Monday, November 30, 2009

Same Flowers, Less Creepy





I don't know what this flower is, but I like it. I shot this back in July when I was at this hotel last time. They grow around the base of the building. I wanted to shoot them more, but the base of the building is pretty much always right outside someones window. I don't want to be the dude with the zoom lense outside your window trying to explain how Im just there for the flowers.
Well, good news is this time I am on the ground floor and it's my window they are outside of and they are still in bloom, or whatever state that is. They are still all orangey. So, I plan to explore further. But first, off to work.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Overheard and overhead

So, on the flight out I'm stuck in the middle seat in the last row. But, it's not so bad as I'm sandwiched between two delightful ladies. The one on my right is a tiny Asian girl and during the course of the flight I begin to believe she doesn't speak much English.
I come to this idea by the way that she communicates via grunts, squeaks and gestures to the flight attendants. Need some water? Point at it and squeal. Want the chips? Angle your head at it and nod vigorously.
We land and to my pleasant surprise they announce over the intercom that they are debarking via the rear of the plane as well as the front. Ho ho! This is sweet, I can jump right off.
But my little seat-mate makes no move to get up. She sits there stonily. Perhaps she didn't understand the announcement, what with her bad English and all. People are streaming out now and I become agitated. Helpfully, I nudge her and indicate the rear of the plane.
In the dryest English ever she says "Yesss, I fear my luggage is in the overhead bin several seats forward. We must wait a bit to disembark."
Durr durr durr. Yes we must, oh, and by the way, I'm a dummy.


- Posted from my iPhone

Quality of Light

I've been thinking about the ineffable, sculptural quality of light.
When I was new to prepress, I would play a mental color game. The trick was to see a color on the world, like the dude across from me's baby puke green sweater, and try to guess the CMYK color breakdown of it. (C10Y20K2 for the sweater btw)
That game is smart and good exercise, but the color of light is only one aspect of it's quality.
For example, if I was color- correcting a photo of this waiting area it runs left to right yellow-green from the flourescent overheads to a more-nuetral-but-still casted daylight from the pane windows at right. I can imagine a correction curve layer in PS with a linear gradient mask.
But the world isn't a flat photo and the light is spilling in all around the place. Softer here by the wall, catching a diffuse cross from the far off opposite windows on right. Harsher and clearer in front of the counter, bouncing all over the white walls and ceiling, eaten up by the steel gray rug.
I want to better see the depth of the light. It fills up these areas heavily and floats lighter over there. I do a lot of macro work and big sky shots; I'm either up close or all open. There is a complex middle space that escapes me. When I shoot it, it never describes the depth of light correctly. There's something I'm missing.
Maybe it's in the metering, maybe it's related to depth of field. I need to explore further...

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Saturday, November 28, 2009

First of Two

So, tomorrow I fly to LA for a month. It's the pre-training before the two-month gig in India. So, basically the start of three months on the road with a small gap in the middle.
I have mixed feelings about the trips, what they mean for me, what they mean for the company, all the people losing jobs, things like that. I'm going to try to roll with it, really I have no other option.
The deal I'm making with myself is that these are both photo trips. As the first trip is preparation business-wise for the second, so too must the first trip prepare for the second photographically. So, I'm bringing a fair amount of gear: camera, three lenses, three flashes, ring flash and various other light modifiers. Not sure about hauling a tripod still. I hate to haul it, but there are a few things I would want it for. I'm thinking I will leave it behind and see if I miss it.
If I miss it in LA, I will for sure want it in India.









This is what I'm bringing, not that bad. Plus another backpack with two laptops, an external hard drive and all the cables. Plus the camera chargers, card reader, spare battery, thumb drives, and things like that. I need the second laptop for work, but I'm hoping I can cut it down to one for the longer India trip.
In all of the trips I've taken this year, this is the first time I'm hauling a seperate camera backpack. I hope it's not too unweildy. Really having to take the second laptop forced the issue. So if it doesn't work out, and I only need the one next time, it may work out. Really just the first of a lot of unknown experiments this trip.

- Posted from my iPhone