Rambles

Spending some time in a very different setting–not the usual woods, trees, lakes and mountains (Not that there is anything all that “usual” about them. They change constantly and offer exciting challenges and looks on a regular basis.) No, this is a dramatic change of scene. About as dramatic and diametrically opposed as I can imagine. We’ve gone from the quiet, secluded luxuries of the northern woods to the frenetic hustle and bustle of the Big Apple.

Apple in the Big Apple

Iconic building

Tall buildings and rooftops.

Well let me tell you, shooting in the city is a very different thing than shooting out in the woods (quite a revelation, I’m sure). The wildlife here tends to be a lot more “in your face” and it appears to be a good deal more plentiful. Downright hard to avoid, in fact. So I’ve been trying out something I have extremely little experience with, street shooting, and it really shows.

Spires

Getting ready for winter.

Cultural diversity.

I think one really needs to be a “city” person to pull this kind of shooting off. It just takes a different kind of sensibility. Gives me a renewed appreciation for folks like Atget, Wee Gee, Cartier-Bresson et al. But it is fun to play with a whole different set of realities in making images.

Nature abounds even in the city.

You just have to look.

It seems I’m getting bit more people oriented at the moment. In the past couple of weeks I’ve done a couple of model sessions and now I’m looking for “decisive moments” on the streets of New York. Is change in the air?

Posted.

No shortage of signs and messages.

We’re taking advantage of the New York visit by doing some museums. Saw a wonderful O’Keefe show at the Whitney yesterday, but they don’t allow photographs so no record of it except in my internal memory banks. We were in MOMA this evening though and relished the exhibit of Monet’s Water Lilies. And since MOMA does allow photos (without flash, of course) I did get a couple there.

Some pretty big paintings.

Some of Monet's luscious brush work.

Helicopter hanging near MOMA's 4th floor.

Weather is supposed to turn a bit less friendly tomorrow, but in the mountains bad weather can be a wonderful time to shoot. We’ll see how it affects our last day in the city.

Burdette

Can’t remember if I’ve mentioned it in earlier Rambles or not, and too lazy to look back through them to find out, but for the past month or more I’ve been working toward getting a show ready that will open at the Adirondack Artists’ Guild Gallery (of which I’m a member) in December. I started thinking about the show sometime last year when I was forced to come up with a title for it. But it’s only been in the past couple of months that I’ve actually been putting all that thinking into practice. The title I came up with was “Dimensions.” It seemed harmless and vague enough at the time. But now I have to do something with it.

(Note: the images interspersed though this post don’t necessarily have anything to do with the show that is the principle subject of this post. They are just some images I’ve captured in the course of doing other work. I will probably post show pics once the show is hung.)

There's a grouse in the tree, see it?

One of the more challenging aspects of mounting a gallery show is coming to terms with the issues of Presentation. You want the show to look good. Of course, you are going to pay attention to the images themselves. That, after all, is the ultimate purpose of doing a show at all. But how those images are presented can make a great deal of difference. Presentation could run the whole gamut from simply tacking prints on the wall and being done with it to putting them into a high tech multi-media presentation or framing them all in diamond-encrusted titanium frames. But the work itself needs to remain the focus. So it’s imperative to find ways to present the work that not only let it speak for itself, but ideally manage to strengthen and reinforce it without getting in the way.

Macro shot of fungi on a stump.

At the pond's edge.

I spent part of yesterday with a former patron who is fast becoming a friend and collaborator. The object of the visit was to parse out some solutions to the framing/presentation issue. As a result, I’m going a quite different direction with framing for the upcoming show than I’ve followed in the past. I don’t have any problem with it being “different”, for my money that’s generally a good thing; but until it all finally comes together and the show is hung there’s not really going to be any way of knowing for sure if the decisions being now will satisfy the goal of “strengthening and reinforcing” the work. Time will tell, of course, and it does tend to keep things interesting. It’s also fun to have someone else to bounce ideas around with.

Winter's around the corner.

Safe Harbor with textures.

I’ve been doing quite of bit of shooting over the past couple of months–much of it in preparation for the show–and have about finished that phase of the work. Now it’s time to distill all those images and all those months of thinking into a coherent body of work. Or maybe I shouldn’t worry too much about the “coherent” part and just mount a body of work.

Burdette

I’m back at Great Camp Sagamore for my final Digital Photography workshop of the season. There is some very different weather and conditions than were present for the first workshop here in June. A couple of notable differences are the absolute lack of insects now and a very significant absence of warmth. Woke this morning to a light dusting of snow on the roofs and a chill in the air that lingered throughout the day. An almost total lack of sun didn’t help matters much.

Snow on Sagamore's very interesting rooftops.

I’ve been thinking about the time of year we are in right now – harvest time. The time of our year when the bounty of the growing season is gathered and stored. As I’ve been prowling the paths and trails near home looking for images to capture over the past several mornings, I’ve been thinking about how like Harvest photography is. In a very real sense, when we go out to take, make or create pictures we are really going out and doing some harvesting of our own.

Sun, snow and mist on the water.

We gather images as we find them into the bushel basket of our camera, be it film or digital, then take them home and store them on our computer until we can cook and can them for consumption. The great thing is, the seeds of the images we collect on any given day are still there and can be harvested again at a different stage of development or by another harvester. All of which leads to the other wonderful part of photo harvesting, the fact that it is not really all that seasonal. Photo harvesting can continue year-round during all seasons and under all conditions. And it takes nothing away when it is finished.

One of those classic Fall shots you just can't resist.

There’s no question that fall in this part of the world is a very wonderful time to be out and about with a camera. The colors and activities associated with autumn are incredibly photogenic. The weather is generally mild and inviting. But it’s not the only time the world around us offers great opportunities for image harvesting. Every season has it’s photographic charm. May the image harvest continue.

Burdette

For some reason I have the idea that before I can log an entry, I need to have something to say. Well, I should just get over that. And even if I do or don’t have anything to say, it doesn’t have to be a lot. Not a lot of something or a lot of nothing – sort of like what’s going down right now. I also don’t HAVE to have new pictures to post with every entry. These are just things I have been burdening myself with which have effectively kept me from making entries. Well, enough of that. I shall Ramble on!

I’m spending a good deal of time right now getting myself and my stuff together for a photo show I have coming up at the Guild Gallery I am a member of at the beginning of December. On the one hand, it seems like it’s quite a way off, but on the other hand it seems like it’s waaaayyy too close. I’ve been thinking about it since spring, but haven’t actually gotten around to DOING much about it until about a week ago. A lot remains to be done. My goal is to mount a very different kind of show than what I’ve done in the past – which in many ways were played a bit on the safe side. I don’t want to play so safe this time. Don’t know yet just where it’s going to go but it’s feeling a bit scarey already. That’s good. Right? Not ready to post any images from it either. Maybe later.

Fall’s glorious right now and I’ve been doing quite a bit of shooting to take advantage of it. The question now is, what happens with the shots? Ahh, the quandaries we pose for ourselves.

Burdette