# 5875-78 / landscape•civilized ku ~ onward and up-rightward

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

AFTER 20 YEARS OF MAKING SQUARE PICTURES-my "serious" work-I find it a bit flummoxing to be tinkering around with the rectangular format.

During the tinkering-playing with horizontal and vertical format full frame picture making-several thoughts have come to mind. Setting aside the square format signature identity thing-the more I think about that, the more it fades into the background-a thought I never really considered before has risen to the fore. I.E., the predominance of pictures made with the horizontal format / aspect (especially landscape pictures). FYI, I have no numeric stats to back up that thought but, it does feel right.

Hardware wise, that idea does make sense inasmuch as, throughout the history of photography, an overwhelming number of cameras have had viewing apparatus that is oriented to the horizontal format / aspect. Especially so in the modern era. The major exception, camera wise, being the (predominantly) medium format square format cameras.

Picture making wise, there are exceptions to the horizontal aspect /format procivility. Most notable is the portrait genre wherein most portraits are made in the vertical format aspect (group portraits excepted). Also, in my commercial photography life, I would guess that 90% of the pictures I made were in the vertical format aspect. That's cuz most of my pictures were made for the printed page-magazines, annual reports, etc. And to my previous point, hardware wise, Making vertical format / aspect pictures required turning the come on its "side" (its "natural" orientation?), or in the case of a view camera, rotating the back.

All of the above aside (and back to the signature identity thing), in the Fine Art Photography World, format / aspect matters inasmuch as most Fine Art picture makers rarely mix formats / apsect in a given body of work. That is to write that the format / aspect they work with is an integral ingredient of their vision / the manner in which thet see. That proclivity (amongst many other "rules") is as sacroscant in the Fine Art World as the one-camera, one-lens MO. Like it or not, good thing or not, the Fine Art World demands, if a practioner wishes to be taken seriously, a consistent artistic vision, technique and concept wise, in a given body of work.

That written, the Fine Art World is OK with an artist creating a new body of work that differs from that of a previous body of work. So, as I mentioned in an earlier entry, I am considering my full frame pictures to be a new body of work. And, to be rigorously consistent, I am leaning toward the veritical retangular format / aspect for all of the work.

# 5872-74 / around the house ~ I get horizontal

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

the cat don’t care who wins the cup ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone

ORIENTING MY IPHONE TO THE HORIZONTAL INCLINATION was not all that difficult to accomplish. In fact it made activating the shutter easier inasmuch as one of the volume buttons-which can be used as a shutter release-falls conveniently to my index finger (mimicing my "real" camera).

Now the question arises, inasmuch as the square format has been an integal part of my picture making identity, does making rectangular pictures compromise that identity?

I have no doubt about my ability to "arrange" the visual elements-line, shape, form, tone, color, space, et all-within an imposed rectangular frame in a pleasing manner. So that part of the change in format does not concern me. It the signature identity thing that makes me wonder about the change.

Maybe I just have to think about it as a new body of work cuz I do not believe that it will change the way I see. And, of course, it is not as if I am going to abandon the square format.

# 5869-71 / around the house ~ this way and that way

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

BEING A CREATURE OF HABIT, I ALMOST ALWAYS HOLD my iPhone in a vertical orientation when making pictures. That's cuz, since I primarily make square pictures, it doesn't matter which orientation I use. So, I use the orientation that I normally use when holding / viewing my iPhone.

Now that I am frequently playing with the Portrait setting for it narrow-er DOF quality, + the fact that there is no square setting-although I can crop to square in processing-in the Portrait Mode, + the fact of my use of (habitual) vertical iPhone orientation, all of the recent full frame pictures I have made are in the vertical format. This relationship of habitual practices and their result just dawned on me. Duh and more duh.

Time to break old habits and hold my iPhone in a horizontal orientation.

# 5861-68 / landscape•civilized ku•people ~ curiosities and wonders

high desert ~ New Mexico (embiggenable) • iPhone

wedding~ Pittsburgh, PA (embiggenable) • iPhone

Mormon temple ~ San Diego, CA (embiggenable) • iPhone

Zippo sign~ Bradford, PA (embiggenable) • iPhone

dancing figure ~ Santa Fe, NM (embiggenable) • iPhone

ice cream stand ~ Canonsburg, PA (embiggenable) • iPhone

Harley cycles ~ Pittsburgh, PA (embiggenable) • iPhone

WHEN MOVING ABOUT THE COUNTRY / LANDSCAPE / PLANET WITHOUT A rigid itinerary, one never knows what one might encounter.

For the most part, that is how the wife and I like to travel. In doing so, serendipitous meandering and chance encounters have served us well cuz we love the unexpected sites, people and places we find. And traveling off-season, not for the reduced expense, but rather for the fact that we most often have wherever we are and whatever we are doing almost completely to ourselves is its own reward. Needless to write, I find a lot of picture making opportunities.

That written, I recently landed, thanks to a reference from a friend, on SIGHTSEER. The pictures, while reminiscent of the work of Martin Parr (technique-wise, using flash-on-camera to light subjects), are quite intriguing. Very good stuff.

#5859-60 / civilized ku ~ it ain't what you eat, it's the way how you chew it

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

(embiggenable) • iPhone

ON A PREVIOUS ENTRY I PARAPHRASED A Sleepy LaBeef album title, It Ain't What You Eat, It's The Way How You Chew It, to reinforce a point, re: it ain't what you see, it's the way how you picture it. AKA: the Vision thing. The point of that entry addressed the topic of making pictures.

Fast forward to this entry and I'll paraphrase Sleepy once again...It Ain't What You See, It's The Way How You View It. The point of which is to address the topic of viewing pictures.

Since the dawn of picture making time, picture makers, Photography Division, have have had available, or, in some cases invented, various ways-far too numerous to mention-of presenting pictures for viewing. Over that time the most ubiquitous manner of presentation has to have been the drugstore snapshot print-which has subsequently been replaced by the practice of viewing a picture on a screen of one sort or another. A specific type of presentation was chosen by a picture maker dependent upon his/her specific presentationn/ display intentions. Each manner of presentation had its conventions and advantages.

The presentation / display intent this entry is most concerned with is that of addressing the issue of the perception a specific manner of presentation / display conveys or influences the idea that this is Art. That is, which presention / display is most likely to influence the perception of a viewer to consider a photographic print as an objet d'art as opposed to a mere "picture". And, to that end, I would strongly suggest that the manner of presentation / display is everything.

Let's get one thing out of way. If a picture maker ain't making prints, he/she ain't making anything. That is not to write that he/she is not getting a great deal of satisfaction / accomplishement / enjoyment from their picture making activities but, without making prints it is, admittedly albeit iMo, like acquiring the skills needed to play golf but never playing a round of golf.

All of the above written, I am not searching for the one and only / "perfect" manner of presentation / display. Rather, my current intention is to investigate the various ways in which various manners of presentation /display influence a viewer's perception of what is or is not considered to be Art. To that end I am working on putting together an (proposed) exhibit which presents / displays 10 of my pictures, each picture in 5 different ways:

as a stand-alone, loose print (8x8")
as a matted and framed print underglass
on a page in picture book (which contains all 10 pictures)
as a small snapshot print
as a un-matted, framed (no glass) large print (24x24")

The exhibit would invite viewers to express their choice, re: which presentation / display method best projects the perception of this-is-Art. That written, I'd be interested in reading your opinion.

FYI, as you might surmise based upon the pictures in this entry, I kinda, but not exclusively, lean toward the matted-and-framed-print-underglass approach as what most viewers might pick as their choice. That written, most of my gallery work has been presented / displayed as large-ish (24x24" images on 36x36" substrate), framed (classic thin metal gallery frames - no matte, no glass) prints.

# 5852-55 / civilized ku ~ a polarizing idea

Pittsburgh, PA ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone

Bradford, PA. ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone

Pittsburgh, PA. ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone

Pittsburgh, PA. ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone

Pittsburgh, PA. ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone

EAST CARSON STREET, ON PITTSBURGH'S SOUTHSIDE, is one of the largest Victorian main streets in the United States. Its entire length-about 1 mile long, straight as an arrow, flat as a pancake-is designated as a historic district.

Over the years, the district, know as "The Flats", has become a "hip"/"happening" kinda place. Lots of bars, funky shops, restaurants and lots of young residents. During every of our visits to Pittsburgh, I (with or without the wife) always head to East Carson Street to go to one of the best ever funky cigar stores. Not to mention that it probably has multiple thousands of cigars in its massive walk-in humidor area. FYI, I find it difficult to leave the store without dropping $300.00+US on some product.

That written, this post is not about cigars. Rather, it is about-instigated by a recent post on TOP-polarizing filters and building facades.

Back in the analoge era, also known as the film era, I had a polarizing filter in my kit. Actually, I had 3 of them, 3 different diameters for a variety of different lenses. They were in my kit for a single purpose...for client demand use, That is, when shooting for a client wherein reflections were a problem that got in the way of their product. They were never used for personal work cuz of the fact that reflections are part of the real world. Case on point, the building facade pictures in this entry....

....while my eye and sensibilities were pricked by the facades themselve, the reflections of the sky and clouds on the facades-and the window display-were icing on the cake for me. Or, in, a modified version of a famous saying, "I don't need no stinkin' polarizing filter".