Experimenting with paint and color and everything else.

There was a time in the 1990's when everything was an experiment. It was a response to the conformity expected at work. When we did jobs for advertising agencies and corporate clients on medium and large format film everyone had financial skin in the game and we made sure no highlights were blown, the focus was were we (and the clients) intended it to be and everything conformed to the prevailing ideas of "high quality." 

What that meant, though, was that on our own time we spent a lot of our own resources experimenting and trying new stuff. I went through a meticulous hand coloring phase using Marshall's transparent oil paints and acres of cotton swabs. We cross processed film to see how it would look. We distressed Polaroid in mid-development. We built our own lighting rigs. And we spent a fortune out of our own pockets on just trying stuff out. And messing up was part of the process of learning a new process, and by extension, translating a new look.

Funny, now that we all have digital cameras I see much less real experimentation and more just goofing around with lighting and post processing. I'm guilty of the same thing. It's almost like it's become an article of religious faith to grab something into the camera in a neutral way with the intention of having a good, solid file as a jumping off point for frilly and risk-less post processing.

Like always shooting in color even when you KNOW you want the image in black and white. Why? "Because (whiny intonation implied) it gives you more flexibility and options."  That's so logical and so chicken shit. Sometimes you just have to fold up the safety net and get on the trapeze naked and with greasy hands. Why? Because we learn more from failure, and even more from near failure, than we ever learn from applying metaphoric goo over the top of a perfect file. If the safety net is too broad and too close to the trapeze the audience understands, in some informed way, that there's no real excitement to be had. We watch the high wire and the trapeze acts holding our breath because of the possibility that someone may fall to their death. If we don't have that in our work then it becomes lifeless and mundane. Without risk there is no joy. Only stale popcorn and tacky souvenirs.

I'm taking my old Kodak out tomorrow to see what I can really fuck up. I mean make art with.....

The Summer Doldrums.

Life slows down when it gets hot and sticky in Austin. I still go out for walks in the afternoon but I do them more slowly. When I get slower I start looking for subjects that are slower than me. I was cutting across the lawn that stretches between the manmade hill in Zilker Park and the Palmer Event Center to poke my head into the Psychic Showcase (only in Austin?) and I saw this elegant and bountiful tree right ahead of me. It's presence seemed so powerful that I stopped in my tracks and just looked at it.

The horizontal expanse of branches and leaves was impressive and the leaves were so thick that the shade under the tree was an almost unbroken blanket of shadow. It was much cooler and even quieter under the canopy. I stood under the tree for a number of minutes and tried to soak in what it must be like to be a tree. To be immovable and stately. I walked back to the point at which I first became really aware of the tree and made this portrait of it. I tried to make it look as serious and stately as it seemed but I also tried to make it give me an expression of welcome. It remained neutral and a bit aloof.

There will come a time, I am sure, when the land in central Austin will be deemed too valuable for trees and developers will cover every square inch of the inner city with concrete and buildings and black top.
When that happens I'll pull out this portrait of this tree and remember a time when trees were valuable. I'll be reminded of a time when people and trees coexisted in the city.

I carry my camera on my walks, in part, to record a way of life. I'm preserving my understanding of the soul of my city. That's my project.

One additional note about my Studio Portrait Lighting Class at Craftsy.com...

Since I am an instructor I am able to offer my Visual Science Lab followers the class at a 25% discount.
If you click through this link you'll get the discounted price: Kirk's Studio Portrait Lighting Class.

Thanks, Kirk

My Studio Portrait Lighting class launched on Craftsy.com This Morning.

Here's my big announcement: My two and a half hour course on Studio Portrait Lighting launched on Craftsy.com this morning. Here's the information page about my course on their website: Kirk's Studio Lighting Course.  If you go there you can scroll down the page and find a two minute video trailer that gives you detailed info and gives you an idea of the production values Craftsy.com brought to the project.

But let me back up and explain this all a little better...

Craftsy.com is a relatively new company located in Denver, Colorado. They create online education programs on a number of different subjects. They started out making classes about crafts (things like knitting, embroidery, even oil painting) and they are expanding to include food and cooking, more fine arts and now photography.  Their aim is to be the biggest and the best arts, crafts and all around education site on the web.

Craftsy.com is bringing in accomplished people in their fields who have written books and practiced their specialties for years and, with an accomplished crew of video producers, editors, and veteran camera operators, work with tight content outlines to produce well edited programs.  The programs are constructed as a series of 15 to 30 minutes segments that move logically through the information. 

The editors at Craftsy called me after researching my books and my blogs and asked me if I'd be interested in spending the better part of a week in Denver, working ten hour days, to create a program that shows people how I approach studio portrait lighting. From gear selection to posing to various lighting designs. I loved the idea.

The reason I loved the idea is that I've taught a lot of live workshops and I always felt that there had to be a better way to teach for both the students and the photographer teaching the class. A video workshop is a much better value for everyone involved. The students get to see the information with all the gaps and stop-and-starts edited out. It's much easier to keep the program focused and on task. Once the students buy a Craftsy.com workshop they can go back to it again and again to review concepts and to see details. Craftsy adds more value by having the instructors participate in a private online forum that's open to all the students of the class to answer questions about the material presented and to share information.

One of my last live workshops was a daylong event at the One World Theater in Austin. We had about 50 participants. Since it was a new space for us we had a few delays getting up and running. Even though we were in a big theater space it was hard for everyone to see and hear, in detail, what we were demo-ing. It's just not possible for 50 people to walk up and look into the finder of the camera or at the screen on the back...  And once I finished a marathon day we were spent. We had no workable way to answer individual questions. No way to continue adding value.

With a Craftsy workshop the students pay $59 and they can watch the program they've purchased again and again. Forever. There is also a very active community around the workshops. When I explored their website I found forums, specific to each class, for questions and answers as well as places to for students and instructors to share projects with everyone.

When the team at Craftsy filmed my class they did it the way a professional crew would film a television show. They used two or three cameras for most scenes and provided both wide and detailed shots that made it easy to see exactly what I was talking about. And while it felt strange to wear a lavalier microphone for 10 hours a day the resulting sound is great. Much better than seat 5, row D at the live workshop.

You can go to the site and see how the program is constructed. I'm covering basics like hard and soft light, types of modifiers, color control, some posing and a lot of my favorite style of portrait lighting. I worked with a model named, Victoria, so you can see demos of how the lighting turns out.  If you want to take the course you can do so without trepidation because Craftsy.com has a Full Satisfaction, Money Back Guarantee. If you don't like the course, if it's not your cup of tea, just ask for a refund.

I think the value proposition is great. The cost of the course, in my Universal Latte scale, equals just 13 large lattes from Starbucks (10, if you are in an airport...). And if you ever wanted to see what I really sound like then this is your chance to find out. I watched the entire program last night---for the very first time---and I really liked it. If you want to learn my style of lighting and shooting you probably will like the course as well.

Finally, the best thing about doing a workshop online is that instead of traveling around the country for weeks at a time doing live workshops I'm all done. Which means I'll be here blogging for you nearly every day instead of trying to get all my lighting gear in the overhead compartment of some tired jet heading for Des Moines... If you are interested in giving the Studio Portrait Lighting Workshop a try please click through the advertisement  below (or, this link) and I'll get credit for sending you there. Big brownie points for me! I think you'll like the course. If you don't you haven't risked a thing.  Thanks for your support. 

What am I thinking about reading in Chinese this Summer? All about Studio Lighting...

In 2009 Amherst Media published my book on Studio Lighting. Frankly it was a fun book to write and a nice follow on to the Location Lighting book I'd done the year before. Last year I discovered that the book was available in Chinese. I found it on Amazon.com but the price was astronomical. A few days ago I checked in to see how the books were selling and I found the Chinese version again but this time the price was much more in line with the original English version. I did what any self possessed writer would do and ordered a copy. 

I think I will leave it purposefully laying about the studio when clients come over. Maybe it will spark interesting conversations. I sat down last night to leaf through and see how the translation worked until I remembered that I don't know how to read Chinese at all. I flipped through the book and enjoyed the memory of making the various images.  The one thing I really about the book was my face on the front cover, partially covered with Chinese characters which I presume spell out my name.

This will sound like a plug but....I really like this book. Not the Chinese version which I am certain is very good and very well done, but the original book. I read it again this Summer and although the gear continues to change the basics are right on the money. I fear that the book is in the "long tail" curve of its life and I would advise you to snap up as many copies as you possibly can before it goes out of print and becomes unavailable. The actual title is:  Minimalist Lighting: Professional Techniques for Studio Photography.  Drop by the studio and I'll be happy to sign your copy.....

What am I reading this Summer? Well, there is this novel by K.B. Dixon....

Novel Ideas. A Novel.

This is the third book of K.B. Dixon's I've read. I just finished it and my initial response was that the book made me calmly amused. Which is a wonderful thing in our frenetic, bouncy, jangly, lives. Dixon doesn't write the traditional novel. He works in paragraphs and pages of loosely interconnected thoughts and observations. The thread that holds this collage of domestic and professional vignettes together is that of an author looking for his next...idea, story, concept. He considers writing a book about an accountant who is trying to devise a spreadsheet that will inform him how NOT to waste any personal time in his life. 

The main character flows through the process of living his live, engaging with his wife, and looking for the inspiration to generate content. It's sounds eerily familiar to nearly all of my friend's lives.  The character comments on the bleak nature of a painter friend's canvases since the demise of painter's romance.  He counsels a friend, in very oblique ways, to extricate himself from a relationship with a crazy person.

Here is a beautifully worded passage from one of his warnings to his friend:

"As for your wayward fan, I agree a certain sort of friendly concern would be normal under normal circumstances, but as we both know, the circumstances as they pertain to Ms. Keen are not normal. Your worry about the rightness or wrongness of a strategic withdrawal seems pointlessly punishing."

He considers writing a "true life" crime novel, does the research, may have solved the crime, but ultimately rejects the idea as the framework for a book.

The book, and Dixon's style, appeal to me because it follows the idea of making literature compelling because it is believable. These are lives that we live in our demographics. We don't worry so much about hunger as we do editorial rejection, or getting tenure, or keeping track of our competitor's success in grabbing pieces of the pie.

Reading Dixon's work always makes me feel smarter and more connected to a satisfied strata of culture that  might long for just a little more but from the comfortable perch of having more than enough...

I recommend his books to people who like to feel the sound of words as they read. I recommend his books to people who suppose their own ennui is somehow unique and gift-like. But mostly I recommend his books because the arc of their loosely connected stories makes me smile.

The two previous K.B. Dixon books that I enjoyed include:

A Painter's Life

and

The Photo Album

Both were fun to read and contemplate. But a warning for my ultra-literal brethren: The book, The Photo Album, contains no actual photographs, rather it contains whimsical descriptions of photographs, imagined by the author which move the collage of the story along.... 

Another milestone noted. VSL hits fifteen million pageviews.

How time flies when you're having fun...

To date I've posted about 1620 blog articles and just this morning, as I waited for Ben to get ready for cross country practice, I was reading your comments from last night and I happened to look at the stats for the site. Just as I clicked into the stats the numbers rolled over to 15,000,000 and I thought it was a fun coincidence.  

After swim practice this morning I'm going to write a blog about my Denver project with Craftsy.com. The project launched last night and I'm happy with the way it turned out. Please drop back by and have a read. Now we're off to hit the trail and the pool. Ben running with his cross country team and me with my swim team.  See you for coffee...

Sometimes life looks stranger through the lens.

After lunch I took a walk in the park.

It was hot so I lingered under the bridge for a few moments.

When I walked out the other side I found rocks stacked like skinny pyramids.

Organic Eiffel Towers.

Millions of years of erosion.

And I could swear they were multiplying before my eyes.

I looked around and there was a field of carefully stacked rocks.

It was a total denial of entropy.

Or a nod to the notion that there are patterns within chaos.

I walked back to my car. No rocks followed me.

Writing about writing.

I recently wrote a review of the Samsung NX300 and the review was generally well accepted. By that I mean the flying monkey boys of the various fora didn't rush in to question my morals, ethics, mental acuity, allegiances, ability to think beyond a first grade level, etc. When I realized that most of the comments attached in the next few days were positive I felt deflated. I must have done a poor job of peeling back the onion-esque parts of that camera because I didn't draw metaphoric blood from anyone. No one even blinked at my continued criticism of EVF-less cameras.

The one glancing complaint I got was that the article was longer than a typical article in a magazine known for running lengthy (and serious) articles. And that made me think about the basic differences between writing, as I practice it, and photography. 

When I sit down to write it's a process of having more than a one sided conversation. As I type I'm working through my arguments or my observations and after each point I pause for a second or two and wonder what one of my friends would say about what I've just written. As though we were sitting across the table from each other, jealously admiring whatever really cool camera each of us brought along, in a thinly veiled attempt to make each other envious, as we enjoy a coffee in cool weather or a nice glass of  beer in the warmer weather. The momentary "silence" sprinkled through my practice of writing acts as my own devil's advocate and most of the time he's either pressing me to defend my premise or to admit where the argument loses steam.

In the case of the review of the NX300 I was trying to be passionately objective, knowing my penchant for falling in love with cameras, racing through a delightful and torrid relationship with them and then succumbing to the wiles of the next one. I felt like I needed to walk my readers through the whole process of what I liked and didn't like about the camera rather than just resort to a "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" approach because my prejudices are well known and at the same time the camera does some things incredibly well and a certain camp of users doesn't really care about my need for an EVF or my desire for microphone jacks. By supplying enough information I'm able to feel like I've provided a neutral spreadsheet of pluses and minuses but anyone who reads my stuff on a regular basis will be able to sniff around the nooks and crannies of the construction of the piece in order to separate my predilections from actual camera design foibles.

When I write I'm doing something that's one hundred and eighty degrees different from my picture taking. When I snap the shutter I'm trying to distill down to one quintessential expression combined with one natural feeling composition. The images are available to viewers as a snapshot, in the most positive meaning of the word "snapshot." While I'm happy if you linger on the image and savor it my intention is always to create locked up package that needs no intervention, captioning or fluffing to deliver it's more or less visceral message. And the message is nearly always the same: "Look! Isn't this cool? Look! isn't she beautiful? Look! Can you imagine that something can be so amazing?"

And I'm really not looking for insight or instruction or critiques when I post a photograph because who can really understand what it is you are trying to transmit to your audience? Who can have the same experiential resumé as me...or you?

But when I write I mean for it to be in the nature of a two way conversation. I know that ideas are never (in my mind) fully formed and perfect. A case in point is my recent take on the decline of the camera market. I gleaned a lot of value from the good comments that came flooding in. Most augmented my argument while others made me stop and think. Which is something I need to do more often.

People ask me why I write since the perception is that it's a time consuming habit and one with meager financial returns. The only answer I can give them is that I like the process. I genuinely like the process of trying to explain myself. I want to connect with people and tell them what it's like to think with my brain. And when I look out across the web I'm looking for that same connection from other writers.

I think that both writing and photography are archly solitary practices (or should be) but I think the sharing of the end product is where we are able to come out of our shells and experience the almost tactile feedback of the people we've attracted to our endeavors. I like the process of writing nearly as much as I like the process of wandering down an urban street with a ripe camera. And I like both of these processes as much as I like sitting in a cool cafe slowly sipping a perfectly made coffee.

One of my goals is to only do things I like. That's a hard target these days for artists and writers trying to keep food on the table. But if we don't make the attempt then what do we really have?

Insight for people who are not totally involved in the creative process. This is important to read if you want to understand your friends who do "art" for a living.

https://medium.com/thoughts-on-creativity/bad7c34842a2

Please go read it. Then come back here and comment.

Pentax K-01. Please send me a case of these cameras. They are quirky, eccentric and fun. I want more...

I guess I should confess that, at this point in my career, I just don't really give much thought to SUPER CAMERAS. If you sent me a Leica S2 or a professional  Canon or Nikon I'd turn right around to sell it and buy more whimsical cameras that make good images and make me smile. Cameras like the Pentax K-01.

It's just a crazy little camera with an intriguing and counter-intuitive, modernist design and lots of happy eccentricity piled on top. I read all about it when it first came out but at the time I had such a strong prejudice against cameras without viewfinders that I literally couldn't see why anyone would plunk down eight hundred dollars or more for a camera that focused like molasses and had one big, reverse cyclops viewing mechanism on the back.  But times and tastes change. I'm hardly as serious about cameras as I had to be when cherry picking between models was a necessity. Now almost all cameras use some variant of a Sony sensor (except for Canon which seems to love sensors with low noise and even lower dynamic range...) and the quality from brand to brand is uniformly good.

I was at Precision Camera here in Austin yesterday and I saw a yellow Pentax K-01 on the shelf. I'd just seen the camera on the web in low res photos and I enjoyed the opportunity to hold it in my hand and check it out. I was delighted. I love the control designs. I love the chunkiness of it. I love the retro/jet age/modernist/metro clunkiness of the whole design. I think it's brilliant. After walking around the store with the yellow used one in my hands I couldn't resist so I bargained like a rug trader and paid less for it than I did for the first really high density memory card I bought. It was a 64 megabyte compact flash card and it seemed to modify and then fulfill Bill Gates assertion that no one would need more than 640 Kb of storage. Only upgraded to 64 megabytes.... (Funny that now gigabyte cards are about as expensive as Tic-Tacs or a Starbuck's latte).

The camera is slow to focus but I have high hopes as I just now upgraded the firmware from 1.00 to 1.03. I'll be happy if it's improved but I'll be fine if I need to use it in the manual focus/focus peaking mode for the rest of my life.

The camera is designed like a Metropolitan car. It's that boxy. I shot with it for a few hot hours this morning and there's nothing really to say. The files are sharp and saturated. The menus got mastered in minutes. The screen on the back is good. It's better with a Hoodman Loupe (I should buy their stock...).  It's a perfect camera for someone would works slowly and methodically. 

I'm finished writing this particular entry because I'm impatient to go to Amazon and find a couple more. If all your cameras are serious tools then you are NOT having enough fun doing photography. This failed and lovable camera is just a blast. I could use four more. And I'd like to get one of the rare blue ones....anybody?

DID I MENTION THAT IT SHOOTS SQUARES? DID I? JOY....