local art institute. He’s an expert in photography and brought a number of very fine photo exhibits to the institute. Most notable was the Edward Weston show that he put together from the collection of Edward’s sister, who had lived most of her life in the Dayton area. Weston would frequently send her prints of his latest work, sometimes folding the prints in half to put them in a standard envelope. The stack of prints was discovered in the back of a closet by the sister’s son who brought them to the art institute.
The exhibit was a great survey of the life’s work of a great photographer. The catalog of the exhibit authored by Nyerges, Edward Weston, A Photographer’s Love of Life, is much more than a catalog. It’s a very fine exploration of the life and work of Edward Weston. It’s a good book to add to your library if you can find a copy.
Mr. Nyerges seemed to like what he saw at the gallery and even made some very generous comments about my own work. So I felt like the evening was a fine success. Nothing like a little praise from someone whose opinion you value.
That’s another Ohio University School of Dance Spring Concert photo up there. I still don’t have any credit information on that concert to be able to say more about it.
