I left the Black Hills two days ago. This was one of the last images I got from high over Deadwood. Is it ‘brooding’ or ‘melancholy’ or even ‘gloomy’? No, it wasn’t any of these. It was just overcast, and I was there and saw it.
I’ve been perusing the many photographers’ Youtube channels to see if I can learn something, given that most of my photo work is from the pre-digital Stone Age of imagery. Back when a press of the button where and when you were defined what you ended up with.
Yes, I have some things to learn — mostly about how to alter what you saw in ways reminiscent of how history works — but not so much about the essence of the art/craft. In fact, most of the experts have little to say on what I consider photography to really be about.
‘f-8 and be there.’
It’s nice when you run across an aphorism that genuinely says it all in few words and this one is of that sort. As mentioned last time, photography for me is about where the photog has been and a bit about what he/she saw and did while… being there…
The ‘f-8’ part of the quote is a sly way of telling us that all techno-babble and faux-philosophizing is really irrelevant (f-8 being a good aperture setting for depth of field and lens definition, meaning you don’t need to know much more) and that the most important aspect of ‘good’ photography is the constant act of putting oneself in a place where interesting photos can be got. Period.
It’s about the sashay…
I have not come across even one self-proclaimed photo maven who has mentioned this, obvious (to me) as it is. What I’m saying is that a photographer’s body of work is really a definition of his/her lifestyle, and, really, little more. It’s not a summation or indication of an emotional state, let alone a worldview or inner life. An utter scumbag can create beautiful and even seemingly empathetical imagery.
How about luck? Isn’t ‘being there’ often a matter of luck? See the image above of the Bighorn? I Arrived at The Badlands yesterday and shot that one within an hour or so. Looked out from the cliffside campsite I found and there it was
. Listen: A wildlife photographer could go for years and not grab a Bighorn shot this good. Enlarge it and look at the quality of the light, and the shadows, how one forms the animal’s backdrop and makes him pop, and how the shadow in the upper right quadrant perfectly balances it. (Even the little bits of scrub brush are perfect.) If the sun had been hitting the shelf behind him this would just be a so-so image. It’s actually an amazing moment, and it was gone in 30 seconds, as the sun dipped below the western horizon and all was in shadow.
This one is just to show you where I am on the face of planet earth.
So yes I was lucky. I could have camped somewhere else or clouds (it was cloudy) could have been in front of the sun as it set rather than parting to let that gorgeous warm light come through.
Had that happened I would have put a different image in that space, one maybe just as pleasing, and that I was likewise ‘lucky’ to get. See, if you decide to live on the road traveling to amazing places you eventually/always get ‘lucky,’ although the specifics will vary.
See the one up there of the other rig? There was a family outside it, a mom, a pop and a couple kids, toying with the telescope. I shot about 50 images of them, hoping for something interesting, what exactly I didn’t know. This was the last one and absent the little girl’s red pants and how I caught her mid-sashay, I wouldn’t be showing it. I would have deleted it with other 49 non-selects. And a different image would be there.
I forgot to show you this, my second campsite in the Black Hills.
But you may not have any interest in photography, so what’s the point here and what does it have to do with How The World Really Works (HTWRW)? See, what I’m discussing also refers to the level of our personal lives, the way things turn out. The body of work concept, I mean. You live your life a certain way, the details will meander with the luck of the draw and so forth, but — unless something catastrophic or otherwise spectacular passes — by ‘being there’ you will pretty much get what you deserve. Or, as with most humans, your life will be drab and uninteresting. Up to you and no one else.
To further make my point I’ve concocted another slide show, consisting of photos I took during the winters of 1995-96 on the island of Tobago. Take my word, each image is a part of the story of my life at that time. No more, no less. I could go on for an hour about some of the photos you’ll see. But mainly, I was there.
Think I’ll add one more.
Allan
https://www.zerohedge.com/medical/watch-uniformed-troops-enter-bars-7-eleven-dallas-randomly-vaccinate-younger-crowd
Chits getting downright creepy.
That was a big SETUP ADVERTISEMENT, for those sheeple who still can’t decide whether to suck up on that juice or not.
Yeah great shots Allan.
I suggest registering at
http://www.fineartametica.com
to sell/repeat your best photos.
Check them out. I believe
they will do well.
Woops, how about
http://www.fineartamerica.com
From the New World Order Reporter, Virginia Stoner – we’ve got a massive death by shot problem happening real-time. Hope she’s still hanging around this blog even tho there were differences of Mandela stuff.
https://www.virginiastoner.com/writing/2021/5/4/the-deadly-covid-19-vaccine-coverup
VAERS data, as always is ignored, and well known to be 90-99% under reported.
Thanks for that!.
See, we saw this coming, and there it is graphed.
So…where are the reporters screaming about this?, where are the Police looking into this? – who are supposed to serve & protect us!, where are the Politicians speaking out about this? – who are there to serve & look after us!…etc etc.
Oh I forgot, today they are fake cardboard cutout/puppets (with no stuffing)….the real ones all died out, or were killed off about 40 years ago.
Yes, she did an important piece of work here.
….And I posted this vax death cover up onto FB an hour or 2 ago, right in the middle of a govt sponsored Crap Covid ” get the vax persuasion article” with high feedback traffic, and it’s absolute crickets from there now LOL!
And see her graphs proving what a crock vaccinations are for all those other diseases through history!.
I am causing whole big threads to be pulled off FaceBook LOL!
Now the guberment is rolling out the very tired “how to spot covid disinformation” crap ball posts.
Good news is, most people are awake, or feeling or knowing they are being lied to.
Epic and brilliant as always Allan!!! Thank you for sharing this slideshow with us all. You are an amazing photographer as well as writer. We should consider ourselves blessed and fortunate for your generosity to share all of it with us!!! Specifically you in min. 4.50. 🙂 Made me smile and miss you as well as surfing even more… What a great life you have lived thus far!!! Miss you my friend!
Mark Dice is a semi-idiot but look what he came up with: https://youtu.be/re30eyNKMuc
Depressing that they have ‘normal’ people participating in this aspect of the fraud.
Allan, although this is off-topic from the current “Nature stuff” which you’re writing about (Activities that could benefit Us All), I can make a link with this indirect link to someone you’ve written about as an asset of intelligence, Sean Penn.
https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/watch-pro-shot-video-of-ac-dcs-brian-johnson-performing-back-in-black-with-foo-fighters-at-vax-live-concert/
Sean was one of the presenters. You’ve got musicians from mostly the heavy metal and “alternative” scenes, but maybe a token “R&B” guy or two such as John Legend… How this control is maintained, I wonder about sometimes, but this already happened a week ago, and the special website for it, Vaxlive.org, was just a part of globalcitizen.org
I verified it, I get so depressed to think about it, but I’m at least relieved that no one forced the aging Ringo Starr (a “friend” of Dave Grohl’s) to be a part of this evil gathering, Lol.
Amazing pics Allan of South D (would love to be there with you – and your pics being great, but I’m sure nowhere near of the in person view) and Tobago.
The people of Tobago looked healthy and vibrant – much healthier than today’s U.S. population by far – given how much we spend on the fraudulent medical monopoly we call healthcare. Healthpoison, if there is such a word, is a better fit.
Get this, folks: On Facebook I was trying to answer an idiot who blabbed about my ‘fanatical nonsensical rankings’ (I assume she meant ‘rantings’)… here’s my post:
My fanatical nonsensical rankings? Speaking of nonsense! Wake up, dear. Or go get vexed and lie down. (Hey, Zuckerberg would not let me write v-a-x-x-e-d no matter how many times I tried. A great example of what you are unaware of.)
I actually could not write ‘vaxxed’ at FB; it kept morphing to ‘vexed’. Georgie O’s Newspeak comes to mind, wherein the destruction of words prevents critical thought.
“A wildlife photographer could go for years and not grab a Bighorn shot this good. Enlarge it and look at the quality of the light, and the shadows, how one forms the animal’s backdrop and makes him pop, and how the shadow in the upper right quadrant perfectly balances it.”
And only someone with a photographer’s eye would know how to frame it and catch the image so perfectly.
I
I would say the Big Horn is an award winner! Seriously. That would look good on any wall in your home. It’s spectacular!
Some absolutely wonderful photos going on Allan, and that Bighorn photo is a one in a million.
Also hasn’t the world of drones opened up the photography world massively! …. so much more wonder & detail is visible from up high – without renting a helicopter!.
I follow some vloggers on youtube, and their best photography by far is taken with their own drone.
Yes, the drones are amazing. A whole other world from up there.
Here Allan, or anybody following Allan interested by photography, you can see some of my clichés: https://www.flickr.com/photos/58263939@N03/
Awesome!!
Thank you
Some good ones! My only suggestion (and I should take this advice) is to crop some for better composition and show fewer. (It’s not what you shoot, it’s what you show.) Like the ice sickle one could be a great abstract if you crop out the context.
Also, get Adobe Lightroom. Now that we are digital, there is not one photo that you can’t improve. Yes, it’s depressing too.
I like raw photos…but thank for the advice
What do you mean ‘raw’? If you shoot raw and not jpegs you HAVE to edit, with Lightroom or some other deal.
By raw i mean untouched…sorry for the confusion raw format exist
Just a heads up: A really interesting movie is free now on Youtube, American Ultra. Worth a look… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKy28QVw1JA&t=584s
It’s probably close to the truth on a surface level. Jesse Eisenberg as a CIA super-soldier and so on.
Getting there is half the fun; being there is all of it!
Life is a state of mind.
A story of chance (the gardener).
There will be growth in the spring!
One of my fave movies.
The big horn one is a marvel. My real hobby is photography (shared like 2000 photos on my FB account). Love to snap moment, specialy with birds…some mystic place along the St. Lawrence River, the old city of Quebec is also really photogenic…in fact the Chateau Frontenac is the most photographed hotel in the world (by example you can see it in the movie I Confess by Hitchcock…and they use it, as background for a field, in the baseball game for cell phone””Baseball Clash”)
Why not share some with us?
Yeah i have yo found a way to share outside FB
Thank you Allan. Your posts are appreciated and enjoyed.
Great slideshow Allan, maybe a warning regarding the goat beheading wouldn’t have gone amiss..
Check out Jay Maisel if you’re not already familiar with him. https://www.jaymaisel.com/ I’ve never seen him without a camera on his person so he is always seeing the moment.
And, he has a book that focuses on what you describe in your post. “It’s Not About the F-Stop.” https://www.amazon.com/About-F-Stop-Voices-That-Matter/dp/0321987128
Wow! – Absolutely incredible Photographer and character of a man, and he must be 90y.o now. Surely he must be about the best photographer in the world, he somehow reminds me of Allan’s friend Peter Beard.
And I loved the story about his 30,000sqft house they called “The Bank”, he bought it back in 1967 for $102,000, lived in it with his family for nearly 50 years, and finally sold it back in 2015 for $55million!!. And it was jam packed with photographs and various objects he collected 🙂
I dunno, Brett, Bob, but I don’t ‘see’ Maisel’s photos the way you do. I went through Puerto Rico and NYC and didn’t find anything I’d hang on my wall, or, frankly, even put in my portfolio as selects. Can you point out one or two of his images that knock you out?
Aside from Beard, you want to see some beauts, check out my old Montauk bud (or ex bud), Walter Iooss, Jr. https://www.walteriooss.com.
Hey Allan your photographs are right up there with the best of the best photographers, and every pic and video you put up are absolute bonza!.
I guess I was very impressed indeed with his people shots, especially the ‘Rome Wedding’.
Thank you for Walter Loos link too! – Awesome, I had heard of him too, but never heard of Jay Maisel before.
I didn’t think you were on FB, i have sent you a friend request, if you can stand more of the Brett there LOL! (yes I saw that mean spirited bitch there!).
He’s quite an interesting man. And, “The Bank” was amazing. He shot millions of slides over the years and many of the walls were filled with slides with the inside walls being glass. I studied with him right after 911.