Windblown

greenspun.com : LUSENET : People Photography : One Thread

Not much to say here, what you see is what you get...except for maybe what's in the shadows...

35mm lens, Tri-X, Rodinal, negative scan pretty much untouched other than level setting.

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), October 10, 2000

Answers

Hmmmm - his shadow is wearing a hat and looking the other way... Interesting profile and pose. I like the wind effect too, but ultimately not the kind of image that leaves me with a feeling of having had a revelation - on the other hand, how often does THAT happen?

-- Christel Green (look.no@film.dk), October 10, 2000.

A beautiful image, a subtle gesture, for lack of a better word. His casual motion is quite graceful, and your moving camera accentuates it nicely. Too bad it wasn't a 28mm, you'd have his feet too. Shooting from the hip here, Jeff? Again your intuition works. Can you think of anyway to get rid of the cars in the parking lot at back, left? My bird-brain keeps going to bright and shiney.

That hatted man-shadow and my internal image of sorcerers makes this a surreal image of magic about to happen... t

-- tom meyer (twm@mindspring.com), October 11, 2000.


while it is, of course, necessary for me to disagree with tom about *something*, i do think this is an exceptional photograph. i don't think it is "beautiful" (see, tom), but i do feel it produces a sense of foreboding, the feeling one gets when it's about to storm in the early evening, and you want to be home, safe inside. the shadows do quite literally make this image, and i must admit (sigh) that the slightly blurred edges enhance the feeling of insecurity engendered herein. good work, jeff.

-- wayne harrison (wayno@netmcr.com), October 11, 2000.

hey, that guy looks like an old frazzled version of me.

-- ed (ekang@cse.nd.edu), October 12, 2000.

You people have quite a mutual admiration society here. The photo isn't squat! Random shooting on any day could net you a hundred of these! This looks like something you get by accident when advancing to frame one with a manual load camera. "Not much to say here" is right, Jeff. Not much to see here either. Sorry for intruding with the truth but guess what, THE EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES !!!

-- steve v (steve1chsn@aol.com), October 14, 2000.


Random shooting on any day could net you a hundred of these!

This statement has been made for over a hundred years about any art which doesn't adhere to some form of codification of craft. I have no respect for these types of statements.

This looks like something you get by accident when advancing to frame one with a manual load camera.

I've been trying this with my pinhole camera, although at the end of the roll. I leave the shutter open and pull the film through with the camera aimed at something interesting. So far, I've had some problems owing to banding that results from not getting an even enough pull, but I will master this and get some good results.

"Not much to say here" is right, Jeff.

Some photos can stand on their own.

THE EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES !!!

Emperors have to have empires and this is something of a democracy, so this statement is a bit silly, isn't it?

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), October 14, 2000.


steve: i respond to your remarks not because you disagree with some of the other opinions of this particular work, but because i must take issue with the methodology of your criticism. much of your displeasure centers on personal attacks on the participants in this forum, not on a fair assessment of the image itself. the fact that several people respond favorably to a particular photograph does not make them synchophants. you have determined that the image has no value. that is your opinion, and you have a perfect right to it; and your explanation for that opinion is certainly understandable. but don't come at me, or anyone else here, with the attitude that we are somehow less competent to judge an image than you are. that is a proposition that has yet to be proven. in short, rail away at your pleasure at the quality of photography posted here; but keep your damn mouth shut concerning pronouncements of a personal nature.

-- wayne harrison (wayno@netmcr.com), October 14, 2000.

steve

Yeah! What Wayne says goes for me too! And that's Mr. Lumberjack to you steve.

-- Mr Lumberjack (james_mickeslon@hotmail.com), October 14, 2000.

Actually, random - or even planned - shooting could never, ever capture this particular image again - and that's the point. Some photographers create images from detailed plans, some find them hidden within the clutter of a scene and carefully capture them, some discover them after the fact in a pile of proofs. But as was brought up in the thread about editing images, in each case the actual artistic act is that of selection.

-- John Kantor (jkantor@mindspring.com), October 15, 2000.

"that guy looks like an old frazzled version of me"... you must be a real babe, Ed. This guy looks to be about middle thirtyish to me, how about it, Jeff?

Although I doubt steve v is still lurking around, I must concur with one point he makes: this really is a "mutual admiration society" and one I'm glad to be a part of... but not when it comes to the pictures we make. You must not read very well, steve, and your criticisms are full of platitudes, "emperor' clothes... first frame mistake... a hundred on anyday... mutual admiration society..." blah blah woof woof.

Lets see some work, steve. Mybe some "female skin" with SFX? That oughta be entertaining... and original, too! (Hey, didn't you and I talk about some soft porn girl-in-a-chair image on LUSENET last year? Are you that same pinhead that kept wanting to see my pictures? I hope you're the same guy... I really do)... t

-- tom meyer (twm@mindspring.com), October 15, 2000.



Yeah. Kudos to Shawn for building a site with a community. Small boys might suffice for pointing out simple facts (ee's gaht nah clowvs awn!), but we're big boys (and girls) here. If you want to attack, ATTACK, dammit.

I've always wondered what was meant by 'gesture' in a photograph, but this image has persuaded me that the term has some use. I'd burn, dodge, or photoshop the cars away though - like small boys, they distract without materially adding to the argument.

-- Struan Gray (struan.gray@sljus.lu.se), October 16, 2000.


Hey Struan, you seem to be working in modes alot these days, involuntary illiteration and now some sort of kid thing... very entertaining, can't wait to see what else pops out...

I ususally use the term "gesture" to indicate a subconcious and genuine motion denoting attitude or style. It has a little reference, also, to the brush stroke gesture that defines a painters signature of technique, most obvious in Van Gogh and the Impressionists but also in much ethno-centric art. Jeff evokes both of those contexts for me with this image. The gesture of the subject, hands in pockets and a "starting" of intent toward some other, and Jeff's own gesture with the camera/brush which is indicative of and resident in his style, not just this one image... t

-- tom meyer (twm@mindspring.com), October 16, 2000.


Alliteration tends to proliferate in my writing when I'm playing (or being) the demagogue. It sounds good and distracts: nattering nabobs of negatisim and all that. I overdo it when I edit too much, or when I'm tired. I've been writing a lot of meat and potatoes stuff of late, so it's fun to indulge myself here. I'm glad at least one other person enjoys it.

Kids figure highly in Real Life just now. Expect a flood of pics of cute babies sometime after Xmas. The plural is deliberate - gulp.

Gesture is easy to understand in the performing arts: it's that last little flick of the wrist which seperates the Corps de Ballet from the Prima Ballerina. In photography it's harder to pin down, but it does seem to demand a degree of ilan on the part of both the subject and the phototgrapher.

-- Struan Gray (struan.gray@sljus.lu.se), October 17, 2000.


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