Shoes and the Cobblers Kids

So I know why the cobblers whole family doesnt have shoes. The same reason why I dont have many family pictures at all. In fact, I have more pictures of Noah and his mom than I do of Amy and the kids. Not because I'd rather shoot her than my wife, but that I'd rather spend time with my wife than take pictures when we're together. Anyway, I knew I NEEDED to take some pictures while I had all my kids and wife together so we met Amy's parents in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia so "Grampy Dub" could press the shutter for us on some family shots. I think they turned out pretty nice.

I'd take a test shot or two before I jumped in to make sure the light and basic angle was right. I tried to set up some keepers for test shots too.





Dubby did double duty as my stand in. I promised to double his normal rate!

Posing tip from Lens Crafters For Photographers and Photographees (I think I just made up a word)

Last time I was in Lens Crafters picking out some glasses, I happened to notice the mirrors the have on the walls are posted a little high. Now I'm not a short guy at 5'11" and 3/4, and I still noticed the height. I thought "What about the poor short people of the world", then the song about "Short people got no reason to live" popped into my head and I thought about the show "Little People Big World" and who might sue because Lens Crafters makes short people feel inadequate with the height of their mirrors. Then it hit me. They do that so you'll raise your chin and see yourself in a more flattering pose. I noticed because instead of looking at the frames, I was reminded how good looking I am, even if I have gained 30lbs since I was active duty. And that's the thing, the raised chin and slightly higher angle erased the extra chin that's been creeping in below the real one.

Recently I was on a video shoot and someone said to the subject being interviewed "Dont ever let someone shoot down on you. It makes you look less important." He's right to an extent, but that effect takes a pretty dramatic angle. That guy had a little of that Napoleon thing goin on anyway so I didn't argue. I just set my camera at a slightly higher angle and everyone's happy. It doesn't have to be noticeably higher, just high enough to accentuate the jawbone.

So next time you're in a mall, stop into the Lens Crafters and see what I'm talking about.

Ashley Before She Pops!

I didn't know my friend Ashley was pregnant until I saw something about it on Facebook. I contacted her and told her she needed pictures done. She was already in her 8th month. By the time we got around to taking these pictures she was 13 days out from her due date. She was a trooper though! I kept saying "Are you comfortable?" as we hiked up to the waterfall. I really didn't want to deal with her water breaking and having to drive her to to hospital. Although maybe I could have done newborn pictures in the same session!

Shannon and Anthony's Wedding

Here's a few of my favorites from Amy's cousin Shannon and her new husband Anthony's wedding. They are such a great, fun loving couple. They are my first couple that opted for the "first look" so we could get a few extra shots before the ceremony. It was the first wedding that I took the time to incorporate off camera flash in most of the staged shots. I was super pleased with the results. It was also one of the few weddings I've ever been to where everything was pretty much on time! It was a real pleasure. Oh, and they rode off into the sunset on a motorcycle! How fun is that?

Weirdness

I was strolling through some pictures the other day and thought "Man, these look different to me than they used to" I'm not talking about editing style or anything. These were straight out of the camera. The tones were much smoother and colors more pleasant. I cant think of anything that I've changed about my approach towards taking pictures. It seems almost like something about my camera changed. Weird.

Natasha and Torrie's wedding

I had the privilege of shooting a co-workers wedding. Natasha is something of a photographer herself and working in a Visual Information shop, there are a handfull of others she could have asked. But she asked me. Thanks Nattie! Here are a couple from her day:

Love/hate relationship

Well, not really a relationship. David Hobby of Strobist featured a series of behind the scenes videos on Dave Hill in a recent blog post. So I watched the videos and was curious as to the result, so I peeked over to Dave Hill's website. I can't stand that over produced, comic book, fake as all getout style! I throw up a little bit when i see stuff like that. I saw him using a Mamiya 7, medium format rangefinder film camera during part of the first video. I was a bit intrigued and wondered if he'd have any film shots in his gallery. As I was dragging the mouse over to close the browser, I noticed a "Personal" section to his site. His personal section is FILLED with some of the most GORGEOUS black and white film work I've seen in a while, including some large format pieces! I've been exploring the black and white medium and large format film niche for a while and this guy has pretty much what I'm striving for. Obviously he's taking these along side his commercial, highly produced and photoshopped work. I think these are much more pleasant though. Different strokes, I guess.

On Carrying a Camera

DC Drive HD
Originally uploaded by Charles Allen

I read this post the other day about carrying a camera all the time. I dont know why I thought I was the only one that thought like that. He took the words out of my mouth. Especially with this: "...when I am driving around, such as when I am coming home from work, I will try to compose photos of what I am seeing out of my window in my mind."

Natasha Ericson

Natasha Ericson
Originally uploaded by Charles Allen

I took the time to experiment a little with the antique 4x5 camera I have. It takes forever to set up and the results are a little unpredictable with such an old camera, but this is also my first print from it. It's like a large format Holga, a nice effect when it works out, but not commercially viable. I'm looking to buy a modern large format camera to solidify this technique.

Art

So I've been a little conflicted about photography as art. I subscribe to too many photography blogs and some of them lean towards the "artsy" side of photography. While I appreciate some pictures I see classified as "Fine Art" others I think are just bad pictures. Jackson Pollock famously splattered paint and called it art. I think some of these photographers whimsically snap pictures and call them art. Today I read this from the A Photo Editor blog:

“I always feel as though there’s supposed to be some deeper meaning behind my pictures, a meaning other than ‘Something inside me connected with what I saw in front of me, so I pulled out my camera and took a picture.’ That does not seem to fly as an artist statement. Why, I’m not sure.” Emily Shur (here)

That's kinda how I feel! I think from now on, my artists statement will be something like "I thought it looked pretty."

I guess there'll always be stuff that I like that others don't for reasons I cant explain. I dont even know where I draw the line between what I think is art or not, and I certainly dont want to dismiss photography as purely documentary. I just dont get some of it.

I'll give you a prime example. Chase Jarvis is one of the leading commercial photographers in the country maybe even the world today. Back in September, he did a fun little experiment where he asked his blog readers to help him edit his portfolio by picking out one favorite and one least favorite. The answers were all over the board, but there were some that rated consistantly low and some high. He asked some art buyer friends the same questions and they picked completely different pictures. The ones that the art buyers picked generally ranked pretty low by his readers perspective and are very much the artsy stuff I dont care for. Dont get me wrong, I love his work and think it's awesome he is where he is today, I just dont get the artsy stuff.

I'd love to hear what you think. Do you have photographers that you think are artsy but cool? Do you have any insight on some of the snapshots people call fine art?