If you have an upcoming car or plane trip I recommend downloading Mariette DiChristina’s incisive look into the creative process, “Brainstorm: Using Science to Spark Maximum Creativity”. One reoccurring theme in the book is the idea that we are all born with creative talent. But conventional educational wisdom rewards conformity, following the rules and staying in one’s box…all potential enemies of creative thought.

According to DiChristina, by the time students reach the second or third grade thinking creatively has been pushed aside by a more linear approach governed by established rules and regulations. In other words, don’t color outside the lines or be labeled misfit. 

But immunity from convention has an unfurling affect on one’s freak flag. By accepting that they are not part of the mainstream, contrarian students (the ones with the weird clothes) feel freer to exercise their creative pursuits.

http://www.amazon.com/Brainstorm-Using-Science-Maximum-Creativity/dp/1427204411/ref=pd_bbs_sr_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1219239821&sr=8-4

Photographers have been debating the implications of post capture image manipulation for some time now. The amount of acceptable manipulation depends largely on your photographic “tribe”. At one end of the spectrum are the photojournalists (who limit reality bending to moment of capture only)  I’m not sure where the other end is.

I’m opening this sore again because of a New York Times article<http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/17/fashion/17photo.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss> which addresses an issue I’m been thinking about for the last couple of years. The idea that while we, the self appointed guardians of photography, have been parceling out however much manipulation we deem appropriate, the end users of our art have been making up their own minds. 

From the Times “..as people fiddle with the photos in their scrapbooks, the tug of emotion and vanity can win out over the objective truth. And in some cases, it can even alter memories — Cousin Andy was at the wedding, right?”

If a mistake was made on our parts, it was the idea that expectations about photography would remain constant….namely, photography represents an objective slice of reality. While this has never been true, consumers of photography have frequently believed it to be. 

This universal shift in expectations about photography is bound to have lasting effects. Stay tuned. 

Keith

What’s more important, the process you use to produce photos or the actual photos you produce? OK, this is probably a circular argument but it’s a worthy thought exercise so stay with me.  

Several years ago I was photographing a Chinese calligrapher who explained that he cared only about his process, not the end product.  His world was reduced to the patch of paper meeting his brush. He drew energy from that spark in the brain generated by creating something. 

Experts who study the mind would probably say that spark is a chemical reward for positive behavior whipped up by the brain’s bartender.  I’m not sure how many bartenders are on duty in my brain but I know how the spark feels and I know when it occurs.  

Which brings me to the question of process vs. product. That buzz in the brain happens at the moment of photographic creation for me. Capturing a moment IS the fundamental photographic process….and the cooler the capture, the bigger the buzz. The tingle isn’t there for me during post capture work, even if I’m adding great value in Photoshop, LIghtroom…or printing in a wet darkroom.

Photography is about capturing a unique moment, enjoying the resulting neurochemical release and using that flush of energy to do it again. Congratulations. You are now addicted…but in a good way. 

keith

I attended one of the Santa Fe Photo workshops last week and gained some interesting insight on self-portraits. According to our instructor, Jay Maisel (living photography legend and national treasure) there are many reasons to shoot self-portraits. The subject is always available and will work cheap which takes some of the logistics out of the equation. But more importantly, images you capture of yourself will take on more value as time passes. Seemingly uninteresting photos today gain historical significance tomorrow because as the world changes the information in the photo can take on new meaning. 

I have recently started to re-think the self-portrait. For the longest time it seemed to be such a narcissistic pursuit.  That probably hasn’t changed but I have adopted the pro self-portrait approach. Any chance to practice the craft is an opportunity to learn something …..and maybe create a few historical documents along the way. 

more workshop images

http://homepage.mac.com/keithphilpott/Workshop%20week:%20Santa%20Fe/index.html

….so I’m shooting these aerials in Austin last week and the helicopter pilot I’m using seems to be unusually gifted. Almost telepathically, I see the image in my mind and Ray Asgar sees it a second later, positioning the aircraft perfectly. Ray’s machine is truly an extension of his body…but only after completing the flight do I comprehend the depth of Ray’s powers.

He apparently holds the record for opening beer bottles with his helicopter. This is accomplished by taping a bottle opener to the helicopter strut and then “flying” the opener into position to pop the cap. See it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw2wviQAXYw

I can’t think of anything to top this but Ray says he plans to undo a bra with his helicopter next. Stay tuned.

Keith

See gallery here:

It happened just over 20 years ago but recent oil prices have piqued our interest in sun cars again. The Pentax World Solar challenge was officially the first trans-continental solar car race traveling from Darwin to Adelaide, Australia. Several of the entries were primitive (by today’s standards) most notably an entry from southwestern Missouri dubbed the “flying bed”. Most were produced by college engineering students other entries came from early evangelists for alternative energy.  Car giant GM devoted a huge amount of resources to its Sunraycer entry, assuring a victory by a wide margin.

It took more than a week for most racers to make the 1629-mile trek down the lonely, Stuart Highway. Often referred to as “the Track” the highway passes through the familiar burgs of Alice Springs and Coober Pedy. At the Three Ways Roadhouse just north of Tennant Creek they’ll steal your underwear for wall decoration…or at least they did 20 years ago.

Keith

Cape Town to Dakar, see it here: http://homepage.mac.com/keithphilpott/WestAfricaGallery/index.html

Keith

Humor is hard to achieve in a photograph. Photos that sound funny often aren’t when you see them and things that sound mundane can sometimes get the biggest laugh. The best are visual jokes that defy description…they’re just funny to see. When I saw these carved pieces in Senegal I immediately chuckled. I quickly fired off a few frames using a 200mm lens to isolate the dark shapes against the light sand. As I walked past the shop owner quickly rearranged them.

Keith

Check out these amazing High Dynamic Range photos:

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/03/10/35-fantastic-hdr-pictures/

HDR images are created with multiple captures of the same subject but with optimum exposure for each dynamic range in the scene. The captures are then combined into one image using stitching software like Photoshop. This gives you perfect shadow detail in the same frame as perfect highlight detail.

I’m sure I’m not the first person to notice similarities between HDR and the Zone System. Ansel Adams and Fred Archer created the Zone System for processing B/W sheet film in the 1940’s. The system was based on the need for a systematic method of bringing exposure times, development and the photographer’s vision together. The process became Adam’s trademark and his name became linked to B/W nature photography. In theory, the Zone works for color too…except that exposure changes affect color shifts in film. HDR gives us the power to practice the Zone with color imagery and still easily control the color.

k

Every time someone messes with a photo and gets caught telling a visual fib it seems to re-ignite the debate about digital manipulation. Most recently a Chinese photographer was caught touching the third rail of photography.

A Chinese photographer (see WSJ Feb.22, 2008 p1A) has combined two images, one showing the new, $4 billion Qinghai-Xizang train and the other, Tibetan antelope galloping through the tundra. By combining these two images the photo depicts an alpine wilderness undisturbed by the shiny, high altitude train with the pressurized cabins.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-02/19/content_6464965.htm

The photo ran in newspapers first then won an award and was exhibited publicly. All hell broke loose when a curious student began to notice the footprints of Photoshop. Now the photographer has fallen on his tripod and gone to that place disgraced shooters go, presumed never to be heard from again.

I’m pretty familiar with the arguments about digital manipulation from a photographer’s perspective. But after seeing this story I wondered what other people might be thinking…photographic evidence in the courtroom for example.

There’re some interesting observations on attorney Rod McCarvel’s websitehttp://www.seanet.com/~rod/digiphot.html

Basically he says that although the photographic print looks pretty much the way it always has the fundamental process of creating it could not have changed more radically in the last few years. In the beginning, the expectation was that a scene had to exist somewhere if it was depicted in a photograph. Compared to the more subjective painting or drawing the photograph was perceived to be immune from interpretation. But with the advent of digital imaging technology, photography is much closer to the subjective painting and drawing because a scene doesn’t have to exist to be represented in a photo.

So if you take this argument into, say, the world of photojournalism photographers are now sent out to “draw and paint” the world as it is. Most journalists will try to remain objective but their photographic reportage will be subjected to more and more interpretation.

Escalating the discussion is the continued advent of user-friendly, image manipulating technology. People in the photography business have squabbling about this for the last decade but the biggest change is that consumers of imagery are beginning to see how easy it is to manipulate images by experiencing it themselves. This affects how they view all photographs.

I predict consumers of photography will grow more skeptical of the images they see. The more amazing the images appear, the more skeptical viewers will be.

But what’s really bothering me is that I seemed to have missed the part about the Chinese starting to worry about propaganda.

k