RotoMerge

Lens testing, lens testing, lens testing - again!

2012-01-09T22:53:00.003+01:00

If you wonder, why it's (again) a little slow on my blog:
I've been testing the new Nikon AF-S DX Micro-Nikkor 40mm f/2.8G lens, the Nikon AF-S DX Micro-Nikkor 85mm f/3.5G ED VR, and the Nikon AF-S Micro-Nikkor 105mm f/2.8G IF-ED VR for Camera Labs. Plus finally drawing up a big comparison of those results.
Pretty interesting stuff for myself as it is the first time ever that I used a DIY test-target captured on 24x36 mm ISO 50 black&white negative film Ilford Pan F plus for testing the lenses at magnifications of 1:2.6
You can easily jump to all my lens reviews and comparisons through this page.

And now that Nikon has announced the new AF-S 85/1.8G lens I'll sure be doing some further lens-testing soon...

Striped Foliage

2011-12-11T23:10:00.000+01:00

Looking through whatever is in front of your subject may create interesting effects. The following image was caught looking out of a barn.

If you look at the large original (just click through the image and choose the action "View all sizes") you can see that the image is overlayed with a white fibre structure. That may give you a hint as to what the "filter" for shooting the foliage was...

Rust and green

2011-12-05T20:26:00.001+01:00

As you already know I cannot resist rust. In this case the rusty wall was contrasted with some signs of life: some green leaves and a grapevine shoot. The texture of the wall was interesting as some layers seem to peel off - the ultimate state of decay. So I called this vista...

Peel the paint:

It was captured in Venice - so salty moist from the sea might have aided in creating this aging wall. Processing was done to emphasize the texture.

Are photographs of abstract art abstract art?

2011-11-09T23:39:00.002+01:00

I very much enjoyed my stay in Venice, where old meets new, modern art meets "classic art". Interestingly the question arises whether photographing abstract art in itself creates abstract art!? Naturally not, because a reproduction of someone else's art will never create art in itself. But...
What is a reproduction? Does a shot of a piece of abstract art constitute an "objet trouve"? Well, I'm pretty sure it depends. And as all this certainly contains some degree of self-reference I'm also pretty sure that if you do it "right" you could create some imagery that simply is publishable.
But enough of the theory, I just incidentally went on a tangent before presenting two images I captured because: they are images of other people's "art". We may now philosophize endlessly but in the end all that counts is: Are these images worth your time looking at it? I (at least) hope so. Enjoy!

But to come back to the initial question: Are photographs of abstract art abstract art? In this case I really don't think so. But "objet trouve"? Yeah, well, maybe ;-)

Rust again...

2011-09-24T14:38:00.002+02:00

I cannot simply walk by when I see "something" rusty! I makes me grip my camera automatically and put it to my eye. The result is just a small crop from a larger photo that I might one day reveal (see: "slow reveal" ;-)). It looks like multiple suns over a calm sea.
This study in rust shows (again) how powerful the orange/blue contrast is...

Quite heavily post-processed with curves and color-tuning, but still only emphasizing what was originally there.

Thoughts on reflections

2011-09-07T20:52:00.002+02:00

The example of a reflective shot in the previous post show-cases some of the distinctive effects you can achieve by shooting into some reflective surface:
- The image acquires a tint from the color of the reflective surface. If strong enough the original colors are drained out and you get a two-toned image*
- the reflected image becomes structured by the uneven surface*
- you can use the frame of the reflector for creating a frame around your subject that's often astonishing, like a puddle after rain.
- you can play objects on the surface against the reflected image of the background in ways that are often not possible without the reflector (like your own person, or clouds that reflect in water or other wet surfaces)

And there are other quite interesting effects that do not show up in this specific example:
- Esp. when shooting against wet surfaces on ground level while standing on them you create the illusion of a "submerged" vantage point. For this effect to work properly it helps to display the image upside down so that the reflected subjects appear in their normal upright position.
- You can show the front and the (reflected) backside of a subject at the same time, sort of "bending the light" around your subject
- With curved reflectors (like Christmas tree balls) you get a strong warping of the subject
- Capturing the original and the reflected subject in one image creates symmetry
- Or you use the reflective surface simply to project additional (colored, structured) light on your subject. Which seems the least "intrusive" way of using a reflector.

Btw. If you want to find all my blogposts related to the topic of reflections simply click on the label "reflection" under this post or head over to the page "Use Keyword Search!" and click on the respective keyword there.
There you can find further examples of the effects described above.

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*does not work when you use a mirror, so mirrors are not as interesting as other reflective surfaces.

Re-Flections

2011-09-06T22:26:00.002+02:00

Next-up will be some thoughts about the abstractifying powers of reflections:

I'm just posting this so you can enjoy one of the most interesting shots I did while visiting (again) one of the most beautiful cities in North-Holland: Alkmaar.
Will post some thoughts on the special effects of this image after a short break...

The repetitive nature of ... nature

2011-09-06T22:19:00.000+02:00

I was after this shot for a long time. I knew this neck of the wood quite well and was always amazed by its ugliness: rows and rows of pine trees with little vegetation in between.
But I was looking after some special shot to exhibit the boring and repetitive nature of this type of vegetation, to bring the trunks of these trees together in an impenetrable wall of wood. Well, here it is:

I was happy with the VR supported quality of the 1/30 sec capture at 70mm (=105mm equivalent on my D300) and used some post-processing to emphasize the blandness of the original.

Has this image some abstract quality about it? Well, I think the pattern (or if you like texture) and reduced color-palette makes for some degree of abstractification. But to be honest: I like it especially because it's still very close to original life impression that you'd get standing there at my view-point. That comes as a special shock to people that are normally not interested in the "abstract" side of pictorial art - but have to realize that there is some abstract quality inherent in their surroundings...

The Edge

2011-08-26T13:05:00.002+02:00

This morning I had no hope of capture anything of interest. But as simply strolling around just felt strange, I slung the camera over my shoulder to give me at least the appearance of purpose ;-)
36 photos and a quick screening of the results later I saw one or two images with potential. Fortunately I had captured enough variations of the theme to pick the most fitting for my purpose. That means for me e.g. that the texture has to show (shot at f11) and not get lost in too shallow dof as was the case with the f2.8 and f5.6 shot. Then I went through some heavy post-processing even using tools not available in Lightroom (*shock*). Thus I created

The Edge:

Drawn to the dark edge, the air is sucked into the void...

What I like about this image:
- abstract, not easy to identify the "original". Makes you trying to solve the enigma
- not over-processed, so the original colors, textures and forms still "shines through"
- reduced color-palette, nicely complementary
- lines/curves leading to "the edge"

Rising, shifting, dancing in the night

2011-08-20T23:17:00.001+02:00

Eureka! After going at the same subject again and again I finally distilled an abstract worth posting:

Processing was done to "hide" the original subject, although still with the basic tools from Lightroom.
What I like about this image: The patterns, the glowing bars of light, the rise from the dark, and the inherent organic movement.
Have a look at the largest size (just click through the image): there is a fine texture to it. And that might just give you a clue as to what was the source of these rising, shifting, dancing columns of light

Color

2011-08-13T22:38:00.001+02:00

Got this one when testing the new Nikon AF-S 28-300mm VR lens. Shot into the low sun and everything turned golden...

Technically there was some shifting in haze/glare when I took the photo, which turned out to be influenced by the image stabilization: Obviously at a certain position of the VR lens-group veiling glare was more prominent than in another position. I tried to capture it with minimal glare. But this is hard, when shooting with the sun shining into your lens.
This is a clear example of abstractification through quite some reduction in the color palette. And that without the use of any trick, filter or post-processing. You just have to look...

Perspective

2011-08-10T21:45:00.002+02:00

Interesting how you start guessing what this is - because you have no hint of perspective. Someone asked me whether this was a burnt forest from an airplane. But no, this is it not:

I did some quite some post-processing on this one (at least for me) to make it more surreal. But the out-of-focus areas should have given you a hint that this was not shot from 1000 meters above ground but more likely is a close-up. Which it is!

No News is Good News?

2011-07-13T23:50:00.001+02:00

Well, not quite! I've been testing the new Nikon Nikkor AF-S 50mm f/1.8G, which is quite a charming little lens. See the results from my two weeks worth of testing here. So that went well and I've only got the task left to translate the whole thing into German as I got the copy of that lens for the review from Nikon Germany. So I owe them one.
But on the photographic side things have been slow lately although I've been able to capture some shots I like. Well, it might just be that I simply have to make up my mind about selecting one or two and explain my choice(s).
But first I got to do the translation...

Finissage / Exhibition closing

2011-05-31T20:58:00.000+02:00

Der letzte Tag meiner Ausstellung fiel mit dem Zeidler-Fest in Feucht zusammen und es gab viele, viele Besucher. So hat es dann zum Schluss noch einmal richtig Spaß gemacht und ich hatte das Gefühl, den Besuchern auch!
Für alle, die sich die Bilder noch einmal im Internet anschauen wollen, oder die keine Gelegenheit hatte, die Ausstellung zu besuchen, hier der Link zu allen ausgestellten Werken.
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The final day of my exhibition coincided with the Zeidler-festival in Feucht. And there were lots and lots of visitors! So it was real fun - for me and also for the visitors.
For all those who'd like to have a look at the images here's the Link to all the exhibits.

Lajos Keresztes

2011-05-28T20:24:00.004+02:00

Yesterday I visited Lajos Keresztes' exhibition "Materie am falschen Ort" (Matter at the wrong place) in Nuremberg. His work is based on photographs of garbage and ranges from the (almost) realistic to the totally abstract. This exhibition is part of a project "Art protects Earth" and is very inspiring. He does quite a lot of work in post-processing and when you see what an artist like him can produce based on photographs of a pile of rubbish you'd be amazed.

His web-site is here. Unfortunately the images from his latest exhibition are not (yet) included. But it is planned to tour through Europe, so if you have a chance to attend: highly recommended!

Below is his image "Windspiele" published at Galerie-Treppenhaus:

Artikel zur Eröffnung / another article

2011-05-05T22:29:00.003+02:00

Heute kam noch der folgende Artikel von der Eröffnung im "Boten". Da er (noch) nicht elektronisch verfügbar ist habe ich auf einen Scan verlinkt. Den Artikel von letzter Woche habe ich auch noch einmal als Scan beigefügt.
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There was another article in the local newspaper today, which I have uploaded as a scan under the link above (also attached is the scan of the article from last week).

Artikel zur Ausstellung / Press coverage

2011-05-04T20:02:00.001+02:00

Hier ist ein Artikel, der in der Zeitung "Der Bote" erschienen ist zur Ausstellung.
Und ich hoffe, dass noch ein Bericht von der Eröffnung erscheint.
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An article was published in "Der Bote", the local daily around here and I hope that another article will be published with a report from the opening.

Fertig / Ready to go!

2011-04-30T22:38:00.001+02:00

Alle Bilder sind nun aufgehängt nach einigen Überlegungen, was wie zusammengestellt wird und wohin kommt. Hat fast den gesamten Freitag gekostet. Die Beleuchtung ist ziemlich unterschiedlich in dem Raum und die unterschiedliche Länge der Ausstellungswände war auch eine Herausforderung.
Aber jetzt bin ich ziemlich zufrieden.
Hoffentlich wird die Eröffnung morgen ein Erfolg!
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All images are now placed after much deliberation about what belongs where. That took the better part of last Friday. The illumination is pretty different in the room and the different lengths of the exhibition walls posed quite a challenge, too.
But now I'm pretty satisfied.
Hopefully the opening tomorrow will be a success!

Traurig / Sad

2011-04-14T21:39:00.004+02:00

Es stimmt uns sehr traurig, dass unser armes altes Hundle in die ewigen Jagdgründe eingegangen ist. Das Alter und ein schwaches Herz haben unserer Ira den Rest gegeben. Sie lebt nun nur noch in unserer Erinnerung und in Photographien.
Hier ist ein Bild von ihr. Ich würde als Titel nun "Go West..." verwenden.
Sie wird einen Platz in der Ausstellung bekommen.

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It's our sad duty to announce that our poor old doggy Ira has passed away. Old age and a weak heart finally has got the better of her and she now lives only in our memories and the pictures that we have.
Here's one of them. I would now change the title to "Go West..."

She'll have her place at the exhibition.

Auswahl / Selection

2011-04-13T21:03:00.006+02:00

Endlich ist die Auswahl der Bilder für die Ausstellung getroffen! 48 sind natürlich viel zu viele, aber beim Aufbau der Ausstellung wird dann final entschieden, welche an die Wand, und welche Bilder in die Mappe kommen.
Inzwischen sind auch alle gedruckt und die meisten gerahmt - jedenfalls die, die sehr wahrscheinlich aufgehängt werden.
Übrigens: Eines der letzten Bilder, die es in die engste Auswahl geschafft haben war das Selbstportrait unten. Nun mag man sich fragen, was das mit "Natur - inspiriert" zu tun hat? Ja, ich bin tatsächlich kein großer Freund von Selbstportraits, aber der Schatten auf dem Acker in der tief stehenden Wintersonne und dieser seltsame Wirbel um meinen Kopf verbunden mit der Zwei-Farbigkeit befriedigte meine Suche nach "natürlicher Abstraktion". Also, wer wissen will, wie ich in Natura aussehe, der muss mich schon in der Ausstellung besuchen kommen...

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Finally the selection process for the images has come to an end! 48 pictures are too much, naturally. But the final decision as to which ones will find their place at the wall and which ones will end up in a portfolio will come when we set up the exhibition room.
All images are now printed and most of them framed - at least those which have a high probability of being displayed on the walls.
By the way: one of the last images that made it on the short list was this self-portrait:

You may ask what that has to do with "Inspired by Nature"? Well, I'm not normally into self-portraits, but my shadow on the earth and the strange maelstrom around my head captured my eye and the natural two-tonedness aided my quest for abstractification. So if you want to know how I look in reality, you have to come to the exhibition: I'll be there!

Horst Schäfer

2011-04-10T20:43:00.007+02:00

I had the chance to meet Horst Schäfer in person at the opening of the new exhibition "eyes wide open" in Erlangen, where some of his images were shown alongside other local photographers. He was the senior there and I very much liked his images.
Horst Schäfer was born 1932 and started as a photog in Düsseldorf (just like me, in Düsseldorf I mean). He soon went to New York and made his career there and at other places in the US in the 20 years between 1961 and 1980. After that he returned to Germany and now works and lives in Nuremberg (just like me, again).
I asked him how he goes about catching the images that made him famous, most of them not studio work. He replied that he just captures the moment, not planning what to shoot and seldom returning to a scene to wait for better light or other changes in conditions.
That sounds like a photo-journalist to me and while some of his images in the exhibition clearly show this freshness and spontaneity many photos have a "planned" and well thought-out look. But that only shows that the real photographic artist can combine the spur of the moment, the one-time chance, with the professional eye for perspective, framing and a feeling for "the moment it clicks".
Great work!
Horst Schäfer's Website is here.

Below is an image by Horst Schäfer:

Natur - inspiriert

2011-04-06T23:34:00.004+02:00

For English version: see below!
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Endlich ist die Entscheidung für den Titel der Ausstellung im Zeidel-Museum gefallen:
"Natur - inspiriert"
Als Photograph begeistert mich vor allem die Natur: Bäume, Blumen, Landschaften, der Himmel, die Wolken – aber auch die Spuren, die der Mensch hinterlässt.
Hier kann man jeden Tag Neues entdecken: das Licht ändert sich, das Wetter, die Jahreszeiten – und natürlich die Natur selbst!
Ungewöhnliche Perspektiven bekannter photographischer Themen zu entdecken, das Spiel der Farben oder des Lichtes einzufangen und in der Abstraktion auf das Wesentliche zu reduzieren, sind die Elemente meiner Arbeit.
Von daher war es am Ende einfach, den Titel für die Ausstellung zu finden. Inzwischen läuft auch der Druck der Einladungen, als Key-Visual habe ich übrigens dieses Bild verwendet.
Und die Auswahl der Bilder ist auch fast schon fertig, der wesentliche Teil schon gedruckt und gerahmt.

Die Spannung wächst...

----English version--------------------
I've finally come to a decision regarding the title of the exhibition at the Zeidel-Museum:
"Nature - inspires" or if you like "Inspired by Nature"
These are both correct translations of the German title and I like the small ambiguity of that.
As a photog I'm inspired especially by nature: Trees, plants, landscapes, the sky, the clouds – but also the traces of human "intervention".
Here you can discover a new angle every day: The light changes, the weather, the seasons – and nature itself naturally!
To discover unusual perspectives of well known photographic topics, to capture the play of colors or of the light and to distill the essence through abstraction are core elements of my work.
So in the end it was easy to find the title of the exhibition. Currently I'm printing the invitations using this image as key-visual.
And the selection of images is almost done, too, as well as printing and framing most of them.

The anticipation grows...

Nikon 35mm madness

2011-03-03T23:52:00.004+01:00

Having had the chance to test all three current 35mm Nikon primes on a D300 and a D700 did throw quite a spanner in any other photographic work I would have liked to pursue. I'm still not through with writing up all the results from the various tests, raking up almost 900 shots in the course of the action! But I can now at least show you some concise comparison of those three lenses. Have a look, you're in for some surprising results!
As 35mm is sort of an universal focal length that comparison was pretty important for me. It confirmed that my choice was excellent, and I'm looking forward to putting the new gear to good use - after I've written up the rest of my findings...
If you're interested in all my lens-reviews, have a look here.

My first (solo) exhibition

2011-02-17T22:53:00.003+01:00

Woohoo! I've been scheduled for my first solo exhibition at a museum: The Zeidel-Museum near Nuremberg which is mostly about beekeeping but has a large room set aside for display of various local artists too. The exhibition will be in May. I'm thrilled and excited!
Now the most pressing concern is about which images to display...
...and what title to give to the exhibition...

Traces of light

2011-02-13T17:21:00.001+01:00

Saw this just today and grabbed my camera. It was too strange looking to pass.
Pure traces of light on a very simple background: white tiles.

Can you guess what this is?

Redesign: more space for images

2011-01-30T09:50:00.003+01:00

Just discovered that there is a (new?) design for this blog that gives some additional 100px in width for the main content area. So images can now be posted at a total of 500px width which gives you a better view on the photos on display here.
Hope you enjoy!
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Unfortunately I had to re-edit each post to accommodate the new width :(

Duplicity

2011-01-28T18:29:00.004+01:00

While testing the new Nikon AF-S 85/1.4G with a Canon 500D close-up filter I ran into another opportunity of sunflowers in the (new) snow.

One part of the fascination with this subject was the form and the warm evening sun peeking through the split structure. But the other was the duplicate form built from the snow that at one time must have been attached to the flower.

Slow Reveal

2011-01-07T15:54:00.006+01:00

Inspired by some reading of Michael Freeman's "The Photographer's Mind" in the chapter "The Reveal" I tried to set up a slightly puzzling image with one of my favorite subjects: Trees.
Found an opportunity today while strolling along the bank of an old canal with an alley of trees on the other side. The snow on the fields and the ice on the canal got some battering as temperatures rose almost to +10°C and everything was wet and glistening.

Captured with the new AF-S 35/1.4G (but I think that hardly mattered ;) ) and some post-processing in LR3

Mirror Wood 1:

Mirror Wood 2:

For gear head over here

2011-01-05T12:29:00.004+01:00

I've finally collected all my lens reviews on an extra page in my blog from where you can easily head over to the respective Camera Labs thread. There you can read about my findings and the comments from others, post questions or participate in discussions.

Love is all around...

2011-01-04T12:14:00.004+01:00

Found this Spanish inscription on a rusty old sculpture:

Solo el amor se queda:

Did some heavy (at least for me) post-processing on this one to emphasize the texture of the background without overpowering the inscription. The final step was giving the words some extra glow. A combination of HDR Efex and Lightroom processing.

I've submitted this image to the chairman's challenge on the theme "Time" over at Nikongear. I like the contrast between the central message of the inscription about the lasting power of love and the lichens slowly encroaching on it. I personally have a clear favorite of who is winning the battle between lichens and love :)

Hope you like it!
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After January 9th I will know how many voted for my entry...

Objet trouvé

2011-01-02T19:34:00.003+01:00

Mostly I stumble across interesting vistas large or small. And then I look for an appropriate angle and camera/lens-setting and shoot. And don't arrange anything on the set. So is this by definition "found art" or an "objet trouvé"?

Btw.: There is only little post-processing in this image.

Is it the Sky, the Sea, or the Earth?

2011-01-01T19:34:00.003+01:00

Many have commented on the similarities between the deep sea and the deep sky: both have been barely explored and are expected to contain mysteries to be yet unveiled.
The interesting thing is that you can come face to face with some 170 Mio. years old piece on earth that contains structures from the sea and shows geometries from the deep skies. That inspired me to process the image in a way that it resembled more an underwater shot or an image from space.

You are looking here at the polished surface of some dark marble containing ammonites (resembling spiral galaxies) and belemnites.
An interesting mixture of chaos and order.

Happy New Year!

Minor White on Equivalence

2010-12-28T00:10:00.003+01:00

It is not only with the more abstractified type of photography that the question arises of how much of the perception of an image is driven by the viewer. But the more abstract a photography is the larger the role of the viewer is: his imagination, his experience, his current state of mind.
The more explicit an image is the less is left to the imagination of the viewer.
Surfing around I stumbled across an essay by the photographer Minor White on what Alfred Stieglitz and others called "Equivalence". You can read Minor White's essay here.
As the perception of "Equivalence" relies solely on the imagination of the viewer there must be different classes of viewers out there. And some which Minor White was not very fond of: "And we observe that all too often the persons who cry "Sick, Sick, Sick" have no imagination. Or, for reasons obscure to them, they deliberately blind themselves to visual experiences that might disturb their basic insecurity."
When reading his comments I started to think of whether they might be still valid as of today, more than 50 years later. Well, I think the flood of images now molding current viewers is still mostly non-abstract - so abstract images might still be hard to grasp for todays average recipients.
But that is my honest opinion - and open to debate. I'd love to hear your commentaries on this topic!

Surreal = not quite real?

2010-12-26T16:08:00.003+01:00

Well I thought I looked quite astonished when I stumbled across this wedding scene:

The photographer was shooting the kissing couple while behind him some (un)invited guests were serenely watching. What a hilarious scene this was!
I raised my camera and found out that didn't have anything longer than a lowly 35mm lens mounted and - as I didn't want to intrude - had to make do with the equipment at hand. Fortunately the "normal" lens and a little cropping were enough to capture the surreal flavor of this vista - my first wedding shot!
According to Wikipedia "Surreal in general means bizarre or dreamlike". So I claim that this image has a place right here, although it is not "abstract" - but it is "not quite real" either.

White Wine with the Fish?

2010-12-14T23:44:00.003+01:00

This is absurd: You're looking at some random abstract figure and imagine seeing things! I imagined seeing a fish in this rust-image I captured the other day when visiting one of my favorite subjects in the vicinity: a derelict rusty old excavator.
As always with rusty material you don't need much to get crazy colors not only in the oranges but also in the blues:

Fish:

Interestingly I captured this image after having been there many times before. So it always pays to revisit certain locations again and again to cover all the possibilities...

Black (and white) Sunflower

2010-12-07T21:33:00.003+01:00

I captured another view in this sunflower field. This time of two single flowers. I went for a b&w conversion - just out of gut feeling.

Chaos

2010-12-05T16:52:00.004+01:00

I was standing in front of this field of snow-capped sunflowers wondering whether I could produce an image that conveyed the decay of the flowers, the jumble of their stalks, and the eerie atmosphere of a field of flowers that belong to summer shivering in the cold of winter. I made a lot of shots, naturally also with close-ups of single flowers, but I found the visual chaos of this specific shot fitting.

Sunflower Field:

In post I chose an amplification of the brown-reds and a yellowish tint for the snow which emphasized the drabness of the scene.
Best viewed at 1024 or 1920 width, so feel free to click through the image to the larger versions...

Fractured Urbania

2010-11-19T21:17:00.004+01:00

There is a very interesting attempt at abstract photography over here called "Fractured Urbania". It is obviously inspired by David Hockney and it is the first of this kind that I've seen somewhere on a photography site. But that may be due to me not surfing enough ;-)

This image is copyright by Chris Heilman 2010. Click through the image for a larger version.

Chris wrote about his image: "A great deal of my photography is about photography. In this case [...] the photographs are overtly about construction of new, large scale urban development. Breaking the photograph up this way suggests impermanence, ... or what? an artificial facade? The picture is an expression of this."

I find it highly interesting but have no clue as to how it was produced. But I'm a little weary as to what is the goal of these images and how this goal is supported by this special technique. As I wrote in a commentary there: "In the case of both images above I'm a little unsure what the topic/theme of those images is. The consequence is that I have the feeling the technique is a little "l'art pour l'art" (if you excuse my French!)... But nice technique nonetheless." To which Chris answered. "This is not the first time I have heard this criticism of my work, and I accept that there is validity to it. Given that, I feel that my themes are perhaps too personally coded to be easily accessible."

I think his remark hits on an often recurring theme with photographs that are more than just snapshots or "postcards": What is the intention of the photographer behind or beyond what can readily be seen in the image?

Branching, Trees, Black & White

2010-11-11T20:49:00.001+01:00

Coming back to one of my favorite subject: Trees.
Fractal structure, blending one typical macro form with different micro-structures they are fascinating all around the year.
So fall/winter is a good time to marvel about the inherent structure of trees, with the camouflage of the leaves gone, the colors stripped. Add to that some aggressive curves, catapulting any colors into either black or white and you reduced the tree(s) to some primeval forms.
I called it

Branching:

Black and White Cats

2010-11-07T17:21:00.003+01:00

Back to black (and white). Those silhouettes against the evening sky just lent themselves to reach the first level of abstractification: a black&white conversion.
Plus the need for high shutter speed and a small aperture made a relatively high ISO of 800 necessary. Add in the tight crop plus cranked-up contrast added some gritty noise too - which btw. works better in b&w than in color imho.
Making those nice pussy-cats look like...

Daredevil & Calamity Jane;-)

Abstract Architecture?

2010-11-02T20:19:00.004+01:00

Well, no. But architecture sometimes gives you material for interesting viewpoints, extreme perspective, or surprising crops that sets your image apart from what other people have seen there, on the street, with the building in plain sight.
Yesterday I was just standing there in front of this imposing granary building in Beilngries, Bavaria. Looking through my viewfinder, I was not hoping for much: Standard "from-the-street" perspective, and the front of the building looked bland. But tilting the camera and aligning the narrow but high windows along the diagonal something suddenly clicked - and so did my camera :)
Unfortunately the standard contrast development did nothing to show both the wooden shutters and the structure of the wall well, so I did some HDR development:

Back from testing

2010-10-18T22:21:00.002+02:00

Phew, a lens with an almost 11x zoom-range is quite a challenge to test. Because the dangerous thing is that performance shifts back and forth when you zoom through the range. So I tested eight different focal length to do the lens justice. But that is now all over.
Coming back to shooting and processing I went for testing HDR Efex pro from Nik Software on bracketed shots and on single RAW files. I stumbled across an image from this year that I really wanted to add some punch to. Not that it is now very abstract, but the lines on the wall, the stark shadows and crass colors lift this image out of the "realistic" realm.

Skull:

Hope you enjoy it!

Testing, testing, testing...

2010-10-03T21:39:00.003+02:00

If you wonder, why it's a little slow on my blog:
I'm currently testing the new Nikon AF-S VR 28-300 f/3.5-5.6. And at that focal range I'm testing 28/35/50/70/105/150/200/300mm at 6 different apertures on two different cameras (D300 and D700). This takes some time. But the impression so far is pretty good.
If you're interested in the results, have a look here. My other reviews of Nikon lenses can be accessed via this page.

Shadow, shadow on the wall...

2010-09-11T23:49:00.003+02:00

I've already shown you an example of the abstractifying powers of shadows there.
Here is another example that conveniently combines abstractification through shadows and oof (and b&w / two-tone in the shadow if you like).

A rose:

The central "gap" through the image is perhaps a bit unfortunate, but as I could neither move the sun nor the rose to another point it had to stay there, separating the subject and its shadowy image...

Warped Reality

2010-09-06T20:16:00.002+02:00

Mirrors are nice props to produce interesting images, reflecting the unexpected or combining different views into one image.
Warped mirrors (or to be precise mirroring surfaces) are even more fun to play with and are great reality modifiers. Just walk up to the chrome parts of a bike and watch with a photographers eye!
Here's one I captured recently, called

Warped Reality:

A Beech is a Beech is a Beech...

2010-08-16T21:37:00.003+02:00

I love trees!
And we have some very impressive and old ones in the vicinity - mostly oaks and beeches.
But to capture the "true" impression of the tree is a real challenge: Often they are surrounded by other trees, the sky produces a strong contra-light while the bark is dark, exposure is critical, and lastly those trees are so huge that even large-aperture lenses cannot isolate them sufficiently.
In this shot I used a wide-angle (21mm film-equivalent) to capture the treetop and combined it with a very low vantage-point. This normally leads to an exaggerate perspective but as a tree is a three-dimensional subject which is as deep as it is wide you can still get a nicely balanced impression of the trunk and the canopy. The original capture was very dark, which quite nicely reflected the overcast and drizzly weather. I tried some exposure compensation but that only led to a glaring sky and a harsh and grainy bark - which totally defeated the original gloomy impression. So I went to some extreme curves trying to balance the bark, the leaves and the sky. This in turn introduced some false yellow, red and blue colors. I desaturated the blue as it looked simply strange and kept the yellow and red leaves as it added a touch of autumn. I also created some dreamy bark textures and ghost-like lighting effects on the trunk, which I found quite fitting for such an old, old tree.

So here is the result of some over-the-top post-processing to capture the "aura" of an old beech.

Psychedelic Beech:

And here is the original.

After the first 100 views I had only 2 comments on the forums: one favoring the "natural" version and one relating to the difficulties of capturing trees.
So you could consider the "Psychedelic Beech" a roaring failure!
What do you think?

Ghosts

2010-08-14T10:49:00.001+02:00

One of the entries to the "Blur" challenge at Nikongear caught my eye. The image is called

Ghosts:

This image is copyright by intruder61 2010. Click through the image for a larger version.

The image captured a high dynamic range scene with colorful elements. The blurring concentrates the image on the light/contrast and the colors as it takes away the details of the scene. The persons in the foreground appear as ghosts moving along.
A very nice example of what you can achieve with blurring.

High Key Abstraction

2010-08-09T23:11:00.005+02:00

Another fascinating image came up on Nikongear again. I got permission to show it here as a very nice example of high key abstraction. ....

Sea Urchin:

This image is copyright by Andrea G. Blum 2010. Click through the image for a larger version.

Andrea commented about her photo:
"I found the empty Sea Urchin shell on the granite slabs at Schoodic Point on the Atlantic Ocean in Acadia National Park in Maine. The gulls drop clams, crabs and urchins on the rocks to crack them open for a tasty snack. (Poor Urchin !!)
The urchin shell had such intricate designs both inside & out.
I made several documentary photos with my 60mm f2.8 AF-S Micro Nikkor, but something so beautiful deserved a more artistic, impressionistic approach.
I tried some multiple exposures and various extreme exposure and colour effects. This high-key abstraction made via an overexposure of the inside of the urchin shell (followed by a white/black point reset in the editor) pleased me the most. BTW, it is not obvious, but the greenish areas are from algae in a nearby tidal pool."

Not much "trickery" in here. Just an interesting subject (and naturally: the eye to identify it!) and the idea to abstractify it through over-exposure.

Comments welcome.

Abstract Reality II

2010-08-06T22:42:00.010+02:00

The other day I saw a very interesting image on Nikongear. I got permission to show it here as it is a very nice example of "abstract reality". It was captured as is, with none of the major techniques to abstractify a photo that I listed here.

Sego:

This image is copyright by James Fitzgerald, shot in 1982 on Ektachrome. Click through the image for a larger version and other shots from James.

This is what James told me about his photo:
"Even though it's 28 years old I remember clearly making this image. I've made many of this type of abstract image over the years.
When I looked at this old painted sign on the side of a building I saw more than just an old sign.
I saw the the muted pastel colours, the lines in the concrete, I saw the "S" from Sego mostly gone, was it scratched out? leaving the word ego?
I wondered, who made this?"

What do you need to capture abstract reality?
Well, simple: Just an eye for detail and a good sense of cropping/framing, methinks!

And this image serves as a reminder what a great abstractifier rust is!

Comments are welcome.

Photomerge/RotoMerge: On the use of Tools

2010-08-01T15:44:00.002+02:00

"RotoMerge" sounds like "Photomerge", a tool from Photoshop that lets you merge multiple images to achieve either panoramic images, HDR pictures or focus-stacks.
But I have not yet used the Photomerge-tool for any of my abstract work as I up to now have only used single exposure shots.
So far my post-processing is restricted to cropping, exposure correction, curves and color-tweaking. So the abstracticity of my images is captured in the making, at the moment of the shot. All post-processing is just like you normally would also do with a realistic photography.
It was only a few times so far when I used tools to change colors and contrast to an extend that you can speak of abstractifying. I did this with an images of clouds and flowers that I'll present in a future article.

But I still have the idea of using Photomerge to create some interesting abstract effects by stacking several photos from different perspectives together. But other than David Hockney I'm not thinking of making a big collage out of different photos but to merge them one over the other.
But so far my efforts have not resulted in anything useful :(

The Picture of Dorian Gray

2010-07-30T21:40:00.006+02:00

"...it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour - that is all."
(Quote from "The Picture of Dorian Gray" by Oscar Wilde, 1890)

I think this describes one of the most frustrating experiences every new photographer will have when they show their work around: Not everybody shares their enthusiasm for an image simply because the passion with (or in a wider sense: the context in) which the photo was taken was lost on the beholder.
There are two dangerous courses that result from such frustration:
- one tries to shoot what pleases the crowd; with the risk of becoming a copy-cat.
- one proclaims: "It is enough if I find this image beautiful" and risk to stop improving.
Both paths will not lead to the desired result: to evoke (or convey) feelings, or even passion through the artful use of form and color.

That inspires a nasty question: What is it in "abstract art" that evokes feelings?

I posted this on some forums but response was scarce. Someone ventured along the lines that something in the colors or forms of an abstract image evokes memories which are coupled with feelings. Perhaps not a bad guess. But that would mean that you as a photographer hardly have control over what feelings you evoke with abstract photos.
My theory is that abstract art relies more on the primary effectors of color and form. Like round forms are associated with the feminine, red is associated with warmth/love etc. You get my drift?
So it is indeed easier for the beholder to associate "things" with a more abstract image than with a very realistic, explicit photo that tunnels your thoughts quite strongly. Perhaps the same mechanism that makes many films of books a less satisfying experience for the reader of the book - because the explicit images in the film restrict the associations the reader of the book had or even contradict them.
So coming back to the quote from Oscar Wilde: It might just be a hint that the highest explicitness and realism in an image not necessarily evokes the most favorite response to it.
Erotic photography is certainly one example where this "insight" is considered a platitude.
And Bjørn Rørslett comes to mind with many intriguing images that are quite enigmatic. See for example his "Colours on Colours" gallery.

Anyone likes to comment?

---
Interesting reading: "OK... I just do not get it???"

The boone of the LCD-viewer

2010-07-28T18:51:00.002+02:00

When I cursed the "transparency" of modern optical viewfinders (ovf) I forgot to tell you about one trick I constantly use to help me evaluate an image and abstract it from the fabulous realism of the ovf: I set my camera to black & white and high contrast!
That only helps evaluate an image post shot but it is at least better than relying on the ovf alone.
- The smallness of the display has a similar effect than the ground glass of the TLR: It makes you concentrate on larger (and important) forms and geometries of your image
- The b&w makes you concentrate on differences of brightness that are more important to the eye and brain than differences in color. Again emphasizing form (over color)
- The high contrast makes it easier to see whether exposure is correct as underexposed or overexposed areas stand out immediately.
In these last two points the DSLR can deliver more support for abstractification while shooting than a TLR.

Funny thing is that when I import all my RAW-images into Lightroom (I don't do jpgs in camera) they at first retain their b&w high contrast "development" and only loose it when Lightroom renders the RAWs with its built-in RAW-converter. And when I look at that process I often find the b&w version better than the color-version that appears after a little while.
That always gives me food for thought...

The bane of the modern viewfinder

2010-07-26T18:49:00.001+02:00

You love the good, large, bright optical viewfinder (ovf) of a DSLR?
Sure you do!
You put your eye to the viewfinder and look at the scene you're about to capture in live-like size and with all the glorious detail. It looks like the real thing, like reality. The camera and its lens are transparent to you.

Much different from the ground glass in the finder of my Yashica-Mat 124G camera I once owned. It was a Twin Lens Reflex (TLR) and when you folded up the view-finder shield and looked down on the 6cm x 6cm ground glass the image projected there through the upper lens was looking much less like reality but like an artifact: It was small, it was mirrored vertically, it had grid-lines overlaid and the contrast was not too good under a bright sky. Even when you looked at it through the supplied loupe it was a far cry from the view through a modern ovf.

But it had one advantage: Your brain identified it easily as being an image, not reality. And that made it easier to compose because you saw important aspects of your composition faster than through an ovf. For example, the tilting lines you produce from tilting your camera upwards when shooting architecture just jump out at you when looking at the ground glass. Or the non-level horizon. The smallness of the screen also made important compositional elements like strong lines or large shadows stand out much more than the small details of the image. So you gave them automatically much more thought when shooting than when your eye is distracted by all the life-like details of an ovf.

So here's a case of pre-shoot abstractification that can help you take better photos because it helps your compositional skills. Even if you were to produce a most life-like image with glorious colors and sharp from corner to corner.

Today's DSLRs don't have something like this and unfortunately their standard matte screens don't even let you preview dof as it will turn out in the shot. Which is a real pity, because dof is one very important factor in composing a photo. And zooming in on the small screen on the back of todays DSLRs doesn't help to judge dof either.

Blur

2010-07-24T12:29:00.004+02:00

Yeah, right: They finally got it!
Nikongear is putting up a challenge to post the best blurred photo here.
Join into the fray or stand by watching in amazement what blur can to to create visually interesting, even artistic images.
The only rule that all contestants should adhere to is "The blur needs to be on purpose though".
The challenge is open until August 8th. So hurry to participate if you think you have the guts to compete. I've already participated with my fav shot from my 1 second series.
So you're up against some strong competition ;-)

The Grid - any comments?

2010-07-22T21:00:00.007+02:00

Looking at my flickr account I see one photo coming out on top when you count views.

The Grid:

This is a shot made while testing my new Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.4 G. I used the lens fully open at f/1.4 trying to give a good impression of real-life sharpness and the dof-isolation and oof-rendering that you could produce with it.
I find the interplay of sharp geometric form in the foreground and colorful oof background quite interesting but didn't think much of this photo until I saw that it is almost every day my most viewed photo on flickr - racking up over 10,000 views up to now (the review had over 26,000 hits).

So now I'm wondering whether this is the ultimate test-photo luring the gear-heads to evaluate the qualities of this lens or has the image qualities of its own?
Well I guess it's a little of both reasons.

But I'd really love to hear from you what you think the (hidden) qualities of this photo are - or are not. Feel free to leave a comment! You don't even need to be registered to do so.

Imagination vs. Reality

2010-07-21T23:20:00.005+02:00

"Photography is the expression of imagination, not the duplication of reality."

This is a quote from an article by Ken Rockwell dubbed "The pen and your signature". He brings home the message that the photographer is much more important than the camera, a point Ken has made many times before. And he is right!
This is the reason why I refrain from doing gear-talk on my blog, although I'm a gear-head myself and indulge in scrutinizing every review of photographic gear - even doing reviews by myself. But that is a totally different hobby from actually shooting images. But if you're actually interested in some of the gear I use or have tested, here's a list of reviews I did over at the friendly Camera Labs forum.

As you can see from some of the reviews I really struggled with some lenses and I'm still not sure whether I simply got a "lemon" (like the 85/1.8) or really have discovered something that others have overlooked. That makes testing a real nuisance and I limit it to lenses I actually intend to buy.

When I'm shooting I really like the gear to be "transparent", i.e. not to show up in the image unless I want it to. That's not because I want to duplicate reality. It's because I want to express my imagination and not expose the limitations of my gear!

Abstractification through Shadows

2010-07-19T19:29:00.004+02:00

Another great "reality modifier" are shadows: They are monochrome, they reduce a subject to a silhouette and they might yield a geometric distortion depending on the angle of the projection surface and your angle of view.
Here is one of the experiments I did with my own shadow to produce a self-portrait:

Shadow of a lonely Man:

Funny thing is: Every time I look at this photo I believe it was taken at a very short focal length (a.k.a. wide-angle). But I'm wrong: It was shot with the AF-S 50mm/1.4 at f/16, 1/125 sec, ISO 200, -1EV.
Funny, how your eyes can deceive you...

Abstract Faces

2010-07-18T19:40:00.002+02:00

When you can see something (like a face) in something quite different (like wood) you are onto some type of abstractification that I had not mentioned in my articles so far.
You may call this symbolism, ok, but in the end it is some form of abstracticism: You find a means to express the idea or basic form of a face from something that is not a face! Have a look at the following images:

Wooden Face I:

Wooden Face II:

The trick is of course to have something resembling eyes. The rest of the face might still be pretty alien - like in these two cases.
Further abstractification could be achieved through conversion to black&white to alleviate the impression of wood.

Paint and Rust II

2010-07-17T22:19:00.003+02:00

Just wanted to add another to my "Paint and Rust" series. It's less colorful than the others but nonetheless interesting. It's called...

2,6:

The challenge with these image is to determine the right frame of the "original".

Sharp Flowers

2010-07-15T17:43:00.003+02:00

Just in case you become dizzy with all this rotating and merging I thought to present a sharp image of a beautiful flower that is one of my favorites.

Flower:

Taken with a 105/2.8 macro-lens at f11, 1/20sec, ISO 200 on a tripod, directly in the evening sun. But although I used f/11 the curves and lines on the right side fade out of focus. I'm not sure whether this is a blemish or does not diminish the aesthetic quality of this image. Feel free to comment!

Wild Flowers

2010-07-14T23:54:00.006+02:00

Other than with trees I tried my new technique also on blazing red summer flowers: Geranium and roses. I did not simply rotate the camera but made all kinds of "squiggly" moves with it to paint the beautiful red color all over the image.
The goal was again to capture the "spirit" of the flower.

See for yourself.

Geranium:

Rose I:

Rose II:

The real challenge was to get an exposure time that would record the movement of the camera. I used a 400/5.6 tele lens at f/32, ISO 200 and +2EV. With the sun out I achieved shutter times between 1/6 sec and 0.8 sec. And only the long focal length made it possible to record some serious blur with these times. People with ND-filters have a clear advantage here ;-)

Post-processing was minimal, just to bring exposure and contrast back to the normal range. Plus some cloning-out of dust-specks on the sensor that were clearly visible at f/32

Ghosting

2010-07-12T23:16:00.003+02:00

Moving the camera through exposure on static subjects gives the impression of them moving and produces an ethereal ghostly image.
What would be better than to apply this technique to a (graffitied) ghost and produce an even more ghostly/ghastly image ;-)

Da Ghost:

You can really see him coming after you...

Textures

2010-07-11T11:02:00.005+02:00

Today caught a view on two adjacent fields and tried to capture the colors and texture. But with a twist: I was after the "tuftiness" of the plants, not its graininess. So I reduced micro-contrast in post so that the individual plants look more like brush-strokes and the texture looks soft.
Just the way I like it...

Textures II:

This approach makes the image look uninteresting/dull in the small sizes you can present in a blog. I recommend viewing it full-screen on a 1920x1200 monitor and use the link here.
Shot with a 300/4.0 tele lens at f/11, 1/500 sec, ISO 280

Seagull and Rust

2010-06-30T22:37:00.002+02:00

Not sooo abstract, but nonetheless one of my favorites.

Rusty Sky:

I love the battle of the blues, the tufftiness of the clouds in contrast to the cold geometry of that rusty container, and that singular seagull sailing across (although it's a little small to my liking).

The shot was taken at 10mm which is always a challenge, as a lot of landscape/sky maps onto the sensor with more highlights and shadows than on a normal shot.
But in this case the dynamic range was manageable. I shot (as usual) with -1EV dialed in and relied on the D300 to nail the exposure. I still got highlight-warning in the reflections of sun in the left-most metal. But I decided to get away with it and even chose some +0.5EV in post-processing to give the blue of the container more glow.

If you click through the image above you can get up to 1920x1200 in size. Enjoy!

One Second

2010-06-25T21:11:00.011+02:00

Here is my series from one walk at dusk:

Trees:

Bow:

Dusk:

Looming:

To appreciate this image, you should click through to the larger flickr-version!

Flash:

All were shot at 1 second, -1EV and with a 50mm lens which was easy to rotate around the horizontal axis during exposure (only "Bow" was captured with rotating the camera around the optical axis).
If you ask me whether I rotated up or down, I honestly don't know. Only thing I know is that I tried a good many combinations of moving and holding to get these results. And was really happy to have a DSLR at hand so that I could review the results immediately. It was quite a hit and miss thing and the results highly random at first. But after getting the hang of it and seeing what worked and what not it became gradually easier.

I have a nice slideshow with images from this series here. Enjoy!

This series was really inspired by the Miyelo series from Viggo Mortensen. His images of dancing Indians performing their traditional Lakota Ghost Dance seem to capture the spirit of this people in a wonderful way. And as I love to capture trees and their "spirit" I immediately saw this technique as interesting. See an interesting overview of his art, music & poetry.

I hope you find the results as inspiring as I.

Next up

2010-06-22T20:17:00.000+02:00

I have to take to the task of presenting my favorite series "One Second" which combines one of my favorite subjects trees with the technique of motion blur from a camera that moves through the one second exposure time.
So consider this an announcement of things to come which has the dual role to put myself under pressure to deliver upon my promises :~)
As the motion blur will mostly come from rotating the camera/lens-combo around the x-axis (in aerobatics called "pitch") while the shutter is open you will get quite a practical impression of what "rotomerge" means...

Paint and Rust

2010-06-21T21:20:00.002+02:00

Often you see rust in combination with paint which was applied to stop the decay.
I have found a good many examples at the North-Sea where the constant salt-water breeze puts most constructs from wood or metal at risk of fast deterioration.
This makes for some some nice photographic opportunities:

79:

Blue-Yellow:

Shut:

Btw.: If you want to know what sort of abstract art you can produce with the non-painterly use of paints and other colorful liquids have a look over there at the flickr-set alchemy by jedw.40cat.
And only photography makes it possible for us to view these extraordinary arrangements/experiments!

Rust

2010-06-20T19:46:00.010+02:00

Natural abstracticism - is there such a thing?
Well, yes! One of my favorites is the effect of water (especially salt-water) on metal: It's commonly known as rust.
It produces the organic type of abstract figures and can add some wonderfully wild colors too. Let me show you some of the images I like (btw.: the header of my blog is also made from rust).

Orange Blue;

Black Hole Sun:

Rust 18697:

And finally two not so abstract but again nicely textured by rust, ReCoil:

Machine:

The colors were a little emphasized in post but as always: I only brought out what was already there in the original image.
.

Rotating Trees

2010-05-30T10:10:00.005+02:00

I've shown what you can achieve through rotating the camera around the lens-axis in one of my earliest posts. I gave this technique another try with a tree whose structure seemed to be quite adequate for it.

Fractal Tree:

Shot with a 50mm lens at f/16, 1/4 sec

Through the rotation the details of the tree are veiled and the Gestalt/character of it brought forward.

Abstract Reality

2010-05-13T12:25:00.005+02:00

This is a fun thing to discover: That even without any tricks you can create photos that look abstract. It is just depending on your subject and the framing. If you look at this post you can find two examples with man-mode objects.
Let me now give you another two examples from natural subjects:

Rule of Thirds:

If you want to know what that is, click through the image to the flickr page and the see the comments there...

Ripples:

This is just the bark of a large tree.

So even photographs of natural subjects can look quite abstract.
Some fine examples come from photographer Bernd Uhde who produced some stunning aerial shots of the earth from baloons or planes. His book "AirRealArt - Ansichten Aufsichten" has many examples where you would have never guessed how this image was shot.

Hommage a trois (3b): David Hockney

2010-05-13T10:35:00.008+02:00

Thinking a bit more about my failure to find a "Hockneyish" reference in my own photographs, I stumbled across an older image that picks up on at least three aspects of his work
- it's huge: the original has almost 50 Mega-pixels and could easily be printed 3m high at 80 dpi
- it's stiched: a vertical panorama made from five single shots
- it's about trees and woods

I applied some tweaks to colors and contrast to abstractify the trees a little and emphasize the glow of the snow-white light. Stitching was done in PS4 with the photomerge function which gives a nice reference to the name of my blog: The image was produced by rotating the camera vertically for each shot taken and merging them together in post.
Thus: RotoMerge.

If you want to know how David Hockney "completed his biggest ever painting", have a look at this article.

Hommage a trois (4): Viggo Mortensen

2010-05-11T22:41:00.004+02:00

Gotcha! You never thought that a hommage a trois could possibly refer to four artists, right? Well yes, it happened, after I skipped David Hockney and remembered the influence and inspiration that Viggo Mortensen gave.
So this post is just a place-holder for the work I'd like to show here and which will be uploaded soon.
I'll be back after a short break...

Hommage a trois (3): David Hockney

2010-05-11T22:17:00.010+02:00

Weeeeeelll, I admit: I have no idea which of my photos picks up some theme/ideas/tricks from David Hockney.
But I'll scan the monograph on him once again...

---3 minutes later---

Aaah, while looking for the monograph on David Hockney I stumbled across another artist that my wife and me find very interesting: Viggo Mortensen of "Lord of the Rings" fame! Did you know that he is a painter and photography artist?

I have his books "Skovbo" with some very inspiring photographs of woods, also "Sign Language" and "Coincidence of Memory". For his artisitic (non-film) work have a look here and for his books there.

It was Viggo Mortensens photographs in the Miyelo series and his take on forests that somehow inspired me or my series on "one second shots". I'll show you some of the results in my next post.

See you!

Hommage a trois (2): Peter Doig

2010-05-09T20:48:00.010+02:00

Peter Doig impressed me with his "blotting technique". He uses it to add structure and light to many of his images, like the blots of light in his cabin-series or to add some foreground like falling snow like in his image "Blotter". I remember an image where he almost hid the scene behind a curtain of blots or streaks. This adds a nice layer of abstraction to an image but also can have the effect of pulling the observer in - because you try harder to look through the front-layer.

My tribute to his technique is this
Night Tree:

I only used a gradient mask to desaturate the colors at the bottom and make the night-sky blue. But other than that there is not much post-processing going on in this image.
It is a photograph of ice on a canal with a tree-like crack in it and blotches of snow.

Enjoy!

Hommage a trois (1): Georg Baselitz

2010-05-09T11:41:00.009+02:00

Well, Georg Baselitz is certainly not into geometric abstraction, but his famous trick was applied here: turn everything upside down.

And when you look closely at the lower left corner you can see my reference to this famous artist.
(As always: clicking through the image to the flickr-page and then selecting "All Sizes" gives you the chance to view this image larger)

Hommage a trois

2010-05-08T10:18:00.006+02:00

I've been touching on abstract paintings and how I found some inspiration there.

In recent years I visited exhibitions of three modern painters:
- David Hockney: Images
- Peter Doig: Images
- Georg Baselitz: Images

Hockney is certainly the artist most closely linked to photography as he worked with photocollage, used photos as originals for his paintings, and played with perspective that seems clearly inspired by photography. I was also astonished seeing some of his larger works assembled from a multitude of canvasses, thus "stitching" huge vistas together. As a corollary his art is not too abstract as you can easily identify the subject of his images.

Doig has clearly some "photographic" influence in his work esp. with regard to light and shadow. I like his series "Concrete cabin" (see one from this series here) where the bright sunlight blotches the trees of a dense forest and a glaringly white concrete building is shining through the wood.

Baselitz perhaps is the odd artist here with regard to photography, but he is famous for his style of painting his subjects upside down and thus giving the observer a fresh perspective. This is somethings that works equally well in photography and is not even easy to detect: I once saw an abstract photography that was obviously based on wave-patterns on water. The artist had turned the image upside down and he admitted that I was the only one remarking on his trick.

Abstractification through B&W: Is it a conversion?

2010-05-07T23:17:00.008+02:00

have a look at this photo:

Snowtree:

What's your bet: is it reproduced in (its natural) color(s) or is it a b&w conversion?
Well, I can tell you: there is not much of a difference here. This image was "converted" to b&w but it looked almost the same in color (after application of a suitable white-balance).
This is (again) a case where the artificial abstractification only emphasizes what is already in the picture. I think this is a major point if you like to abstractify photos without "overdoing" it.

The other interesting observation is the absence of gray. There is not much gray in the original image and I used no curves to separate blacks and whites any stronger. The only post-processing apart from the b&w-conversion was setting the blackpoint at around 64 (255 = white)

Lenses, Reviews

2010-05-04T23:24:00.003+02:00

Yeah, hardware is what makes a photo, right?
Well - at least lenses are necessary*. But not sufficient to take good photos.
That's why I'll delve no deeper into this subject here than to direct you to some of my reviews at Camera Labs:
Nikon lenses
Sigma lenses
Tamron lenses
Tokina AT-XD 80-400mm 4.5-5.6 review

So if you ever wonder what I think of the lenses I use and those lenses I gave back/sold, have a look over there...

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* unless you take photos without a lens

(Curved) Glass and Patterns

2010-05-02T11:21:00.006+02:00

Here are two examples I captured in Auckland. What astonished me most was the distorted reflections in the windows of the high-rise. This is an indicator of how curved the glass was and adds a nice layer of abstraction to this images.

Glasshouse:

Reflections:

Two Examples of Geometric Abstraction

2010-05-02T09:55:00.008+02:00

If you look for it you can find some opportunities for creating (semi-)abstract images without the need to rely on any post-processing, reality-modifiers or camera-tricks. It's what I call abstract reality.
What do you need for this? Well, just the right subject, an interesting angle of view and the right framing. It works on the brain simply by taking away the 3rd dimension plus any well known reference-subjects depriving us of the sense of size and perspective. There are some classical examples from macro-photography, but the following image shows that extraordinary magnification is not necessary.

Rhythm:

If you recognize what this structure is the image does not seem too abstract at all. But I bet you did not often had a view like that. So how long did you take to identify this structure?

Here's another, very obviously called Grid:

I used b&w-conversion here to strengthen the sense of abstraction. I find myself often combining different methods for abstractification to achieve a greater overall effect. And it seems that certain images lend themselves more to one or the other method of abstractification but I have to think a little more about it and find some good examples (mental note to myself: reserve for future article)

Btw.: It is mere chance that both images are of man-made objects who's regularity lends the images a strong sense of geometry and pattern. So remembering my article About Abstract Art you could classify this as "geometric abstraction". Trying this with a natural subject tends to produce images more of the "lyrical abstraction" kind.

And another remark: Pattern can make for very interesting images, even if used in a very realistic context. A nice example is the winning image of the "CORRIDOR" challenge over at Nikongear. I'll come back to this in another post, combining reflections and pattern in high-rise buildings.

Abstractification through Camera Movement

2010-05-01T10:54:00.005+02:00

Now today is the 1st of May and we should celebrate this with some colorful flowers, shouldn't we?

Here's an image of a rose I like very much:

I shot this with a 400mm lens at f/32, 1/6 sec, ISO 200. The 1/6 sec together with the large magnification of the lens allowed me to produce quite some motion-blur when I tried various camera-movements. The trick is to find the right movement that fits with the natural structure of your subject. In this case it was some sort of "drop-shift".
There is very little post-processing in this image. Just contrast enhancement plus some color-tweaking, as this technique reduces contrast and saturation.

When you look at the long exposure times you need in this kind of shot under bright sunlight you need one or more of the following:
- lens that can stop down to f/22, better f/32
- lowest camera-ISO of 200, better 100
- Neutral density filter (I did this without)
I've done most of my work of this kind hand-held with shutter speeds between 1/8 sec and 1 sec

Abstractification through B&W Conversion (2)

2010-04-28T19:52:00.008+02:00

The following image is a prime example of how b&w conversion emphasizes the nature of light in an image. This on is called
Morning Light:

There is also some contrast-tweaking with curves because the gradient in the contra-light is very subtle.
Taking this image in you may find it pretty realistic looking, although all colors are missing. Seems to relate quite well to the impression I had when standing there: in the strong contra-light and the slight mist colors really looked very subdued to the eye. The only exception being the green of the undergrowth.

Abstractification through B&W Conversion (1)

2010-04-27T23:58:00.001+02:00

Funny how the limitations of film in the early days made each photograph an abstract reproduction / object of abstract art: The color-palette of the original subject was replaced by a grey-scale and the use of colored filters to influence the reproduction/mapping of different colors to various shades of grey was commonplace.
Today most photos/videos are in color and a b&w conversion is a deliberate decision to take away the colors and thus abstractify the picture.
For me there are two major reason to use b&w: To emphasize form/gestalt over color and/or to increase the impact of light-gradation and thus emphasize the nature of light in an image.
I'll show you some examples in my next post.

Btw. Today most images are two-dimensional and not many people think of that as an abstraction from reality. But with the increasing use of 3D-techniques in the cinemas I’m pretty sure that in 50 years time 2-dimensionalty / taking away the depth of an image will count as abstraction too.

Structured Glass

2010-04-25T22:03:00.009+02:00

This shot of a cactus was done through the structured glass of a green house:

See how the structured glass makes the cactus look like under water or like aspic-preserved.
(as always, clicking on the image leads you to the flickr-page of the image where larger sizes can be accessed through the "All Sizes" button)
The effect is largely dependent on the distance of the subject from the glass. That's because the glass is such a strong modifier (at least compared to rain) that you'd reduce your subject to mush when you place it too far from the window.

Abstractification through dof / oof

2010-04-23T22:48:00.004+02:00

Funnily I just stumbled across an image with the title "post abstract expressionist impressionism" that shows pretty well, what dof/oof can do to abstractify your photos:

(c) arthurking83
You can follow the thread about this image here.
This shot is a nice example of mixing sharply depicted abstract graffiti and unsharp realistic scenes (the street) to produce a quite unique photo.

How to achieve Abstracticism

2010-04-21T22:05:00.004+02:00

Let's make a little list about ways to abstractify photographs.

First up there are all the things you can do with post-processing. And I don't dare to list them all, because you can argue that in the end every tool apart form cropping/rotating is a step away from the most realistic representation of your subject. So instead I'll list the manipulations that I'd be using in my efforts to abstractify:
- B&W conversion
- Exposure compensation and curves
- Manipulating hue and saturation of colors
- Merging multiple exposures

And then there are the things you can do with your camera while taking the picture:
- Aperture: use large apertures to limit dof, reduce contrast, produce vignetting
- Focus: using mis-focus to deliberately produce oof results
- Exposure: over-/underexpose
- Shutter: use slow shutter speeds in connection with movement of subject (motion blur) and/or movement of the camera (shake, displace, rotate)
- Interaction of strong light with the lens resulting in flare/glare/ghosting, sunstars
- Lens effects: like from a fisheye, a lomo-camera*, from a lensbaby, or even from using no lens at all
There are also all kinds of capabilities of modern cameras like picture styles, multiple exposures, b&w conversions that can be done in-camera. But for the sake of simplicity I'd consider all this as post-processing as it does not influence the RAW image and normally can be far better controlled with software.

And finally there are all the options that lay outside the camera but influence the RAW image. Let's call them reality-modifiers:
- Filters and filter-like natural effects like haze/smoke/fog, rain/snow
- Reflection/refraction in "non-perfect" media like water, (curved) glass, metal, hot air
- extreme magnification or unusual/strange perspectives and framing can also yield quite some abstractification
All those reality-modifiers have in common that the effect can be seen with the naked eye (perhaps apart from extreme magnification).

I'd like to delve deeper into those abstractifiers in the upcoming posts and also post images to show the effect(s). And if you have other methods outside post-processing add those in a comment!

So, stay tuned...

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*Here is a nice article about "How To Make Digital Photos Look Like Lomo Photography"

Any Comments?

2010-04-20T14:26:00.004+02:00

I encourage you to comment on any of my posts or if you don't find an appropriate article please put your comment here!
I've chosen settings where anyone may place a comment here, even anonymous users. I also switched off "word verification" to make it easy for you to leave your comment. But that will only hold up when the comments stay civilized and on topic.
If you like to know what I advocate when commenting, here are the house-rules.

Abstractification through Rain

2010-04-20T13:21:00.005+02:00

Picking up on my last post here's an image to show the effect of rain on a window-pane:

I don't like this image very much because the "hidden" subject is not very interesting but it gives you a nice demonstration of what you can achieve.
One thing to observe here (and I urge you to go to the flickr-page of this image by clicking on it and view it at larger sizes up to 1024x680) is the dependency of the effect on the viewing size: The smaller the size the clearer the background subject stands out. This is an issue that will come up time and again, as other effects of abstractification like dof/oof also heavily depend on the viewing-distance.
How did I get that shot?
- 150mm, f/16
- focus on the window
- distance from window approx. 2m
- distance to house approx. 100m
Normally you'll find that the distance between the rain-streaked window and the subject behind it is beyond your control. So to achieve the desired effect the most important variable is the distance from the window as it determines the relative size of the rain-streaks on the subject: the closer you get to the window the more prominent the streaks become. Next up is to choose the right focal length to frame the image correctly. And the last variable to influence the outcome is the aperture to determine how out-of-focus the subject behind the window is.
Well yes, there is also the decision on where to focus, but I found focusing not on the window-pane reduces the effect quite dramatically until - when you focus on the distant subject - the remaining effect looks like a small imperfection. Not really noticeable and more of a nuisance than an artistic effect.
So there are a lot of variables that greatly influence the outcome. Certainly a technique where you have to experiment quite a bit to achieve satisfying results.

Finally here's a crop from that same image to show you a close-up of the effect:

Btw.: using structured glass can achieve similar effects but normally lacks the randomness of rain.

Inspiration from Paintings

2010-04-19T18:09:00.002+02:00

As I had announced in my "Next up"-post here are some thoughts on the inspiration that paintings can supply.

This is a monotype by my wife titled "Girl at the Window". And we're lucky with that as my wife seldom gives her images any title at all! She claims that titles influence the perception of an image by the beholder - and she doesn't like that. Well, in this case you can easily see half of a female face "behind" a window dotted with rain, or don't you?

How does this inspire me? A rain-streaked window can indeed be a very strong filter to "abstractify" an otherwise boring subject and reduce it to its main colors and forms. I'll show you an example of that shortly...

About Abstract Art

2010-04-18T18:54:00.012+02:00

Have a go at some interesting Wikipedia articles if you like to read what types of abstract art there are, e.g.:
- Abstract Art
- Geometric Abstraction
- Lyrical Abstraction
- Abstract Expressionism
You see from this that there are many, many styles of abstracticism. But rest assured, I'm not going to delve into these specialties.
Interestingly a search for "abstract photography" revealed not a single article at Wikipedia but only some hits in articles about individual photographers, like Morgan Fisher.
Mental note to myself: Someone has to have a go at that article.

Here are some interesting quotes from those Wiki articles:
"Figurative art and total abstraction are almost mutually exclusive. But figurative and representational (or realistic) art often contains partial abstraction."
"Abstraction indicates a departure from reality in depiction of imagery in art. This departure from accurate representation can be only slight, or it can be partial, or it can be complete. Abstraction exists along a continuum. Even art that aims for verisimilitude of the highest degree can be said to be abstract, at least theoretically, since perfect representation is likely to be exceedingly elusive."
The latter reference to "perfect representation" is interesting in that many photogs try to achieve just that by acquiring the latest and greatest technology.

Some buzzwords used to describe various abstract styles:
"Direct drawing", "calligraphic use of line", "brushed, splattered, stained, squeegeed, poured, and splashed paint", "brush-strokes", "compositional drama", "dynamic compositional tension", "compositional randomness", "repetition", "sensibility." But really, apart from the use of the words "paint" (which could be substituted by "color") and "brush" those catch-phrases could easily be from an article about photography.

Next up

2010-04-18T13:19:00.011+02:00

Just as a note to myself (and as an anchor to anyone wanting to suggests topics) here are some ideas for upcoming posts and other work:
- RotoMerge and Photomerge: On the (non-)use of tools
- Paintings: Adding my wife as another source of inspiration (Done, see here)
- Abstract: What is "abstract" all about (Done, see here)
- Keywords: Make a page to easily access posts by keywords/tags/labels (Done, see on the right under "Pages")

Photographs and Paintings

2010-04-18T11:28:00.008+02:00

Just to kick off things a bit further I remembered an interesting thread at the Nikongear forum about Photographs and Paintings.
My thoughts on this were:
"Let's put photo-realistic paintings aside for a while.
I think paintings show ways of abstraction from / transformation of a photographic reproduction that are interesting to photographers. Abstraction can make the image/viewer focus more on the "grand scheme" like the colors, the light, the main geometric form etc. This is at least for me a source of inspiration.
Unfortunately for us photographers we only have limit means to achieve abstraction unless we use post-processing: dof/oof, motion blur, shake.
...
Ah well, come to think of it: there is also the use of filters or other "optically active"/reflective/refractive subjects in a scene like water/waves, glass, metal, smoke/fog, hot air, flare."

And here's another image that shows how you can "abstractify" a tree using its reflection on water:

As always you can click through the image in this post to its flickr-page where there is more information about it and also larger versions.

Images speak louder than words

2010-04-18T10:23:00.008+02:00

Before digging deeper into the mysteries of abstract and not so abstract photography with words I've gone to the task of collecting some of my images in a newly created RotoMerge flickr-set and also added some links at the bottom to artists that inspire my. There are some images from Philipp Keel's book "color" in his facebook, and for only 15€ it's a steal and can give you quite some inspiration.

So have a sneak peek at my RotoMerge set to get an idea, of which type of images I'm trying to create and talk about in my blog.

And to explain a bit about the name of my blog here's one image that shows the results of rotating the camera during a 1/8th second exposure:

Let's get started!

2010-04-17T18:07:00.002+02:00

Well now, here we go: 1st entry on my 1st blog.
Who am I and why did I start it?
I came back to serious (and not so serious) photography in 2006 when getting my first DSLR. "Serious" not meaning that I'm a pro but that I seriously tried to improve my skill and devote some time and effort into this hobby.

I've since joined Camera Labs as moderator and very much enjoyed this super-friendly forum. I will stay at this forum and post e.g. all my reviews (like of the latest Nikon AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8 VRII) there and answer the questions of posters etc.

But all my thoughts and ideas get distributed all over the forum so I decided to have a blog collecting some of the things I find interesting in photography. And one of those things is a more kind of "abstract" photography, where you paint with the light from your subject, smear the photons all over the sensor and use a variety of techniques to produce images where form and colors are not defined by ultra-sharp, highest-resolution reproduction of your subject. Or where the resulting images have an abstract quality despite being sharply defined.

This will certainly have to be explained in greater detail. And some images should be posted to make my point. But all in due time!

So stay tuned if you're interested in this topic and other tidbits about photography and feel free to comment either in English or German. Ah, and the secret behind my blog's name will also be revealed...

Btw.: I shoot mostly nature and like the work of Bjørn Rørslett. But more on that in a later post...