If you are on a PC and a Photoshop user, this handy cheat sheet for shortcuts will help a great deal. The full cheat sheet can be downloaded from Smashing Magazine, for free.

Bookmark This:

Go on, stretch yourself.  The 365 photo a day is a rite of passage that at some point we all attempt, and often people will fail at maintaining it. However, that’s not a failure of the project it will have taught you a lot (ok maybe not if you stop on day2) and opened your eyes to those elusive grab shots and the difficulty of producing a sustained output. I know it has for me.

FWAPhoto is  a photo a day project with a difference, it is not one submitter but many, and so has a constant rich vein of photographic talent to draw from. You can even submit your own work to the project. It’s definitely  a site worth browsing with a fresh hot cup of Java and some time to kill.

Not quite a 365, but  a few of us set up a 31 day photo challenge that we’ve talked about before. It’s coming to a close soon and has been fun to participate in and see what everyone has produced. Seeing how a group event differs from the very personal 365 exploration has been interesting and informatinve.  I know a few, including Matt, are hoping to make it a 365 experience.. let’s hope they can. For me, I’m thinking about it again.. maybe this time I will finish the task.

Bookmark This:

Earlier I wrote about how we interact with emotions in photographs,  and how the darker emotions invite more connections and narrative, well here’s a video that is part of Nikon’s Your Day in 140 seconds or less competition in which people submitted 140 second videos taken with their DSLRs.

I really like this video: Today

It has a nice warm feel, and the transitions of facial expression makes you think and is also capabable of giving you a dose of the warm and fuzzies, if you let it. I think it is the transition of emotions and the question of “what made them smile?” that really helps you connect with this, along with the very well selected soundtrack.  Watching with and withoutaudio, shows how important the right choice of audio is for pieces like this. The new DSLR cameras with their video capability are going to open up opportunities in portraiture,  the moving portrait can be very engaging. Hmmm anyone got a 5D2 they want to loan me?

Bookmark This:

Well I’ve posted about Monkeys in photographs, so how about an ape behind the  camera?

Nonja is  an orangutan at Vienna Zoo, that has been given a specially modified camera. It dispenses a raisin every time she presses the shutter and then uploads that picture automatically. Hmm I sometimes think some people need a camera that delivers an electric shock to make them think about what they’re taking and is it worth the pain? (me included sometimes).

Nonja has a Facebook page too, there’s some interesting shots there and worth a browse through, and a fair few that have a composition device that i really like namely:breaking the frame.

From PetaPixel.

Bookmark This:

Well, the video capabilities of the DSLR, have been long talked about, and our appetites whetted via the films produced by the likes of Vincent Laforet, such as his reverie film.  Whilst these are nice and cinematic pieces, there has been a lack of real world use surfacing. Most of the demos, tend to not use speech and are montage pieces with a soundtrack. Until now.

I found about Danfung Dennis’s Battle for Hearts and Minds documentary via the picture stories blog. A post over at DSLR shooter has a nice piece on his setup and some of the issues that he faced in the heat of Afghanistan, the lack of AF, once filming, must be a nightmare in the highly mobile and changeable situation he was in.

A trailer for the documentary is below:

An interview with Danfung Dennis, by PBS, can be seen here and more of his videos are available on Vimeo.

Bookmark This:

Carrying on from the Hiroshi Watanabe post, and the question about whether you see the real person when you pose, or a carefully crafted projection, here’s some of the Men Crying pictures by Sam Taylor-Wood. The fact that many of those she chose are actors, again makes you question what you are seeing, is it real or is it false? Which thoughts were they accessing to make them cry, you see the likes of the Daniel Craig portrait and can connect straight away with the look and the emotion involved.  The Robert Downey Jr photo stands out as a very different piece and one that looks self indulgent and pretentious.

Continuing the water theme, Manjari Sharma’s Shower series is a very interesting look at portraits that immediately have a strong sense of vulnerability and intimacy. The act of being in a shower puts the sitter in an unusual and vulnerable position, even when clothed as some of them are. The images also conjure up the feeling of river baptisms, the ritual of cleansing spiritually rather than physically. It’s an interesting series and one that makes me want to hear some of the subjects stories.

via PDN photo of the day

Bookmark This:

This post was almost labelled:  “So easy a monkey could do it”,  not as a comment on photography, but as something for you to use next time someone whose photograph you are taking says they are not a good subject…

I found Hiroshi Watanabe’s website from the promotion of an exhibition of his work that was on PDN Photo of the Day, and I must say I absolute love the work he is producing. His Suo Sarumawashi series is particularly interesting, the connection that the viewer has with the Macaque monkeys  is nothing short of astounding. The aesthetic that Hiroshi has is very quiet and studied but with a real underlying strength, and while his influence is undoubtedly there in the image, it melts away and leaves the subject there as the dominant force. He has mastered the art of sculpting the photograph and leaving you with just the subject to contemplate, which is a hard thing to accomplish! This has the added advantage that you see past the unusual nature of the subject, forgetting that you are looking at a monkey in a Nike shirt, but instead you are staring at one of the most intimate and telling portraits that you’ve seen in a while.

Another thing the portraits manage is to make you question the idea of performance and expression. The very human and expressive faces of the monkeys make you question what you see from human sitters. Are we seeing the real person or a trained persona, is it real or is an act?

This aesthetic extends into his other work, the Kabuki Players series also carries that through, and in his American Studies the very ordered and studied eye also shows through. To me I can see a very cultural eye in his work, one born from the country of his birth. It has a quiet, studied, contemplative air yet one that is looking for an order and respect in the scene, be it a vista or intimate portrait.

The Suo Sarumawashi series carries on this cultural air, and to me, I see images that are very reminiscent of Akira Kurosawa movies, some of these down to the clothes of the Macaques, but mostly to the emotion and expression of the monkeys themselves.

Check out Hiroshi Watanabe’s online portfolio, it is one that’s worth a long browse.

Bookmark This:

Well you’ll be pleased to know this is a much shorter post than the last one, but very related. On City Streets is a book that I have ordered and I am awaiting delivery on (not so patiently). As soon as I read about the book and the back story on the Online Photographer, it was a must buy option.

Gary Stochl, after shooting on his own for 40 years and “without really showing his work to anyone” walked into Columbia College’s Photo Department, with a paper shopping bag of prints. Bob Thall, the head of the department, browsed the prints that Stochl brought in and cancelled his afternoon schedule to devote more time and effort to the archive.

I love the story for the independent attitude of Stochl and his drive and determination to work at what he loved, to create that body of work, and then walk into an office to show it. From that meeting he has had exhibitions, and now a book too. One that I’m looking forward to getting!

Read more of the story here at The Online Photographer.

Bookmark This: