Experiment, try, fail, succeed. Don't sit still.

I went out to Willie Nelson's place west of Austin with Selena to take a few images to promote her band,  Rosie and the Ramblers.  We didn't use any lights for the images shown here.  I'd just bought the two Canon 1Dmk2's and I tossed them in the bag along with the three Zeiss ZE lenses:  The 35mm f2, the 50mm 1.4 and the 85mm 1.4.  I tried every permutation of available light shooting I could think of and then some.  The top image was shot, hand held with the 50mm lens, wide open.  Or close to it.

I'd always heard that this lens was "dreamy" and "unsharp" wide open and while I admit that focusing it on one of the cropped frame cameras can be.....challenging I think the center sharpness of this high speed optic is pretty damn good.  Another myth in the trash basket.

I heard the same thing about the 85mm 1.4 lens.  All of the well known photo test sites sing the same mantra on this lens:  "It's soft and dreamy wide open."  The shot above was taken, handheld, with that same 85mm 1.4 lens, used at its widest aperture.  I think it's pretty wonderful.  All fast lenses are designed to be sharp in the middle at wider apertures.  Because,  that's where we need them to be sharp.  If I listened to the pundits I would never have purchased the lens because I would have been told that it's only usable above f4. Pretty crazy if you ask me.

While I rail a lot about the futility and silliness of heavy post processing I recently bought a copy of Topaz Adjust and I've been playing around with all of the filter presets.  They are all too heavy handed but I find that I can fade the filter result in PhotoShop and then I like the effects much better.  Not sure it's any better than what I could normally do by myself in PhotoShop but it's a lot of fun to experiment with.

Part of my new experiments have to do with microphones for video production.  I bought a Sennheiser wireless microphone system and I've had very, very good results so far.  In the next week or so I'll write a review about the microphones and transmitters.

I know that dipping my toes into motion might scare off some readers but, c'est la vie. I think the whole market is moving to motion and the sooner we come to grips with stuff that moves around and makes noise the better.

Off to see Michael O'Brien sign some books.  Hope you're having a great week.

Best, Kirk

Michael O'Brien kicks it up another notch and shows why he's the real deal.

Get this book of images by Michael O'Brien and Poems by Tom Waits and understand that there's a whole step up in the art of photography beyond us geeks that write blogs and use 50 flashes to show off.

I guess it's easy to lose track of what you got into photography for.  We let clients side track us and we let trends corrupt the way we really should be shooting.  I'm as guilty as everyone else.  But it doesn't feel so bad until someone with a laser focus and a gift for digging in and shooting the hard stuff comes along and rubs our faces in it.  Then all of a sudden a book about LED's or a trip around the country flashing the rubes doesn't seem like such an incredible deal.  That's not to say that Michael is the type to rub anyone's nose in anything.  As far as I can tell the man is a saint.

Michael O'Brien spent four long years meeting the homeless people he photographed (with dignity)  for this book.  He didn't do it because he was sponsored by an equipment manufacturer.  He didn't do it for the money (there rarely is any in art books...).  And he didn't do it as a way to claw into "social media" and show off.  He did it because no one else was doing it and he felt that these were faces that comfortable people needed to see.  We needed to understand a different and pervasive reality outside our limited suburban comfort zones.

He did the book in concert with the singer and poet, Tom Waits.  It's out.  It's there now.  And since UT Press subsidized some of the production you'll be getting a book for $40 that would have cost closer to $70 if produced by one of the bigger, for profit publishers.

I talked to Michael today and he told me he was surprised to find that the final printed work was as good as the original prints he made.

The images were done with a 4x5 view camera and on Polaroid materials.  Check this book out and you'll understand why the world still needs photographers who care less about booking the next workshop or shooting trendy slop for a blog that's peppered with affiliate advertising.  We need them because they are the "bar."  And every time they raise it they make everyone think harder.  And hopefully, work better.

August Osage County. A look at the finished piece.

About a week and a half ago I posted a blog about photographing actors for an upcoming Zach Scott Theatre play.  Here's the link:  http://visualsciencelab.blogspot.com/2011/03/cant-get-enough-of-those-crazy-leds.html.   I showed you the "behind the scenes" raw images that I shot of each actor.  Some were accented from one side and some on the other.  They were all shot against white.

I thought it would be fun and instructive (and a good way to procrastinate) to show you how the designer, Rona, put all the photos together for the promotional postcard.  The combination is much more powerful that the photos individually.   Having a client that does good design work and uses photography well is especially good when they add in two other things:  A big bold credit line coupled with distribution to 20,000 carefully selected trend makers in the community.

You'll probably remember that I shot all the images with the antiquated Canon 1dmk2n cameras and a Zeiss 50mm lens.  You can see that, given the size this will ultimately be used, that we didn't need any more pixels than what we had and that the workflow was quicker and smoother with the smaller files.

Tonight I'm going over to the theater to photograph the dress rehearsal.  It's a long play.  Nearly 3 hours. There are two intermissions.  There's a lot to shoot.  I'm told that the set is pretty cool and I already know the cast is great.

Tonight I'm thinking of shooting a one lens/one camera system.  Make it as easy on myself as possible, commensurate with good results....

So I'm leaning toward the Canon 5Dmk2 with the 24-105mm f4 L lens.  I'm taking the 7D along as well and if the play is such that I need more reach I'll go with that body instead.  For documentation, where expression and timing is more important than ultimate technical quality, I trust both cameras up to 3200 ISO.  The reach will be the determiner.  Just to hedge my bets I'll stick the 70-200 f4L in the bag, as well.  You never know when you might really want to "reach out and touch someone" with your lens..."

It's all part of the process of life.

We were so busy back in the late 1990's but I never neglected to spend as much time as possible with my son, Ben.  I'd come home from a morning shoot on a bright Summer day and corral Ben and his mom, Belinda, into my old, green BMW and we'd head out for a lunch adventure.  To this day Ben doesn't get that other dads don't take time for a long, lingering lunches with family.  On this particular day is was in the 90's already by noon.  We were all in the mood for burgers so we headed to Hilbert's on north Lamar Blvd.

We ordered our burgers and fries and grabbed seats at the counter.  The bright sun diffused itself thru a yellowed sun barrier on the floor to ceiling windows that looked out over the picnic tables and the parking lot.  Ben was eating french fries and his mom and I were talking about vacation.  Where we'd go and what we'd do.  I looked down at Ben and he looked at me with such love and adoration it almost made me cry right there on my vinyl covered stool, in the run down burger joint.  I lifted up the camera that accompanied me everywhere, like an oxygen tank on the surface of Mars, and snapped one or two frames.  I've cherished the memory of that warm and ultimately happy day ever since.

Ben has grown up to be a wonderful 15 year old.  He still gives me a warm and happy look from time to time.  We still go out for burgers when he's not at school.  I look forward to summers in Austin.  We each have our own activities but we come together at lunch and dinner to catch up and just exist together.  I'm grateful for photography because it captures these wonderful moments for me and sticks them in my face to repudiate times of self pity or narcissism.

Kodachrome 64.  Scanned.  No lighting.  No tricks.  No layers.  Only unconditional love in both directions.  That's the reason for photography.

I love this portrait very, very much.

I had the perfect assistant for a while.  Her name was Renae.  She was telepathic.  She could sense what tool or prop I needed it long before I even thought about needing it.  And she would occasionally say, "You need to do a beautiful portrait now.  I'll have a friend drop by."  And one day she announced that I should photograph Amy.  And since I never thought to argue with Renae I dutifully prepared the studio for Amy's arrival.

I was still shooting film at the time.  Early years.  Maybe 2000 or 2001.  We had digital cameras but we used them for quick stuff.  Not for art.  We shot this on Astia.  With an R8 and a 90mm Summicron.  We shot all our fun stuff on Leica R cameras back then.

The lighting I used was my favorite.  A big soft light high up and to my left.

I took one look at Amy and fell in love with her face.  She was remarkable.  A natural beauty.  We shot a lot of portraits.  And we played with the light.  But that was secondary to our banter and back and forth.  It was a seduction plain and simple.  From both parties.  Eventually it all got silly and Renae broke up the moment and we all had a few glasses of wine.  Then everyone went home.  And that's the way the best portrait sessions go.  Men or women.  You meet the sitter.  You mutually conspire to fall in love in the safety of the studio, both knowing that it won't progress past the last roll of film.  You flirt, you engage, you tease.  And when you get good images you give your subject good feedback and they push closer to the invisible edge and then the moment passes and the energy ebbs aways and you become friends.  And you know you've taken a wonderful portrait.  But you know you could not have done it if your subject hadn't submitted in some way to your advances and responded in kind.

And that's when you know the magic of portraiture manifested itself to you.  If you can't fall in love with your sitters you are doomed to make documentations instead of art.  In commerce it's different.  That's why it's important to do work that pleases you and the private sitter and not worry about the masses.  Not everyone is lovable and not everyone can fall in love.......

As Renae pushed our sitter out the door she gave me a look.  She knew just where the edges of the process blurred and how to enforce her own mystical idea of inspiration.  I've never known a more prescient person and I've never had an assistant like that again.  She made herself part of the process.  And she was so valuable to my vision that I gladly let her.

Um. Shut up and shoot. Social hour's over.

Here's what the web has done for us (me).  Allowed photographers to share their images, thoughts and words all over the world.  We've spent the last five years talking about shooting until we're all blue in the face (and I thought that was just the result of a bad profile....).  And for every hour we spend talking about how to perfect the images we may take in the future we've loped off one more hour that we could be making those images.  Every hour spent in one direction is a lost opportunity in another direction.

Habit's a bad thing to fall into.  I have a couple of friends who are photographers of a sort.  I used to have coffee with them.  All the time.  There's always something you could talk about with a common interest like photography.  It was always fun in the first go around.  You got to share and they got to share and world seemed interesting.  But then we fell into habit.  We met even when there really wasn't anything to share.

With a couple of friends I felt a trend happening that's a running joke when it comes to doctors.  You know,  you run into a dermatologist at a cocktail party and show him that curious mole.  He says,  "Interesting.  Why don't you call on Monday for an appointment?" And then he wanders off to find drinking companions that aren't looking for free medical advice.  So, with me, having the curse of having written a few books about the craft and having practiced it as a business, the fun talk evaporates pretty quickly only to be routinely replaced by, "Which lens?"  "Which setting?"  and in the old days, "Which Film?"  And there is no right answer.   To them photography is different from work.  And what I do is different from what they do.

And I get frustrated.  Because all the talk is aimed at making the "how" more and more quantified without a care for the what and why.  Technique has become the big idea.  And when technique is the big idea there is no idea.    I'll be happy to hear someone talk about what they want to actually shoot but I don't want to hear about an amazing new HDR discovery or the way they mapped their printer profiles or how they lit something.  Believe me,  after all these years all I have to do is look at the photo and I'll be reasonably certain how someone lit something.  My photo friends might be interested in what PhotoShop can do but we don't need to talk about it.  For me it's a tool like a hammer or a wrench.  It's not a muse.  It's not an inspiration.  Look outward for that inspiration.

So many people use the idea of mastering all of the technical shit inherent in photography because it gives them an excuse not to mount up and ride off in search of the magic.  Because the fear is that they won't know the magic when they see it, and,  they're afraid that their magic won't resonate with their audience.  And I can't help anyone with that.  I shot for one audience:  ME.  And believe me, if I see a photograph of someone I've loved for over a quarter of a century, standing in the Louvre in a gray beret, all I see is the smiling eyes and all I take in is the happiness of the moment.  And my audience feels it all in a very real way because I am the audience and the photograph was taken for me.  To capture, in the amber of time, a vanishing moment that I wanted to preserve and look at again and again.  Not something I need other people to admire.

And every time talk turns to  HDR, gradients, techniques with multiple inverted layers and all the other quasi-techno goo that seems to make our actions and intentions more viscous,  I'm trading that time for the opportunity to please my solitary audience with one more image.  Tell me about your exciting idea to photograph models in Milan, or feral cows in Des Moines but don't bore me with details of the flight and how you plan to process the files.

The only way to gain magic is to give up control.  And giving up control is hard.  And fraught with uncertainty.  And not everything will work out just right.  But in the times that you let chance guide your  hand instead of the tight brace of technical "mastery"  you might occasionally stop thinking long enough to allow your spirit to create.

I shot the image above on ISO 64 film on a cloudy day in Paris way back in 1986.  I know what camera and lens I used but it doesn't matter because the scene will never happen the same way again.  Belinda and I were walking through a room at the Louvre that was filled, at the time, with sculpture.  I'd just photographed an Italian man disregard the multi-lingual signage and lean over the rope to lecherously run his hand over the smooth, marble hip of a tasty nymph statue.  I turned around to say something to Belinda and the light washed over her in a beautiful way.  I saw her eyes sparkle.  I doubt I noticed the out of focus shapes behind her but I've come to love them very much.  I clicked one or two frames of precious film, looked into her beautiful hazel eyes one more time and we moved on to look at a different genre of art.  


When I go back and look at frames like this I'm overwhelmed by the concentration of emotion I see in them.  Lost to me are meaningless issues of sharpness or lens curvature.  Lost to me are discussions about the seemingly random noise of the grain.  All I see is Belinda as I saw her in that moment.  That's why it's art to me.  


If you have to explain, fix in PhotoShop, render in layers, etc. you've captured something much different and while I might like the taste of that dish I don't need to hear the exacting particulars of the recipe recited.

What If You Thought You'd Done Your "Ten Thousand Hours" Only To Find That You'd Only Done One Hour Ten Thousand Times?

People ask me all the time,  "Why do you change gear so much?"  "Why are you constantly experimenting with new lights and new ways of lighting?"  "Where do you find such interesting models?" But what they are really saying is, "Why don't you find a comfortable rut and stay in it?"  The idea being that you get to have one big idea or style in your career and once you hit that point you should keep endlessly reiterating it in order to squeeze all the juice you can out of that particular turnip.

So much chatter on the web last year and the year before about Malcolm Gladwell's observation about the need to log ten thousand hours of practice before you master your (fill in the blank) art/craft.  And I think, at the core, it's a useful concept with eddies of truth and substance.  But it never ceases to amaze me how our western culture wants to distill everything down to quantifiable results, with a maniacally singular focus.  But that seems to grow from our linear and metrically obsessed modalities of gauging business success and, by extrapolation, everything else.  We tend to equate quantity with good and speed with success.

With the rise of corporations the general goal seems to be the reduction of any craft or art to a series of production steps that can be isolated and repeated, ad infinitum, always finding a way to cheapen or condense the product while remaining profitable.

This applies so handily to the craft and hobby of photography.  In books, at workshops and online the constant demand from would be artists is for the "formula."  It's always couched in these questions and requests:  "What's the correct ratio?"  "Give me a diagram showing me exactly where to put the lights?"  What's the best (lens/camera/tripod/lightstand/modifier) to use for XXX?" And my favorite:  "What is your technique for getting people to look interesting?"

Once many people have run the gamut of workshops and books and on line forae they narrow down the stuff they've learned about each niche in photography and then slavishly follow it.  And if they follow the same course of action over and over again for ten years or ten thousand hours they are generally no closer to their goal of making their own art.  They've done the hour or twenty hours of instruction and practiced the same small things over and over again.

The goal, perhaps, should be to abandone any sort of formula and rely on your own intuition and taste to augment your experimentation and your growth as a collaborative and empathetic human being.  That might be the secret people are really looking for.  And it has a formula:  experiment and refine your own vision.  Hold the camera your own way.  Make the most of your ten thousand hours.  Even if it means sitting quietly and listening to the person you'd like to photograph.

Beauty Dish. Fotodiox Amazes me Again!!!

Earlier this month I posted something about a huge (70 inch) Octagon Softbox (similar to an Octabank) that I ordered from a company that sells on Amazon.com, called Fotodiox.  The octabank/octagon softbox was a whopping $75 and, after I assembled it and shot with it a few times I considered it to be the bargain of the year.  Amazing.  A few of my friends read my little blurb and bought them as well.  We are now a fan club.  Here's a link to the eightsided softbox.  You can pay up to $1100 for a similar light modifier from a well regarded european company.  But even more amazing is that the price included a speedring.

That's background info.  A quick intro into my previous purchase from this online store.  Here's this week's "Oh my gosh!  It costs how much?"  from the same supplier.  I've shot with Profoto for years and in the mid 1990's we shot a lot of stuff with the Profoto beauty dish.  And it did a great job.  But when styles changed I sold it with a bunch of older Profoto stuff and my lighting went off in a different direction.  For almost ten years I did almost everything with giant diffusers and soft lights.  Except for my little forays into battery driven flash and LED mania (which is the future of lighting....).

Now we come to this week.  I've been shooting a ton of portraits outside with my Profoto 600b Acute system and frankly, with any wind at all, it's a pain in the butt to use umbrellas and softboxes outside.  The umbrellas especially have a nasty habit of going "airborne" and messing up the illusion of calm and reserve that I work hard to build.  My clients love the look of the outdoor portraits and I confess that I do too.  I usually try to put a scrim between my subject and any direct sun and then wail away with the 600 w/s seconds at my disposal.  I could do this with my Elinchrom Ranger RX system but it's twice as heavy.  The trade off is battery life.  The Ranger has reserve you won't believe but the Profoto is just the ticket for a one man show.  I bought three new batteries for the Profoto and now I can go thru a full day, shoot tons of stuff and still have back up power.  But none of that seems to help keep umbrellas in place and working.

I remembered reading some rationale for buy a very, very pricey plastic beauty dish being offered for shoe mount flashes and the one thing that rang true was the idea that a beauty dish with a diffusion sock on the front holds together better in the wind than a comparably sized umbrella.  Makes sense.  It's rigid and locked on with a speedring.  I put myself back in the market and started looking at the Profoto version.  My, the price has gone up.....

On a lark I checked in to see if Fotodiox offered one.  They offer two!  A 22 inch and a 28 inch.  Being a soft lighter I always go for the bigger unit.  Unlike the Profoto version the inside is metallic.  The Pfoto is matte white.  At 1/3rd the price I couldn't pass the Fotodiox 28 inch beauty dish up.  It came today and I couldn't be happier on many levels.  First, I saved money and that's critical to the continued happiness of my CFO.  Especially two weeks and change before tax day.  Second, the unit it very well built with a nice interior deflector and an interchangeable speedring set up.  With one inexpensive adapter I'll be able to use this light on both the Pfoto and the Elinchrom lights.  And finally, it comes with a well made diffusion "sock" that fits over the front.  The whole system is a whopping.......$109.

If you buy it with a less pricey speedring, say for an Elinchrom, Alien Bees or Bowens unit the price drops to an even sillier $89.

While I haven't done any exhaustive tests I have put it on a monolight, fired it up and looked carefully.  It's just the way I remembered a beauty dish to be.  Considering that my last Profoto speedring purchase cost more than this whole unit I am very, very satisfied.

Now I'm off to shoot in the wind......