The World As I See It

November 4th, 2011

2011-11-04T15:16:00.000-04:00

No photographs today. I'm working on the Occupy Wall Street series, and they will come. But I discovered a film, which was broadcast on PBS a long time ago, about W. Eugene Smith. If there is one photographer above all others who has affected my sensibility about my art and craft, it is Gene Smith. During the 1980's when I was developing my skills my photography mentor, Mario Cabrera, talked to me about Smith's work and the photo essays he did for Life Magazine. I roamed up and down Broadway for those magazine vendors who set up long tables with back issues of Life arranged by date, and I carried a bibliography of all of Smith's work in my wallet on the off chance I might find an original copy of the magazine with a photo essay in it. I found almost all of them. This series of films tells the story of Smith's photographic journey in touching detail. Take some time with it. If you have any interest in the power of photography, you can't help but being moved:

http://www.americansuburbx.com/2008/10/asx-tv-w-eugene-smith-photography-made-difficult.html

November 3rd, 2011

2011-11-03T18:27:00.000-04:00

I spent a few hours in Zuccotti Park this afternoon, at the Occupy Wall Street space. I was curious to revisit the area after my trip there a few weeks ago. There were significant changes. The demographics were different, and the physical presence was also not the same. Photos will follow. There was one significant incident. The police presence was much heavier than before, and the boundaries of containment were much more defined. A couple of the protesters crossed that line into the police area, and elicited a strong response from the police. Several protesters ran through the crowd shouting 'Legal!' in the hopes that some legal representative would present themselves to mitigate the situation. None was forthcoming. In the confusion, the crowd surged towards the police lines and several protesters were rounded up by the officers - including me - for possible arrest. I squeeked out of the group by showing my press credentials to the officer in charge. But make no mistake about this. The police response was provoked by the protesters who violated the crowd control barriers.

I have not yet processed any of the photos I shot today, so apropos of nothing, here's an image of an entirely different character that I found in my archives.

November 2nd, 2011

2011-11-02T11:00:00.000-04:00

Wow, whatever happened to October! Luckily I had no power outage as a result of the freak winter storm. But we did have a water main break just before the snow started, and the repair work was hampered by the foul weather. I don't know what's worse, no electricity or no water!

I'm in the process of researching format changes to this blog, and I plan to get out Thursday to shoot in New York, hopefully at OWS again. So I'll have new images to post. I don't often do this, but here is a link of a documentary story worth looking at. And, here's an image for today, taken on West Broadway in SoHo. This individual was highly miffed that I took his picture. He followed me up the street arguing with me for several blocks and at one point grabbed my camera and tried to rip it off my shoulder. I don't know who he is, and I hadn't intended to work on the image and post it, but it's a slow day for me, and if he was so adamant about not having his picture taken maybe he needs to be recognized. I'm just sayin'......

October 30th, 2011

2011-10-30T20:40:00.000-04:00

I'm planning to go back to Zuccotti Park this week. After processing and presenting the photos I took the last time I was there, I have a clearer idea of what I want to shoot and how I want to show it. This is a profoundly significant movement. It may wither during the cold winter months, but I strongly suspect it will be back in full force, maybe even stronger next spring. There is a very interesting write up that appears in the New York Review Of Books concerning the OWS phenomenon that bears consideration. You can read it here. The democratic spirit is alive and well in Lower Manhattan.

October 29th, 2011

2011-10-29T18:45:00.000-04:00

Still not even Halloween, and we have a snow storm. Sheeeesh! This is not going to be an easy winter.
Now that the Photo Expo East and my portfolio review are done, I can get back to my unroutine routine. The review went well, but suggestions were made as to which images I should have left out. That's good for me, because I never can make the final decision about what needs to be cut. I didn't need the reviewer to tell me about how good my images are. I already know that. But that is all I got from her: 'they are fabulous, reminds me of Gary Winogrand's work from the '70's'.

Well, OK. I'll take that. But I was looking for some direction, and none was forthcoming. I've been spoiled in the past with exceptional reviewers, I guess.

Here's my image for today, from the OWS series. Not everyone at the demonstration was on the same mission.

October 26th, 2011

2011-10-26T16:20:00.000-04:00

I'm heading into the Photo Expo East for two days, tomorrow and Friday - having a portfolio review on Friday. So I probably won't be able to post until the weekend. I've gotten the strongest response to my OWS photos that feature a direct unequivocal message. So here's another.

October 24th, 2011

2011-10-24T14:21:00.000-04:00

Sorry to have missed a day of blogging yesterday. I was getting my portfolio set up for the Maine Media Workshop review later this week. I've also been busy getting things set up with a printer that I may have do a bulk printing of my Bill Monroe photo book, and I think I'll be able to offer it for sale on Amazon.com. Exiting stuff (for me anyway). So here's two images (to make up for yesterday) that I shot at the OWS gathering in Zuccotti Park. I plan to go back next week to shoot more, but with a more finely honed perspective.

October 22nd, 2011

2011-10-22T16:37:00.000-04:00

What impressed me most about the Occupy Wall Street protest in Zuccotti Park was that they were organized enough to have cleaning crews and food crews to do everything by the book. So there was no reason for the City of New York to force them from the site for health code violations. There was a real community spirit despite the extremely varied cultural and economic backgrounds.

October 21st, 2011

2011-10-21T20:27:00.000-04:00

The first of many pics I shot in Zuccotti Park. What surprised me most about the crowd gathered was that along with the usual rabble rousers, opportunists, and pinkos there were a surprising number of senior citizens and baby boomers - straight people - who were really into the mood of the gathering and sharing the anger and frustrations of the younger idealistic adults.

October 20th, 2011

2011-10-20T16:31:00.000-04:00

I spent a couple of hours in Zuccotti Park this afternoon. Reminded me of the '60's - or at least what I can remember of them. Took lots of photos. I'll be posting them as I work on them. I was very impressed with the crowd and the behavior there. MTC

october 19th, 2011

2011-10-19T17:04:00.000-04:00

No photo today. I would be totally remiss if I didn't mention that a movie is about to be released entitled 'God's Fiddler'. WOW! What a pronouncement! I mentioned it on Facebook and the response was funny. It wouldn't be appropriate to go into here. Just see this movie. Even if you hate classical music.

October 18th, 2011

2011-10-18T02:14:00.000-04:00

Still recovering from a bout of bronchitis, grrrrr! So much down time has given me the opportunity to really pick through my choices for my portfolio- review-to-come. I've narrowed the field down to 28 images. I'm bleary eyed from looking at b/w work, so for a change of pace, here's a shot that would only work in color. Took it on a side street in the DUMBO section of Brooklyn. It's a tastefully processed HDR shot (no that is not an oxymoron). It's a bicycle.

October 16/17th, 2011

2011-10-17T00:15:00.001-04:00

Just on the cusp. I've been so busy coughing and sleeping I haven't had a chance to shoot much, but I hope to get back on my feet this week. I dug through my past files and found an image that I always looked at then passed over and said I'd get back to. Well, I got back to it. I saw this gentleman ambling down West Broadway in SoHo.

October 14th, 2011

2011-10-14T22:15:00.000-04:00

Still a bit under the weather, but pumping antibiotics into my blood. When I get hit with this bug I 'm amazed at how much I can sleep. But then, at 3am it all catches up to me and I'm wide awake with nothing to do. So I worked on this shot I took in Union Square Park. I avoided working on it initially because I knew the sunlight on the side of the guy's scalp would be blown out, and impossible to manage.

As I mentioned yesterday, I am preparing a collection of my New York Street Photography for a portfolio review on October 29th. I think I need to whittle the number of images down from 31 to about 25. It's very difficult to choose what goes and what stays. I may have to ask for some outside help. But not from this guy!

October 13th, 2011

2011-10-13T16:58:00.000-04:00

It's that time of year again for me. Seems like every October I come down with a whopping case of bronchitis. The timing was just right. I was just notified that I was selected for a portfolio review with Maine Media Workshops at the end of next week. I had a review with them two years ago, which served as the impetus for me to get going on putting my work together into books. That led to the Manhattan Diaspora and I Hear A Voice Calling - Photographs of Bill Monroe books. They were both conceived of and put together with a book being the end product.

This time I plan to show a selection of my street photography. Not quite as coherent a body of work, and all shot and processed digitally, so it's a very different presentation for me. I've narrowed the images down to a selection of 31, surprisingly most of them are of my more current work. Now it's time to print, print, print.

This shot was taken last weekend in Union Square:

October 12th, 2011

2011-10-12T17:40:00.000-04:00

Yikes! I had an exciting trip to the dentist this morning. Not feeling much like writing anything, but here's two more shots from my walk across 14th street the other day:

Charlie's Angels Redux:

Caught in the act:

October 11th, 2011

2011-10-11T10:22:00.000-04:00

I missed a day, yesterday. Nothing important going on, I just forgot. To make up for that, today I'm going to post two images. I took a walk across 14th street and around the Meat Packing district on Sunday. It's an area ripe with subjects. The first shot is entitled The Aliens Have Landed. I don't know if she was a model out on a publicity stunt - there was nothing she was promoting - or just looking for attention.

The second shot was at a healthy food fair in the neighborhood. The image is called Only A Matter Of Time.

October 9th, 2011

2011-10-09T21:11:00.000-04:00

I spent the balmy afternoon in New York strolling around the lower end of Chelsea and across 14th street to Union Square. A summer type day in October. Nice. I got some good shots too. But today's pic is, once again from my archives. I had tried to do this image justice any number of times and failed. Then yesterday I gave it another shot with the new Color Efex Pro 4 package, et voila (I can't figure out how to create accents in this blog format) (I know, I know, it's a b/w shot so how come I use a color plugin to create it, go figure.....):

October 8th, 2011

2011-10-08T18:18:00.000-04:00

Yom Kippur is over, time to get back to work. I'm still having computer issues, but it's narrowed down to one tiny thing. Unfortunately it's the one thing I use all the time. But now I'm 95% sure it's an issue with the software developer, not my computer. I did manage to process a photo I took in New York on Thursday. Actually, it's the same delicious young lady I published as a b/w yesterday. Hell, she looks good to me both ways.

October 7th, 2011

2011-10-07T17:54:00.000-04:00

After a major computer overhaul I'm finally settling down now. I can finally take the time to dig in and learn all I can about Google+. I was never a big fan of Facebook for reasons that Google+ solved. It's an interesting concept. I hope it catches on. Just FYI (and I know you're all dying to know) my Google+ ID. is GeneLowinger. I'll probably post many of the same images there as here (or here as there) and as on my 500px portfolio. (Sigh, social networking is hard work!)

Anyway, here it is, my image of the day:

October 6th, 2011

2011-10-06T19:03:00.000-04:00

I spent the afternoon at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. A new retrospective opened featuring the work of DeKoonig. He's not my favorite but certainly bears attention. Anyway, I also dug into my archives once again and found an image from a couple of years ago that I took at the MoMA for the Salvatore Dali retrospective. Here it be:

Publish Post

October 5th, 2011

2011-10-05T17:39:00.000-04:00

Since I've gotten some new photo processing software I've been digging into my archives to find shots that I have never processed before. Looking at old work with a fresh eye never hurts, there's always something that can be learned. I must have passed this shot by dozens of times. I posted it in my portfolio at 500px.com, and been quite surprised by the response to it. I like it both in color and b/w.

October 4th, 2011

2011-10-04T11:38:00.001-04:00

The post is early today. I'm a busy guy: places to go, things to do, people to see. Well, you get the idea. Better early than not at all, and I'd be too tired after my orchestra rehearsal this evening to do anything except read my fan mail.

What! You think I don't get fan mail?

It always pays to dig into my archives. There's so many photos I've shot that I never get around to process, and sometimes I use them to play with some arcane bit of software that I've never tried. I shot this way back in May of 2011 while on a walk across Houston Street. The dappled sunlight coming through the trees made for a challenging development. You can make up your own story about the couple.

October 3nd, 2011

2011-10-03T22:22:00.002-04:00

After all the work I went through to reconstruct my computer system, today I think I nailed what was the problem all along. A dying external hard drive. Now it's dead, and my system is zipping along merrily. I'm so happy, I think I'll just post a color image I just finished working on with Nik's Color Efex 4:

October 2nd, 2011

2011-10-02T16:48:00.000-04:00

Had an interesting trip into New York yesterday. I went to a violin shop that was displaying probably close to a hundred contemporary violins, violas, and cellos made by American luthiers. I was like a kid in a candy shop. I tried many of the violins. One stood out above all the rest, but since I'm not in the market for another instrument I just enjoyed fiddling around with it.

It was a rainy day. That's always a challenge for picture taking - the conditions are photographically very interesting, but not good for the equipment. Still, I stood under some overhangs and got some reasonably good stuff. I was itchy to get material so I could try out an updated Photoshop plug-in: Nik Software's Color Efex Pro 4. I enjoyed working with it. But since I'm primarily a b/w photographer, I converted my images to that, and liked the results better, so that's the way they stayed. I have to train myself now to go out and look for color images that should stay in color. The functionality of the updated plug-in is fabulous. Lots of new ideas and techniques to try out. I just have to get the right images for them.

So here's what I got on a rainy Saturday in New York City:

October 1st, 2011

2011-10-01T10:17:00.000-04:00

I survived my computer crash, but had to reformat my hard drive and restore everything by hand. Not a pleasant task, but thank God I'm compulsive enough to have a separate disk copy of everything besides my Time Machine backup. Still a little glitch here and there, but no big deal. If I have more problems I may have to check on replacing my ram or hard drive. But right now that seems unlikely.

My internet buddy, Fuad Babayev, has a blog/portfolio site here that bears attention. He's a wonderful street photographer who I met at www.500px.com and with who I felt immediately artistically sympathetic.

I've found many others for whom I have the same empathy. It's a wonderful way to connect with other photographers you might never have seen or met.

Enough chit chat. I have two photos today that are both from the Washington Square reunion of last weekend. The first is of banjo legend Eric Weissberg (he recorded the Dueling Banjos sound track for the movie Deliverance). The second is of my friend Gene Yellin, who played in my band for a while and with whom I recorded a highly unrenowned and unrecognized cd entitled Nobody Rides For Free.

September 29th, 2011

2011-09-29T21:55:00.000-04:00

I know I said I would post every day. I couldn't yesterday because ever since I installed the new mac OS dubbed 'Lion' I've been having crashes. I spent the day today reformatting my hard drive, reinstalling the new OS and third party software, recovering data and photographs from backups, and I still have tons more to do.

So, no photos today. Hopefully on Friday. I still have some shots from the Washington Square reunion from last Sunday.

Thanks for stopping by.

September 27th, 2011

2011-09-27T15:09:00.000-04:00

An early post today. I have an orchestra rehearsal this evening which usually exhausts me, so I'm sure I won't post if I wait until then.

While I was in Washington Square on Sunday I grabbed a shot that was happening right before me, but there was no time to get the camera up to my eye to compose, focus, and check exposure. I had to shoot from the 'hip' and I got only two frames. Luckily they were both in focus and pretty well exposed. But then, I've practiced this kind of shooting for years.

The exposure and focus for this type of shooting is a no-brainer since I use auto focus and auto exposure in aperture priority. But the framing/composition is the tricky part. I blew many a great moment because I had to learn how to tilt the camera just right so I didn't get too much sky (which could easily whack out the exposure setting) or get the subject only half in the frame.

The shot I got was featured today on a website that I contribute regularly to entitled One Daily Shot. Here's the image:

Oh my God! Really?

September 26th, 2011

2011-09-26T19:48:00.000-04:00

Whenever I visit Greenwich Village, I always feel a little nostalgic. It's where I hung out as a college student - at Washington Square, the Folklore Center on McDougal Street, or Gerde's Folk City on West Fourth Street. When I started going there, beatniks were on the wane but still there. Hippiedom was in the winds. But that was just a name. The philosophies were pretty much the same - peace, free love, anti-materialism. I don't know what its called now, doesn't matter. It's still there, after all, it's the Village. Other areas of the City change. They sink and then some slick real estate developer buys up the good deals and the gentrification starts. There's new building in the Village, but it just never seems to become gentrified. Must be the influence of the New School and NYU. But no matter why, I hope it never changes. Sitting around the fountain has been a pastime for many generations.

September 25th, 2011

2011-09-25T19:50:00.000-04:00

Washington Square, Greenwich Village, New York City - 50 years ago (but not to the day): the police were ordered to clear the area around the fountain of all those who gathered there to sing folk songs and songs of protest. Today we had an annual gathering of many of the people who continued to go the fountain after that event in 1961, and who continued to play music there. Some blues, some old-time, and some bluegrass. It was the same today, just that we're fifty years older. Our numbers are diminishing, as are some of our faculties. But the spirit is still there. It was a fun afternoon. Photos to follow.

But for now, I took this shot last week at Madison Square Park.

September 24th, 2011

2011-09-24T14:58:00.000-04:00

While I was at the Centennial Celebration in Owensboro, KY I had a chance to see Rodney Dillard. He and his brother Doug formed a band in the 1960's called, aptly enough, The Dillards. I saw them perform in New York City at Gerde's Folk CIty, the folk music mecca in Greenwich Village. That was just about the same time that the White Brothers - Clarence and Roland - and their band, the Kentucky Colonels, were asked to make several appearances on the Andy Griffith Show. Roland was drafted into the army, and the show producers turned to the Dillards to fill the slot. The Dillards performed as a four piece band: mandolin, guitar, banjo and bass. Their music at the time held little interest for me because there was no fiddler in the band. When I saw Rodney perform in Owensboro he had a full five piece bluegrass band, and he put on a powerful performance. Nice to see old timers still kicking butt.

September 23rd, 2011

2011-09-23T17:08:00.001-04:00

My big news for today is that I may have found a local publisher/printer who can produce my book, I Hear A Voice Calling - Photographs of Bill Monroe, at a much better price than the print-on-demand price from Blurb.com. I'll be able to supply the book to the International Bluegrass Music Museum in Owensboro.

This Sunday is the annual Washington Square reunion of all the folkies from the '60's. Hopefully I'll have some good shots to post. Seems like all my socializing this month has been at reunions of what used to be.

I guess that what happens when you get to be a certain age, huh?

Here's two photos of the legendary bluegrass banjo player, J.D. Crowe. The first was taken in 1993 at Wolf Trap Farm in Virginia. It was shot on 1600 ISO film at 300mm and hand held. I had steady hands in those days. The second image was taken at the Bill Monroe Centennial Celebration. I had taken many shots of J.D. playing, but rarely of him smiling. I was about to give up trying and then, bang-o, he smiled for about 5 seconds. I just picked up the camera and shot a series of frames, hoping that all the settings were correct. There was no time to check.

I had some help in understanding how to reformat my blog page to accommodate larger size images. Maybe I won't have to migrate the blog after all.

2011-09-22T21:21:00.000-04:00

I spent three days in Owensboro, KY at the Bill Monroe Centennial Celebration that was put on by the International Bluegrass Music Museum. I'll talk about the experience as I post images from the event. This is Jesse McReynolds. He performed with a band that featured three of his grandchildren, all of whom did very well on stage with him. Jesse is one of my musical heroes. When I got it in my head to hitch a ride to Nashville, in 1965, he gave me a ride from Philadelphia to Tennessee on his tour bus. He was a pioneer in the early days of bluegrass music, and still pushes the limits of the music, always trying out new ideas. His most recent album was a collection of songs by Jerry Garcia. Is that a Grateful Dead sign on the peg head of his mandolin?

I played around with some software to create the toned/framed version of the image. I like the toning, but I'm not sure about the frame. Don't be shy, let me know what you think.

The problem with posting photos on this blogger site is the restrictions on the size of photos. I'm considering moving the blog to another site at which I regularly post my photos. I'm going to post this same blog entry on that site and try to get the images to a much larger size.

I'm Back

2011-09-22T17:47:00.000-04:00

After a long hiatus I've been inspired to begin posting again. Hopefully on a daily basis with a frequent image to share. I've been shooting continuously since I last posted, and I started a gallery at http://500px.com/GeneLowinger which I update as I shoot. I've also set up a page at Google+ (which is now public) so if you have an account there, feel free to add me to your circles. I post photos there also. I'm looking forward to hearing back from you, so feel free to leave comments (be nice). And I'll post information about my latest book of photographs in the next couple of days.

I'm not really pleased with the way this current host handles photographs, so I may look at alternative hosting sites - I just want to stay away from too much coding and configuring.

Thanks for stopping by. Come back again soon.

Memorable Photographs/Image of the Day

2011-05-30T12:22:00.001-04:00

In this entry for Wired magazine a case is made for why what I call 'static' photography is, for the most part, forgettable. I find the points made in the article salient and right on the money. So often the talking heads of photography tell us that we need to get out early in the morning or late , to get that golden light. They say that the light of mid day is boring and difficult to manage.

Well, yes, it may be difficult to manage. But it is manageable. As for boring, if your subjects depend entirely on the angle of light to generate interest in them, there's something wrong. Landscapes, cityscapes, urbex, and the like don't move, don't go anywhere, and are present 24/7. People, on the other hand, tend to get out and move about pretty much on a bell curve as the day progresses from dawn to dusk. Nighttime is a different story. For a shot to tell a human story and/or have an emotional message - to touch the viewers' insides it's gotta have someone in it.

Street photography is, for me, the most challenging and fulfilling type of shooting. It requires quickness, technical knowledge, insight, and nerve. When I'm out shooting this stuff I feel buzzed. I don't get that from finding a run down building, setting up my tripod to do bracketed shots, and all the post processing required for stuff like HDR. I shoot it. It's fun. It's diverting. But it doesn't give me a charge. When I see static images I don't feel like I've been punched in the gut. When I've produced an image like that, I don't feel like I've done my muse a service.

In my last blog entry I posted some images I shot on 14th Street. That wouldn't have been possible at any other time of day. The subjects were there, and the challenge was to work the situation - the light, the other people, the location - into a meaningful composition. Here's another shot from the same photowalk. I titled it 'Oh yeah, oh yeah, I wanna be just like Peter Rowan when I grow up, oh yeah, oh yeah .....'

And here's a link to another shot that won 'Image of the Day'.

A Walk Across 14th Street

2011-05-27T12:40:00.001-04:00

I took a long walk across 14th Street the other day. Started at 14th and 8th Ave, walked to the East River with a little detour around Union Square, back to the Hudson River, onto the High Line and back to Penn Station. I'm not sure what the distance was, but I was exhausted afterwards. I got some nice street shots. I may do the same thing with other cross town arteries. Here's a couple of goodies:

Never too old for one of these funny ciggies:

Very chic 'working' girl:

Another Blog, Right On

2011-05-25T09:51:00.005-04:00

When next you hear a photographer crow about the superiority of their slide- or JPEG-only photography, do not mock them, do not deride them, do not castigate them. Show compassion and pity them, for they have yet to realize that they fail to walk the righteous path.

The quote is taken from The Online Photographer entry for today, written by Ctein. I'm so heartened these days by reading blogs of other photographers that echo my thoughts and sympathies. So often in the past I have felt like the odd man out because my line of thinking is certainly not mainstream. I often want to pose a rant here. But when I start usually I get to a point and say to myself 'Why bother?' Lately I see many others have already done for me.

Nice.

Bravo for this, And Ditto

2011-05-23T18:44:00.000-04:00

The Leica Camera Blog for today had a very interesting entry concerning the actual printing of photographs. Yikes! What a concept!.

Digital photography has made taking pictures incredibly easy. I am amazed, during my perambulations around New York City, at how many people are armed with cameras of varying size and sophistication. It's good, and it's bad. Good because more people taking pictures means more of a potential audience for the work of serious photographers (such as you and me ...... well, at least me). Bad because I'd be willing to bet that most of those people taking pictures find it so easy to take them that they wonder what all the fuss is about over good photographs (as in 'mine are as good as that'). I won't go there .... it's a minefield.

Looking at a shot on the rear screen of one's camera, or viewing the photo on a computer screen compliments of iPhoto or any other elementary photo editor, however, is a far cry from seeing a beautifully printed photograph. I cut my teeth in a wet darkroom. In those ancient days of film photography, the only way to actually see a picture was to look at a print. Putting aside the trip to the one hour photo store, to actually get a print required some effort, thought, and (gulp) expertise. And after all is said and done, actually having a physical image, maybe even a framed one, to look at is in itself an esthetic exercise. To actually produce a beautiful print, however, requires a skill set that very few camera owners ever attempt to learn. There's just no room left in the brain's photography locker, what with all that other information stuffed in there about camera bodies and lenses, and megapixels, and copyrights, and .......

I'm not saying 'bah, humbug' to viewing photographs on a computer screen (not here, anyway). The screen has it's place. But if an image is really a work of art, it deserves to be printed.

Back Again

2011-05-13T20:14:00.000-04:00

It's been two and a half weeks since my last post. I had some personal matters to which I needed to attend. That's done, and I did some shooting so there's some new material to post and talk about.

This afternoon I attended the New York Photo Festival which is held every year at around this time in the DUMBO district of Brooklyn. At first I was reluctant to go because of my experiences of the festival in past years which presented photographic material as 'conceptual art'.

Now don't get me wrong. Photography is definitely art. And there is a discipline of conceptualization within photography that makes a strong argument for conceptualized material. But in the past exhibits that I've seen at this festival a lot of what has been positied as work within this definition is just plain junk.... as in bad photography. Remember the story of the Emperor's New Clothes? Everyone clucking about something that wasn't there?

This year the work presented is much more documentary oriented. And what a relief to see that! I've been getting the feeling over the past two years, and it was borne out by the work in this festival, that at least some young up-and-coming photographers have a social and political conscience. They're not all playing ostrich by hiding their heads in the sand of conceptualization or the glitz of fashion. Doing serious documentary work requires taking risks emotionally, financially and spiritually. The payoff is in having an affect on the way people look at themselves and the real world around them.

The festival runs for two more days, and it's worth a few hours to walk through.

Now, here's a couple of the shots that I've been working on during my very long hiatus:

Chinatown, NYC

Central Park, on Mother's day

Easter Parade 1

2011-04-25T13:42:00.002-04:00

Sunday turned out to be a beautiful day on Fifth Avenue in New York. The parade is not so much an organized event as it is a chance for exhibitionists to grab some attention for themselves. Of course, being New York, there were wack-os and opportunist beggars and break dancers taking advantage of the crowd. I'm baffled that there are still suckers that fall for three card monty games. I tried to grab some images of them, but some very big dudes advised me that photography would not be acceptable.

I didn't think there were as many promenaders as in previous years, but there was lots to photograph, however. Here's the first installment:

A Quick Post

2011-04-22T20:15:00.000-04:00

I spent some time at the Neue Gallerie yesterday. Wonderful show of German Expressionism: Klimt, Kokoshka, Schiele .... The show is a must see, and the building itself is a masterpiece. I wasn't allowed to bring my camera inside with me, nor was I allowed to bring in bottled water, I had to drink it all before I went inside!

A couple of shots I grabbed on the subway:

MTC

Street Photographs

2011-04-20T20:23:00.004-04:00

I thought this quote from Bruce Gilden apropos:

'If you can smell the street by looking at a photograph, then it's a street photograph'.

Wednesday at MoMA

2011-04-06T21:22:00.000-04:00

As a follow-u to my Guggenheim visit to see the German Expressionist show, I stopped by MoMA to look at the German Expressionist Print show. It was much more than just prints. There's some classic work from the museum's collection. And the show puts the whole movement into perspective from1905 up until Munich went to hell in 1933.

I had some time on the street this afternoon too. I saw Santa taking his Spring vacation in New York:

A Few New Street Shots

2011-04-05T21:01:00.001-04:00

After the couple of hours I spent at the Guggenheim Museum (see my previous post) I took a loooooong walk - from 89th street and Fifth avenue down to Penn Station at 32nd street and Seventh avenue, that's a little more than three miles - and shot a bunch of images. Not that I'm making excuses for myself, but my workhorse lens - Nikon 24-70mm f2.8 zoom - is in for repairs. Boy do I miss that lens. I have a backup lens that is a Tokina 28-70mm f2.8. It was my standard lens back in my b/w film days.

I loved that lens when I shot film. But I never used it for color. Now that I shoot digitally with it, I can see it's shortfalls. I would have never noticed with b/w film, but there's some serious chromatic aberration on the edges of things. The aberration in and of itself is not a problem once an image is converted to b/w, but if there's any aberration that kind of means the edges can't be sharp. I have never noticed this problem with the Nikon lens. Hey, you get what you pay for.

Here's some of the shots:

What a cutie, huh?

'When I get home and change my clothes, I'm gonna look just like him ....'

But for the grace of God......

Here's some of the shots:

2011-04-04T22:23:00.000-04:00

I spent a few hours at the Guggenheim Museum in NYC this past Saturday afternoon. Wonderful exhibit of German Expressionism. Even better though, I got a chance to practice my surreptitious picture taking technique. Photography is not permitted in the museum, and the guards are very watchful! To wit:

A Quickie

2011-04-03T14:39:00.000-04:00

Just a quick note today. My portfolio of 50+ b/w images went live on the 591 Photography Blog. If you stop by to see the work be sure to leave a comment.

I spent the afternoon pounding the pavement in NYC yesterday afternoon, so hopefully I'll have some new posts this week. Enjoy the weather. Spring is in the air!

Layers of Interest

2011-04-01T12:00:00.000-04:00

There are a number of elements that create a feeling of depth and interest in a photograph, and that make the viewers' eye move through an image to where the photographer wants to focus interest. These are 1) color, 2) sharpness, 3) lightness/darkness, 4) contrast, and 5) texture. I've discussed these before to varying degrees in previous blog posts, but I want to focus on their use (pardon the term) in creating that depth.

The problem arises because photographers look to create a three dimensionality in a medium that exists in only two dimensions. When you watch a moving image on any kind of screen - tv, movie, computer - that image can move horizontally across, or vertically in front of you and you get a feeling of left/right and up/down motion. But that is two dimensional. If you view a moving image that is dead center on the screen (a two dimensional surface), and stays dead center on the screen but seems to be moving away or towards you (that's in the third dimension) there's only one way to create that illusion: the image must get larger or smaller. That perception of motion can be enhanced by using changes in the five elements mentioned, but if the size of the object/person doesn't change, no matter what you do to it, the viewer will not perceive motion in that third dimension. That illusion in the third dimension on a two dimensional surface requires use of the fourth dimension - time. Some period of time must elapse during which the object of attention changes size, and because we are talking about a moving image that time period is possible to manipulate.

A still image, however, whether it be a photograph or painting exists in two dimensions - just as in the above example (with the caveat of course that we do not consider the dimensionality of the painter's use of globs of paint to raise the texture off the canvas, a là Van Gogh) - and does not change no matter how long the viewer stands in front of it and observes. So the photographer, to create a feeling of third dimensional depth must use those five elements somehow to creadte that dimension. Putting aside, for the time being, the artist's intuition that comes into play, he/she uses technical mastery when the button is pressed and when the image is processed in either a wet or digital darkroom. Here's that image that garnered so much attention over the past week on the NAPP website:

Obviously we can remove the first element, color. There is depth to the image that moves back from the viewer's point of view to the wheelhouse of the tugboat, and the limit of that depth is established by the clouds in the sky that fall behind the boat and appear to lie on the same plane as the building and trees on the left and the boats in the distance on the right. Let's move through the image.

Right off the bat, the viewer's eye starts with the two white lines in the lower right corner and moves into the black hull of the boat. The blackness of the hull is contrasted in texture and tonality with the shaggy mass of rope in the lower left hand corner. As the hull seemingly recedes into the distance the eye is drawn upward towards the brightness of the dramatic clouds in the dark sky but before the eye can come to rest on the highlights there is the wheelhouse which is rimmed by the various cloud textures behind it and appear to give it a somewhat ethereal look as the high sirius clouds radiate from it.

One of the most serious flaws I see in b/w photography as it's posted on the various internet sites is that good composition is often marred by lack of depth and richness in the shadows (blacks) of an image. Take a look at the work of W. Eugene Smith, especially the Pittsburgh series or Minimata, or the Albert Schweitzer story. There's a lot of just pure black in there, and with that, lighter tones don't have to be so white to create effective contrast. They can be gray enough to hold detail, yet still be bright enough to draw the viewer's eye.

One Week Later

2011-03-31T17:10:00.001-04:00

It was one week ago today that one of my photos was selected as the NAPP image of the week. It came at a time that I needed a swift kick in the butt. The feedback I got on that image and my portfolio as posted on the NAPP website was really wonderful. I have been deeply immersed in expanding my photo craft, and in the process lost a little focus on what my photo passion is. As it turns out, my NAPP portfolio, which can be seen here was all b/w images. I change the images posted quite often so they may not always be b/w, and they may not always be documentary, and there may occasionally be an HDR image thrown in. The NAPP portfolio is my 'sounding' board for experimenting. But I always try to post images that speak for me, that express some kind of emotional impact, and that say something about the world around me. I do that best with b/w photography.

I will soon have a portfolio of 50+ images posted on a photo blog published in Europe (when the images are live I'll post the URL). Many of those images are on my NAPP website also. It's exciting to get that kind of recognition. That website gets around 500 unique visitors daily, and over 15,000 a month. YIKES!

I hope some of them come to my website.

I'm going to take a little time to explore the possibilities in shooting stock photography, and also explore how to work Twitter, Flickr, and Facebook to get more traffic to my site and this blog. I've avoided doing this for a while now, but I can't play ostrich anymore. If you read this blog I hope you'll check out my Facebook page, my Twitter page, and my Flickr page also. I'll let you know when they're all set up and connected.

Now that the weather is finally becoming more amenable to getting out to shoot, I'm looking forward to, well, .... getting out to shoot. It's been a difficulty winter in the NYC area.

I have my focus back, I have great tools to work with, and the best subject matter - NYC - to work with. And I'm chompin' at the bit.

NAPP Image of the Week

2011-03-24T14:57:00.001-04:00

The National Association of Photoshop Professionals is a photographers' organization that features portfolios of its members to which each member is allowed to post up to 24 images, and change them as often as he/she likes. Each week the powers that be at that organization judge all the new submissions for the week to select the Image of the Week and six editor's choice awards for the week.

The NAPP is an organization dedicated to the education of professional people in the use of Adobe's Photoshop/Lightroom software. Those programs are very, very deep in functionality. There's an incredible amount to learn about how to use them effectively. Photoshop was originally designed not for photographers, but for graphic artists. Still, there's a lot of functionality that's applicable to working on photographs.

I often spend quiet chunks of time browsing the work of many artists who submit their work to the site, and I'm awed by the creativity and craftsmanship that go into the posted images. I don't do all that much manipulation of images and/or elements within the image. While I can appreciate the highly processed look that many artists submit, I don't seek to do it in my own work.

Over the past three years of belonging to this organization my images have been selected twice for editor's choice recognition. That was very gratifying, but it kindled a nagging desire to win the coveted Image of the Week award. Not an easy thing to do, given the mastery and craftsmanship of the members of NAPP submitting work for consideration.

Drum roll please ............. I won this week. You can check it out here. What is so satisfying for me is that it is first of all a b/w image, not color. And secondly, that it's a straight shot, by that I mean it is NOT the result of merging different exposures of the same image that create an HDR composite. There's parts of the image that appear to have that HDR quality - especially the sky - but it's a single color exposure, hand held, and converted to b/w using Nik software's Silver Efex Pro 2 technology. I don't think that kind of detail and tonal range would have been possible with SEP 1. Nor would it have been possible in my wet darkroom - well, not possible for me, maybe Ansel Adams could do it.

If I have any regrets about this particular selection it's this (and a miniscule regret it is at that. I mean min-i-scule!): it's not my usual street/people oriented subject matter. The boat was moored at a salvage yard in Jersey City, NJ. There was tons of wonderful urbex subject matter to photograph, but I shot this before I was bitten by the urbex (or for that matter the HDR) bug. I just saw a great opportunity to use my super wide angle 14-24 f2.8 lens. The exposure lay dormant in my Lightroom catalog for over eight months. Then, out of boredom I was scanning through my old photos to look for something to play with and stumbled upon it. I guess it pays to never throw old stuff out.

591 Getting Ready

2011-03-23T20:12:00.000-04:00

A photography blog entitled '591' has invited me to post a portfolio of my b/w images on their site. I've been working feverishly on getting the images ready. Most of them were already processed with the old Nik Silver Efex Pro version 1. But the newer version 2 has been so exciting to work with I reprocessed all but one of the images I am planning to put up on that site. It's been a lot of work, but an amazing difference (as you'll see when the gallery goes live).

Also, I've been preparing a proposal for the National Museum of American Jewish History. I'm trying to entice them to mount a special exhibit of my photos that I featured in my book Manhattan Diaspora. I haven't abandoned my blogging. I'll be back with lots more photos and stories and diatribes.

Hope to see you soon.

Knowing Your Software

2011-03-16T11:29:00.000-04:00

Before we get into this topic I need to mention a link to a blog I read quite frequently. It's called The Online Photographer and the particular entry is here (so I don't have to reiterate what's said so well there). Got the idea? I have felt like that also. I love looking at snow scenes, I don't enjoy photographing them. I love landscapes in general, and I enjoy photographing them, but I don't get an adrenaline rush nor do I have palpitations when I see a beautiful vista. I get a bit more charged when I find some urban decay - especially because I like to set up my tripod and shoot bracketed exposures for processing, and I look forward to playing with my software to make an image with impact. But what I really love to do - and it gives me an adrenaline rush, and palpitations, and I know I'm good at it - is shoot people doing what defines their lives, with an eye to turning the scene into a b/w image. Things just come together for me when I shoot with that mindset. The images I make evoke an emotional response in the viewers. And that's the most important effect I want - to get the viewer to react to the shot.

All the graphic and emotional elements need to be present in the frame when I push the shutter. But what I do with all of that information, how I manipulate it to make the viewer see what I want him to, is the point of this entry. Obviously, the better your technical mastery of software the easier will be your efforts to make adjustments to your photos. But because you have that mastery does not necessarily mean you must use it. Knowing when to stop, where to draw the line, is as important as knowing how to fulfill your vision of an image with digital wizardry.

I use specific software packages because they suit the way I work and think. It's as silly to debate whether Lightroom is better or worse than Aperture, or that OnOne's plugins are better or worse than Nik's, as it is to get involved in the Canon/Nikon blather. I use Lightroom to maintain my catalog and it makes generating all the necessary output easy and painless. When I first got into digital much of my image development was done in Lightroom also. For a quick edit and fast output it works wonderfully well. Sometimes, if I think the image requires a simple tweak with an external editor, I go directly to my plugins from Lightroom. Most often, however, I go into Photoshop to do the detailed work. The flexibility afforded by layers allows for many more options. For instance: often I take a color image into Photoshop, run my OnOne/Nik plugins, and then decided that maybe the image might look good as a b/w. So I simply create another layer and keep right on working.

Now about the actual plugins: I can't tell you how often I've worked in a Photoshop plugin created by OnOne and dearly wished I could have the functionality of Nik control point technology. I've made some very nice adjustments in Photo Tools, but there's just one thing that bothers me and the OnOne brushes just can't give me the level of control that I want. So I save the Photo Tools adjustments to a layer, go back to the previous layer and start over in Nik's Color Efex Pro and try to get the same kind of feel. It's just me, I know. But I've learned my Color Efex Pro filters well enough by now to understand where to go to get what I want.

HOWEVER (notice the caps?) this does not mean I quit there. I've always made time to go through all the Color Efex Pro filters to experiment. Learning effective software technique often requires thinking outside the box. Just because a filter is called 'Dynamic Skin Softener' doesn't mean you are only allowed to use it to soften skin.

When Nik's HDR Efex Pro came out I got caught up in the excitement of it and spent several months searching out subjects to pursue. It was definitely fun. That's one particular area of photography that I didn't particularly like when it first hit the scene, but have now come to enjoy. There's good and bad HDR just like everything else. HDR processing is not an end in itself. It's the stuff that comes after I create an HDR image that I really get my jollies from.

Most recently Nik released the next iteration of it's Silver Efex Pro. B/W is where I live. I love shooting b/w film, and I was totally addicted to working in a b/w darkroom - ahhhh that smell of fixer. Now that I shoot digital, I don't miss it at all. I have much more control with the software than I ever had in the darkroom. And I don't spend the next day coughing and hacking up phlegm after a six hour stint in the dark.

If you would like to see my most recent b/w work generated with the Silver Efex Pro 2 software, please visit my NAPP portfolio, my Flicker photo stream, my Facebook page, and my personal website.

Open Ended Shooting On The Street

2011-03-09T22:28:00.004-05:00

Before I get into the main subject of this blog, I want to point you to an entry Mind Tools the subject of which is what is called Concious Competence. This insight was pointed out to me recently and I was looking for a way to incorporate it into a blog post. This entry is as good as any. Give it a read, and see if you can apply it to what follows.

So how do you go about shooting on the street with no specific agenda in mind? My answer to people who ask me, as if I'm going to give them a magic formula that will transform them into hip, cool, savvy street shooters is 'I dunno, I just do it....'

But of course for you, my readers, since you are already hip, cool and savvy (why else would you be reading this blog?) I'll try to elucidate - of course using as many three syllable plus words as possible.

OK, you walk out the doors of Penn Station on Eighth Avenue, get your camera set up with autofocus, aperture priority, auto ISO, and you're ready to go ..... right?

WRONG! Why wasn't your camera ready walking from the train to the outside doors? There's no pics to be had in Penn Station? The point is, there's pics to be shot all around you, all the time, and as ready as your eye and mind might be to see them, if your camera's not ready ...... well, you get the idea. My friends tease me all the time because I never go anywhere out my door without a camera hanging from me. Sure it's simplistic, but if you want to take pictures, you have to have a camera. And it has to be ready to use. So if your eyes, mind and heart are doing their job, and you see something ..... click, you got it.

What is that job that your eyes, mind, and heart need to be doing? That's the million dollar question. It doesn't happen just when your feet hit the ground and your on the move. It happens way before that. You need to be thinking, eating, drinking, and breathing images. You need to be always, always, always looking at the work of other photogs. I'm talking about magazines, on the web, and most importantly in museums and galleries. See how other photogs see, and then critique their work to see how you would shoot the same thing, but better.

When you walk down a street and other people walk towards you what do you look at? Their feet? Their clothes or what their carrying? Their bodies (hey, I'm a guy)? Or do you look at their faces and especially their eyes? When you look a photo of someone what's the first thing you look at? Right, their eyes. And when you see a photo in your mind are you thinking about the angles and lines, and how they will lead the viewers' attention to what you want them to see in the photo? Are you aware of how the subject fits into the surroundings? When you process a photo after you shoot it, if all this is in place, you'll have a shot at a good photo. It will still take work to bring it all together (that's for the next installment) but if it's not there to begin with, forget the shot. You can't manufacture an environment after the fact and have it be believable as real life. Fashion and commercial photogs do it all the time in the studio, but when we see a pic in a magazine, on an unconscious level we suspend belief anyway. To make a street shot believable the environment has to be real.

That's a sixth sense. I call it intuition for lack of a better term, but that perception comes from years of shooting experience, and thousands of duds. Take for example this shot:

I shot it from my hip with a 24mm lens pointing upwards. I'll post the raw image next time and talk about the processing, but for now the final image will do. This is a busy guy in the middle of the day walking in a commercial area totally absorbed (and unhappy) in his cell phone, oblivious to what's going on around him. If the buildings on the left were not leaning and/or if the lampost were perfectly straight there wouldn't be that sense of unbalance, urgency, and impatience. The little figure above him, on the lampost going in the opposite direction adds to the look of absorption and isolation of the character. It's the middle of a busy day - the sun is a high noon reflected off a building.

To be continued ......

Teachers Learn From Students

2011-03-08T16:46:00.002-05:00

I learn so much from working with my students, musical and photographic. They force me to think through processes that I do on automatic pilot. I gave a mini photo workshop this weekend. The topic was street photography. It's a very difficult technique to master, probably because it's so open ended. If you're doing portraits the subject stands there in front of you, either in a studio or an environmental setting. If you're shooting landscapes, all you need do (and this in itself is not so easy) is find a good vantage point to get all the elements to work together. Your subject isn't going anywhere, isn't going to throw anything at you or spit at you, or run away.

I hadn't really thought about breaking my processes down until I had to prepare for this group of people. Here's what I came up with:

1) Preparation - when I know I'm going out to shoot I have to decide if I'm going to focus on a particular subject - say (just for example) people standing near fire hydrants - or I'm going to be open to anything that may happen. If I go out to shoot looking for a particular subject, very often I am totally closed off to anything else because I'm so focused on finding my subject. That's not necessarily bad, I just have to accept that limitation. Sometimes I go out to shoot with a subject in mind, but tell myself to be open to other things. Usually when I do that I come back with nothing, or very weak images. It's just how I work. On the other hand, going out to shoot being open ended requires a very different skill set which I'll cover in another blog entry.

2) Being mentally ready - How do you get those great impromptu street shots? You have to be there and be open to seeing what's going on around you. You have to have your camera at the ready - not in your camera bag, not hanging around your neck, I mean READY. Like in position to get the camera up to your eye, and with your finger on the shutter. If your not ready, you can kiss that shot goodbye. It's going to be over before you GET ready.

3) Being equipment ready - the camera has to be set to grab the shot as it happens. There's no time to set your focus up. No time to adjust exposure settings. And very little time to frame the image with your zoom lens. As for focus, autofocus is the answer. When I used to shoot with my Leica M6 rangefinder I set the lens on it's hyperfocal infinity setting so that most of the image would be reasonably in focus. Today's cameras and lenses are lightning fast. I generally tend to stay away from continuous focus because my images turn out to be not so sharp that way. But that's just me. For exposure I use aperture priority, which is aided by auto ISO, so I'm reasonably sure to get acceptable shutter speeds. I want to control the aperture myself so that my depth of field is within control. The noise I get in images from high ISOs is very manageable with my software. If you go out shooting street stuff with a fixed focal length lens, you'd better be prepared to do a lot of cropping once you start to develop the images. Zoom lenses are here to stay. Fixed focal lengths have their place, but not in street photography. When I shot with my Leica I used mostly a 35mm or 21mm lens. And did a lot of editing in the darkroom.

4) Lastly, know your software - this I'll save for another post also.

I did some of my own shooting while I was out with this group. We walked from Penn Station in NYC up to 75th Street, and back down again to Penn Station. That's a total of four miles. We could have just stayed in one small area and done the deed. But I needed coffee beans and Citarella's on Broadway and 75th street has very good Kenya AA beans. My students thought they got their money's worth from the workshop because they were exhausted at the end of it. Here's a few pics I got for myself:

'I'll think I'll duck into this phone booth and change into my Superman outfit .....'

'Yeah my son's middle name is Indiana, so what?'

'That's a funny book you got there....'

Friday Experiment

2011-03-04T22:35:00.004-05:00

I automatically put my 24-70 f2.8 zoom lens on my camera without ever really thinking about it. And then I proceed to shoot in my comfort zone. When I have that lens on the camera I hardly ever think 'outside the box'. This time I changed lenses before I walked out my door. I put my 70-300 zoom on the camera with the intention of making images of small details. It changed my whole way of thinking and shooting. I often found that I was much too close to the subject to have the lens focus properly, so I had to move back. I was in a tight space for these photos - at an old pump house that I have often photographed before -so I wasn't always successful with that long lens. I also shot with the clear intention of processing the photos in the new Nik Silver Efex Pro 2 plugin

The intention in converting a color image to b/w is to, well .... remove the color. Of all the factors in an image that lead our eyes through the graphic representation, and create the tension/relaxation leading us to an emotional response to a picture, color much more so than focus, contrast, or lighting will dominate. Removing the color makes manipulating the viewers' attention much easier. With people in an image it's easy to do. Not so with static inanimate objects.

In each of these images I added some toning. That's a technique I often played with in my wet darkroom which involved using an added chemical bath that reacted with the silver in the print to impart a warm sepia or cool blue temperature to the emulsion. Sometimes it was possible to use a double bath and create a duotone print with the shadow tones being one color caste and the light or paper tones another. To get the color balance to work was often a time consuming tedious labor-intensive task. Digitally the process is much easier and more flexible. Although the functionality to process this way has always been available in Photoshop, it's been cumbersome and not very gratifying to work with. But with the new plugin it's a new game.

I often create a 'vignette' effect on my images to keep the viewer's eye from drifting off the edges of the print. In the images that follow I've tried to go further with that and in some photos created a blanched effect on the edges and/or corners to give the image an aged look.

And lastly, to simulate another effect I used quite often in the wet darkroom I placed an edge frame around the images. When enlarging a frame from a film strip I would use a negative carrier which I had altered by enlarging the space through which the negative image was projected, thereby giving a rough edge to the outside edges of the negative. It created a black band around the image that made it totally self contained, and was possible to do only to images that were full frame (not cropped). Digitally it's possible to create that framing effect on any image, cropped or not, and the variety of textures, sizes, and finishes on the edges is endless.

For better or worse, here's the first group:

Street Photography

2011-03-01T11:21:00.001-05:00

The thing I love about doing street photography is the spontaneity and challenge of seeing and acting quickly and decisively. The variety is endless, especially in and around New York City. If I go out for a walk with just one specific thing in mind - which I often do - I'm usually closed off to a lot that might pop up in front of my eyes. Sometimes I'll actually see something happening that does't fit in to my plan for the day and I'll say 'Nah, not part of the plan' then a little while later, after it eats at me, I'll say 'Shit, what was I thinking?!'

It's not bad to go out with a plan in mind. And sometimes taking a diversion from the plan can be so distracting that it falls apart. That's all part of the challenge. The endless variety can sometimes be so overloading that I don't know which way to turn first. That can lead to getting absolutely nothing worthwhile for the day. As I sit on the train returning home I scroll through the images on my camera's LCD screen and delete the obvious clams. When I'm roaming around the streets I shoot a lot from the hip - that is, I hold the camera in front of me level with my sternum and my finger on the shutter button. If I see a scene I'll begin to shoot as I approach it, usually with the zoom lens set at 24mm, aperture priority, and autofocus. It takes a lot of practice to judge the camera angle and tilt so that heads and/or feet are not chopped off by the framing. But that's part of the challenge, and that's why I use a 24mm focal length. Usually the first shot is way to far out and the last shot is too close.

I often read blogs of photogs who shoot landscapes, urbex, and posed commercial images. They often talk about how challenging it is to come up with interesting shots that are not repetitive in composition and/or subject. Shooting on the street presents a completely different set of parameters. It takes practice and experience to be able to judge how background elements will visually play out when you shoot as I do. Serendipity is a big factor too.

But there's that moment when I first see an image on the LCD when everything comes together, and I say "YESSSSSS ..... I got it!' And I can't wait to get home and start to work on it. Then I have to change gears, work patiently and meticulously with the image and software to make something beautiful.

I've been a little obsessed (there's an oxymoron for you) with the new Silver Efex Pro 2 software that I just got. I love creating b/w images, and this makes it way more fun than it ever has been before. I'm taking a short afternoon trip tomorrow to play with my camera toys, and later in the day to play with my software toys. Should be interesting. But for now here's a few goodies I've reworked with the new software. This first image is one I talked about yesterday. It was the winner of a daily competition. It's called 'Three Beauties' and was shot at the Museum of Modern Art. I was walking around the garden - one of my favorite spots to shoot - and just looked up to catch this composition. I composed it in the viewfinder:

The next shot was taken on 57th street this past December, before the snow hit. It was definitely a hip shot. The juxtaposition of the old guy with the overcoat and cane, and the 'bombshell' in lingerie was very funny. Actually I really wanted a shot of just the 'bombshell' but this guy wouldn't get out of the way!

This image was taken on Essex Street on the Lower East Side. A hip shot as you can tell from the skewed angle of the frame and the perspective looking up. If I'd lilted the camera a little more down I might have gotten his legs and feet, but then I would lose the instability of the upward view. Given his old world look, I thought adding a bit of toning, some vignette, and a frame to give the image an aged feeling might add atmosphere:

Lastly, another hip shot on the subway platform. Subways are a world unto themselves. On the platform, in the cars, on the stairs. Wide angle is essential here, especially in a crowded subway car. This was shot on the platform of the IND 4th Street station:

A Quick Morning Post

2011-02-28T10:00:00.000-05:00

I just noticed that one of my pics, which I shot last summer, was selected for today's blog entry. The website, One Daily Shot, posts images on a daily basis as submitted by readers. I have always enjoyed their selections, but today's is a testament to their good taste.

Check it out.

Projects

2011-02-25T21:53:00.000-05:00

I met with the director of the International Bluegrass Music Museum a few days ago. We went through all my photos of BIll Monroe and selected a group of forty images that she would like to have in a show at the museum that will coincide with the opening of the celebration of the centennial of Bill Monroe's birthday. That would be in September of this year. You can get all the information here.

And .... all those photographs that I had in my book I Hear A Voice Calling that were originally intended to be in a coffee table photo book? They just may be, if things work out well with the museum show.

On another note, a few weeks ago I entered several photographs in a competition, which I rarely do. This one was a little special because it was run in conjunction with a software developer whose products I swear by: Nik Software. They announced that a new version of the b/w conversion plug in for Photoshop was on the horizon and that the winner of the contest would receive a free version of the new plugin when it was released to the public. The second place prize was a printed version of the photograph. There was no third place prize offered. After the dust settled, one of the images I entered was selected as the third place winner. The judges just couldn't dismiss my entry....... aw, shucks. I was awarded the new plugin as a prize. It became available yesterday and although I haven't yet received the license key, I downloaded the software and have been using in its fully functional demo mode. I've been going back through my catalog and reworking selected images with the new software to see how the results compare. The new plugin is quite amazing!

Here's two examples. The first image was done with the original conversion plugin, Silver Efex Pro:

I was quite pleased with this image when I first created it. And I still like it, but the end result after processing the same raw file with the newer plugin, Silver Efex Pro 2 absolutely blew me away:

The ability to control detail, contrast, and tonal range is much more than I could have achieved in a wet darkroom.

The next image is one of the shots I submitted to the competition, and was selected as a winner:

Again, I must say that I was quite pleased with the results of the conversion when I first made it. But when I reprocessed the same original file with the new software the results were far superior:

Each time I work with new software I'm really impressed with the results, and then new stuff comes out which is much better than what I had been working with. When will this end? I can't imagine anything better. But I'll take whatever comes and start the learning curve all over again.

Keeps me young.......

Greek Synagogue 2

2011-02-17T21:54:00.000-05:00

Here's a few more images shot at the Greek Synagogue on Broome Street in Lower Manhattan. I was moved by the atmosphere in the room. There was a feeling of spirituality in the air that I felt was totally missing from the restored Eldridge Street Synagogue which is really just a museum. When I visited the Eldridge Street space I was totally uninspired, not at all motivated to shoot photos of a static space. The Greek synagogue seemed to vibrate with intensity.

Greek Synagogue

2011-02-14T22:01:00.000-05:00

Kehila Kedosha Janina is a Greek Synagogue on Broome Street in lower Manhattan. The area which was once called the Lower East Side was an enclave of immigrants of many different backgrounds and nationalities - German, Italian, Jewish, and now Chinese. The blocks surrounding the synagogue are all Chinese now. The synagogue has a very small devoted Sephardic congregation. Religious services are celebrated on Saturday and holidays, and the building is open for visitors on Sundays.

I spend a few hours taking photographs in the building this past Sunday. The layout of the sanctuary and the decor is typical of any small shul. The Torah scrolls are different in that they are in round containers rather than two scrolls covered by an embroidered cloth. The liturgy in the prayer books looks the same to my uneducated eye, but I was assured by my host that there are significant differences between the Sephardic and Ashkenazic service.

The first of these photos looks from the rear of the sanctuary to the bema and the ark holding the Torah scrolls beyond that. The second photo looks towards the rear from in front of the ark.

Sunday in New York

2011-02-13T22:25:00.000-05:00

I had no intention of going into the Big Apple today, but with a break in the cold weather I just had to get out. I stopped into the Greek synagogue on Broome Street, and stayed for about two hours. I'll post shots as I work on them. While I was waiting for the A train, I grabbed this hip shot:

A Quickie

2011-02-10T12:21:00.000-05:00

I desperately need a photo phix. But it's been so damned cold it's tough to get out and shoot.

I entered a shot into a competition sponsored by my favorite plu in developer, Nik Software, specifically for b/w images. And the first prize was a license code for version 2 of their b/w conversion plugin. There were originally just two prizes being considered. But last night I saw that they added a third place prize because the judge felt that a photo I entered deserved an award. This is it:

I was in Port Newark last week and shot a structure that was not old, or falling apart, or grungy. Surprise, surprise! It was directly across the road from the maximum security Essex County Prison. I was expecting an imminent visit from a prison guard, or to be attacked by some wild dog from the meadows. See what I go through to get these shots for all of you? Here it is:

On that same day I shot the underside of an overpass. The color version is here:

The b/w version was posted last week here. I like them both. You (let me know)?

I'm heading out this afternoon for a walk around town. I have to do some shooting, otherwise I'm going to curl up into a ball on my couch and sleep away the afternoon.

Port Newark

2011-02-06T20:18:00.000-05:00

I took a drive this afternoon past Newark Airport into an area I have just begun to explore. There's a few junk/auto salvage dealers, some trucking yards, and shipping container lots. And quite a few dilapidated and abandoned buildings. The area need a lot more exploration, but it's rich with images.

And The Winners Are ....

2011-01-31T10:50:00.000-05:00

Last week I did a poll of a group of friends. I asked them to decide on their three choices from a group of eleven b/w photos. I needed their input because Nik Software - the developer that produces the Photoshop plugins that I use for 90% of my post processing - is having a giveaway contest for an update to their Silver Efex Pro plugin. I'm allowed to submit three images for consideration.

Narrowing down my b/w images from over the past year to just eleven was difficult enough for me. But it was impossible for me to get it down to three. And since my artistic sensibilities are skewed differently than the general human population. I'm sure I would have picked the wrong three anyway. There were three clear winners from the group. I submitted them to for the competition, and the winner will be announced next week. Here's the three picks (in no particular order):

Snow, Snow, Snow ....

2011-01-29T21:35:00.000-05:00

I'm done with it. Really. Enough is enough. Right?

Wrong!

All we can do is make the best of it, so:

A Glitch In Google?

2011-01-24T12:17:00.001-05:00

There must have been a glitch in Google - the administrator for the blogspot product that houses my blog site. My email passwords got totally screwed up for a few days, and I couldn't access my blog or the software that I use to post to it. Oh well, I'm back now - lucky World!

Last week, during a drive home from Jersey City on US Rt. 1, I noticed a neighborhood just off the highway that looked ripe for urbex (urban exploration). It's just east of the Ironbound section of Newark. Technically I guess it's called Port Newark. Loads of manufacturing spots and truck terminals. There were two buildings in particular that I had noticed - both of them rundown dilapidated wrecks. Surprise, surprise!

What draws me to these places? I think it's the impermanence and deterioration of what at first might seem like something indestructible. That's life .... transitory. Nothing is permanent. Not even permanence.

I braved the cold, went back to the area on Saturday, and found both buildings. I had a chance to get close to one of them and photograph it, but it deserves more than one trip. As I was shooting the building some people came out to ask me what I was doing there. After I charmed them and explained I just love to shoot old factories they were fine with it. However the owner's fifty pound pit pull wasn't .... guess I'm not going back there and climbing over any fences when nobody's around. When I checked out the second building I could see from the road there was a chain link fence around it and 'no trespassing' signs posted. Usually I forget how to read when I see those signs. But considering the probability that I might encounter yet another fifty pound unruly pit bull, I may have to be satisfied shooting the building from the roadside. Time to break out my telephoto zoom lens, I guess.

Here's a few shots from the first building:

New Ideas

2011-01-19T22:26:00.000-05:00

As I said in a previous post, my first love in photography is shooting with b/w processing in mind. Then whammo! Nik Software, the maker of my favorite photoshop plugins, announces that they will shortly be releasing a new version of Silver Efex Pro, their b/w conversion software plugin. I loved version 1, and after seeing a pre-release demo I'm sure I'll love version 2.

With that in mind I went back through my color images and took a fresh look to see which, if any, could stand up to b/w conversion. Here's an old HDR shot which I liked very much in color. The b/w version has a totally different look and feel to it. I like them both:

My First Love (Photographically speaking)

2011-01-17T21:58:00.000-05:00

I was reminded today of what my first - and overriding - love is. I've been so enchanted by the new technology that creates HDR images, and with the new toys I have that go into creating it, that I have drifted away from shooting images for b/w conversion. I was reminded today by the announcement by NIK software of a new upgrade to their b/w conversion software. The new enhancements look really yummie. I so want to get back into doing my street photography. That's the stuff that translates so well in my mind's eye to b/w.

The problem is the weather. It has been just too damned cold to go out and walk around in the streets of NYC when the temperature is 25°F and the wind chill makes it feel like 10°. That in combination with my advancing years (I'm turning into a crotchety old man ..... and all you who already think I am one can .....) makes shooting street material very difficult. But I can't just sit around and wait for Spring.

My best work is my b/w. It's the language of abstraction and the ability to create intense focus. It's an integral part of the story of each image. So I guess I'll just have to bundle up in layers and hit the pavement.

Playing In The Snow (2)

2011-01-13T21:36:00.000-05:00

Here's more images I have processed from my fun in the snow:

Playing In The Snow

2011-01-11T20:51:00.001-05:00

I was getting a little stir crazy yesterday. I took a ride to a location close by that I visit often in the autum because of the magnificent foliage, and there's a couple of old decrepit buildings there .... pump houses. The building in which I was interested was on the far side of a lake, separated by a water dam which is traversed by a very, very rickety bridge which was covered by snow and ice. Ten years ago I would have crossed it, no question about it. Now, not a chance. But further on down from the dam the stream is quite narrow with many rocks covered with ice and snow enticing me to cross. I was wearing my waterproof boots, so crossed. Climbing the bank on the far side was not easy. But I made it with no thought of how I was ever going to get back.

This building was destroyed by fire quite a few years ago. It had been locked up and it's windows closed up with cinderblock. Recently it was surrounded with a chain link fence. I took some shots of the dam and the crossing bridge, and more shots of the burned out pump house. When I crossed in front of the building I was surprised to see the gate of the fence unlocked and open, and there was a wide gap in the cinder block that had closed up the door opening. Years of wishing I could get into the building became a reality. There were parts of the building that were totally inaccessible. But what I could access put me in Urbex nirvana. The light was very dim and some of the exposures took well over a minute to make.

Here's the first of the images that I've processed:

Experiment

2011-01-06T12:39:00.000-05:00

WhenToo cold to go into NYC today. I started playing with a shot I did several weeks ago while I was walking around the DUMBO area of Brooklyn. I've posted this before. Here's several takes of the same image. The first is the properly exposed shot which was the first of a series of five which were then used to blend together into an HDR image:

When I first posted the HDR shot with my then current post processing, I wanted to bring out the pastel-like hues in the blues and brick, so I made this image:

I still like what I did there, but once I began playing with my toys I tried to blend two different HDR renderings and then in post processing add some softness to the overall feel. This is what I ended with:

As I look at it now, I think it may be a tad dark and too yellowish, but I like the general 'darkness' in the mood. There's just so many different ways to take a photo like this, it's hard to know when to draw the line. It's all a matter of personal taste (or lack thereof).

It's A New Year (3)

2011-01-04T22:25:00.002-05:00

Ok, the last one of this series .... maybe. Still from the same location in Orange, NJ. I'm planning on going back there later this week, or early next week to get into some of the buildings to shoot their interiors. I'm hoping for some creepy light and interesting stairways. We'll see. In the mean time:

It's A New Year (2) ......

2011-01-03T21:08:00.000-05:00

More from the factory/warehouse site in Orange, NJ:

It's A New Year ......

2011-01-02T10:58:00.000-05:00

.... with new photos and ideas. As I mentioned in yesterday's post, the owner of property in Orange, NJ agreed to let me into the buildings to take photos. If it works out, I should have tons of stuff to work on and post. Here's some of what I shot yesterday:

The Year's Ten Best Shots Part 2

2010-12-31T16:54:00.021-05:00

Good stuff today. I took a drive to some turn-of-the-century (20th) industrial buildings that are in pretty bad repair. Walked around and shot some stuff. And the owner of the property popped out of a window to ask what the hell I was doing there. I'm going back later this month to get inside one of the buildings. Should be some really interesting URBEX material there.

As for the year's (2010) ten best, here are the color shots:

This is not HDR. NYC Transit Musuem:

And this is not HDR. Bench in Alley, Millburn, NJ:

Cider Mill, Ralston, NJ:

Abandoned Pump House, Millburn, NJ:

Staple Street, TriBeCa, NYC:

Two Bottles, Staple Street, NYC:

World Financial Center, North Cove, NYC:

Dumbo, Brooklyn:

Brooklyn Bridge, NYC:

Under the Manhattan Bridge, NYC:

The Year's Ten Best Shots

2010-12-31T16:40:00.000-05:00

This is a very cutesy idea. Not at all like me to do this, but since everyone else is (well, at least a lot of folks whose blog I read) I don't want to be the odd man out.

Did I really say that?

After reviewing all my work for the past year I decided to split this up into two posts. First the ten best b/w shots, then the ten best color shots - which will all probably be HDR.

Here's the ten b/w shots in no particular order:

Historic Paterson, NJ:

Sitting with a friend on Broadway, NYC:

Easter Parade on Fifth Ave. NYC:

Museum of Modern Art, NYC:

On the #1 train, NYC:

Hanging out on Ninth Ave, NYC:

IRT at Penn Station, NYC:

Central Park, NYC:

Victoria's Secret, 57th Street, NYC:

On 57th Street, NYC:

Very Interesting Video

2010-12-29T16:25:00.000-05:00

This video is definitely worth checking out. Ninety Nine percent of it hits the nail on the head. I leave it to you to decide what the one percent is.

A Walk in West Orange

2010-12-22T21:43:00.000-05:00

I went to West Orange this afternoon to explore the possibility of photographing the Edison National Park Factory. The old factory building and the Black Mariah always fascinated me, and as a youngster I remember touring the site. That may or may not happen depending upon whether the powers that be there allow me to use a tripod, grrrrrr......

But right across the street from the park site is an old factory building that has fallen into disrepair, and the surrounding streets had a few other interesting structures.

And check the link at the top on the right for my newest book Manhattan Diaspora which is available in the Blurb.com bookstore by clicking on the widget.

Manhattan Diaspora

2010-12-21T17:38:00.003-05:00

My latest book, Manhattan Diaspora, is publicly available on Burb. Click on the badge at the right and you will be taken directly to the Blurb store where you can purchase the book. If that doesn't work you can click on this link.

Copy/Emulate/Learn

2010-12-17T22:37:00.001-05:00

I found this quote on a blog by Bob Cornelis that I read almost daily:

“The secret is to follow the advice the masters give you in their works while doing something different from them.” (Edgar Degas)

'I like to look at the work of others, particularly those much better than me ..... But what to do with what I see? Sometimes I actually will try to emulate the work pretty closely, though this is more as an exercise, typically to learn a new technique that I can use later. More often I go through a process of trying to identify those qualities that I admire. If I can extract those in abstract form from the actual work, it’s more likely I’ll be able to use them later in a more personal way rather than be overly influenced by what I’ve seen..... As artists we’re constantly editing, sorting, and evaluating everything we see. We absorb it, let it churn away in our internal incubator and then try to put it to good use in our work....'

This resonates with me. It's a process I've used my whole life. When I was learning to play fiddle I listened to the masters - Chubby Wise, Jimmy Buchanan, Benny Martin - I dissected what they played, tried to figure out how they made it fit in and then carried the techniques to tunes I was learning to play. When I studied violin I listened to Heifetz, Kreisler, and Oistrakh, not that I could emulate their great technique, but their phrasing and musicianship were a constant source of inspiration to me.

When I began to play at my photography, before I ever thought to take is seriously as a vocation, I poured over the works of Gene Smith, Cartier-Bresson, and other great masters. Now, in the digital era, I try to look at as many varied approaches as possible to learn new techniques. I don't often like what I see, but occasionally an approach or a workflow will hit home and I try to incorporate that into my efforts. I've seen a lot of HDR work. Most of it is excessive, over the top, and in bad taste. But I've found a few photographers' work that hits home and I've tried to incorporate their techniques into my work to develop my own voice.

I've always felt comfortable working in black and white - that's a carry over from my film days. And the opportunities offered by digital photography and the new software plugins the possibilities are exciting. Since I've been shooting digital, color has been slowly creeping into my repertoire. I was never comfortable with it when I shot film. Occasionally I'd throw a roll of Kodachrome into my camera and shoot some autumn foliage. But I didn't want to use color film for my documentary work because I was always concerned that I wouldn't be able to control the images as I could with b/w film. Only recently have I begun to feel really comfortable with digital color processing. And only recently have I become more open minded about different techniques.

Dumbo Redact

2010-12-15T12:02:00.000-05:00

More Dumbo shots. The first really is under the Manhattan Bridge. It gives a sense of just how massive a structure it is:

Then there's the Brooklyn Bridge as seen through the narrow streets:

And some assorted street scenes:

Dumbo Odyssey

2010-12-12T21:12:00.000-05:00

Dumbo stands for District Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass. The previous post for my tripod tales had two images from my trip to the district. Here's two more. The first, with it's horizontal and vertical lines, and the color palette reminded me of something like a Pierre Bonnard painting. The second just grabbed my attention as I walked by.

More Tripod Tales

2010-12-11T23:26:00.001-05:00

I spent the afternoon in the Dumbo District of Brooklyn - that's Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass. It's a small section on the Brooklyn Waterfront where the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan Bridge merge into the Brooklyn Queens Expressway, and it's where the Brooklyn Ferry Landing is/was. The views are quite breathtaking with the Lower Manhattan skyline sandwiched between the two bridges. And the buildings are for the most part one-time industrial warehouses and factories that are being given new life by slick real estate developers as condos and art galleries. Kind of like what happened to the Chelsea and TriBeCa districts of Manhattan. Thankfully some of the grit and grime still remains. Every time I return to the area it's a little more gentrified, more bland and homogenized.

I'll be working the next few days on processing the photos (while I wait for the next revision of Manhattan Diaspora to be printed and delivered to me) so I'll post them as I get them ready. Here's the first two:

Tripod Tales

2010-12-06T18:12:00.001-05:00

If you asked a carpenter to screw two pieces of wood together and then handed him the wood, screws, and a hammer he'd have a tough time doing a clean job of it. Shooting bracketed images to be merged together in HDR software (which is designed to merge photos that are in register) without a tripod is kind of the same thing. The photos would be merged, much the same as the two pieces of wood would be joined if the screws were banged in with a hammer, but the results would be messy.

I've shot with tripods before. Even did some HDR work with one. But using a lightweight tripod (so it's easily carried and handled) that is well made (so it's easy to set up and operate) makes the experience enjoyable. Kind of makes me want to seek out opportunities to play with the toys.

I was not a big fan of HDR work when it first came to my attention. But that's because many of the practitioners use it tastelessly. There are quite a few FLICKR groups devoted to displaying HDR images. Just browse some and you can see what I mean. I, however, wouldn't stoop to creating such unrealistic claptrap. Nope, not me.

A Cold Day In NYC

2010-12-05T13:23:00.000-05:00

I took a walk from TriBeCa down to the World Financial Center. It was a test run for a photowalk in NYC with my new 'lightweight' tripod. It's definitely lighter than anything else, but a bit cumbersome nonetheless. I guess I'll just have to get used to it if I want to shoot crisp HDR brackets. While in TriBeCa I revisted a few of the spots I shot last week. Having a tripod was a distinct advantage for what I wanted to do. The images will follow later this week.

I thought a cold windy day would be ideal for visiting the North Cove outside the Winter Garden. Who in their right mind would go outside on the wide open Hudson River on a cold blustery day? Besides me, that is. Seems like I'm not the only crazy. But I got some good shots anyway.

Milking a Spot

2010-12-03T16:38:00.002-05:00

There's not a lot to photograph in my boring suburban town, so when I find something interesting I have to squeeze everything out of it I can. This weekend I hope to get into NYC, especially TriBeCa again, and maybe lower Manhattan. So I'll have new material, but for now:

New Toys

2010-12-02T19:31:00.002-05:00

I just got a few. A new tripod and head amongst them. I couldn't wait to get out and play today. Went to a local spot where there's an unused, decaying pump house. I've put up some photos of this place before, but here they are again..... well, one for now. I went a little crazy with the post processing, trying out new techniques. It's a bit over the top, but it was fun to do.

It's Been Done Before .....

2010-12-01T22:39:00.002-05:00

Many times, many ways. But the building was there, I was there, I had my camera, so what the hell.....

A Walk Through Tribeca 2

2010-11-29T20:09:00.000-05:00

I processed a few mor images that I shot in Tribeca. Even though the software I use to create HDR does a wonderful job of alignment and anti-ghosting, it's extremely difficult to shoot bracketed shots for HDR hand held. As I worked on them the lack of crispness was very apparent to me. I plan to get my hands on a new tripod and ball head for this weekend. So I'll make a return trip to the spots and reshoot some of these images.

This is in an alleyway called Staple Street:

This is Duane Street:

A Walk Through Tribeca

2010-11-28T20:33:00.000-05:00

Tribeca is short for 'triangle beneath Canal Street'. When I worked in the financial district (ughhhhh!!) I would often take a walk there during my lunch hour. It was still somewhat industrial, and the buildings had a gritty look to them. Delivery trucks lined the cobblestoned streets.

I went back this afternoon to scope the area. I'll be getting my new tripod sometime this week and before I lugged (ok, ok, shlepped) it down there I wanted to see what there was to see. The buildings are for the most part still there. But they're way cleaner looking - been spiffed up and made into coops. And the delivery trucks have turned into BMWs and Mercedes Benzes. Too bad.

But there are a few isolated pockets of grunge - one little alleyway I found (not telling where) was still graffiti laden and had some pretty nice details to capture. It will be my first project with the new tripod. I shot some bracketed exposures hand held - tough to do in subdued light. Here's a peek at one, more to come though ....

The Day After ....

2010-11-26T20:56:00.000-05:00

Looks like I'm going to submit the book to Blurb for a test print sometime next week. So far everyone who's seen it has liked it. But I've only asked people who I knew would like it ......

Here's a rework of an older shot. I like this version best - cool subdued tones:

Turkey Day

2010-11-25T12:21:00.000-05:00

I don't want to seem too trite about this, but it is Thanksgiving. And since I have a blog that many people read because they are seriously interested in the minutiae of my life I want to take this time to express my thankfulness and gratitude. Seriously (I'm not glib or sarcastic all the time, y'know.....).

I've had my dark times in life. Haven't we all? But now is the time, and now is what I'm talking about. It all brought me here. A rabbi who was a major focus of one of my photography projects in the early 1990's once told me 'God gives me everything I need.' This was an epiphany for me. I've thought about it ever since. Especially from the perspective of what I have - if I have it God, must have given it to me because I need it. So what do I have: obviously a place to live, food in my belly, and clothes on my back - those are the essentials. But I've been blessed in my life for an abundance of things for which I've not always been grateful. But I sure as hell am now: talent, perception, intelligence, good health, friends who tolerate and appreciate me (this one is a biggie), an insatiable curiosity about the world and people around me, and a drive to express myself in music, words, and pictures. Yeah, yeah, I could go on about my years of depression and anxiety, about my addictions, yada yada yada..... But during all that time I also was given Bill Monroe, Raphael Bronstein, Ariana Bronne, and Mario Cabrera. And all of it, the whole package, brought me to here. And as I said in the beginning, now is the time and now is what I'm talking about.

On another note - I've discovered how to justify my typing on this blog, so it should be easier to read now. Thanks for that to my working with the Blurb technology for my new book. SPEAKING OF WHICH ..... it's 90% done. I've printed off a copy on my desktop printer, and it looks good. It's being proofread by my readers as I write this. I'm expecting to submit it for the first printed copy sometime next week, so the book may very well see the light of the Blurb salesroom (hint, hint) before the end of this month. Just in time, eh?

Now for all your indulgences, here's my TG present (I discovered that my monitor was getting out of whack colorwise, so a few of my most recent posts may have looked a bit green. I think I fixed the problem):

Under the High Line

2010-11-22T21:03:00.001-05:00

The High Line is a great attraction on the west side of NYC. I've walked it many times, and taken some really fun pics on it and looking down from it. Some impressive photographers (you'd have to ask some of them in person about the veracity of that, however) have worked the views endlessly.

I thought it might be fun to follow the elevated park along at street level just to see what those great views look like from the ground. One really interesting difference in perspective is the way the shadows play out. Here's what I shot, for starters.

I Made It Into NYC

2010-11-21T09:28:00.001-05:00

About six months ago I needed some repair work to be done to my primary violin bow. It's a very good bow and I didn't want to give it to a repair shop for more than one day, but in this area of New Jersey that's not possible. I took the bow to the violin shop which I at one time frequented quite regularly and had to leave the bow for what possibly might have been two weeks. It was a slow time musically for me, so I left it. When the bow was returned, it seemed to be repaired competently.

Wrong. Six months later, the same problem occurred. This time I made the trip into New York a highly respected luthier/bowmaker prepared to leave the bow for another stretch of time. When he saw what was needed he told me to come back in a few hours. I was surprised, but pleased. That gave me the chance to
roam the streets for a few hours and do some shooting. That's a luxury I haven't had for quite a few weeks because I've been deep at work on my new photography book.

I got some good shots which follow. I still have a borrowed aluminum tripod that's way too heavy to shlep around New York unless I know I have something specific to shoot. And the carbon fiber tripod I lust for is still a bit out of financial reach for me, but soon .... I hope. I shot one scene HDR bracketed, and some other street dramas. One scenario continually popped up in front of me at different locations. Victoria's Secret apparently has an ad campaign in progress which features sexy, voluptuous beauties scantily appareled in lacy lingerie - nothing new for Victoria's Secret. But the ads and store displays are all titled 'Hello Bombshell!' I noticed quite a few interesting juxtapositions, and had to grab the shots.

Oh, by the way, not that you would care after seeing those pics, but the bow was repaired quite well this time, with a caveat that it needed more work.

Working In Overdrive

2010-11-16T12:01:00.000-05:00

Sorry no photos today or for a few days. I've been working hard getting my images into shape for the new book. Blurb doesn't make it easy. I think they want people who create books to use the lowest quality images so that Blurb has to devote the least amount of space for each book. The guidelines are vague at best, and their support is by email or live online chat. No phone contact. I hate that.

On a brighter note, I've gotten all my ducks in a row for the new gear I need. My friends aren't wealthy enough for these gifts, so I'll have to suck it up myself. A new tripod and ball head (to shoot HDR), vastly expanded storage capacity for my photos (my internal hard drive is full), a graphics tablet, and color calibration stuff for my camera. Setting everything up while I create this book is gonna make December a verrrrry busy month!

The Next Step

2010-11-12T23:05:00.000-05:00

I've been hard at work on the next book Manhattan Diaspora which should be off to the printer for a first shot sometime at the end of the month. I finally buckled down and wrestled with the copyright registration process. The government bureaucrats can make anything difficult - I know I have a login ID already, but I couldn't remember my password. When I requested a reminder the site asked me questions I couldn't answer correctly. After several tries I just gave up and created a new user ID. I'd bet I'm just one of thousands who have done the same thing.

I spent the afternoon on Wednesday wandering around the Lower East Side to explore my old stomping grounds. There's still some little kernels of the old neighborhood, but mostly not. Rentals for a one bedroom apartment run around $3k a month, and most of the project buildings have been turned into co-ops that go for upwards of $500k. The children of the old-timers just want to get out of town. Can't blame them.

But I got a few goodies while I wandered the streets. One old timer invited me into the House of Sages. This organization was at one time a big yeshiva on East Broadway, now it's reduced to one room.

The New Book

2010-11-05T17:35:00.000-04:00

I spent the major part of today working on the book. After a two hour session conferring on Skype with a friend who agreed to edit the book with me, I reorganized the photographs and pared the original collection of 105 images down to 86, along with a front and rear cover shot.

That's a significant adjustment, but the story flows much better now. No return contact has been made by the people I reached out to for input comments on the photographs, so this will probably have to be a solo flight. But that's not a problem. The more I do myself, the more control I have over everything. Not that I'm a control freak .....

I have yet to decide on the dimensions of the book. It could be 8x10 or 11x13 inches. The cost of production is significantly different which would affect the selling price. The larger size is much more impressive, but the idea is to sell books. It's difficult to tell how many pages the book will be until I begin to play with the layout.

For now I have to make the final selection of photos, get the order arranged, and write the text. Then on to the layout and production problems. It's all going much more quickly than I expected, which is good. If this all goes smoothly and relatively painlessly, there will be more books to come.

I'm BUSY!

2010-11-01T19:57:00.000-04:00

Posting will be intermittent for a few weeks. I'll be shooting and processing. But I've begun to dig in and start work on my next book which I talked about in the previous post. I'll be creating the book using Blurb software, and Blurb will ultimately be the printer for the book. I expect to be posting the final product to their store where it will be available for sale. There will be a widget on this blog and on my website that will connect to the book at the Blurb store.

This will be an interesting process (for me, anyway - maybe very boring for anyone else to read about) and writing to this blog will be part of it. I need to learn the software to format the book, I need to write the and I need to select and organize the photos for it. There's more than three hundred prime photos that need to be edited down to a reasonable size. The more photos in the book, the more the book will cost to produce, and the more I have to charge for it. I want to keep it manageable, and still tell the story. It's not an easy process.

First things first. This week I'll be learning the software and paring down the photos. I'll be thinking about text and trying to get in touch with some of the people in the photos to try to get their comments on the story. I don't want to have to write the whole thing myself.

That's it for now. This is gonna be fun!

My Next Big Project

2010-10-28T21:33:00.001-04:00

Yes, it's here.

I spent the day in New York City. First at the Javitz Convention Center which was home to the Photo Expo, and then at B&H Photo. I took care of business at the Expo: found the tripod and ball head I would be comfortable with (if I could afford it), and found the device I need to restructure my computer storage architecture.

Then on to B&H Photo where I was scheduled to submit work for a portfolio review. Generally I shy away from these kinds of events, especially if there's a charge for the review - which is most cases. Reviews are just another person's opinion of my work, and the only thing that gives their opinion any validity is my estimation of them as an opinionator. In most cases those pundits that do reviews don't impress me. This was different. The overseer of the reviews was Maine Media Workshops, an organization for which I have considerable respect. And the list of reviewers was impressive, even to this cynic and skeptic. I was scheduled to have my review done by Karen Marshall, whose work can be seen here . After I received my assignation I checked out her credentials and work on her website, and was mightily impressed.

And a little trepidatious. My anxiety proved to be totally unnecessary. The work I presented to her was a collection of forty images culled from the work I shot on the Lower East Side in New York City back in 1992-93. They were the images that comprised a gallery show I put on in Hoboken last year. I thought this would be a good opportunity to get some feedback on putting a book together.

When I met Karen I simply explained to her that this was a collection I shot on film back in 1992 of B/W images which I had digitized. After she looked at the first few (maybe 3) images she said unhesitatingly that I should make this work into a book, and I should do it with Blurb which is a do-it-yourself technology available on the internet. I'd heard of others who were very satisfied with their experience doing this, but shied away from it for myself because I just didn't want to get into the whole marketing thing. She was encouraging and supportive and spoke in very glowing terms of the images in the collection of their being of sociological and historical significance, and she even suggested I consider presenting the material to the Museum of the City of New York (that is way down the road for now).

I walked away from the experience buzzing. I had little quantum flashes popping off in my head with ideas and thoughts about the whole thing, and I had to start writing notes to myself. I love to work in overdrive like this. Problem is, I don't sleep well when I'm like this and I get cranky and cantankerous.

So watch out World, I'm at it again.

Historic Paterson, NJ

2010-10-25T21:26:00.000-04:00

I've always loved taking these kinds of photos, but never knew there was a name for the genre (actually, I never needed to know. Would have done it anyway). It's called URBEX, short for Urban Exploration, and there's a bunch of websites devoted to the subject. Not necessarily photo sites. Apparently there is a class of folks who just love to muck about in grunge, dirt, refuse, and unsavory people with no other end in mind but to muck about.

The attraction for me is the textures and nuances that can't be found in clean modern structured (dare I say sterile?) environments. HDR technique is perfect for enhancing the light and textures.

Halloween Is Coming

2010-10-23T19:56:00.002-04:00

I know this is a bit over the top for my usual processing, but then Halloween is over the top anyway. It's from a local cemetary that has some gravestones that go back to before the Civil War.

BOOOO!

This past February I took a drive to Paterson, NJ to check out the somewhat famous Paterson Falls. What I discovered there, which was considerably more interesting, was a 'historic' district with old mill and manufacturing buildings which was the center of the silk processing industry in the Northeast. I took some single frame photos back then and talked about them here, here , and here. Now that I have the brand-spanking-newest HDR technology to play with I went back to shoot more images so that I can sharpen my chops.

More later this week.