Kinda sick, right? Maybe a bit skeezy? Photographically speaking, that’s a lot like one of my guilty pleasures lately: Terry Richardson’s Tumblr.

Richardson's Diary

I mean, we’re talking about a guy who doesn’t really have a great repertoire in technique. This is a guy with a ton of tattoos, who looks like a Kentucky hick, is known to have downed drugs in quantities that would kill me, and has published a book that reportedly involved the photographer himself getting a beej.

I can’t tear my eyes away.

View from Kalaulau

Originally posted on the family site.  I really like this one, though, so I’m posting it again.

Keep Off

I’ve been playing around on Google+ lately and am a bit confused by all of the so-called “must follow” lists out there. In particular, I’m surprised to see Thomas Hawk’s name bandied about so often, when his actions seem to be detrimental to photography in general.

Perhaps it’s my poor memory, but it seems to me that I’ve only noticed his name in conjunction with attention-gathering activities: his recent criticism against Jay Maisel and pushing the boundaries of appropriate behavior at a museum in San Francisco come immediately to mind.

This seems to be a shame to me. It’s possible that he’s right on all accounts (for the record, I support Jay in the recent issue and have suspicions about Hawk’s personal behavior in the latter), but his manner of pushing back works to the detriment of all photographers.

I’m sure I’m not being terribly clear, so let’s go with a more generic scenario. It’s 100% legal to take a photograph of someone who is out in public.  Take an attractive woman to a public beach in a bikini, for example, and have her strut around. If some photographer comes up and starts shooting away, there’s nothing that can legally be done about this. It’s not illegal for the photographer to make posing requests, either: “arch that back”, “let’s go for something sexier.”

It might be totally unwelcome and disturbing, but it’s not illegal.

So here’s the thing: if the attractive young lady’s boyfriend/husband/guardian/father (collectively or individually: the defender) comes along and stops you, who’s wrong?  We know it’s not the photographer.  If the confrontation gets physical, the defender will be looking at jail time.  And yet, since the photographer was at the very least creepy, who is going to stand up for the photographer?

Only other (already biased) photographers, who the general public will generally ignore.

I believe that it’s this type of behavior that gives photographers a bad name. While perhaps being correct (legally), actions like this make it impossible to get support from the people around us – and that means we lose it when it’s critical for everyone.

Just a personal thought, I suppose.

Disclaimers:

• Photographers violating personal space is a bit of a personal issue, so I’m biased towards disliking people who act in such a manner, as did Mr. Hawk at SFMOMA.
• For the record, I like Mr. Hawk’s work. He is an excellent example of issues I have with photographers in general (some of them, at least).
• This entire article is an option. Duh.

Cream in my Coffee

Reflecting back, I’m noticing that I seem drawn to taking pictures of my coffee. I’m sure I could dig in deep and psycoanalyze the reasons, but in the end I think it’s one of my main joys in life. I’ll pass on the booze, the rich and sweet foods, the travel – so long as I can have a leisurely cup of coffee, I’m in heaven.

The caption image to the right is doubtlessly my signature coffee image. Stolen worldwide and still driving most traffic to my Flickr stream. Earlier last week you might have seen another cup of coffee. Saturday morning, it was this:

Latte, technically

It’s interesting that the only fully successful image (in my mind) is my first. I really like the last image, but it’s really a portrait of a cup, not coffee. I suppose this

really requires more thought…

The overall concept of this book is, for lack of time to give a better explanation, a photographic project of a small, low-income section of Buffalo, New York. I have no particular affinity for the people or the place, but I found it quite compelling.

First among this is the photographer: while no longer spry at 90, he’s still active. And he lets people be themselves – this comes out in the work. It’s a relaxed approach, and one that leaves plenty of mystery and conjecture in the portraits, which is doubtlessly why I like it.

However, the latter half of the book, “Quartets” stands out among my many other photobooks that I’m slowly collecting. Individuals, shown over four decades, with their interviews and a bit of a history to them. Some are sad, some are uplifting. All make me think.

Definitely thumbs up on this one on a personal level.

Disclaimer: I get paid if you buy this book, albeit a small percentage.

Diane Arbus, Self Portrait, from Revelations

I just picked up Diane Arbus’ photobook Revelations. Only thirty pages in, and I’m already seeing something I really like: a self-portrait of Diane, in vulnerable and intimate pose.

It seems that any book that is retrospective, or even a body of work, could benefit from this approach.  My initial reaction was one of wonder: there’s a melancholy, but calm strength to her look.  Unlike many self portraits, this one immediately invoked a connection with her.

It made her human.

So thinking about my own work, or my own projects: I’m starting to see a real value in self portraits, and I’m somewhat saddened that I don’t have any from my past.  There’s a value, I think, to seeing the wear and tear on the person behind the work: what happened as they went through their creative process.

It’s like documenting your life, in a way that I can immediately identify with.

So far, highly recommending this book:

Revelations

It’s not for everyone, though. If you aren’t into street photography, or images that let out the inner beast in us (and the beauty therein), then you might want to stay away.

If this is the same guy you see here, then I’m just not buying it. No way that dude is 80, especially if he was a cigar smoker.

A living legend, though.  I’d probably shell out the $5k for a chance to spend a week at one of his workshops, but I know I never will.  Joe McNally spends time at those workshops.  My work doesn’t even come close to the level he’d be expecting.

I just hope there’s enough time left in both of our lives for me to get there.

Dammit.

Really, after you capture a few frames, what else is there? Everything else, in fact.

In other words, show the moon in its environment: with stars in the background, or in its relation to other celetial bodies (coming soon, I’m still processing that one), or the landscape (also coming soon), or the neighbors.

Meanwhile, at the neighbors...

In this case: while waiting for a long-exposure shot to finish, I was playing around with my Canon G11.  Took this – it’s a slow shutter, and completely hand-held.  What I was trying to capture: a lightly cloudy evening, with surprising shadows, and… the neighbors ignoring the eclipse & watching TV, instead.

Yes, the blue light you see is coming from a TV.

Four posts in and he’s already making more relevant content than this blog is.

Add it to your feed reader!

I’m tempted to say “fine work,” but I’m not sure that it is fine. Passable, certainly – but not great.

I get this from a limited view: from “Ansel Adams in Color,” to be exact. There were things that I found that broke a bit of my mental image of the man: learning that he tried fairly often to create his vision in color but personally felt he failed. That he considered even his better (color) work to be lackluster. That he played with the English language in letters to friends.

And yet, he was not completely dismissive of color. I find it curious (and a bit obvious, in hindsight) that he considered all color tones to be a subtle lie. I find this to be self-evident: colors in photographs are representative, yes. But not spot-on, somewhat limited in their range, and sometimes misleading.

Having read this book now: I’m glad I did.  It’s heartening to see images from the greats that failed to match their mastery, and it’s equally heartening to see his mastery of exposure translated into color.