Making a Move

I've enjoyed having this blog on Blogspot, although I don't update it as much as I'd like. I want to be able to do a bit more than Blogger will allow, so I'm making a move over to Wordpress.

If you follow me in a news reader then you won't even see this post, I've switched the feed to forward over. If you're checking this out at pdaphotography.blogspot.com, however, jump over to pdaphotography.com, if you don't mind.

Thanks very much for following along, I've got some exciting things on the way. :)

Beyond the Sunset

A few weeks back someone commented on this image that Indiana must be as gorgeous as her friend says. Without really thinking about it I replied that gorgeous is everywhere.

Thinking through all this it occurred to me that the only reason sunsets and flowers are beautiful is because we all agree that they're beautiful. There's nothing inherently more beautiful in a flower, compared to a doorknob. It's just that we decide that we like the shape and color and texture of a flower more.

One of the benefits of shooting every day has been in increasing the sensitivity for interesting things; and now that I'm thinking of beauty as something that is implied I see it everywhere.

What a gift, photography. That I'm as captivated by a doorknob as I am by a sunset. I live in a fascinating world.

On Being Interesting

“Tell me, how can I take more interesting photos?” With missing a beat, Jay [Maisel] volleyed back, “Become a more interesting person.”

From Scott Kelby's Guest Blog Wednesday with Chris Orwig.

Suffering makes for interesting, but what type of interesting is up to the sufferer.

My Good Fortune

This is the greatest good fortune, to not only be fascinated by life, but to be able to capture and to share it.

(Apologies to James Herriot for rephrasing a line of his, about his fascination with animals.)

More Modern Dance

Not writing much, but photographing quite a bit. A few months back while surfing through some other photographers websites it struck home, how really hard photography is. Every time I think I'm beginning to understand how big the pool is I realize it's a pond, or a lake, or an ocean.

I had been working at it pretty consistently for almost two years, and improving, but it seemed like I still had so far to go before I was communicating visually in the way other photographers were. Again, I got to comparing photography to playing an instrument, and thought about how hard a concert pianist works at their craft.

I remember wondering as a child, how someone could spend eight hours a day practicing the piano. I understand where that passion comes from now.

So I've redoubled my efforts. In the past two months I've had my camera with me almost always and make a point of photographing every day. Certainly not for eight hours, and some days it's only for the dogs' evening walk, but I'm making images. I'm also using my iPhone camera more with apps like Camera Bag (if you're going lo-fi, why not really go all the way. ;) )

I've really seen a difference, and my style is really starting to come through. It's been a fantastic exercise.

Flickr Meetup this Evening

I'm really late in getting this out here, but we're having a Flickr meetup at the Indianapolis Museum of Art this evening. 6PM, we're meeting at the Love sculpture. This is open to everyone, Flickr users or not (and your families). :)

We usually just wander and make pictures at these meetups, but this time those of us who are interested plan to work on portraiture a bit.

I'm thinking of heading over a little early to walk around inside the IMA. I've been enjoying a new iPhone app called Art, it's a simple art gallery application with 400+ famous works. I've been wanting to start learning a bit about art history and this application has really helped fuel that fire.

I'm especially impressed with Caravaggio. The light in his portraits have really given me something to think about.

Anyway, I'm hoping to be there a bit early to enjoy some of the art there myself. Come out to the meetup if you're available, we always have a great time.

Eight Bit Vision

After photography club this last week a few of us went out for some food and beer and talk, and we had a great talk. We got into all sorts of things, from the technical details of using the back button for focus activation, to lighting setups with reflectors, to maximum sync speeds and how this can limit your lighting options when shooting outdoors...

One of the diatribes I got onto, something that I've been thinking about lately, was how refined your vision can become over time. I'm beginning to understand how a blind person's hearing can become hyper acute, I see things now that I never noticed before, things that seem so plainly obvious.

It's as though you gain the ability to see in higher bit depths. (Or not, if you don't care for nerdy simile.) When you start out you've got eight bit vision, where there aren't many tones between each color, with high contrast, losing detail in the shadows. With work you expand the depth, so subtleties that you glanced over before jump out.

I see patches of light that I would have never noticed, and I know why they're there. The sun coming in this window and bouncing off that white door...

I'm excited to see how far this goes. Already I see with such greater acuity, I wonder what I'll be seeing this time next year, or in five years.