TBT, 360 TELEPHOTO ZOOM LENS, NO SHUTTER, F32, 6 SEC'S?? 10.25.03., 6:02 P.M.

© Ber Murphy 2013

ASTORIA PARK POOL, ASTORIA, N.Y., 7.31.13., 8:12 A.M.

© Ber Murphy 2013

RETIRED CONCRETE PLANT, REVIEW AVE., QUEENS, N.Y., 7:52 A.M. 5.15.13.

© Ber Murphy 2013

GREENPORT CEMENT PLANT, HUDSON, NEW YORK, 6.22.11., 1:48 P.M.

© Ber Murphy 2011

ASHINTULLY GARDENS, TYRINGHAM, M.A., 5.27.12., 3:12 P.M.

© Ber Murphy 2012

SUNKEN MEADOW BALL FIELD, RANDALL'S ISLAND, NEW YORK., 4.10.12., 6:14 P.M.

 © Ber Murphy 2012

OLDCASTLE QUARRY, LEE, M.A., 5.20.11., 11:19 A.M.

METRO TERMINALS, NEWTOWN CREEK, BROOKLYN, N.Y., 5.17.11., 6:47 A.M.

SKYSCAPES SERIES, LONG ISLAND CITY, N.Y., 9.23.05., 6:58 P.M.

This photograph is the reason why photographers need outside opinions on their work. I found this in the Skyscapes "REJECT" box. Really!! I may need some help.

ASTORIA TURBINES, QUEENS, N.Y., 1.22.11, 9:43 A.M.

Image © Ber Murphy 2011

VERNON BLVD POWER PROJECT, LONG ISLAND CITY, N.Y., 5.19.11 11.13 A.M.

Image © Ber Murphy 2011

PEPSI COLA SIGN, LONG ISLAND CITY, N.Y., 3.12.11, 5:52 P.M.

Not to bore everyone with my personal and the chronological history of the Pepsi Cola sign again, you can read all about it in the previous post here, but suffice it to say, my original shot from the last year needed some extra oopmh. Many people have such an affinity for the sign that I was asked on numerous occasions for prints. Problem. It was shot with my newly bought iphone and not my trusty 8x10. Not everyone was pleased with the offer of a 1.6mb file print.  Option?, lets do it again for real. I trotted off to re-shoot only to find many factors working against me. No lights on the sign at Dusk, no lights on after midnight, no lights on at 5:30 A.M. So after checking the meta data on the phone from the original shot, for all the elements to come together, I realized would have to retrace my footsteps to a tee. Not my forte. But in serious photographer fashion, I waited another three months and sixteen days to return at the exact time and date as the original, one year later. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

Image © Ber Murphy 2011

The Chocolate Genius and the Talking Head

These are the two images I will be showing this weekend at Polaroid: Instant Joy at A.M. Richard Fine Art in Williamsburg. They are of musicians David Byrne and Marc Anthony Thompson. David one time leader of Talking Heads and Marc founder of the music cooperative Chocolate genius Inc. I created this series at the rehearsals for the Tibet House concert series at Carnegie Hall. Shot on Polaroid only, combining the 8x10 809 and 804, a cross processing of Color and Black & White film. Everyone has their own favorite Polaroid and this is mine. This was not that long ago, 2005, but even then this was one the only ways to get the acquired look of sepia, unlike today's digi effects.
I shot on Polaroid because I knew I wouldn't have much time and wanted the subjects to be as comfortable as possible quickly, also its expensive so it was either one or the other. 8x10 is a real ice breaker especially when people, musicians, actors etc are(were) used to much smaller versions. Today they would think you were insane to show them 2 1/4 Polaroid. So we pinned them up and more and more of the musicians showed up for their shot and I did it two years running. Still love the shots and had an awesome time doing it.

TO FLICK OR NOT TO FLICK

After the furor over APE's choice of to use Flickr as his tool for his showcase, I came up against some of the same Flickr discrimination myself last week. After meeting a very nice photographer at the Blindspot auction, I emailed him some images based on a conversation we had on regards to alternative process. I sent him a number of images of mine using Flickr. Private, only he could see them, but he emailed me back and from the tenor of his comment was shocked and quite perturbed, that I would take the time to shoot 8x10 but then put them on Fkickr. We joked back and forth about it, but the underlying feeling was that this tool was so beneath me, I should be ashamed to be seen in its company. I was a little dismayed at this but it made me read over the Jackanory's comments about the resentment in some quarters to Rob using this program. What are people thinking? Its reminds me of the hue and cry on Photoshop's arrival."No way, I shoot everything in camera" Wonder if those guys are still saying that today. ITS A TOOL PEOPLE. Use it accordingly. Use your noggins. Nobody has to know you have stuff up on it. There are plenty of times when I need to put something together fast, other than my website for a potential client. You have another tool to show them work, that may tip the scales in your favor, great, thanks. Personally I think clients couldn't care less, they have a lot more shit to think about than Flickr. Use it for what it is and move on. Lets get pass this to more pressing and interesting subjects, like ......Polidori in Versailles. Now where's Soth when you need him?

Stan B over at Reciprocity Failure read my post on Azo film and recommended looking at the work of Joseph Mills. He uses outdated paper with a specific toning technique which includes varnish and achieves a beautiful washed out look, not unlike 8x10 cross processed Polaroid. His work Inner City can be seen here, represented by the Cohen Amador Gallery in NYC

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA WILDFIRE REMNANTS

Here are some of the images from my series of the California wildfires. I set out on this project with very little preconceived ideas about what it might look like except I wanted to shoot large format(naturally) and give it my own spin. Shot over a period of three days, just as if it was an assignment, I covered a fair amount of territory and captured varying degrees of destruction and how it affected its surrounding environment. My wife's family and many friends all live close to the firing lines so I'm reasonably familiar with these deserts, which was a help and it also made it more personal as we followed the coverage very closely as the fires themselves were raging. Unlike Katrina, this is such a personal almost individual catastrophe. Not everyone was touched by the blazes, the randomness at which the fires touched down meant people from the same street shared very different experiences. Your house burned to the ground, your next-door neighbor's fine, not a scratch (plate 1). How do you get your head around that? Living in the desert the blaze could pass you by 10 feet and your safe, or pick you out like a heat seeking missile and torch you (Plate 3). On the photographic side, after looking at 30 or so images I found some familiar threads running though this and my previous series which was pleasing, but it feels unfinished so a return in the new year is in the works.

YES MASTER

Very excited this week as we have two nights to catch the Master, Richard Misrach himself, appearing on the East coast. His new book is out, ON THE BEACH, signing at the Strand book store on Broadway and 12th street and then Pace/MacGill has an opening for the very same, the next night. Everyone has one of those photographers that when you see their work for the first time you go, aaah yeah, THATS what I've been trying to do. Misrach is one of those for me. After getting out of school it was great to see someone who was actually alive using an 8x10. Misrach is one of the Large Formatists who continued the view camera tradition long after it was out of vogue in the late 70's & early 80's. He was able to combine a modern social ethos with an archaic tool and create a new photographic palate. His Desert Cantos work shot him out of the mainly photographic world and on to the art stage itself. He worked solidly through the 90s culminating with two books in 2000 & 2001 Golden Gate and The Sky Book. Golden Gate blew me away when I saw the work at the opening. Such breadth and dept of color from our natural landscape, amazing. But like all idolatry, there comes a time for a let down and I think it maybe tomorrow night. Just like the team that breaks your heart by not making the playoffs on the last game of the season ON THE BEACH may be that defining moment for me. I can't wait for the prints, excited about the book but in all honesty I'm just not that crazy about the subject matter. Maybe seeing it all together will be the answer. If you have a chance try to get to one of the events, do, he doesn't show up that much on the East coast, and see what all the fuss is about, it should be worth it.

THE SWIMMING VISIONARY?

Nice piece in PDN this month about Gregory Crewdson. Go here for an equally compelling Q&A on NPR . Very candid in his answers about his process. This guy is another one, who like Gursky, elicits a lot of chatter. Of course I feel camaraderie for the paysan because of his affinity for 8x10, but I have had some people ask me " how is he a photographer anymore". I suppose I could have told them to go listen to the NPR piece but then we wouldn't have any thing to write about. Anyway, I'm sure most people ask the above question in the true sense of the word, - see the image - shoot the scene - print the picture. Of course our business is ever changing and that model seems quite quaint in comparison to what in fact is the reality of most peoples photography today, no matter what their process is. Instead of is he a photographer?, maybe the question really is, what is a photographer today? With the advent of digital, Flickr etc just about everyone can be and seems to be a photographer. Martin Parr's story about Bruce Davidson losing out on a rather large job to a Flickrite, being an example. If you can point it, shoot it and you get some work then where does that place someone like Crewdson, in photographic terms. You really can't say he just takes a photograph. The production alone would make Walker Evans, one of his original inspirations, turn in his grave. Imagining the Mis-en-scene is so complex, putting a six figure photo shoot is immense, that work alone could kill ya. But.... in reality he doesn't light the scene himself, doesn't do any of the digital work himself, which seems like a monumental part of the job, doesn't proof his prints, doesn't print the finished product. These are all things we loved about being photographers right? I would have my minions do all that kind of drudgery also. So what exactly does he do? "Acctionn" Click.He has a crew of 70 people to run the whole schebang. I know that's pretty simplistic, in view of the huge production but... photographically? How much of the work do you have to do yourself to be still considered a photographer, in the old sense of the word. For all intense and purposes he is a director but he doesn't have to illicit the range of emotions all directors have to get from their actors. I think the cobbling together of the images and director of photography he uses, seem to be the sticking points for a lot of people also. So is there another newer, more modern name for Mr Crewdson and his ilk, image director, photo imager, image creator, or just Visionary. I know other photographers have left some of less glamorous photographic work behind them along time ago, advertising and Fine Art guys in particular but I wonder if Crewdson did much more of the process in camera, would that quell some of the questions?. He says he has never used strobe but considering he doesn't do it himself anyway, why not. I'm sure someone out there would be willing to take on the challenge of one of his lighting scenarios. Find some old Stacked Ascors, they will give you F32 in hurry. Before the advent of the new technology this was one of the great challenges posed to many an advertising photographer, "I want all that in the frame and I will pay you to do it". No Photoshop, figure it out. And how is that different from the galleries funding Crewdson's work so they can all make profit from the final image. Is that really a fine art or a pure money making venture for Crewdson and the galleries?, not unlike making a film for a studio. Certainly artistic with great vision but there is a bottom line, somebody will want a return on their money. Nothing wrong with any of this, we are all looking for funding in some way or other.
Now lets get this straight the finished product is terrific. What he creates in one image can sometimes be mesmerising but these are many of the questions being raised with the advent of digital and how one implements it in ones work. The other is whether Mr Crewdson could give a rats ass what he is called. And will that word photographer, as we once knew it, be obsolete sometime soon?

THE WEEKENDER

NYC, 600-1500ft above sea level, 4:37 p.m.


Columbia County Fire Tower, N.Y., 1260ft above sea level, 11:24 a.m.


As almost all photographers will tell height is one of the most valuable assists in shooting anything or anybody. How many times have you said to yourself " if I could only get up a little higher" or "where's the ladder... what do ya mean ya didn't bring it". Well this weekend I was lucky enough to get more than those couple of feet. First I was able to traverse lower Manhattan in a helicopter. Couldn't get the 8x10 in but seeing as I was petrified to even move my head I don't think I could have used it anyway. The 4/3 format I have with my digital is really close to the large format dimension so it gives me a very close approximation of what I would see if I could get a view camera to these areas. This is the second time I have been up in a chopper and it is spectacular. Once you get over the initial butterflies and see whats around you, it really is an awesome sight. Unfortunately the blog hurts the image quality so go here for a closer look.
I then found one of the many Fire Towers still standing and dotting New York State. As you can see the panoramas are wonderful, and with any luck this may be a new segment of SKYSCAPES. Thought the 1.65 mile, up hill trek through the State Park might hinder this being a very regular occurrence. We'll see.
PS With all this running around I missed the donnybrook over the Gursky opening at WTJ 'Gursky revealed'. I do have to drop by and see the monsters for myself but for now I will keep my head down, out of the way of the bottle throwing and keep trying to figure out how he gets a view camera 600ft up in in the air over the desert?

OUR MAN IN PALM SPRINGS

The Palm Springs Photo Festival caught my eye this week because the promotional photo being used is by Large Formatist and old pal Robert Maxwell. He is one of the pre-eminent portrait photographers working today. That he combines alternative process with newer media, for me makes his accomplishments that much more exciting. I was lucky enough to assist him on and off for a few years, right after his wet plate fetish but still carrying a torch for the big camera. To say that Robert is one of the true characters of our business would be one of overwhelming understatement. If I were a betin man, I would give you odds he is Ridin surf in Southern California as we speak, but his passion for that and his lust for life in general has translated into fabulous photo essays on many of the subjects he loves . He's been able to straddle the fine art, editorial and advertising aspects quite deftly and I'm sure his speaking engagement at the show will be laced with great insight, tirades, love letters and just about anything else that pops into Bobby's head, on the subject of our business or anybody Else's business for that matter. You never know even the NYC crew may show up and get him all riled up.