Clarity

Music | Dawn by The Cinematic Orchestra

With the banter in my brain going from Large Format 4x5 and my 35mm digital SLR, I'm finding it surprising that these last 2 shoots came so easy for me with the resulting photographs very close to what I envisioned in my head. I've been working on shooting solo with Cain for over a year. As elusive as she has been, times where I just decided to give up and move on, somewhere in the back of my head I knew that whenever we got together, we'd come up with strong images in our eventual collaboration. I wouldn't call this shoot a commission, as I wanted to just as strongly want to photograph her as she wanted to be photographed by me. In any case, we got some very strong images in this loosely put together shoot...

Sherry

Music | Chasing Pavements by Adelle

My quest to get comfortable with 4x5 has taken a step in the right direction. I shot 6 sheets of Sherry today, 4 at one location and 2 here... I'm feeling a bit more confident with loading the film onto the reels and processing, though I'm still experimenting with dilutions of the developer and such... I managed to nail this neg and the other I shot at the same spot, but the other 4 sheets were like my first try and a bit thin. It is a process and learning curve I hope to have mastered by the time my other camera arrives in January. I'm also getting more comfortable with this camera, but the mechanical movements of my body are still strong and sometime dominate my head - another aspect of this transition I hope to have overcome.

Sherry is a regular, often sitting for me in times of inspiration, and times of desperation as well. My exercise of just getting out there and shoot brought us to a park on the other side of town, using the fall colours and textures as our source of creating. We walked until I felt something and here, I loved how the triangular shape of the branches framed her, off center within the camera frame. It also doesn't take much for Sherry to strike an elegant pose...

Falling Upon Us...

Music | Nomra by Matana Roberts

Somewhere in Helvetia, OR

Beauty is a Rare Thing...

Music | A Ballad for Rita by Fred Anderson

Out in the Open...

Music | The Horizon Has Been Defeated by Jack Johnson

OK, I put it out into the public... I've got people on the outside knowing what my intentions are. I have put myself in a position where I have to walk the walk...

I was just talking to a friend about a friend she was describing as a self starter, goes out and seems to always achieve what she sets out to do. Not a runner, she is now training to run a half marathon, even though she has lots of pain while running...

I know I perform better when I have people counting on me. I'm not much of a self starter. I seem to need and build momentum before before I get going... or a deadline. My interests in shooting with my 4x5 is itching me. Ever since processing my 1st batch of film, I've been wanting to shoot more. I've had a few excuses preventing me from going out to shoot... my car is in disrepair, I've got projects que'd up that I have to finish, my prescriptions are really knocking me out...

So this evening while I was writing to a friend who I wanted to photograph, I decided to extend the invitation to a bunch of people, some who will not be surprised to hear of this request, but others that will be. Most are friends, others are acquaintances, friend's of friends, people from forums...

"Before the weather starts to change for the worse, I would like to create a portrait of you. Unlike the way I've been shooting for over a decade, I'll be using a 4x5 camera and shooting film. I'm traveling down the road back to the basics. Just a camera, tripod and film.

I am not making this a big production to get you in front of the camera. We can take as much or as little time as you'd like. What is important to me is having subjects in front of me as I go back in time and work with this large format camera. My goal is to remaster the techniques of processing film by hand. Further along down the road, I hope to print some of these negs using an old technique using Platinum and Palladium.

If your interested, or not, email me and let me know your thoughts.

Thanks,

Ted"

And so I also extend this invitation to you. If you are in the Portland area, look me up. I've got a few boxes of film ready to go, chemicals to process the film and maybe a print in return (digital at this point) for you time.

Commitment!

Music | Life for Rent by Dido

The commitment is pure inspiration! To do anything consistently, every day, other than wake up and fall to sleep amazes me.



Abbey Ryan's A Painting a Day

Get out the Tissue...

Confused... and Dazed too!

Music | All Coming Back by Sarah Blasco

I don't often have conflicts selecting when a photo should be colour or Black and White when I make that initial decision. However, I think everything about this shot worked, including the colours in this photo...

Hopworks Brewry

Music | Go by Wayne Shorter

It has been awhile since PattyDaddy and HambahgaStakee reviewed a burger joint, but we just hit Hopworks on Powell to have a luscious cheeseburger, thickly cut fries and some seriously good organic beer. I've been there several times and was surprised that it had not yet been reviewed on one of my favorite blogs, Portland Hamburgers. Patty Daddy had not been there and as I had declared a Top 5 Joint, he agreed after the meal.

A Very Sophisticated Shot...

Music | Blood Count by Jon Raskin

I've always had a mantra of keeping things as simple as possible. Well, maybe that isn't true... I don't have enough sophistication to think of complex ways of doing things... Anyway, I ran into a problem with this shot as I needed to have a boom for a light to be hung from above. Because of my unsophisticated ways, I carry a minimal amount of gear. I didn't have what I needed, but came upon this...



Yes?... No?...

of course yes...

Maiden Voyage

Music | It's Amazing by Jem

Wow, this 4x5 thing is gonna take awhile to master... I'm a bit more clear knowing that I've got a lot of improving to do with my developing of film. The dynamic range can be much improved. I'm also not getting what I think I'm seeing thru the view finder. I'm feeling it is just a matter of getting to know a much larger space to control, thru out the entire viewing area of 4 inches by 5 inches, as opposed to viewing a scene thru a 35 mm slr.

My hands are wet now and I'm over the initial fear of processing film. I'll just have to keep going and move closer to what I see in my head and what I see in print.

A Rush!

Music | Epistrophy by Thelonious Monk with John Coltrane

I'm sitting on a cloud right now. For the first time in maybe a decade, I processed film with my own 2 hands. The procedure was actually much more simple than I anticipated, but I dared not look at the film, even after going thru the fixer phase which allows you to pull the film out into daylight. Methodically, I went thru my rehearsed routine and did not deviate from each step I had planned. Finally, after pulling the film off the reels to hand dry in the bathroom, I saw a beautiful negative image. Frankly, it has been so long where I had to judge negatives, I'm not sure how good of a job I did with the developing... But merely seeing an image on the film made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on edge! So, in the bathroom they hang, drying slowly before I can soon admire them up close.