THEYALLBELONG - cuz they all happened today. It was one of those days where things ( stars ) were aligned. Today after much angst trying to find a place to get my COVID vaccine I finally got one - of all places my local Safeway! Next I received in the mail a package from Germany that I’ve been literally waiting for two months for. Contains Scala BW slide film and chemicals to develop same. Next started the afternoon of zoom webinars - Jason Lee and an associate talked about their photographic style. Jason Lee has had several careers - notable as the star of the TV show ” My Name is Earl” which I used to watch . He then went on to have some notoriety in the skateboarding world. Now he’s an accomplished photographer whose shooting style I closely identify with. From there it was onto to Zoom presentation by Heart Mountain which was one of the incarceration camps for Japanese Americans during WWII. Finally after my wife lost her $5500 pair of tinnitus reducing hearing aides, I found them this evening avoiding the expense of replacing them. To say the least I’m exhausted but that could just be the dinner time whiskey and COVID vaccine ?
Finally after about a year I’ve gotten the phrase “Prairie Madness” trade marked. A trade mark is an entirely different beast than copyright. As soon as you create something it’s copyright protected. You gain extra protection by registering it with the copyright office. This doesn’t require anything special. But getting something trade marked is something you apply for and can be rejected if it doesn’t meet requirements. The process is complicated and in the end I succumbed to one of the multiple inducements from lawyers to get their help. It cost me a flat $125 to get my application on the straight and narrow. So now I’m free to make all the mouse pads, T shirts I want with this logo - tell me what size you want.
I’ve learned to not be afraid of shooting outdated Black and White film - it works out fine. No adjustments in ISO or development times. This is NOT true of color film especially E-6 slide film. Anyway I found an 8 year old roll of Rollei RPX 25 and shot it. Very happy with the results.
I just self published a book of my photos that emulate the New Topographic genre. This new way of looking at landscape photography got it’s start in 1975 when the George Eastman House sponsored an exhibit displaying the works of:
The photographers who were featured in the exhibit were relatively young in their careers, including Robert Adams, Lewis Baltz, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Joe Deal, Frank Gohlke, Nicholas Nixon, John Schott, Stephen Shore, and Henry Wessel, Jr. Looking at the photos from that exhibit 45 years ago, it seems like current landscape photography wholeheartedly embraces “new topographic” principles.
This is now a series of posts about this amazing tornado photograph taken out by Simla, CO where I was born. I actually have a large print of this in my house. At one point I thought it might be fake but realized it was picked up by National Geographic and they tend to do a good job of vetting their photographs. I just discovered on DPreview that this photo won a travel photography award:
WINNER, BESTSINGLEIMAGEIN A LANDSCAPE & EARTHELEMENTSPORTFOLIO: James Smart, Australia
James Smart/www.tpoty.com
Location: Simla, Colorado, USA
Artist Statement: This ‘drill bit’ type of tornado is a rare anti-cyclonic tornado, which happens in around 2% of tornadoes. It touched down in open farmland, narrowly missing a home near Simla, Colorado as it tore up the ground, gathering the soil giving it its brown color.
Gear and Specs: Canon 5D Mark II 70-200mm lens, F4, 1/90 sec, ISO 100
Just a few images I just received from the developer. These are from Riverside Cemetery here in Denver. It takes about 2 months to get the slides back which is a bit much. I’ve got some chemicals on their way from Germany to allow me to do this at home.
This is the third time to the Last Chance Module. I wanted to see what it would look like shot with BW InfraRed Film. Really the only film for me is Rollei Infrared 400. It’s a film that should be bracketed in order to get the exposure you want without having to do a lot of sketchy post processing.
The Losers Collection -= Photos selected for exhibition but not purchased. Essentially every contest I’ve entered is now part of the Losers Collection. All have been professionally framed . Frame dimensions are listed with each photo.
I don’t remember how I stumbled upon this book - the cover is obviously very familiar - see my post on the Last Chance Module. I have just started to read this book but it appears to be just what I was looking for in terms of another set of opinions about the West. It has also introduced me to the Autry Museum in LA, started by Gene Autry of Movie fame.
Vicki stuck to just 5. Interesting that we had one in common - Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey - she has not read it but found it and thought I’d be interested in it!
This year my S.O. came up with a cheap way to do stocking stuffers - simply put a list of 5 books to recommend to the other person. I went overboard and put 10 - didn’t cost me anything to add 5 more. These are NOT guaranteed to be crowd pleasers - just books that I think have merit. Here are my recommendations:
This is what a quarter century of photography looks like. 4Tb to be specific. Dad taught me photography when I was about 13 but I really wasn’t serious about this pursuit until his passing in 1996. Since then I’ve made it my passion. In the last three years I’ve done more film photography than digital but I still do both. So here ya’ go 4 TB of mediocre photography!
Vicki had this idea that I should gather all the photos that have been accepted into the various contests that I’ve entered over the last year or so. Safe to say that my non-professional status is holding up as I have not sold a single one! ?
I forgot to mention that another one of my photos is hanging at the Northwinds Art Center in Port Townsend, WA.
The web site had two videos and the one I looked at did not have my entry in it and it appeared to be a video of the entire exhibition. I saw the 2nd video which is of the Juror making comments about how he goes about jurying such an exhibit. It was there so I was relieved to see that it was actually in the exhibit.
Vicki took last nite to decorate the house for Xmas. She pulled out all the stops - The Santas have not been seen on display for at least a decade! The framed fibre art is really interesting - Vicki’s sister made it when she was a kid and gave it to Vicki. The framing was expensive but it came out great. She is NOT planning on giving it back to Julie! The last picture is sort of what the rest of the house looks like so you shouldn’t get the idea that we live in a pristine palace !!:)
This image was selected to show at the SAGE Gallery in Sheridan Wyoming next month. I submitted a total of four images - not sure this was my strongest image but it’s the one that they selected so.. time to print and frame it. I usually get it nicely framed because so far none of my entries have sold so they just come back to me, hence the reason to have a nicely framed photo.
