On Printing
Last year a local gallery sold one of my large (44"x30") prints. They're keen to sell more, it's what most galleries like doing and so I recently took in some sample images on my tablet to show them a range of images I thought would work in their space. I had a set of 10 images to show which worked either individually or as part of a series of twos or threes. We eventually settled on three; two new images and a reprint of the one that sold. Jolly good ... now I need to print them.
For me as a photographer, and as an artist I guess, there is a stage of the process which quietly freaks me out ... I'm talking about printing and You, clever reader forearmed with the reading of the post's title, will no doubt have guessed this already!
A couple of years ago I had my first exhibition. I wanted my pictures to sing, to look as good as they possibly could and so I set about looking for a printer ... not a machine ... a person ... an artist. Someone who understands what to me is a dark art ... someone who can take what I have created and take it to another level ... namely a wall. I didn't want a commercial sausage machine with automated calibrations. I was looking for someone who would create something special. I needed to trust them with my work.
When I first visited Stephen, who lives an hour's drive away in rural New South Wales and saw the tidy cottage which houses his printers and workstation I was quietly impressed. When he showed me the range of papers he collects and started to show me sample prints speak of black levels and colour absorbency and paper saturation levels and the depth of gloss and coatings I thought "He knows his stuff ... he certainly knows a lot more than I do..." I quietly nodded. It was when he spoke to me of his theory: that a viewer has two simultaneous reactions to a picture - the first is a response to content or subject, form and balance ... the second is a subconscious reaction to the colour and texture of the print itself and it was this subliminal aspect of the print and it's combination with the structure and form of the image the he strives for in his printing ... he got a faraway look in his eyes when as he explained it and I thought "you're the one" and so I entered a relationship with a printer. You have to trust them ... they can make or break your picture. (I'm paraphrasing ... he said far more eloquently than that) ...
There's a strict calibration setup for my monitors to ensure that the colour and tones you want are what Stephen will see when the images lands on his display. He understands implicitly how his inkjet printers interpret colour and tone and crafts an individual colour profile for each image to achieve that ... it's what he does and he does it exceptionally well.
When the printing's complete and the prints delivered I get tense and sometimes I don't want to unroll them or open the folio case ... the images have entered the tangible world ... they're now real things. Real things that people will look at and buy and hang on their walls ... I feel a buzz from that mixed with a weird sense of responsibility ... one which I hope I never lose.
Eventually of course I do open them and look and pore ... and breathe. Prints of this size are a reasonable investment ... they represent my investment in my talent as an artist. An acceptance and belief in what I'm doing ... trying to do ... should be doing. They look fantastic of course ... what was I worried about?
I took them to the gallery the other day and we discussed frames and mounts and wall space ... I signed them. There, now they truly are mine. Michael, the gallery owner, loved them and the first of the prints goes up on the wall this week. It's exciting.
Are you printing your pictures large?
Cell Block 69 - The Spiegel Garden
A couple of weeks ago I attended and photographed an extraordinarily fun gig in an extraordinary place. Cell Block 69 were performing at The Spiegel Garden - a purpose built circus style marquee that has been enjoying a month long residency at the Senate Rose Gardens for the centenary of Canberra celebrations. The group? Comprised of 8 members all calling themselves "Corey" they customarily play 2 gigs a year, one in Sydney and the other here in Canberra. They've been together for nigh on ten years and are somewhat of a Canberra Christmas institution (if there is such a thing). They play covers ... trashy Eighties covers. Whip It!, Queen, Computer Games, Centrefold, Girls on Film, Jump etc etc. They have gone to tremendous effort to replicate the sounds using period effects and analog synthesisers. Lead singer Pip Branson changes costumes and character for each song ... he is a very talented boy. The gig got very crowded and was a little nuts at times. It got a little crowded when I squeezed through to get to a position at the foot of the stage. Impossible for me not to sing along ... I remember those songs when they were released!
(apparently you can click on a picture to see it writ large!)
The gig finished at 2am. live on the other side of the lake in the middle of Canberra and I was on my bicycle so I got to ride home under the stars ... getting home around a quarter to three ... I smelled like a squash court so I showered after initiating the loading of the images off the memory cards.
Tell me, does the gallery option I've used in this post work? would you prefer larger, in-line images?
A larger, more comprehensive set of images from the gig can be found at Lushpup Images ... here.
What's the last gig you wnet to? Was it music or poetry? What kind of music? did you dance and get all sweaty or was it a sit down more formal affair? Do tell :-)
Collective Thoughts
I have been getting back into taking pictures again. This follows on from my moving and renovation experiences late last year when I took almost no pictures of anyone or anything except the progress (and at times ... total lack of progress) on the renovations to my flat. It was a period of perhaps six or seven months where I took next to no pictures purely for the pleasure of taking pictures ... it was like my photo-mojo had vamoosed. I like to think of it now as a kind of enforced sabbatical ... a time when I reflected upon other things and new directions ... though I recall at the time finding it confusing and debilitating.
I mean, after a while you start to think about whether you'll be able to take pictures again. You look back on the remarkable things you've captured and published before but they feel like they were taken by a different person and there's so much going on in your mind, things are moving so quickly, that even beginning to write a post feels like it's passed before you even start.
I knew the mojo would return ... I could feel it circling me. I began to see pictures again ... the ones the you compose when you aren't carrying a camera. You see the picture ... the light, the crop, the depth and the colour even though you didn't actually take it. Truth be told that's how most of my pictures are captured ... I have a large mental store of those ones ... the ones I saw but didn't take.
Enter The Ellis Collective; a six piece folk-rock (also referred to as 'Bloke-folk' ;-) ) group from Canberra. I'd shot them before and we were both very happy with the results. I met with Matty Ellis (the large chap with the shaved head) in early March and we tossed around some ideas. There were to be two separate shoots ... the first of the band having a picnic and the second ... well ...
Matty had this idea of a shot with band at night standing in front of a car's headlights and I began to think of how I'd do it. This was one of those times when you know technically how you would take a shot but have never actually taken a shot like it. I knew from my Strobist readings many years ago (that's a great site if you're into using any kind of flash in your photography btw) how to expose for the background lighting and illuminate the foregound with speedlights or flash. I knew I could do it and I wanted to do it and the band were into it but I'd never attempted it before ... and certainly not with paying clients! There was a real risk that we would come away with nothing ... that I'd assembled the group in the dark for nothing ;-)
The shot called for a stretch of deserted road ... I used trusty Google Maps and found a spot amongst the fields of Pialligo out near the airport, arrived at sunset and began to set up. We moved a car into position and I got the band to stand in front but it became clear that I needed more light ... so we moved another two cars to just out of frame ... now we had plenty of light :-)
Now for the speedlights, I used two (Nikon SB-910 & SB-800) atop two mid light stands on either side of the band. The SB-910 on the right of the frame sported a Honly speed grid to provide harsh, directional light across the band. I controlled the power of the speedlights using the the D600 camerabuilt in flash as a commander. The camera uses the Nikon Creative Lighting System (CLS) to alloow the body to remotely control the power setting of speedlights. The camera was atop a tripod and the pictures shot through my 70-200 f/2.8.
The road was dusty and I got the band to kick up some dust to produce a smokey effect. One hassle with that was there a light breeze blowing across the frame from right to left ... I left the camera (with my remote in my pocket) and went down to band to get some dust in the air. However, the remote sensor on the Nikon is on the left side of the body and wouldn't trigger from my upwind side ... for these pictures I threw the dust, ran across the frame, fired the remote and got the picture ... fun! I do like a picture you have to do some work for :-)
I even did a lighting diagram just for you :-)
And some from the picnic shoot too :-)
Lucie Thorne - The Front - 24th February 2013
I had the pleasure, in between passing cells of heavy rain, to see Lucie Thorne perform at my local pub/gallery/cafe The Front yesterday afternoon. Lucie sings finely crafted stories of longing with aching melody and feeling. The Front provides an intimate setting to see performers and Lucie did not disappoint.
Apparently she's become quite famous!
You can visit her here.
Lucie Thorne - The Front - 24th February 2013
Last of the Summer Rains
It rained last night, a soft gentle rain that collected in heavy droplets and made everything glisten this morning before the clouds moved in again.
I do love water drops ...
Poised
as I ride the wave
the rush and churn of new over old
I am still.
centered and reflecting a blue sky
I love gerberas.
Sydney Archistracts
A term I found in the Plus "Archistract" or an Architectural Abstract describes seeing a building in an abstract way ... it's something I like to try when I'm visiting a new city (or a city that's not my city). The trick for this technique, the real trick, is to look up. These are from my walking around Sydney last weekend. Archistracts seem to work best in monochrome ... which suits me at the moment because I'm on a real monochrome kick at the moment :-)
Happy Birthday ... to Me!
So it's my birthday today ... the hour and nine minutes that's left of it anyways :-)
It's been a fun day despite having to go to work for a large part of it ... I got to have cake and champagne with the family and red wine afterward and catch up on my blog and all the lovely people who've stopped by on various forums to say hello and wish me well. It's been nice ... a laid-back kind of birthday and to celebrate I've included a bokeh firework shot on Saturday night looking toward Darling Harbour in Sydney. Gosh, that was a fun weekend ... nothing to do but decide what to do next, take photographs ... or not ... I walked a long way.
So, Happy Birthday to Me! :-)
What's your ideal way to spend a birthday? Soaking bath? Skydive? Zilch? Everyone? Noone? Chocolate!
Do tell :-)
Night Moves
Three images from a moving car. These were all taken on a single journey back from a party out in the countryside last year. I wasn't driving so I was able to drag the shutter and capture the light traces transcribed by the reflectors on the road as our headlights illuminated them. I took 8 frames I think of which these three were the best ... and I thought that a reasonable shooting average! And now the song 'Night Moves' is stuck in my head ... why do I do that?
Ribbons
Jazz
Spirit Chase
They work as abstract patterns evoking a sense of the other ... our minds shape them into objects we relate to ... I'm interested in what you see in them ... do tell! :-)
Elsewhere
Time spent elsewhere. If I start to type will the words flow?
I honestly don't know...
It's been three months and now it's the last day of 2012. It's been an intense period for me and I'm looking forward to what 2013 will bring. As some of you will know, my partner and I decided to split amicably in August. We'd been together for over thirteen years and while I'm not going to go into the details here suffice to say that we both want different things in life and neither of us can see it happening if we stay together. Things are friendly and all but it's still tricky at times. So I've been busy renovating my flat and moved in two weeks ago. The renovations took much longer than planned, thanks largely to an oft-times absent builder, but it's worked out well with end of the school year and Christmas holidays. The flat's turned out very nicely and I'll do a whole post on that soonly. It doesn't feel quite so much like a hotel suite anymore ;-)
Astute readers of this blog will have noticed I've been very quiet creatively and while I've been taking some pictures I've not had a workstation to process them on until I moved in. That said, I have done a couple of commissions for Living Magazine;
pimped a friends Cadillac
got flown to Adelaide for a weekend of following two gorgeous musicians around the Adelaide Hills (the images are beautiful but awaiting my workflow mojo to return ;-) )
On the way there, I stuffed around in the airport;
I did go outside ... to Sydney even;
Wirestorm, one of the large pictures from last year's exhibition sold for $2,000 at a local gallery ... I was quite pleased about that :-)
Two of my photographs were selected for book covers;
Canberra by Paul Daly
and a dragon-fantasy book in Canada ... the title of which I am unable to currently recall
![...dragon tail... [REDUX]](http://geoffreydunn.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/20080609_NIKON_D80__DSC8667-Edit.jpg)
The Australian National Botanic Gardens featured my work when I photographed their AfterDark night garden experiences
I finally entered the smartphone fraternity and spend many, many hours playing with it. It takes decent pictures too. I've spent a good deal of the past three months drooling over the new Nikon bodies but came to the realisation that if I'd bought one then it would pretty much sit in its box... the time is approaching though!
On the way I lost track of some friends and I honestly don't know what happened with some of them ... things went quiet and just nothing ... I didn't have the energy to follow through and all and chase things that seemingly held no return ... my mind really was elsewhere.
Looking back I've been busy and I would oft look at my neglected blog and read through my feeds but have not commented when I felt I had nothing to share back ... it's been kinda like that ... a lot of feeling I had nothing to share back ... not publicly anyways.
If you've read all the way down here ... thank you ... and I wish you the very best of the season and a spectacular 2013. I'm going to be there and I'd love to see you there too.
Geoff
About time I said hello again
A quick post to say hello again. Life has been very busy for me here at Chez Geoff with little time to devote to my blog or to photography in general. One of the exciting things I've been doing is pulling together an exhibition proposal for The Sum of the Parts sometime in 2013.
While I've been touching base in the briefest of spaces I have watched my list of unread post from the people I follow regularly grow and grow. I will come and visit but right now I have some things I need to get organised so I will be sporadically in and out. I did take the time to take a series of selfies on the weekend. It's been a while since I took any selfies and so I thought it a good theme for this post say hello :-)
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Round Like A Circle In A Spiral
Round Like a circle in a spiral...
This morning I awoke thinking about lenses and the thought: Why aren't photographs circular? I mean the lenses produce circular representations of the light. It must be for practical reasons; glass plates, negatives, storage ... convenience ... who has or had the time to cut out circles? And storing circles ... knowing which way was up. I got to thinking about how these early practical considerations have shaped the way we look at the world. How we frame and crop it to suit. Our cameras have shaped and at times constrained our view for so long that I feel sometimes we forget that the world is not cropped into 4x6 or square or 5x7 ratios ... that the light coming into our lenses is circular and that we chop it up. Our eyes don't see in terms of square cut windows. I think it strange that with the advent of new technologies that potentially free us from the practical constraints of the past (such as digital imaging, capture and projection) we still cling to them ... we call them imaging standards. I imagine that a camera that the captured the light in a circular fashion would be labelled 'novelty' or of 'limited practical use' simply because it did something new (there's an irony in there somewhere).
like a wheel within a wheel ...
From a biological perspective, our eyes see circles. We are fortunate to have them hooked up to a superlative imaging system in our brains that creates the impression that we see much more than the circles of light refracted upside-down onto the back of our eyes. Our brains take this input and effectively stitch our visual reality together for us. Our visual experience appears so seamless because the transition between scenes is edited out. You can test this for yourself very easily by a simple experiment. Standing in front of a mirror, look at your left eye. Now look at your right eye. Did you feel your eyes move? Quite likely. Did you see them move? No, you didn't. That movement is a transitional scene that your mind edits out ... I don't know why it does but it does. Magicians and sleight of hand experts exploit this phenomenon.
Now I don't spend hours in front of a mirror trying to see my eyes moving back and forth and I only present it here to illustrate how what we see is not always what we see.
The photograph: you're looking down the barrel of a 105mm field gun at a defence recruiting display at the Canberra Show. I loved the way the rifling spiraled away into the bokeh. The colour is a result of the crowd walking past the other end of the gun. Reference - sprial - blur - colour ... what more could you want? Sometimes the world blurs into shape and colour ... abstract forms and amorphous shapes (thankfully not when I'm driving ;-) ). It retains for a time the rigidity of frame, of reference but becomes something else entirely ... something without frame or reference.
Did you try the experiment? Go find a mirror and try it now. Did you see your eyes move?
Curiously Curiosity
You may have gathered I like things astronomical and sciencey. On Monday afternoon I took the kids out to the Tidbinbilla tracking station outside Canberra. The station is also known as the Canberra Deep Space Communications Complex (CDSCC) and forms an integral parts of NASA's space communications network alongside similar stations in Madrid and California. The Tidbinbilla station was the one that was going to be facing Mars when Curiosity landed after its nine month journey between the planets. I wanted to be there at 1530 when the signal was received (or not received!).
We arrived out there at about half-two and parked by the side of the road some 500m from the front entrance. We joined a long line of cars and more were arriving behind us. By the time we got into the visitors centre the place was packed and standing room only (and rather stuffy) with a large screen piping in the feed from JPL. It was fantastic to see so many people - and all sorts too - out there to witness something the internet would have shown them better. Mobile devices had to be switched off so they didn't interfere with the radio gear on-site. We left the main building and went outside to the playground and some fresh air(!). I caught up with a photog mate who was out there doing some time-lapse work.
I loved explaining to the kids that at that moment, at 1500 the dish was sending a signal across 220 million kilometers, to another planet, to the Curiosity to 'Go!' to begin it's descent... and that after 30 minutes we'd know whether it had worked or not. That dish there ... that one right there ... will pick up the signal. I was excited ;-)
At about 1525 we sneaked in around the side into the visitors centre to listen to the JPL stream. We could hear them calling the descent rate of 0.75 meters per second when they announced 'Touchdown! Curiosity has landed'. The place erupted in near-teary and relieved applause ... the atmosphere was terrific ... we all clapped and cheered. We applauded not only the engineering feat (the calculations!) or that it all worked (I want a sky crane!) but through relief that hopes and dreams had not been dashed. That this will be the last rover for some time and had it failed there would unlikely be another for many, many years. What a cool thing ... they took a moving science lab the size and weight of a car and flung it through space and landed it on another planet to within 7km of its landing spot ... who on Earth works that kind of stuff out?
The photo is one I took on another visit (we're somewhat regulars) during winter last year. It was an icy windy day beneath low clouds when the sunset broke through and bathed the dish in beautiful golden light.
I'm guest blogger today over at Vision and Verb
In what amounts to my first ever ... I am today's guest blogger over at Vision and Verb. I was nominated by my friend Ginnie who is a regular poster here at Pictures with Words. The article is my post Falling Out of the Habit of Writing (over at Vision and Verb here)
Vision and Verb describe themselves as a '...global gathering of women of this age' and you can read more about their philosophy. Astute readers of this blog will have worked out by now that I am not a woman. Apparently the gathering enjoys male blood on occasion though I have to admit this wasn't made explicitly clear in our initial correspondence! ;-)
Regardless of the whole blood thing, I'm chuffed that they thought my post was something that related well to the group's directions and philosophy and I'd like to say a big thank you to them. :-)
a full moon always rises at sunset
moon rises full across a sparkling sea the sun cedes the sky
You want to know something that absolutely fascinates me? Of course you do! You'll need to think about this a bit so let's go ... 'a full moon always rises at sunset' ... think about that for a moment. Have you ever seen the full moon rise at any time other than sunset? You know, like in the middle of the night or in the morning? The answer will be no because it doesn't happen. OK, so far, so good. Now hold that thought and add to the fact that the lunar cycle is fixed ... well OK, let's say regular at 29 and a half days (29.53059 days to be precise). So every 29 and a half days there's another full moon. OK? Now the next bit gets confusing but stay with me and let's quickly recap;
- full moon always at sunset
- full moon occurs every 29.5 days
Alrighty, there's another cycle working here too, the seasons. Every day the days get longer or shorter depending on the season you're in and by 'day' I'm referring to the amount of daylight. So, here in SE Australia the days are growing longer as we march toward Spring. There's a full moon this Thursday (2nd August) and it will rise at sunset even though the day has lengthened. What balance!
There's lots more moonphase related stuff over at Moonconnection.com which is where I lifted the diagram below;
]
Courtesy Moonphases.com
Think about it next time you see a full moon rising ... just remember 'a full moon always rises at sunset'.
I'm the type of person who follows the moon and the seasons ... I know where the moon will be (roughly!) at any given time of the day or night depending on where the lunar cycle's up to.
Do you follow the moon? Do you use the sun to tell you which direction you're facing? Do you live above the arctic circle? You can tell me what happens there! Do tell. I'm interested.