(embiggenable)• iPhone
week of 9/20/20 part 1 ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
week of 9/20/20 part 2 ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
TODAY IS THE LAST FULL DAY + NIGHT AT RIST CAMP. For the last week, we have been treated to great weather and a spectacular Autumn color display ... a wonderful way to make an exit.
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AS OUR 5 WEEK SOJOURN AT RIST CAMP WINDS DOWN, my picture count hovers around the 150-60 mark. No doubt, with Autumn color near its peak-Leaf Peeper Season-there will be another 40-50 pictures added over the next 4 days.
Not a single picture has been made, during this time at camp, with my Olympus µ4/3 cameras. Never felt the need for it inasmuch as the iPhone continues to deliver the goods. Looking forward to getting home and firing up the printer cuz I think I've got some good ones.
FYI, in answer to the question in my last entry, I can now write with a high degree of certainty that I am not a cow.
it’s that time again ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
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SOMETIMES HEAVEN IS A PLACE WHERE nothing ever happens. But, for some reason(s), pictures are made. And then, something is happening here, but you don't know what it is. Do you, Mr. Jones?
My apologies to Mssrs. Dylan and Byrne. However, in fact, there are times when this is exactly how it feels.
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blast furnace ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
Hudson River ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
Hudson River ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
TOOK SOME CAMP VISITORS A COUPLE MILES down the road to the site of the remains of an iron ore mine which was built pre-American Civil War. Pictured here is the 5-story blast furnance.
Due to some bad luck, bad timing and an impurity in the iron ore-later discovered to be titanium-the mine was in operation for only 3 years,1854-57. The mine was built along the very upper reaches-1/4 mile from its source-of the Hudson River (2 pictures aboce).
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(embiggenable) • iPhone
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BEEN WAY UNDER THE WEATHER FOR A FEW DAYS so my posting as been sub par. However, I awoke today only to read yet another flat-out stupid / ignorant / mis-informed Mike Johnston statement, re: the iPhone as a picture making device is...
"...not quite there from a technical standpoint. It's perfectly adequate for taking pictures to be viewed on...itself. And for emailing and texting. (And for putting on the blog, maximum width 800 pixels.) But I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be as happy with it if I were making even small prints."
He then goes on to write that "Although I should try that. I also don't own the latest thing in iPhones; mine is a 7+, released almost exactly four years ago."
So, he hasn't made any prints from his 4-year old iPhone but he's pretty sure he would not be happy with them if he did. So, by that lupey logic, next time he is given a new camera to review, he should instead obtain a 2 generation older model of the same camera and just paste and copy his impressions of that camera into his review of the new camera.
STUPID. IGNORANT. UN-INFORMED.
There. I wrote it. Now I can go back and take another rest.
And, PS (to Mike) re: pictures made with the iPhone are "perfectly adequate for taking pictures to be viewed on...itself. And for emailing and texting.". Actually sir, in my experience, my iPhone pictures are more than perfectly adequate to viewed on gallery walls, printed to 24x24 inches and larger. Maybe you need to get out more and see what's going in the world of photography.
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RE: THE DECLINE OF / INTEREST IN PHOTO BLOGS....
It is quite possible that one of the tidbits which Brooks Jensen wrote about in his Things I've Learned About Photography list contains some insight into the current photo blog decline....
For the first several years one struggles with the technical challenges, making sure and steady progress - a learning curve and growth process that is rewarding, stimulating and self-renewing. But, eventually every photographer who sticks with it long enough arrives at a technical plateau where production of a technically good photograph is relatively easy. It is here that real photography starts and most photographers quit.
One of my takes on that idea is that there was a period of growth, photo blog wise, that accompanied the emergence and growth of digital picture making. There were lots of picture makers-newbies and "old-timers" making the transition from analogue to digital-who were looking for info and advice on equipment and technique. And, as gear sales moved from the realm of real camera stores-thus ending the over-the-counter chat with a knowledgeable sales person-to the realm of the virtual camera store where nobody knows your name, the search for advice moved to the blog-o-sphere (no youtube yet).
That written, once the quest for info, together with the significant decline of the new gear sales and the emgerence of youtube, was satiated, the long slow decline of photo blog readership began. I would also suggest, re: the Brooks Jensen thing, that there was a significant decline in the number of "serious" amateurs-those who had reached the point where real photography starts-who lost whatever "passion" that they may (or may not) have had.
In any event, here I sit still doing my thing since blog post # 1 posted in January 2007. My heyday was 200-300 daily page views, with lots of comments, for quite a number of years. Most of those comments revolved around the medium of photography and its appartus (aka: conventions). Amost never about gear and/or technique. Today, the blog has a consistent 70-80 daily page views but, unforutnately from my POV, very few comments.
Nevertheless, I carry on and will do so for the foreseeable future.
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AFTER BANGING AROUND TRYING DIFFERENT METHODS OF COLOR>BW CONVERSION, I have discovered / come to the conclusion that the Sanpseed app BW conversion tool is very good. And, surprise, surprise (not), just the mere selection of the tool does the job...no sliders / adjustments / diddling around, the default conversion, aka: neutral, is the just easy-as-pie ticket. And, with a tiny bit of after the fact fine tuning, it looks good to me.
ASIDE "AFTER BANGING AROUND TRYING DIFFERENT METHODS OF COLOR>BW CONVERSION", it felt rather like banging my head against a wall.
On a different topic, I will mention in passing (pun) that 2 long-time photo blogs have folded up their tents and are passing into the great beyond. Those would be The Visual Science Lab-which should have been more accurately named, My Cameras and Gear Obsession Blather and Ming Thein.
Neither site will be missed by me. Re: The Visual Science Lab...even though I did visit it on a fairly regular basis, it was more a matter of idle curosity cuz the site never offer much in the way of good pictures but, on the other hand, you had to give the author credit for being sucessful in making a good living. No easy feat over the long run. Re: the Ming Thein site...I have never been interested in sites that peddle / sell advice on the topic of making good pictures. So, it never caught, much less held, my attention.
That written, time marches on and a once thriving scene of good photo sites has slowly started to fade into irrelevance or flat out disinterest.
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dormer ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
IT HAS BEEN QUITE A WHILE SINCE I HAVE DONE a gallery crawl. That is, a day spent walking around a gallery district-one with a concentration of photo galleries-and viewing lots of photography.
Most of my gallery crawls were had in NYC. However, the district which at one time housed quite of number photo galleries-enough to fill at least a day of crawling-has been re-developed into condos. That situation added to the shake-out of the last recession and there ain't a whole lot left to see. Now there's the pandemic and there ain't much of any thing happening in the gallery world.
I am really jones-ing for the opportunity to view real live pictures.
FYI, the dormer picture above is of my morning wake-up view from my bed at Rist Camp.