I’m not shilling for them, mind you. This is just my opionion: there’s no better publication for B&W art-style photography. Even if the photographs inside aren’t to my taste, I’ll happily say: at least the layout is dependable and you’re not constantly crushed by ads (all advertisements are in the beginning & end of each issue, but not between pages like a typical magazine).

I’m only mentioning this because I’m having a hard time focusing on content in magazines these days. In fact, I’m dumping my Professional Photographer and American Photo subscriptions altogether, and just skimming all others.

Here’s the problem: I’ll start reading an article, then I get interrupted. I have to skip a page where some loud advertisement is telling me that their shiny tool will make my life better. What was I reading? Oh yeah, skip a page. Read a bit more. Get distracted by sidebars, the smaller ads, ads on the opposite page, etc. Find a “article ends on page whatever” & skip to the end. Search through two or three endings to articles, find mine. What was I reading again?

The disconnects in the middle of reading are killing me.

I suppose this is how they’re doing things – and I suppose this is what they’re used to getting away with. But in the internet age, I don’t have to wade through that mess to get content, so I’m opting out.

Behind a waterfall

Part of my growth in photography (such as it is) has been of late: I no longer take pictures of any old thing, but instead I look for a purpose. There can be many different reasons – “I was here” (as a snapshot), or “this was neat/beautiful.” But as I get older and experience more, I find myself letting many of the beautiful things slide. They’re no less beautiful, I’ve just seen them before. As such, they hold less interest for me.

The pool in Kauai had a waterfall. It was neat – but then again, it was a rather small waterfall. You could get inside, and that was interesting – but it was somewhat dirty, and not much to see. From the outside, it was just a wall of water. People were constantly moving in & out, and angles weren’t that interesting.

Because I was drawn to it, I knew I would make some photographs. My goals: to remind my daughter what it was like, and to imprint a memory on myself about why this pool was special relative to all others. So thus began the search for an intimate, unusual view. Something that would stand out in my mind.

Although the photograph associated with this post isn’t really that good on any artistic level, it meets my purpose for shooting in this case. It’s wet, as you are in the cave. The view is unusual – from behind the waterfall. You’re close to the water that is falling – intimately close, in fact. There are people nearby – a little girl taking photos of everything with her camera (that was cute!), her mother with her, people lounging in the sun in the distance, and the building where the magic man made magical drinks that relax mommy and daddy.

Although no award-winner, I consider it a success.

How do you display images?

Take some time to check out the Epic Edits blog.  Specifically the post on “10 Online Photography Portfolio No-No’s.”  The subject is of interest to me for a couple of reasons: primarily, I’m (among other things) a wearer of many hats.  One of those hats is Web Developer (a programmer, actually – but that spills into the realm of development and design), and just about everything on that list is something that I have done.

Deliberately?  Willingly?  No, not by a long shot – but that’s what the client wants, and that’s what the person writing the check gets.

Three of the items did make me think a bit, and I thought I’d expand on them here:

On image diversity

From my comment on that post:

It’s hard to disagree with many of these – many apply to *all* websites (please stop that music! And flash! And intro pages! Gah!). Photo size, quantity, and diversity, though: I’m sorta torn on those subjects. I suppose it depends on your intended audience – it’s easy to be *too* diverse, or have too many photos. I’ve seen far too many sites with repetitive, redundant images.

I suppose that’s more of an observation that it’s hard to setup a good portfolio in any environment, though. Take my thoughts with a grain of salt.

Thinking about quality & quantity, though: it brings to mind Michael Johnson’s proposal for the Tenset. I’m leaning very much in favor of his line of thought these days…

To elucidate with examples: if you’re a diverse photographer, don’t show your diversity on a single site.  Think like this: if you specialize in landscapes, don’t add in senior pics, wedding snaps, and boudoir shots to your site.  Yes, you’re diverse.  But the range from each of the subjects is too much of a stretch.

For example, someone looking for landscape photos? They’re looking for breathtaking scenery.  Don’t throw some teenagers at them, no matter how good they may look.  You’re telling your audience you don’t do landscape full time.  Wedding photos?  Don’t throw boudoir photos at them (and especially don’t throw teens & boudoir into the same site!): they’re likely to think you’re only interested in taking off their clothes.

Diversity is OK, but don’t cross genres with too much haste.  Better to have separate sites. Sure, drive people from one to the other with links – that’s a great service, and shows that you have the cognitive wherewithal to separate dissimilar subjects.

Plus, with the multiple sites: you’ll get better search results on each topic.

On image quantity

The classic complaint is that there aren’t enough images.  Put in more, more!  I disagree.  I’m no photo editor, but with the level of my current photo obsession I spend far too much time looking at other people’s images.  If I’m looking at a portfolio, I’m wanting to get a good feeling for the person quickly.  Please don’t make me dig through tens or hundreds of photos to get an idea of your work. Even if they’re all that incredible – it’s overkill, and the viewer will go numb.

I’ll go numb.

Notice the link earlier to the Tenset? Read it – it’s a great overview to not killing your visitor with quantity.  Not up front, at least.

On image size

Image size is something that heavily depends on your visitor.  If you’re looking at a photo-specific site, it’s a safe bet that you’re being visited by photo-obsessed enthusiasts.  Or at the very least, people who place a high value on the visual.  These are people who will appreciate large photos.  Give them what they want!

Visit Stuck in Customs (Trey Ratcliff) for a view of  someone who has done this well.

You’ll note that I do not give huge image views on this site.  It’s a matter of download time: usually I leave smaller images in the display for faster download.  Want the larger image?  Click the image, you’ll generally get the larger size.

Even as I type this, I realize that Trey is doing it the correct way.  So what if it takes a bit longer to download the image?  They’ll get the full impression up front, which is probably a better display.

I mean, the view was spectacular: clouds rolling in, overhead.  The sky blue, but going hazy – the sun was losing its strength.  But there, in the distance: yes, it’s light, hitting the mountain!  This is a great thing, if only I can show the contrast well.  And in that sense, I think it failed.

Early on, duChemin makes a point about color.  To paraphrase: if color doesn’t add anything to the meaning of the frame, don’t use it.  It will merely dilute the main idea.

Now, Mr. duChemin prefers monotones and duotones.  I’m not really sure what I prefer, although I do have a strong affinity for B&W – especially through NIK’s Silver efex plugin.  So I played around with a few versions, trying to get a feel for things.  What ended up being my favorite:

Hospital again, in B&W

If you view it large, you’ll get the intended effect: the light on the mountains, darkness all around.

This was, perhaps, a tad overdone in processing.  But it makes two points: first, color wasn’t really an integral part of the experience.  Black and white rendering makes that distant brightness really stand out.  Second, the processing in B&W allowed me to focus on really driving in the differences in luminosity, which again drove in the point of there being light in the distance.

Besides, I also got to make it look coolish with the grain and what all…

Too late, you’ve missed your chance.

You come back, on the way home.  You see the same sight.  Only now clouds have moved in, and the view is completely different:

Hospital View

Arguably, this is a better view than before: the burst of color along the mountains, the contrast between the lit foreground and the darker sky. But wouldn’t it be better still to have both views?

I’m sorry to say, I missed my chance. I was skiing.  It was cold.  I didn’t want to stop. I missed capturing the pooling, eddying mists along the mountains.

A subject that keeps coming up is “know your style”. This is similar, in my mind, to the phrase “find your voice” that I heard so often in writing classes.

And just like in writing classes, I think it’s utter hogwash.

Yeah, you’re probably not convinced – there isn’t a wide range of photographic styles really shown on this site. Mostly environmental landscapes with a few abstracts.  Well, that’s what I show here. I’m not interested (right now, at least) in showing my portaits, or my experiments, or my higher-end photos.  This blog is mostly about my experiments.

Look , my “style” depends completely on my mood.  Wintertime?  I’m in a dark mood.  Lots of dark photos, heavy on the shadows.  On vacation in a warm place in the cold, Alaskan winter?  You’ll see bright, almost overly-saturated photos.  I’m loving the respite from daily grayscale (and that’s really what Anchorage is like in the winter!), and I focus on that.  In-between?  Anything goes.  Alaskan summers I can get into strange grains, or lose myself in odd effects.  Having a bad day?  You’ll see textures creeping in to my images.  Strong emotions of any sort?  I start getting into abstracts.  Around family?  Suddenly I go all photojournalist on you.

“Know your style” indeed.  Photographic style is deeply personal, and depends deeply on the person.