Ultima Thule / Stephen Vaughan / Impressions Gallery

Stephen Shore Research

An Interview on SeeSawMagazine:
http://seesawmagazine.com/shore_pages/shore_interview.html

US 22, Union, New Jersey, April 24th 1974

Ginger Shore, Causeway Inn, Tampa, Florida, November 17, 1977

Jackson, Wyoming, September 2, 1979

Stanley Marsh and John Reinhardt, Amarillo, Texas, February 15, 1975

West Fourth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas, October 5, 1974

Uncommon Places

I read the interview with him in the Seesaw magazine, i found it highly interesting that he spoke about not really wanting to go to larger formats. I loved how he experienced looking at the ground glass and thought that once the camera was on the tripod why not move up to 10x8 over 5x4. In my experiences with both mediums, I feel that 10x8 is even still different to 5x4. The camera is so large and heavy that I approach transporting it in a different way that effects the subject I shoot, as a 5x4 field camera has been very portable still, though a little fiddly at times, especially in the cold. But the 10x8 is something else. Like him I was fascinated by the view on the ground glass. I love how detailed it is, and 10x8 being 4 times bigger than 5x4 really gives me something to look at to the point I almost don't need a loupe. However unlike him I was directly thinking to move up negative sizes, as I wanted something larger, something that could almost be a final print.

I love how he found the different format made him see photography differently, this is something I have definitely experienced. I have, over my studies been experimenting with larger and larger formats, but not until 10x8 has my photographic reasoning been altered. The other cameras still let me take trips as they were portable enough that I could stuff it in my bag, size and weight of them hasn't really bothered me as I am strong enough to walk for miles and miles up hills etc with a large heavy burgen, the 10x8 is too large for a rucksack, too heavy to just be carried on a tripod like the Mamiya RB67, it has to be transported in its PeliCase, which although it has wheels, is not built for the type of terrain that I am used to. ( I carried the Mamiya RB67 on my shoulder for 17 miles of the North Downs Way, I was tired but it still wasn't too much of a burden). Even the 5x4 can be taken on trips, all that happens is my consideration and thoughts become slower and more considered.

With the other formats I have been slowed down more and more, which I see s a good thing, making me consider my photographs more. But this format made me need to photograph different things and make me think of the photographs, because my darkroom paper negatives were final prints in themselves, as objects that stand in as a representation for my thoughts and feelings, other than 'oh thats a pretty view, i need to capture it'

He speaks about how the viewer also can consider a photograph more with a large format camera, I feel, like he says in the interview, that because it is so detailed one can look at various parts within the composition and spend more time taking in the details and reading each aspect of it, whereas with a smaller format for example 35mm, the images are smaller and there is often a lot less to take in.

He speaks of the photographs being a sort of diary, this is sort of where my thought process was about my relationship with the camera being one of a pet or a wife. His relationship is as a diary.

He says beautifully the different between taking a picture of a person using a tripod, versus taking a photograph handheld:

"There are a lot of portraits in American Surfaces, and I just love them. And they're not the kind of portraits that are about presenting the person as a three-dimensional character. They're almost looking at the people as surfaces, as cultural artefacts. And looking through Uncommon Places, I think that I went in a different direction with the portraits. Working on a tripod is very different for a portrait; generally people are less self-conscious, because there's not a camera between me and them. The camera is not an extension of me; it's this tool I'm using to make something. And I can pay more attention to them, because I'm not seeing them through a viewfinder. I'm seeing them with my eyes, and I'm choosing the moment just with my eyes, without a camera in between"

His concept of "surreal density" how all the details are in the negative, and by printing big you can see all these details, this is the magic of the ground glass, you see all these bits, you are hidden away under the dark cloth, a voyeur into the beautiful dirty world that is fascinating enough for you to spend the time and money to set up a shot of it. He speaks of printing big so all the tiny details in the negative that could go unnoticed, come out and can be read by the viewer for many minutes or just a few seconds.

The Photography Show N.E.C.

Today me and a small group of friends went to the photography show at N.E.C in Birmingham. When we walked in we immediately played with the large Canon telephoto lenses, they auto focused very fast. The stand was higher than the rest of the show so we were able to look around the show and use the lenses to focus on things in the distance.
We looked around the Fujifilm area, where we quickly noticed that the prints there had been done by Genesis Printing. We walked around to the Hasselblad stand to ogle at the expensive equipment. I was excited to see the Arca Swiss, Linhof Studios stand where I spoke to the representative about the technical cameras they had there. Being primarily a landscape photographer, I have seen technical cameras online, but I didn't understand much about them, so it was really nice to have a wee play with one to understand it's workings.
There was a DXO Mark booth, the guy there was doing a quick retouching presentation on their software. He was quite cocky and the software didn't blow me away completely, but there were some really cool aspects to the software. He brought a ton of clarity and detail out of a misty photograph. He also sharpened a really grainy and under exposed photograph, it was sharp but I also felt it lacked some detail. One of the photos he retouched looked unreal, which didn't work with its landscape setting, also one where he quickly clicked away distortion from a photo taken with a fish eye lens. There was one really nice photo he did where he fixed highlights and shadows, but it could have been done in lightroom. Overall there were some good points to it, but I think it was mostly designed to blow away people with not much experience with retouching.

I was most excited by the Lee Filters stand. I own some graduated density filters myself, but I haven't afforded Lee Filters, They look so much more precise and clear than filters I own. They had some work be Joe Cornish, a well known and respected landscape photographer there. I have seen videos of him talking about his workflow, and I was interested to learn from the text that he often shoots with a Nikon d700. It was nice to see the "Big Stopper" filter that cuts out 10 stops of light.

I was impressed by the Induro and Benro Tripods. I do have a decent carbon fibre tripod, but i do often find it a bit limiting, as it doesn't extend very high and isn't so adaptable. I have a Manfrotto tripod that is great but weighs several kilos, so it is great for shoots where I don't have to travel with it, but I usually leave it at home, especially considering not all the aluminium legs have foam on to protect our hands in the cold. These Benro and Induro tripods felt really nice, were very adaptable and were lovely and light too. Of course they also felt very sturdy, the main thing one looks for in a tripod! I visited the Manfrotto stand too, I liked the variety of colours for some of their tripods, but I wasn't as amazed as I was when I went to see the others.
3LeggedThings were also nice but I was most impressed by Benro and Induro, I liked Benro a little more as there was some blue colour in the fittings, though they seemed like the same tripods really, its the little touches that impressed me.

Robert Adams

Robert Adams was born in New Jersey in 1937, and moved to Colorado as a teenager. Adams was a professor of English literature for several years before turning his full attention to photography in the mid 1970s. His work is largely concerned with moments of regional transition: the suburbanization of Denver, a changing Los Angeles of the 1970s and 1980s, and the clear-cutting in Oregon in the 1990s. His many books, well-known to those concerned with the American Landscape, include The New West, From the Missouri West, Summer Nights, Los Angeles Spring, To Make It Home, Listening to the River, West From the Columbia, What We Bought, Notes for Friends, California, Summer Nights, Walking, Gone?, What Can We Believe Where? and The Place We Live. 
from: http://fraenkelgallery.com/artists/robert-adams

From his series, "The New West"

Here he chose a square format. I like shooting in square format as it allows me to concentrate on the subject. I like using the hasselblad 500 series for their tactile feel and especially that old 80mm 2.8 where you pull the tab down to change your settings. It feels so rugged and smooth to use, the only way I would improve them is have a better focusing screen and have a wee built in light meter. However I really like that the camera is fully mechanical. I go off on a tangent, my point about square format, which I have nearly only experienced with the hasselblads, is that unlike a rectangle format where I think about how do I frame this scene, horizontal or vertical? With square format I can really focus on the scene and what I am trying to say with a photo, it stops me thinking but makes me think.

I think by choosing to only work in black and white, Robert Adams has let the viewer focus on the subject of his photos, you aren't distracted by colour and colour cant give any unwanted connotations. It has allowed his work to be focused and consistent. We see only what we need to see, the subjects exactly as they are.

Alternative Process User's Group: Second UCA Collodion Demo - by popular demand. 19t...

I found the bog for the old processes at UCA, I went in the room severl times when Peter Renn was running the workshop, but I was buy processing sheets for my project, and as it was dangerous chemicals and it was already full I couldn't join in, I would have loved to though. Dave - one of the digital technicians at the uni - looked classic with his big old american beard looking like he had just come from the american Civil War





Alternative Process User's Group: Second UCA Collodion Demo - by popular demand. 19t...: As the first demo day was 100% oversubscribed I really had no choice but to run another one! This was every bit as enjoyable as the firs...

The Camera as a Personification

In my previous studies I had come to the idea that the camera is my pet, that I look after it and care for it, I feed it light and the love it gives me is photographs, another way of looking at this is, the camera is my wife, I give her love in the form of light, she gives me babies in the form of negative prints.

terra infirma, geography's visual culture - irit rogoff : Concept Reflection

"Geography is at one and the same time a concept, a sign system and an order of knowledge established at the centres of power. By introducing questions of critical epistemology, subjectivity and spectatorship into the arena of geography we shift the interrogation from the center to the margins, to the site at which new multi-dimensional knowledge and identities are constantly in the process of being formed.

What is geography beyond the charting of land masses, climate zones, elevations, bodies of waters, populated terrains, nation states, geological strata and natural resource deposits? Geography is:

• a theory of cognition and a system of classification
• a mode of location
• a site of collective national, cultural, linguistic and topographical histories
• a homogeneous space which becomes an order of knowledge through universal indexical measure of the land.

Geography therefore is a body of knowledge and an order of knowledge which requires the same kind of critical theorization as any other body of knowledge. Geography as an epistemic category is in turn grounded in issues of positionality, in questions of who has the power and authority to name, of who has the power and authority to subsume others into its hegemonic identity."

pages - 20 - 21 Routledge 2000.

spectatorship - not sure its a real word - the act of watching something
epistemology - the study of knowledge - not sure if epistemic is a real word
cognition - acquiring knowledge
homogeneous - similar, comparable
indexical - referring to an index
theorization - theorize - actively forming theories - not sure theorization is a real word
positionality - pretty damn certain again a word has been bastardized to make a new 'word' - in this instance the sentence would still make sense and be grammatically correct if Rogoff had just written the word position.

If we skip over the annoying faults in the text, there are some good points here, that geography isn't just about maps, it is about history, location, and cultural identity. This, I will bear in mind when I am next making landscape photographs. The concept of identity is something key to my current project - that the camera is recording a moment in time when I am gone to dream, not necessarily asleep, but gone, then I must return to it, as I would return to a lover.