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Zuiko 28mm in surreal London
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PostPosted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:10 pm    Post subject: Zuiko 28mm in surreal London Reply with quote

Well I will admit that I paid quite a lot of cash for my 5d, and the workstation that I processed these on was also far from cheap (pays for itself in other ways though) but when people are willing to sell me lenses like this for ?25 "buy it now" on Evilbay, in absolutely dead-mint condition with a very nice UV filter, well I just don't know what to say. I have paid more than this (substantially more) for a polarising filter. Which was rubbish.

This was a couple of weeks ago, when the weather was rather inspiring I must admit...


1. This is my wall "sharpness test" but I liked the shot in this light Smile






2. Walking along the Thames






3. OK I added the light beam in photoshop (sorry) but I think it gives something extra...






4. Noticed how great the sky was looking...






5.






6.







7. Now this one is going up in my downstairs loo, with the title "Meat And Two Veg." It is one of my favorite buildings, recently (fantastically) converted by Swiss architects Herzog and De Meuron.







8.





9. Another great bit of architecture, by Dennis Lasdun.





Hope you like them, let me know what you think.

Simon


PostPosted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

#3 is the best one to me , incredible even if I not a city photo fun.


PostPosted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 10:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Fantastic! Amazing images!

Which is the best one? Hard to say. I think 3 and 7 are most impressive, but I guess I like No. 6 the best - the situation (and how you captured it) is great!


PostPosted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Now this set is what I would point to someone who'd ask me about "bigger than life" photography!
To turn city landscapes into dramatic and somehow dangerous places, is clearly an important part of your style. Which I think is something good because first, it's important, and not at all easy, to develop a personal style.
I must confess that I'm not much into strong post-production of the photographs (like #3 for instance), but what I appreciate in your images is that you use postproduction in a creative way, differently from what many do, who just try to make their images look like magazines images, all the same.
My personal favorites of the set are #7 and #9
I'm not sure if the clouds in #7 are real or brought in, or real but much processed, but no matter where they come from, they give the building image a strenght and clarity that, coupled with the dense greyscale tones, brings to my mind the memory of the photography by Leni Riefenstahl.


PostPosted: Fri Aug 03, 2007 11:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Now this set is what I would point to someone who'd ask me about "bigger than life" photography!


Not sure what that means but I will take it as good!! Smile

My background icludes some post-production film work and animation and I think this is why I like tweaking things in photoshop as much as making the capture sometimes.

But the only thing that was not there when I opened the shutter was the light beam, and this is not a big addition, I will post the version without, but it looked a bit boring!!

The clouds in 7 were there and were the reason for the shot, although it is a cool building at any time. All other PS is curves, channel mixer, selective colour and so on...

I did take some photos with the (attila inspired) nikon 105mm f2,5 just the other day which surprised me as they were the first digital photos that I did absolutley nothing to in photoshop, not even sharpening.

Thanks Orio for interested comments, and thanks Attila and Lucispictor for your kind words!!


Last edited by spkennedy3000 on Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:19 am; edited 1 time in total


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Oops Simon I am SO sorry!
I wanted to reply to your message, but instead of hitting "quote", I hit "edit" (as admin I have access to all posts) and erroneously edited your original message instead of replying to it!!
When I realized it, it was too late, it was gone Crying or Very sad
So please repost - and please accept my apologies for this!


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

About your doubt about my comment of "bigger than life":

Bigger than life - I meant that your images don't render the reality, but something that goes to a larger scale. Where the expression must not be intended literally, but metaphorically. Your skies, they are shown not only as air with clouds. They are the house of Gods, a bigger place above, over the world of small humans.
How else would you read the beam light that you cast on your photograph, than your wish to be the God of the scene, and rule your own world within the four sides of the frame?

I hope this explains what I mean. Yes it can be taken as a compliment. It surely is not a negative critic. But what I meant with it, was mostly a description of what I saw, not a judgement.


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I like your interpretation!!

I thought the caption for 3 might be something like "The Chosen One"!!

Number 7 I like the best because it does resemble in my eyes something that it is not (3 uniquely male qualities - is my hint strong enough? Does noone else see this? Wink ) and that is really what I like - the familiar turning into the unfamiliar, while retaining an aspect of the familiar.

Phew too much philosophising, time for bed!!


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

spkennedy3000 wrote:

Number 7 I like the best because it does resemble in my eyes something that it is not (3 uniquely male qualities - is my hint strong enough? Does noone else see this? Wink )
Phew too much philosophising, time for bed!!


It's not philosophy the problem Simon, I think you have read too much Freud Laughing move over to Jung, his vision is not so phallus-centred and it's much more interesting and working (in my opinion of course) Very Happy


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 7:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
It's not philosophy the problem Simon, I think you have read too much Freud Laughing move over to Jung, his vision is not so phallus-centred and it's much more interesting and working (in my opinion of course) Very Happy


If you can read Jung without falling asleep then I am REALLY impressed!! Very Happy


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 8:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

spkennedy3000 wrote:
Does noone else see this? Wink


Of course, but I mostly do not react to such an image connotation. Wink
You never can be sure when it was intended and when it happened by accident... Wink


PostPosted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 8:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here is an un-photoshopped version as it came out of the camera. For interest and to show the extent of my trickery is not as great as you might think!! Smile I don't think you could fake a sky as beautiful as this even if you wanted to...

Do you prefer it like this?




PostPosted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 12:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

spkennedy3000 wrote:

If you can read Jung without falling asleep then I am REALLY impressed!! Very Happy


Oh yes I do! I am a devotee. Jung is THE man! Very Happy


PostPosted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 12:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

spkennedy3000 wrote:
Here is an un-photoshopped version as it came out of the camera. For interest and to show the extent of my trickery is not as great as you might think!! Smile I don't think you could fake a sky as beautiful as this even if you wanted to...
Do you prefer it like this?


hm... I do not agree with you, in my opinion what your camera has captured is a normal sky, or if you prefer, a normally beautiful sky. Your image has become something totally different and much more powerful, so no, I don't think that your post-pro work is minor. I think it has completely redesigned the image.
I of course like much better your reworked image. I am not againts post-processing like a, you know, dogma or something. It's just that in this phase of my life, it does not interest me. I am more interested in exploring how far I can go, photographically speaking, with my camera alone. I am interested in seeing where can I go considering the click as the final step of the creative process, instead of as the starting point. I am interested in finding out what my mind and intuition can get out of the existing, instead of building my own world from scratch.
This of course describes what I am more interested into as a photographer, but does not cover what i am interested as a viewer. As a viewer, I like to see everything, even the things that are different from what I try to do. Especially them. And I can appreciate something that is very or compeltely different from what i would do, because I have an analytical mind when it comes to art, so I am able to place a separator between what I do as a photographer and what I tink or feel as a viewer.
This is to just say that I can appreciate and like what you do no matter the differences.


PostPosted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 11:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Very nice series.

I like the way you converted them to B&W as well. not too "gray", as you often see...

looks like you had fun that day Smile

Tom


PostPosted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 1:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Orio,

Good stuff I will keep on posting! My taste in processing is developing with each shot I take. My current opinion is that since every stage in photography from opening the shutter to making the print is a matter choice, and photographs do not represent objective reality, the stage over which I probably have most control is the one I will probably exert most influence over, and bring my attitude to the subject to bear the most.

Reading Jung for pleasure is not normal Orio I am fairly certain. Smile


PostPosted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 3:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Very interesting thread! I like #9 for the architecture and the comp, but
all of these make a great set of photos!

It was a couple of millenia ago when I studied the behaviorists like Jung,
Thorndike, Skinner, to name a few, but never for entertainment. I could
make a pun that you have to be Jung at heart, but won't. One I found
entertaining was a book by Fritz Perls (Friedrich Salomon Perls) entitled
"In and Out the Garbage Pail" he was the founding father to Gestalt
Therapy in the US, and along those lines, Orio is definitely more than the
sum of his parts! Laughing

Simon, thanks for sharing these! Cool

Bill


PostPosted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 7:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Excellent series. The BW images are just dreamy.


PostPosted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 12:11 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Fantastic, I really like #1 and #7. All are great Cool


PostPosted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 2:07 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I googled Leni Riefenstahl to find out how to start a cult here in Washington DC, something about bending light with x-ray lenses to make evocative darkish photos that step to the edge and beckon to jump. Where do I sign up? Let's go over the top. Yahoo! Geronimo!

Here we have the old white Wonderbread Factory, and on the sidewalk, a jet black elevator going down. In my dreams, the ersatz bread factory was painted white, Miami South Beach, deco, and Dhoruba Bin Wahad was the elevator boy. I drove down late in the afternoon, without my Leni lens, to see if it was worth violating my constitution and getting up early in the morning to make a major image. Naturally, the building was not as I remembered it, and there was a chain link fence around the elevator head. It seems they are keeping the fence around it for the US presidential election. Something about "image".

Maybe the fence is part of the picture. I need a skinny, emaciated gulag guy to get inside the fence. The factory is not whitewashed, but it does have peeling paint, and sinking brass. Actually it has as many ventilators as the Titanic had smokestacks, and that just might work. I may have found trouble!

The jet black elevator head for the elevator that only goes down, under the ground, that's the iceberg. There's a fence around it, but the ersatz bread factory is moving way too fast. The bread factory has been empty for years, but so was the bread...

Or I could just get up close and watch paint peel.


PostPosted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 2:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Reading for pleasure is not American.

You have to buy something, a book maybe. Don't stop, you're over the top, buy buy buy, beg and borrow, never read the instructions before putting it together, just buy it. Buy it for me, buy it for you, documentation is boring, buy buy buy.

Something about utopia. I didn't read it.


PostPosted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:58 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Very strong images. Cued by Orio elsewhere, I note the Riefenstahl-ish supernatural. Call it lending a certain dignity to the commonplace, as applied here, and that makes it your personal style. Those architectural design features do beg to be seen and showcased. I love the bridge arches scene, and showcasing the strength of design in architecture, and glorifying the little man with his suitcase on wheels, rehabilitating Leni by community service in the cause of social justice. Fifteen minutes of fame for the little man with wheels.

The manipulated skies do help evoke. We are painting with light.


PostPosted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 10:08 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Very nice series, while No. 6 is my absolute favourite. Those big stone tiles with the uneven and rounded edges are so typical of London, they remind me of countless walks with aching feet back to the car parked somewhere far away...


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