I don't do shadow self portraits much anymore--its a favorite thing of young photographers and occasionally veterans. Lee Friedlander, one of my favorite photographers took many over his career(his are way cooler than mine by the way--you should look him up). Today as I was walking to Allegheny to meet with a prospective student I just happend to see this shadow. I passed it up on the first flight of stairs and considered going back, but a few steps further and I saw it again. It was neat because this super long shadow made me think of my dad....no he's not tall and no he doesn't take pictures of his own shadow(I'd guess he'd even say that I was wasting my time taking it myself). My dad says the same thing over and over again when he sees a tall skinny guy. 'He must be a poet.' Then if you bite and ask why he'd guess that he'd say... 'because he's a Longfellow.' Yes I did chuckle thinking about this today and it has been great thinking of him off and on today and again now as I write this out. Hope he and mom are over their colds. Photograph by Richard Sayer
1 Comment
There are thousand dollar light kits, all great stuff. These light kits allow you to manipulate the light to do just what you want it to do if you take the time to really learn how. I've spent a lot of time with some pretty fancy lights. Back in photography school 20 plus years ago we had state of the art stuff. Tonight, I used a floor lamp like you could buy at nearly any store that sells floor lamps. My shoot with Agrippine went very well despite not using the studio lighting that I usually use. I couldn't do some things--I could stop action and have Agrippine jumping or anything like that, but I could direct the lights and create dramatic shadows and the like. I haven't been able to go through all the images yet, but I did like this one right off the bat and decided to make it todays featured picture. I liked how Agrippine was small and the shape of her shadow dominates the composition. I will use this one light idea several more times. Photograph by Richard Sayer
These ideas of symbolism have been swirling and swirling around my head, partly because I want to talk tomorrow about it in class and partly because I want to really re-evaluate what my symbolism is. I make pieces and put a lot of stuff in them and then take a lot of stuff back out of them, I cover up and layer as if I were painting---all in attempts to find the best way to say--and in most cases to find out exactly what it is I'm trying to say. Today I started out with a very complicated composition with many many layers and images and a field of images in different distances and plains and ended up negating most of it to come up with this. I did take this to another place afterwards with more images and further meaning, but wanted to post this simplified self portrait to see if it stands on its own. By Richard Sayer
Last night I attended my nephew, Levi's 3rd birthday party. It was great! I photographed him opening his presents, his family singing happy birthday to him and him blowing out his candles. I snapped this photo after the presents and the cake. This is Levi with his three cousins. They all love him very much! After the party was over and everyone went home, I laid down with Levi and watched a little bit of "Horton Hears a Who." We got to talking about all sorts of things, like the desert, what a mayor is and dreams. I asked Levi what he dreams about and he said, "dinosaurs and sometimes sharks." Happy Birthday Levi!! You are an old man!!!Photo By: Harmony Motter
I decided around 11:30 last night that I needed to look at me recent work and sort of figure out what it is that I'm either going to do--or not going to do with it. Now mind you, I've got my computer so bogged down with images and half-made pieces that it isn't the most efficient machine. My every attempt at cleaning it up and throwing away things to free up space has resulted in 'finding little gems' that I didn't see had potential before and I end up spending more hours eliminating even more space on my hard-drive instead of what I had intended. So as I was looking at my folder of recent work--aptly titled 'Untitled-1' I was planning on just getting rid of 90% of it. In it I have photographs of folded up pieces of paper with notes on them, self portraits, photographs of apples and sleeves of crackers and images of paint--details shots of palates and close-ups of paintings. The next thing I'm doing is putting together the piece above. For some reason I got to thinking about Clyfford Still--though I wasn't sure why--this piece shares little with Still--perhaps some of the vertical movement reminded me of some of Still's work in the 50's. There was work that I was thinking of also but couldn't remember the artist and still can't place it this morning. It'll probably haunt me all day. One of the problems with separating yourself from the world, as I've tried to do a little so that I could re-focus on my core, is that your mind sort of goes a little numb to the details and memories. My memories of names and words seem to be fading more and more--though I still vividly remember images. It might get down to a discussion I recently had about photo credit placement on multi-media pieces in the media. I said that who did the piece isn't information that is directly needed to be known by our readers/viewers and therefore shouldn't be a part of the presentation. I embed that info in the pieces I do so they can be found, but I don't feel that including my name next to the title or even at the end(though the end is better than the beginning) is benefitting the story - in fact I argue that it gets in the way. If a viewer reads the title and done by--they pause and think if they know that person and therefore break from their involvement with the piece. So I think I remember images because the image is ultimately what has spoken to me--the artist actually becomes trivia. But I still wish I could remember the artists name so I could look him or her up---I think the artist was in the Gablik book book--I'll look at that today.Until then--this was something I made while attempting to re-evaluate yet again! By Richard Sayer
Photograph gives us a few moments to stare at something and really reflect upon who we are. I feel thats why strive to capture moments instead of just posed pictures. Getting a candid as if the photographer wasn't even there shows us a lot about who we are--we still see the clothes people are wearing, their hairstyles, what they look like,...and we get added to that - we get to experience a little of who they are by seeing their reaction to the activity they're participating in - we get to know what they are feeling or thinking. Its about moments so much more than anything else--about technique or angle or composition - any of that stuff we can teach about how to take better photos. If you don't capture the moment all the rest of that stuff will just seem flat. This was taken today at the Saegertown High School business week trade show, it was a fun game one of the businesses came up with to help bring awareness to their product. Meadville Tribune photograph by Richard Sayer
I have decided that I am going to learn how to apply paint to surfaces. I have come to understand that I do have the ability to see photographic images in my mind. However, I do not have the natural ability to paint. Today was the first time I attempted to hold a brush in my hand. My color of choice is yellow. The photo in the back is a pic of sticks that I have displayed in my living room. I can only get better from here!
Harmony Motter Years ago I thought it would be cool to get down low into the path of some sparks coming off a grinder to take my photos. And it was cool. The only problem was the 14 mm lens I was using didn't have any filter on it and looking at the glass afterwards was a little disheartening. It didn't ruin the lens, but it didn't help it out any either. The little marks that were made made the lens less sharp and in time the marks deteriorated the lens. So when I did it again, this time with my 17 to 55 mm lens I was confident that it would be ok, because I did have a filter on it. The story is about students getting ready for the annual RoboBotics competition. Aaron Powell of MASH was doing some grinding of the frame for his team's bot. Meadville Tribune photograph by Richard Sayer
Before I came to work at The Meadville Tribune and began to really focus on developing my photography and story - telling, I was a student of drawing and painting. I drew and painted every day for more than four years as I worked toward getting my degrees. I began painting rally seriously in 1988. It was around that time I first saw a Francis Bacon painting. It was of hanging meat. Another image was of a pope that was actually a rendition of a famous Velasquez painting( I forget which Pope). I was struck by how each picture looked sort of the same. It took me years to sort of understand how Bacon's work could influence or even help me, I just liked them. Once I saw how his layering of color and softnesses of tone could be used(however ineptly) to help me convey some passages in my painting I was hooked on his work. I got to thinking about Bacon tonight after seeing this reflection of diving Villa Maria girls basketball player in the gym floor of Meadville Area High School. I was also thinking about some of the landscape painters of the late 1800's and early 1900's and I also though a little bit about Hans Hoffman for some reason. Anyway...I thought it was a cool image after I cropped out the player(whose face wasn't quite sharp enough or interesting enough to keep whole) and turned if 90 degree counter-clockwise. Photograph by Richard Sayer
When I edit photographs, I keep my eyes and mind open to see something beyond what is in front of me. Sometimes its seeing the image in black and white, sometimes its seeing an odd gesture that could be even odder if turned sideways--and sometimes, like today its a combination of the two with the added notion of using photoshop to eliminate a chair to create a completely different type of picture. Now I think I'm going to work on toning this picture a little richer and cleaning up some things, but I really felt I found something in this picture that just didn't quite work out as I shot it, as a horizontal with the model arched over the chair. I reminds me a little of Chagall somehow and maybe even some Man Ray stuff(though its not in that caliber). It might give me some ideas for future shoots and attempts at making this sort of image without photoshop. Photographic illustration by Richard Sayer
|