The Online Photographer

Colin Jago's self-portrait from Auspicious Dragon

Thanks for everything, Colin: Shades of Alec Soth. To the great dismay of his fans, Colin Jago recently brought his uniquely thoughtful, always enjoyable photography blog, the Photostream on Auspicious Dragon, to a close. Though we will mourn, we wish Colin all the best with all his newfound free time.

(OT) On the other side of no tomorrow: So I wake up this morning with an old song in my head. I go to the closet and find the disk—a Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab "Original Master Recording" of Steely Dan's "Katy Lied," which I probably haven't listened to in fifteen years—and cue it up on the turntable. And then, when I settle down with some freshly brewed coffee, what do you know, there's this in the virtual morning paper.

Through late November, more than 2.1 million vinyl records had been sold in 2009, an increase of more than 35 percent in a year, according to Nielsen Soundscan. That total, though it represents less than 1 percent of all album sales, including CDs and digital downloads, is the highest for vinyl records in any year since Nielsen began tracking them in 1991....

Which is true, except, um, about a third of those sales were to me. Well, not really. (Daddy don't live in that New York City no more....)

In case you're a 1-percenter too, Mosaic's new four-disc limited-edition "Thelonious Monk at the It Club" is a religious experience. I'm just sayin'.

Onion gets the gestalt of digital photography: New device desirable, old device undesirable.

...The new device is so advanced when compared to the old device that it makes the old device appear much older than it actually is. However, the new device is reportedly not so radically different as to cause confusion or unwanted anxiety among those familiar with the feel of the old device.

'Its higher price indicates to me that it is superior, and that not everyone will be able to afford it, which only makes me want to possess it more,' said Tim Sturges, owner of the old device, which he obtained 18 months ago when it was still the new device. 'I feel a strong urge to purchase the new device. Owning the new device will please me and improve my daily life.'

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Camera Collector's Corner: Here's one for the glass case that few will be able to match. Wow.

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Comic by Steve Bell, The Guardian

Police admonished: At least the British appear to be getting this matter sorted. The Independent reports that the Government's independent reviewer of anti-terrorism laws, Lord Carlile of Berriew, has warned the police about hassling photographers to no purpose. Says Lord Carlile, "The police have to be very careful about stopping people who are taking what I would call leisure photographs, and indeed professional photographers. The fact that someone is taking photographs is not prima facie a good reason for stop and search and is very far from raising suspicion." Hear, hear.

UPDATE to the above: See here. (Thanks to David Nicol)

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Kirin Beer cam (a real beer can in the background). Photo by Dirk Rösler.

It's real Lego. And a real camera.

Erin Fong's more ergonomic DSLR concept

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Rare in the wild: One of the most wonderful of classical photographical typos, seldom actually encountered. Observed on Ebay.

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Micro 4/3 in action: Reader Roy Feldman used the Panasonic GF1 and 20mm ƒ/1.7 lens to do a short feature on the painter Stephen Magsig for Michigan Radio Picture Project. Interesting, too, because, as you can see from the presentation, Mr. Magsig is a photographer of sorts, too.

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Your Facebook pictures say so much about you: A Canadian woman on long-term sick leave for depression says she lost her benefits because her insurance agent found photos of her on her Facebook page in which she appeared to be having fun. She had been diagnosed with major depression and was receiving monthly sick-leave benefits from insurance giant Manulife. But the payments dried up this fall when her insurance agent found pictures showing her having a good time at a Chippendales bar show, at her birthday party, and on a sun holiday.

The woman said she was following her doctor's advice by trying to have fun as a way to forget her troubles.

(Associated Press)

And in an unrelated Facebook note, our friend Bob Burnett came across this on the social networking site:

Name: Petition to make bendy buses make accordion noises as they go round corners
Category: Common Interest—Beliefs & Causes
Description: A pressure group to increase the enjoyment of public transport.
Privacy Type: Open: All content is public.

Adapters are getting popular, yes: But this is ridiculous / sublime.

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...The rosy glow of product placement. Billie Holiday, trains going through tunnels, that special fragrance, and...

Photo: Nonja

So easy a caveman could do it? Photography's so easy an ape could do it.

Okay, so Nonja is...well, not that good. But since I mentioned Dr. Johnson the other day, recall what the good (albeit sexist*) lexicographer said about a dog walking on its hind legs: "...it is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all."

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Thom's 2010: One of the regular high points of my web reading year has arrived: Thom Hogan's "2010 Nikon Predictions" arrived a couple of weeks ago. (Pity that word "Nikon" is in the title—although it's accurate—as the article, as usual, is a must-read for shudderbugs of any allegiance.) A snapshot of the industry and a bellwether—and entertainment in prose, to boot. Might need a refill on the coffee, but do not miss.

Mike
(Thanks to Brian Dickie, Ken Tanaka, Steven House, Jaladhi Pujara, Rod Purcell, Dean Forbes, Sandy Rothberg, Paul Parker, and Rob Atkins)

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*The full quote is, "Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all."

Featured Comment by Colin Jago: "Many thanks. And for the avoidance of doubt: that newly free time is going to be used for, you know, actually taking some photographs."

Featured Comment by robert e: "According to photographer Thorsten Overgaard, that is [Audrey] Tautou's own M8 in the Chanel ad. I've read that she photographs every journalist who interviews her."

From Chicago Public Radio's "This American Life."

(In case you can't see this, the direct link is here.)

Mike
(I can't remember who sent me this, but thanks!)

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Featured Comment by Yunfat: "Funny. But James Nachtwey has told of an opposite effect as well: 

If there comes a time when I'm the only one who can make a difference, then I'll suspend being a journalist and help people. I have intervened in lynch mobs several times over the years and managed to save people. And there was a time I tried to save a man in Indonesia.

People from a mosque in Jakarta were offended that a Christian church had a bingo parlor next to the mosque. They saw bingo as a form of gambling, which was against their religious beliefs. So they attacked the bingo parlor and began to kill the Christian guards. As I asked people in the street what was going on, one of the guards came running up an alleyway, chased by a mob. I tried to stop the mob from killing the guy. Three times they actually stopped. Once, a man was about to cut the guard's throat. At that point, I got on my hands and knees and begged him not to do it. And he didn't do it. He actually put down his knife and stood the guard up. But then the mob turned on me and became very threatening. People were in my face, pushing me back. While they were pushing me back, they finished the guard off. I thought that if one of them struck me, they'd probably take me out as well. I resumed taking pictures of the guard, and that didn't seem to bother the mob. They allowed me to photograph it. But they wouldn't allow me to stop it.

—James Nachtwey

...although I have to say anyone else who did what he did would probably end up dead. I firmly believe that cameras can lend the appearance of being an impartial arbiter, but I certainly won't be putting myself in front of a murderous mob anytime soon."

Featured Comment by Ctein: "Okay, as one of those really small kids most likely to get picked on in elementary school, I say from experience that blaming this on the camera game is bullsh*t. Kids in elementary schools don't make it a habit to break up fights. They are not budding young Good Samaritans. They're less civilized and less socially conscious than your average adult in such a situation. Which is setting the bar awfully low. The camera game at most provided safe psychological rationalization for them not getting involved, but that's all."

Featured Comment by J Ho: "Being one who grew up during the first generation of 'extreme sports,' I witnessed hundreds of instances where human behavior radically changed once a camera was introduced into a situation—especially when the camera was being wielded by a 'professional' (something I happened to be at the time).

"Once the possibility of someone's heroic/insane/justplainstupid exploits being recorded (not to mention maybe being published in a magazine/video) for others to witness, individual (and group) behavior became far less 'risk-averse' and far more aggressive.

"It was as predictable as the sun rising: 'pro' shows up with some cool cameras and the injuries would commence. In fact, some photographers would refuse to even begin shooting until the skater/bmxer took a big enough chance to make it worth 'wasting' film (Velvia) or video (High-8).

"The term of art was 'dying for the camera.'

"A month or two later the photo/video would be published, and the stunt portrayed would come to be considered 'normal' or a 'baseline' for the next series of actions—ever more risky, ever more 'camera worthy.' Ultimately, we had people jumping out of helicopters hovering above ramps and vaulting 50-foot gaps between ten story buildings; at the time, we thought that kind of stuff was the ultimate, although it seems rather quaint in retrospect."

Yoshihisa Maitani, 1933-2009

Photo: Olympus Corp.

I've returned, ready, rested, and rarin' to get goin' again. I notice the world has not stood still while I've been away: on July 30th the world lost Yoshihisa Maitani, who, partly by happenstance* and partly by accomplishment, will be forever known as one of the great camera designers in photo history; and, in light of new intelligence, I have decided to retract some past snarky comments I made about Annie Leibovitz. I hereby apologize for calling her Romulus and Remus riff for the Lavazza calendar "the worst photograph ever made." She's had more important issues to deal with, as recent news makes painfully clear, and was doubtless scrambling to crack a hard nut when perpetrating that pic. On a different level than many of us will ever inhabit, true, but that probably makes it worse, if anything. Most of us mortals have been between that nasty rock and hard place a time or three. So I take it back, what I said. Good luck to her.

So what did I do on my summer vacation? I hope to write at least one report. (One of my grade school teachers gave everyone an automatic "A plus" for their "What I Did Last Summer" essays. I hope you'll be feeling similarly lenient when you slog through mine). One thing I can tell you is that I only used one single lens for ten days, the Pentax 15mm ƒ/4, to try to force my eyes to deal with its flagrant wideness. The strategy only sorta worked, but it kinda did. Sorta. Again, I hope to report, once re-entry into real life is fully accomplished. (Re-entry being my sister-in-law Basia's apt term for returning from an extended vacation. Hold the emails: I'll be dealing with the existing stack for several days. What's harder, do you suppose, getting ready to go away, or coming back?) Posts might be light for the next little stretch, but rest assured the fire's relit and the old engine chuffing away again. Thanks for coming by while I was gone (the site received a little more than 160,000 visits while I was away. Not losing all my traffic sure makes it less stressful to go).

Cheers,

Mike

P.S. Oh, and, to brag shamelessly, I sank a 37-foot putt, longest of my life by far. Sixty-odd shots that good, all strung together, and I could beat Tiger Woods. Yeah. Right. I'll work on that.

*It was not common then or now for Japanese workers to be allowed to stand out and do the star turn, and Olympus management reportedly had to be persuaded by its American advertising people to allow Maitani-san to be singled out in a series of still-famous ads.

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Featured Comment by Roger: "I'm not hooked on T.O.P. I could have stopped my daily checks of the site to see if you were back early any time I felt like it. Really."

Featured Comment by Dave Kee: "Annie, oh Annie, what were you thinking? Never having had much money I am always amazed (and a little repelled) by rich f#%ks who can't seem to make do with so much. On the other hand who really needed that red Miata? Tolerance, tolerance."

Mike replies: Thanks, Roger (and to everyone who sent good wishes on either end of my recent break). Dave, how come you wrote "#%" for "ol"? (Just kidding.)

I hope Ken doesn't mind us pointing this out, but it is pretty funny....

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Featured Comment by Stephen Gillette: "A cautionary tale for all of us husbands to ponder. The '92 Subaru Justy comment really scares me. I think my wife would aim higher, but then again...."

UPDATE: The link is gone now. It was trivial—a Craig's List ad ostensibly by a woman from North York, near Toronto, wanting to trade in her "slightly defective" husband because he is obsessed with reading Ken Rockwell's website and wastes money buying all the latest cameras. One of the things she listed that she would take in trade for him was a '92 Subaru Justy. —Ed.

Michele McNally, Picture Editor for The New York Times, is answering questions, through tomorrow. Some good answers already.

Phase One has purchased Leaf. (Warning: PDF link). As Our Humble Correspondent, the Curator and Chief Featherduster at the Northeast Kingdom Field Camera Repository and Odd Format Graveyard puts it, "not something that's going to affect the average TOP reader. But in the small puddle of the MF digital market, it's an enormous splash."

Will there be a professional version of the Olympus EP-1? The BJoP's interview with Mr. Akira Watanabe.

Michael G. Dougan, Tambay (the Watchman)

This is the first picture I've personally seen from the new Fujifilm GF670 / Bessa 667. Brief review and more pictures by Michael Dougan at Japan Exposures.

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I normally don't like to write about something until I actually have something to say about it, and don't get me wrong, I really appreciate getting tips from people. But something that happens here periodically is that a news item will seem so "right" for TOP that dozens and dozens of people will send me emails about it all at once, and I feel like I have to mention it if only to bring the flood of emails to a stop! (Not that I don't appreciate tips, seriously. How else would I know about anything? I live in Wisconsin. Yesterday the most exciting thing that happened here was that there was a squirrel on the roof.)

Okay, so, this morning, by audience acclaim: The New York Times has started a new photojournalism blog.

It's called "Lens," and it took me a while to figure out. Whenever I come across an "innovative" web format, it points out how standardized a lot of web content has become, to the point that you don't have to think about how most sites work. I read a couple of "webzines" (Playback and Winding Road), that remind me whenever I read them how annoying and inconvenient their magazine-simulator format is, and how much better they'd be if they were simply presented in a standard web format. As it is, you get preoccupied with navigation, zooming in and out, trying to figure out how to go from one article to the next one you want to see, etc., etc.

Okay, so here's how you use Lens. You go to the static introductory page first, then click on the "let's start looking at pictures" link at the bottom of the post. That brings you to the actual blog, which runs from left to right instead of vertically. (Here's the direct link.) When you go to full-screen mode, the pictures are nicely sized but you have to peer at the tiny captions—especially annoying on the "Pictures of the Day" post where you zip incongruously from one world hotspot to another with nothing but the captions to ground you. You have to sort out which arrow takes you to the next picture in the entry (the one at the bottom) and which arrow takes you to the next entry (the one at the right-hand edge). Oh, and once you're on the "Read more" page for any given entry, it's like the old joke about asking for directions in New Hampshire: "Can't get there from here."

I assume I'm going to get used to all this.

And while I'm kvetching and caviling, when will writers and editors start to realize that simple English words aren't good web names? A good web name is something unique, so it's distinctive and can be searched for (oh, all right—I suppose "The Online Photographer" isn't a good web name either). There's a British speaker manufacturer called "Spendor," for example, named after its founder Spencer Hughes and his wife, Dorothy. Inadvertently, Spencer Hughes stumbled on a perfect web name years before the web existed—there's no other Spendor; search Spendor on the web and virtually every result is about Spendor speakers. As I've repeated many times now, the name of my town, Waukesha, despite being unpronounceable by any operator past a fifty-mile radius, is still a good web name: Google "Waukesha" and you get where I live. Take that, all you Springfields.

Now try searching for lens. The new Times site does show up on the first page, but so does a "shareholder activist investment firm," a record label, a manual for "the light, efficient network simulator," a Wikipedia entry on optics, and LensCrafters, a retailer of eyeglasses and contact lenses.

I'm being petty, I know. Hey, I told you at the start I didn't have anything to say.

So how good is Lens-the-blog-not-the-light-efficient-network-simulator? Remains to be seen. On the other hand, anything Fred Conrad and David Burnett want to say, I'll read.

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Quote 'o the Month: Ken Jarecke, from a hard-knuckled little snarl entitled "Short-Term Thinking": "Since when is not being as dishonest as the Iranian government a valid journalistic standard for the American news media?"

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And Speaking of Iran and the infamous fourth missile... It appears they're at it again. (Are Iranian propagandists stupid, or do they just think we are?)

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Pat Boone Signature Leica: Making fun of Leica special issues and commemoratives is an old and honorable sport, but this one is almost too easy. In which upper-crusty staple of Eastern prep school English classes is it explained that white bucks are cool only when they're pristine, until such time as it's just impossible to keep them clean any more, at which point "dirty bucks" become all the rage? Was that John Knowles? J.D. Salinger? John Updike? F. Scott Fitzgerald? Must have been Fitzgerald. One thing seems indisputable: the latest value-added M camera should only be used while wearing white cotton trousers, or a linen suit...

...Just remember that if you buy one in June, it had better be dirty by November.

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National Geographic's Infinite Photograph

Read more about it here.

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The March of Convergence: The editors of Esquire magazine imagine [vide] that Greg Williams' March 4 cover of the magazine, featuring Megan Fox, is the first magazine cover ever shot with a movie camera—the Red One.

It's certainly the first time we have encountered the title "photographer-director," in the following sentence: "Using the RedONE, a video camera that captures images at four times the resolution of high-definition, photographer-director Greg Williams...recorded ten minutes of loosely scripted footage with Fox—getting out of bed, rolling around on a pool chair, inexplicably lighting a barbecue." (We're curious as to how he held the camera steady while he rolled around on a pool chair, putting aside entirely our puzzlement as to how exactly one goes about lighting a barbecue "inexplicably.")

But, apropos our April 16th post, look what happens when he, too, wants to signify "camera" in an advertising photograph:

Photo: Greg Williams, from his website

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The Shifting Contradictions and Beauties of the World: Speaking of convergence, this gem comes from a 2006 Bomb interview with Yale's Tod Papageorge (who left an interesting comment about this post the other day regarding his old friend, the late Garry Winogrand) ("RW" is Richard B. Woodward):

RW Are the mistakes that your students are prone to now the same mistakes that students were prone to when you were teaching back in the late '60s?

TP No. I think now that, in general—and this includes a lot of what I see in Chelsea even more than what I see from students at Yale—there’s a failure to understand how much richer in surprise and creative possibility the world is for photographers in comparison to their imagination. This is an understanding that an earlier generation of students, and photographers, accepted as a first principle. Now ideas are paramount, and the computer and Photoshop are seen as the engines to stage and digitally coax those ideas into a physical form—typically a very large form. This process is synthetic, and the results, for me, are often emotionally synthetic too. Sure, things have to change, but photography-as-illustration, even sublime illustration, seems to me an uninteresting direction for the medium to be tracking now, particularly at such a difficult time in the general American culture. All in all, I think that there’s as much real discovery and excitement in the digital videos that my students at Yale are making as there is in the still photography I see either there or in New York, perhaps because the video camera, like the 35 mm camera 30 years ago, can be carried everywhere, and locks onto the shifting contradictions and beauties of the world more directly and unselfconsciously than many photographers now seem to feel still photography can, or should, do.

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And You Thought Kittens Were Bad: On Photo Synthesis, University of Illinois molecular phylogenetics postdoctoral researcher (and photographer) Alex Wild interestingly speculates that anthropomorphism makes even scientific photographs more accessible to the primate brain (we humans, he means) and thus, more popular.

Alex Wild: Are these two ants sharing an intimate moment?

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Sensitive Summicron Surgery: We're not big fans of adaptors that necessitate stop-down metering, but in case that's one of the ways you have fun with photography, you might want to know that Leitax is now making Leica lens to Nikon body adapter kits. We're all thumbs, and feel that any operation involving loose ball-bearings is best avoided, lest the [expletive deleted] little bastard end up hidden in a tiny crack in the floor on the far side of the room; but maybe you're a bit more competent.

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New Life for the Old Gang: Bob Dylan's new music video from "Together Through Life," like the album cover, uses photographs from Bruce Davidson's "Brooklyn Gang" project. Check it out (under "Check Out Related Media").

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And for a humpday smile... The wry visual humor of René Maltête.

Mike
(Thanks to Ken Jarecke, Stan Banos, Edd Fuller, Albano Garcia, Sungazer, Robin Dreyer, Dale Moreau, and Eolake.)

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Featured Comment by bobdales:

"Damn! I forgot my white Leica."

Featured Comment by Stuart Hamilton: "That's a very interesting interview with Tod Papageorge, and as a bonus includes a link to another with Emmet Gowin. I like to be reminded that photography, like all the arts, is mysterious and difficult, and that technique is just the beginning. Thanks Mike."

...Plus, it's Jazz Appreciation Month, which I can get into
Who knew there was an International Garden Photographer of the Year? Then again, I didn't even know that today is Buddha's Birthday in Japan. It's also Poetry Appreciation Month. April is the coolest* month....

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The Eyeborg

Canadian filmmaker Rob Spence, who lost an eye in a childhood accident** and previously fitted himself with an artificial eye with a working red LED in it (shown above), is now working with a team to install a digital camera in a prosthetic eye. He says he intends to "provide a new perspective on the growth of surveillance in western societies."

The members of the Eyeborg project are trying to fit a digital camera, a wireless transmitter and a power supply into the prosthetic eye.

(Note: in this case the digital camera is just a digital camera, unrelated to the efforts reported in a popular documentary to create a photomechanical eye connected to the brain.)

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The Thesis of Hockney (as in David) and Falco (as in Charles M.)

"The Hockney-Falco Thesis: Our thesis is that certain elements in certain paintings made as early as c1430 were produced as a result of the artist using either concave mirrors or refractive lenses to project the images of objects illuminated by sunlight onto his board/canvas. The artist then traced some portions of the projected images, made sufficient marks to capture only the optical perspective of other portions, and altered or completely ignored yet other portions where the projections did not suit his artistic vision. As a result, these paintings are composites containing elements that are 'eyeballed' along with ones that are 'optics-based.' Further, starting at the same time, the unique look of the projected image began to exert a strong influence on the appearance of other works even where optical projections had not been directly used as an aid."

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'Seven Days' superior to '$12 Million Shark'?
Our friend Joe Reifer writes to say that he just finished reading The $12 Million Stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art, and he finds it inferior to Sarah Thornton's Seven Days in the Art World, which he found to be more entertaining and "not as dry."

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A veritable cache of rare books

Fred Herzog, Crossing Main, 1968

Speaking of books, remember the big deal over Fred Herzog's beautiful book of nearly forgotten pictures from the '40s through the '70s, Vancouver Photographs? You might recall that, following our review, the book went from #2,200+ on Amazon Canada to #1, and then quickly sold out.

Well, we've learned that the Vancouver Art Gallery, which co-published the book with Douglas & McIntyre, still has some copies! If you were one of the people who were frustrated last time, you have another chance***. You can call their store (in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) at +604.662.4706, or email them. (Note that the store doesn't open until 10 a.m. Pacific Time.)

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Here, Elvis, hold this a sec
DSC Labs' "Test Charts in Action" contest winners.

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Special offer from Calumet for wedding photographers

Calumet Photographic is offering a special price on the Phase One 645 camera body equipped with the P21+ Digital camera Back, 80mm ƒ/2.8 AF Lens, Phase One Classic Warranty, and Calumet Travelite 1500ws Two-Head Umbrella Kit. Only $12,989.99.

The P21+ digital back offers a high-speed capture rate of up to 70 frames per minute of 18 megapixel, 16-bit capture. The camera accepts all the Mamiya 645 lenses, and also film backs.

(I was hoping an up-to-speed wedding photographer somewhere could explain to us why anyone would choose this option in preference to a D3X, A900, or 5D Mark II at less cost....)

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New Polar site

Freeze Frame is a brand new website featuring the archives of the Scott Polar Research Institute at the University of Cambridge. The site features extensive galleries of photographs taken from 1845 to 1982 on research expeditions to both Poles.

Just in case you haven't had enough of the snow yet.

Mike
(Thanks to Benjamin Marks, Oren Grad, Joe R., Vlatko Juric-Kokic, and Robert Phillips)

*Little T.S. Eliot joke there.

**Running with scissors, we assume.

***Another chance to buy the book, but, you'll note, also another chance to be frustrated. If you really wanted it and you miss it again, well, I live in New York City and I'm listed under "John Smith."

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