Tag: photographer

Two Minutes of Light

Luck favors those who are parepared – and patient.

You read this story again and again.  The setting may be different but the plot is always the same.

It’s a dreary, overcast day.  You had planned this photo session for months, scouting it on Google Earth for the best location, checked the sun position on TPE (The Photographer’s Ephemeris), and received inspiration from the photographs of other photographers.  You made travel plans and booked lodging.

You arrived early at the iconic location, having traveled across the country and driven many miles in a rental car to get there.  But as you approach the sky turns dark with low hanging, gray clouds.  The light is a disappointment but you walk out to a viewpoint and set up anyway.  You keep telling yourself that good fortune happens to those who are prepared.

The minutes tick by and the sun, unseen behind a thick cloak of clouds, continues its inexorable decent to the horizon.  Other photographers join you and you ask each other, “Will it happen?”  Most shrug their shoulders and reply, “It doesn’t look like it will.”  It turns chilly and a cold breeze starts blowing.  Many photographers mutter, “It’s not going to happen,” pack up their gear and head back to their cars and a warm meal waiting them in the comfort of a nearby restaurant.

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A Conversation about Fine Art

Listen in on a conversation about the nature of fine art photography.

What’s on your mind?

I’ve been thinking about ‘fine art.’

You’ve got to be kidding. I mean there are PhDs that study this sort of thing, masters of the arts that won’t touch the topic. What makes you think you can think about ‘fine art?’

I don’t know. I just wonder about it. I’m trying to be an artist and I wonder what it all means, if I’m truly an artist or if I’m getting any closer.

Ok, you’re a photographer, aren’t you? So you must be thinking about fine art photography. You must be nuts! Nobody agrees on what fine art photography is.

Yea, fine art photography, that’s it. What do you think? Do you have any ideas of what it really is? I mean I’ve heard people say that if you want your photography to be art all you have to do is to call it art and it is so. ‘My photographs are fine art.’ Lord knows you hear that enough. But that seems a bit too simplistic, a bit too easy. It seems like it should be more than that.  I mean, can you snap a picture, run down to Costco to get a large print and call it art?

 

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Ansel Adams – The Making of 40 Photographs: Lodgepole Pines

Another post in a continuing series based on Ansel Adams’ wonderful book, “Examples – The Making of 40 Photographs.” This post covers a photograph from his Pictorialist period – Lodgepole Pines.

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Lodgepole Pines (1921)

This Ansel Adams photograph has always stood out from the rest of his works.  It doesn’t have the usual crispness or drama that one normally expects.  Instead the focus is soft and the shadows are not full and rich.  It almost seems like it might have been created by another person.  And for that reason I find it all the more interesting.

It’s difficult to imagine the great Ansel Adams as an amateur, a novice photographer.  One normally associates him with a supremely confident master of his art, a pioneer of techniques, both technical and aesthetic, that we still use and revere today.  And this is certainly an accurate characterization.  But like all of us, he had to start somewhere.  We all go through a period where our art is in its formative stages, where we are discovering ourselves, our vision and our voice.  And this photograph was part of the process for Adams.

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Lightroom Tutorial – Polarizer Filter

How do simulate the effect of a polarizer filter in Lightroom.

A Polarizer filter is generally the first filter a landscape photographer buys.  It is so versatile.  It can darken blue skies, reduce harsh reflections and intensify colors.  Many photographers put polarizers on their lenses and never take them off.

But this is a Lightroom tutorial.  So why in the world am I talking about polarizer filters?  Well, it’s because I have a trick I’d like to share with you, one that I’ve never seen discussed anywhere else.  It’s what you can do in Lightroom to create the polarizer effect without a polarizer.  In fact, it can be better than the real thing, especially if you are shooting with a wide angle lens.  Because, the angle of view can be so great that part of the sky will be affected by the polarizer and the rest will not.  So it looks pretty unnatural when the sky in part of your image is dark and the rest is washed out.

So, what’s the trick?  Well, consider this image taken on a recent trip to Hawaii.  I shot it with my Canon G11 and I don’t even own a polarizer filter for it.  It’s a photograph of the ongoing eruption in a crater in the Kilauea caldera.  In the bottom of the crater is a lake of lava.  The smoke you see is a plume of noxious gas.

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(Click on the image for a larger view)

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Ansel Adams – The Making of 40 Photographs

A continuing series of posts inspired by Ansel Adams’ book “Examples – The Making of 40 Photographs.” In this post, the 1932 photograph “Alfred Stieglitz: An American Place.”

I’m continuing my journey through this marvelous book, “Examples – The Making of 40 Photographs” by Ansel Adams.  It’s a fascinating experience.  Much of the legacy of Ansel Adams is distorted these days because of all the hype about him in the press.  But to read the master’s own words is inspiring and refreshing.

Alfred Stieglitz, An American Place

Alfred Stieglitz

I could only find this tiny rendition of the photograph Adams discusses in his book.  So I apologize for the quality.  But the story is the important thing.

Adams’ main cameras were large view cameras.  I have two 8X10 prints of his hanging in our home, contact prints made directly from 8X10 negatives.  In fact, most photographers of the time (1932) photographed with large format cameras and their prints were contact prints.  Photographers that used enlargers were extremely rare.

This photograph of Stieglitz was taken with an amazing new device, a Zeiss Contax 35mm camera.  It was taken when Adams visited Stieglitz’s gallery in New York to show some of his photographs to the one most people considered the finest photographer in the country.  Stieglitz was impressed and arranged for Adams to have a one person show.

Adams commented on his experiences using a small camera which sounds very similar to today’s comments regarding digital SLRs.

“Small cameras make pictures far more immediate; and many negatives could be made in the time required to produce one with a sheet-film camera.  The technique of 35mm photography appears simple, yet it becomes very difficult and exacting at the highest levels.  One is beguiled by the quick finder-viewing and operation, and by the very questionable inclination to make may photographs with the hope that some will be good….  The best 35mm photographers I have known work with great efficiency, making every exposure with perceptive care….”

One can substitute ‘DSLR’ for ‘small camera’ and the statement rings just as true today.

Having photographed in the past with a 4X5 camera I know the slow, exacting deliberation it takes and often think that this is a desirable approach with my Canon 1Ds Mark III and even my Canon G11.  The latter especially is great for spontaneous photography.  Setting up the Mark III is a much more deliberate process but not like setting up a 4X5.  I like to encourage my workshop students to slow down, connect with the land and then try to capture what they are feeling.  You don’t get this from chasing after as many  captures as you can find.

I was standing next to a large format photographer on ‘The Bridge” in Zion National Park at sunset.  He was shooting 8X10 color film.  I asked him how much it cost to press the shutter.  He replied, “$35.”  The light didn’t happen that time and he did not press the shutter.   One of the beauties of digital photography is that it doesn’t cost us anything to press the shutter.  But if it did, we would slow down and our photography would benefit from it.

In researching for this post I came across a letter by Ansel Adams that I must share with you.  The letter was written to his good friend Cedric Wright.  Adams had just come through a period where he was emotionally torn between passion for his beautiful lab assistant and commitment to his wife Virginia and their two children.  He had a clarifying moment in Yosemite when he observed a glorious thundercloud over Half Dome, a moment in which he saw clearly the meaning of love, friendship and art.  Here is what he wrote.

“Dear Cedric,

“A strange thing happened to me today. I saw a big thundercloud move down over Half Dome, and it was so big and clear and brilliant that it made me see many things that were drifting around inside of me; things that relate to those who are loved and those who are real friends.

“For the first time I know what love is; what friends are; and what art should be.

“Love is a seeking for a way of life; the way that cannot be followed alone; the resonance of all spiritual and physical things….

“Friendship is another form of love — more passive perhaps, but full of the transmitting and acceptances of things like thunderclouds and grass and the clean granite of reality.

“Art is both love and friendship and understanding: the desire to give. It is not charity, which is the giving of things. It is more than kindness, which is the giving of self. It is both the taking and giving of beauty, the turning out to the light of the inner folds of the awareness of the spirit. It is a recreation on another plane of the realities of the world; the tragic and wonderful realities of earth and men, and of all the interrelations of these.

“Ansel”

Join me on an upcoming workshop.  Click here for more details.

To see more of my photographs click here.

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Making a Photograph – Vision

Develop your vision and express yourself through your photographs.

“This photograph speaks to me.”

The photographs that have a strong impact on us speak to us.  The photographer has created an image that moves us.  Did he or she have something in mind when making the photograph?  Probably so.  Strong images just don’t happen by accident.

As one grows as a photographer one’s vision becomes clearer.  One begins to discover who they are and what they have to say.  And as one’s technical and aesthetic skills develop, skills used in both the field and the darkroom, one’s ability to express their vision becomes stronger.

The artist’s vision is an important element of their art.  The clearer an artist is on what his or her vision is the more expressive their art becomes.

If you’re not clear on what your vision is, live with your photographs.  Become aware of what you associate with them, what stories they are telling you, how they make you feel.  And as your vision emerges nurture it, strengthen it, let it speak through you and your art.  And then your photographs will also speak to others.

death_valley_sunrise_2012

We do photography workshops.  Come on out and join us.  Click here to check us out.

You can also check out our photography.  Click here.

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Inspiring Quotes

Inspiring quotations from photographers and other artists.

Art is the desire of a man to express himself, to record the reactions of his personality to the world he lives in.  ~Amy Lowell

Join me on an upcoming workshop.  Click here for more details.

To see more of my photographs click here.

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Journey – First Steps

Introducing “Journey – First Steps,” a showcase of 24 photographs from Ralph Nordstrom and a chronicling of his discoveries in photography over the past five years.

I’m very excited to announce that I just published my first book.  It’s something I’ve been thinking about for along time.  The title is “Journey – First Steps” and it showcases 24 of my favorite photographs from 2005 up into 2010.  It’s also a chronicle of my development as a photographer from those early uncertain days to today.  Not only does the book contain these photographs but I share with you where I was at the time they were taken and the discoveries I made along the way.

Your are invited to check out the preview.  It contains a sampling of the 54 pages and is available in eBook format (viewable on iPad and iPhone), soft cover and hard cover on Blurb.  It would make a beautiful gift for someone dear.

Oh, and let me know what you think.  Thanks.

We do photography workshops.  Come on out and join us.  Click here to check us out.

You can also check out our photography.  Click here.

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Spot 2

I just upgraded my Spot 1 to Spot 2. I haven’t tried it out yet but I’ve been using the Spot 1 for about a year every time I go out shooting.

In case you don’t know what Spot is, it’s a GPS reciever and communication satelite transmitter. The GPS tracks your location and the transmitter sends signals to the nearest communication satelite which is then downloaded to a ground station. From there a message is sent to the email addresses and cell phones you specify.

There are 4 kinds of messages on the Spot 2 – checking in, custom, help and SOS. I’m using the custom message to rub it in to my family that I’m out shooting and they’re not.

I just finished configuring the new device and am ready to give it a spin. But here’s a link with a review that gets me excited about what to expect.

http://hardcoreoutdoor.com/2009/11/18/new-and-improved-spot-satellite-messenger–spot-2.aspx

I can’t wait.

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“The Photographer as Artist” Presentation

This afternoon I was honored to present “The Photographer as Artist” to about 55 members of the Newport Beach arts community.  The talk was hosted by the Newport Beach Arts Foundation.  The presentation was very well received.  Afterwards people made comments like,

“I expected to see a slide show but was pleasantly surprised to hear your analysis of art and photography.”

“You didn’t give the presentation I expected.  Instead you showed insight into the nature of art and how photography relates to it.”

“I understand better now how photography is an art.”

“Your talk was inspirational.”

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