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March 5, 2015March 5, 2015

Virtual communities

In his 2012 novel “Reamde“, Neal Stephenson describes a community of hackers that is “post-web and post-email.” They operate and communicate within a multiplayer computer game, forming complex networks that have implications in the physical world.

I am fascinated with how human communities evolve from physical to virtual ones, and which elements of the old models persist through this evolution. For photographers, for example, this has had some real implications already – our photographs are rarely viewed in any other media, but on a backlit screen. As Flickr, Instagram, Pinterest, etc. wax and wane, they are going to leave some of their elements for the future virtual communities. It would be nice to be able predict what those elements of future visual (and other types) of communication would be…

March 4, 2015March 4, 2015

Panoramas

Panoramic landscape photos, the ones that are composed of several individual shots that are stitched together by a software, are fun because they offer a view that cannot be achieved by naked eye. By the way, I think this is one of the main criteria for “interestingness” of a photo – it should show something that I viewer would not normally see by him/herself, e.g. an extreme close-up, a frozen motion, a unique point of view or colour combination, etc.

For panoramas, I find that composing the final image is a challenge, because at the time of shooting, my brain picks the focal points of the individual sectors, not that of the final image. As a result, panoramas often either don’t have a compositional focus or have multiple competing elements (e.g. a mountain, a cloud formation, a rock in the foreground, etc.) Because it is difficult to visualize the end result at the time of shooting, I like using my iPhone camera for panoramas. It allows me to see the result right away instead of waiting until I stitch the individual images on a computer. Of course, the technical quality is inferior, compared to an image produced by a DSLR, but I think the main appeal of panoramas is their initial impact (the panoramic nature of the scene being the main element of the composition), so the instant feedback offered by the phone camera is worth the penalty in noise, banding and other defects. As one prominent photographer, who’s name escapes me, said about excessive noise in particular, “if people a concerned about noise in your photo, you have a boring image!”

March 3, 2015

My neck of the woods

When I think of Russian landscape, at least that of the European part of Russia, the history of which is heavily influenced by the invasions of Mongols and Tartars, I imagine it as a vast steppe. In reality, until relatively recent times (mid-XVIII century), the European Russia was dominated by forests.

I realize the great importance of forests in Russian history and culture only now, when reading the lectures by Vasily Klyuchevsky. He explains that the forest was not only the natural resource and a strategic barrier between the early Russian city-states and the Asian invaders, but also the spiritual haven, a place where, for example, hermits would retreat to live in silence in order to escape the stresses of then-modern society. I suppose, nowadays, living without Internet would be a comparable feat…

When I go to Russia this year, I would like to try to take some photos of (whatever remains of) its forests. Generally, I find that photographing forests is not easy – the light is limited, the focus of the composition if not easy to define, unlike in the pictures of sea coasts or mountains. Nevertheless, some of my favourite landscapes from BC are those of the forests (e.g. the image above.) The West Coast’s forests and the trees themselves, though beautiful, are quite different from those of Russia. I wonder if I would be able to convey this difference in a photograph…

March 2, 2015

Old news

Most of the content that is being generated in research, art, literature, etc. is not new, but a re-statement of old concepts. This does not mean that re-visiting old ideas is a useless exercise. In fact, calling something an “exercise” implies that the activity has some intrinsic value.

My three-year-old daughter and her friends like listening to the same stories, watch the same cartoons and play the same games day after day. Of course, their preferences change periodically, but it is still fascinating to see how much children like repetition. Naturally, this is part of their learning process. Similarly, perhaps, re-visiting old ideas helps us learn the underlying concepts and even shape the ideas themselves.

Many authors wrote about the benefits journalling or blogging. One of these benefit is the ability to formulate an idea or point of view. For example, Kevin Kelly, the author of “What Technology Wants,” among other popular books, points out that the writing process does not start with formulating the idea in one’s head and then setting on expressing them in written words. Instead, we start writing, often on the same topics that we or others have addressed before, and through this process, the old ideas become clarified and (re-)formulated.

Similarly, photographing or painting a familiar subject, such as a still life or a landscape, not only refines the technique, but opens up new dimensions of the subject. Perhaps, this is why the old works of art are sometimes entitled “studies.”

March 1, 2015

Conditional happiness

I find that if I have some experience in a particular type of photography (e.g. travel, street, studio portrait, etc.), this experience makes it more difficult for me to improve in that area than in a completely new situation. I think it has something to do with what is referred in Zen Buddhism and Japanese martial arts as shoshin (beginner’s mind) – a condition of openness and lack of preconceptions in studying a subject. The very fact of gaining experience removes this openness, as we start to project the experience to form ideas of how further learning should occur.

This lack of mental flexibility is particularly frustrating in street photography, where photo opportunities are fleeting and highly variable, which makes them easy to miss, if the photographer’s mind is locked on a preconceived idea for a particular type of shot.

Interestingly, there is a parallel between letting the preconceptions shape (and constrain) our view of the learning process and the concept of conditions that we attach even to the notion of being happy. The following quote from Albert Camus describes the latter concept:

“Those who prefer their principles over their happiness, they refuse to be happy outside the conditions they seem to have attached to their happiness.”

February 28, 2015February 28, 2015

Making plans

I wrote earlier that my view of the planning process had been influenced by the books I read a few years ago, when starting my work as a university professor. One of them is “Advice for New Faculty Members” by Robert Boice.

In this book, Boice makes a case that planning as a process lends itself well to brief, regular sessions. In other words, I don’t have to wait for a large chunk of uninterrupted time in my schedule to begin planning something (e.g. a lecture, a photo shoot, a vacation, etc.) Not only this large segment of time might not appear for a long time, but when it does marialize, it would be better used for a more creative or “deep” activity. As far as planning, it works just fine when done in small chunks.

Working on planning in small increments accomplishes two things: (a) it allows us to start the process early, which reduces the stress as the deadline approaches, and (b) it allows us to visualize the actual event (the lecture, the photo shoot, etc.) between the planning sessions. I find the latter part particularly valuable, because without a clear vision of the outcome, the plan itself is not particularly useful. To borrow an analogy from Matt Mullenweg, a dog chasing a car might have a good plan for how to catch it, but no idea what to do if it succeeds.

February 27, 2015February 27, 2015

History lessons

I like history. It has always been one of my favourite subjects to learn outside of work, but my interest in history is very casual. I enjoy the history of art and science, biographies of prominent historical figures and history of places to which I travel. Being an engineer, I have always felt that pursuit of history, while entertaining and intellectually stimulating, lacked the immediate usefulness beyond the obvious “learning from mistakes of others” sort of things.

Recently, I read an interesting observation about the applied aspect of history in a series of lectures about the history of Russia by Vasily Klyuchevsky (1841 – 1911). His idea is that an ideal state of the society is that of perfect balance, when each subject/element of the society is living and functioning to its full potential, without diminishing his/her own rights or oppressing others. Klyuchevsky describes history of a society as an accounting balance sheet, a bank statement of advances and shortcomings left to us by previous generations. If our ancestors have made great progress in certain areas, but fell behind (with respect to other societies) in others, it is our generation’s role to make up for the shortcomings (or at least, to work towards reducing the deficit), while taking advantage of the positive elements passed on to us.

February 26, 2015

Candid portraits

When the subject is not aware of the camera (at least, at the moment when the photo is being taken), the resulting candid portrait is often much more alive and “real” than a posed one, although the latter is often better executed from a technical standpoint. Professional models are trained to take the full advantage of a posed photo shoot. They know exactly what poses, view angles, lighting, etc. work best for them and, most importantly, can consistently reproduce their best poses. On the other hand, candid portraits makes “mere mortals” equal to pros in some respect, since it is much easier to be relaxed and behave naturally if one is not aware of the camera. In this case ignorance is, indeed, bliss.

I find that one interesting exception is photographing small children if they genuinely like being photographed. My three-year-old daughter is like that (most of the time). Everything in her world, photography, is a game to her. When she asks me to take a picture of her, she is fully aware of it, but somehow remains completely relaxed and continues whatever she was doing without missing a bit – exactly as she was doing it a moment earlier. I think this is because it all part of playing: she would “pose” for the camera one instant, run over to see the picture on the LCD the next second, and grab a camera to take her own picture of something that entered her attention field the moment after that. Incidentally, just as my daughter does not discriminate between playing model or photographer, the subjects of her photos (taken with an indestructible toy camera) uniformly span the range from portraits of her mom and dad to closeups of parts of furniture and toys to stickers of “Frozen” characters attached to whatever happened to be within reach.

February 25, 2015February 25, 2015

Action photography: when to stop shooting

In sports and action photography, capturing the decisive moment of the action is most important. High framing rate of a modern DSLR greatly helps in this respect. Having said this, there is a fine balance between capturing an interesting moment and shooting too much during a sports event.

I find that sometimes it is better to stop shooting, look up from the viewfinder and just observe the athletes, the venue, the spectators, the referees, etc. Doing so calibrates my overall experience of the event and provides the necessary pause to decide what would be the best subject, the lens, the viewing angle, etc. to convey my impression of the game to the viewer of the resulting photograph. By the way, I think that the impression of the event photographer is inherently valuable, if only for the unique proximity to the action that this position provides.

This balance between shooting and observing has some parallels to the larger issue of presence over productivity, which has been raised by many authors (e.g. Anne Dillard in her “The Writing Life.”) I personally find that so much value is presently placed on action, that it is easy to miss the point, when the action becomes mindless and the original intent of it is lost.

February 24, 2015February 24, 2015

What’s in a name?

Last calligraphy lesson was dedicated to practice signing our work before sending to to japan for grading. The signature contains the name of the group, my current rank (using a ranking system of dan, similar to that of martial arts) and my name in katakana.

Writing with a small brush feels different from the usual shodo practice. Although not a part of the test, the appearance and the style of the signature has an influence on the judges decision in a similar way that a way of wearing one’s bogu, holding the shinai, bowing, entering and leaving the dojo are all factors in the outcome of kendo grading. Similar to kendo, the feedback from the judges of a shodo grading is very limited, with some rare exceptions, when brief comments on the specific entries would be printed in a monthly booklet. It would be interesting to have a glimpse of what goes on in the judges’ mind as they examine my work…

In the mean time, covering pages with my name for couple of hours had a mixed feeling of being back in the first grade and that of doing suburi before kendo practice.

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