Beneath the skin
October 26, 2010
are the secrets that project who I am. Today, at least.
Unstill 3
Unstill 2
- Unstill
I am contemplating the physical form of secrets. Their essence, were it tangible, if you will.
I believe I will.
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Reflections on Teaching, Learning, and Culture
October 24, 2010
I perceive culture as a collective sensory reflection of any given society’s environment that persists over time while also evolving through time. How culture persists over time involves both learning and teaching directly via formal and informal education. How culture evolves through time is a collective, but indirect response/reflection of how and what information is internalized. What the information comes to mean after internalization is reflected individually through contribution to society, be it an intellectual or artistic reflection. Because it is impossible to remove the individual from interpretation and therefore meaning, culture persists at the same time it evolves—however slowly that may be.
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practice
May 22, 2010
if it doesn’t make perfect, it at least expands the skill set.
Pieces
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john dos passos
May 20, 2010
“Apathy is one of the characteristic responses of any living organism when it is subjected to stimuli too intense or too complicated to cope with. The cure for apathy is comprehension.”
trying to understand is the foothold out of the abyss.
those outlines of my internal conflicts are only slightly transparent, the issue–my issue, the thing that releases the shutter–is less and less defined by the shape of shadows and more so by the fine, fine edges of something luminous. something at odds with human waste and the mark it leaves behind.
where that mark is left, well that is part of my something luminous.
how will i present this, visually?
words come easy, but the mental pixels? well, they’re a bit out of focus. still.
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visual apathy
May 4, 2010
- visual apathy
at the close of the semester, after feedback from h, this is where i find myself–or perhaps i was here all along but only just realized it after examining the lack of cohesion in my portfolio coupled with the diversity of its subject matter.
i’m looking. always looking. but my attention span, my interest in any given subject, falters after so many shutter releases. see, it’s all been done before. and innovation, uniquity, well that’s what we’re all after. isn’t it? us self-proclaimed artists, anyway.
accordingly, inevitably, and unavoidably i’ve entered a state of visual apathy. in realizing this, i’ve stumbled across a project idea: Visual Apathy
i intend to define it visually.
my regards, h, for all the inspiration.
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on landscapes
April 27, 2010
social. spiritual. environmental. emotional.
social landscape
emotional landscape
spiritual landscape
environmental landscape
Ultimately, in the words of Susan Sontag, I have come to believe that “photographs objectify: they turn an event or a person into something that can be possessed.”
These landscapes reflect those intangibles images/representations that come to mind when I consider the landscape and its many implications.
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Review
April 25, 2010
Ante
Fore
Mykal: Before
Mykal: After
This set of before and after images is intended to represent editing abilities using CS4 and CS5 beta (by invitation from ADOBE via NAPP).
The content aware features in CS5 are remarkable, reducing time spent removing unwanted elements in a photograph as seen in the landscapes above. I’ve successfully removed entire trees from several of the waterfall shots.
CS4 was used on the images of Mykal to remove the facial scarring/imperfections seen in the before picture. Much of the technique I use in portrait editing was learned from independent study using the “Photoshop World Playbook” –particularly Katrin Eismann’s techniques,”Skin” by Lee Varis, and several copies of Photoshop User and Digital Photo Pro. I do recommend attending the Photoshop World Conference–extremely valuable learning opportunity!
Overall, I’ve achieved a solid skill set regarding portrait retouching. Still working through some issues surrounding candid, landscape (rural & urban), and street photography. Primary area of concern? Achieving correct exposure at the time of capture–specifically finding the element in the image that represents 18% grey when I can’t find my grey card (frequent occurrence). Nothing to do, but shoot until I have a solid understanding of correct metering without an additional (handheld) light meter.
Good source of info on metering:
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/camera-metering.htm
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Intersections Between Language and Photography 