Tuesday Morning Chaos Theory

A kind of reductionism appears to be popular in photography circles these days. Lines leading to an obvious subject, a vignette applied (subtle, but there), extremely selective focus, 'depth'. Nuttin' wrong with any of that delicious stuff, of course. But here's a photograph that celebrates chaos, detail, the harsh light of afternoon on a clear winter day, and the flatness of the picture plane. Enjoy!

Ole Saint Beatnik

I still have a handful of the Christmas ornaments my parents bought in the 1960s and 1970s. I definitely cherish these items, but at this point they sure do make me reflect on the passage of time. Anyway, Ole Saint Beatnik here is one of my favorites. Remember beatniks? Each year when we pull him out of the box, I can't resist making his portrait. I stopped down quite a bit for this, but with his cartoonish looks, I still couldn't get the whole face in acceptable focus. Maybe I'll get some extra depth of field for Christmas.

Good light this weekend.

The power of sequence; the power of focus

I was in a hurry taking a photograph of this old mill. I was parked on a busy street in a rough part of a town I don't know very well. So I didn't want to faff about composing this image. For the frame on the left, I placed the focus on the barbed wire and let the background be controlled by the DOF at f/8. For the frame on the right, I focused on the building. When considered as single images, I tend to prefer the one on the left. But, in revisiting the images after the passage of a few months, I kind of like the interplay of the two versions when presented as a diptych. The change in focus can suggest a narrative, but in a very subtle way. Subtle = good, right? Shot on the Leica R9 using the 50mm f/1.4 lens. There was a time when I preferred the f/2 version of the lens, but now I'm digging the 'Lux. Delta 400 film with sloppy development :(. 

Nailed it... wait... oh crap...

I was captivated by the contrast between the structure of the old stump and the fungus growing on the edge. I was using a 35mm lens at f/6.3 and I focused on one of the large cracks in the wood, thinking that the depth of field would cover the fungus, too. I wanted both to be crisp. But no, the depth of field was not quite sufficient to make me happy. Of course, I'll gain additional 'depth' due to the small size of the posted file, but that's cheating, right? No worries, I'll return to the scene again later to refine the result. It's kind of like spiraling in to the find the optimum result.