Cartas de Amor

No eran celos, amor, sino exigencia de tu plenitud, de tu totalidad.
Ahora ya te he arado entera, te he sembrado entera, te he abierto y cerrado, ahora eres mía.
Para siempre!
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Amor mío, piensa en todas partes que estoy a tu lado, más bien que soy parte de ti misma.
Quiero no sólo amarte, alma mía, sino ayudarte a vivir.
 

— Pablo Neruda

Ruins from Cuba

First of all, I think its quite apparent that the composition is simply delightful. The road ahead as the suns sets, the beautiful ruins probably dating back 400 years, the textures, it all needed a makeover in order to come alive. So right into Lightroom it goes and I started from a preset and started tweaking from there, adding some brushes and boom I finally arrived at this.

Ruins from Cuba

I rather like it and so did Rey, he communicated to me that the new image got a dimensional makeover which it didn’t have. I’m hoping he chimes in on the comments with some background information on how he saw these shots.

Subsequent to this first processing job, I immediately tweeted Rey to please send me something that would qualify as street photography as I wanted something else and again Rey obliged. Gotta love this intercultural photography exchanges! Here’s the original frame and it was again apparent to me that the composition was great but the frame was missing some tender loving care.

Somos Novios

I debated whether to process this image in black and white first after a few exposure corrections but immediately I knew it need to be in color. Cuba is a country riddled with scenes and scenes some of us have never seen before and I didn’t want to leave it to the viewers imagination. Here’s my version of this image.

Somos Novios

Again, I’m happy Rey loved them and I think the morale of the story here is to never throw away your files. You never know what will happen with a little time on your side. Another thing that blew away was the astounding amount of details that can be extracted from a Nikon D300S. Processing these files was simply delightful, I felt like I was drawing and had a great brush and canvas.

Matanza, Cuba

Matanza, Cuba

If you have not visited Rey’s blog Desde Mi Habana make sure to have a look. Rey’s site is filled with wonderful idyllic scenes from Cuba from all genres. Thanks Rey for being such a sport.

Above is our conversation and I wanted to expand on a few points because my initial tweet generated the discussion between Wouter and myself. Photography, the actual act of photographing, is undoubtedly a seperate process from the art of actually post processing ones images. As John Sexton once said:

For me the printing process is part of the magic of photography. It’s that magic that can be exciting, disappointing, rewarding and frustrating all in the same few moments in the darkroom.

You see I too agree with my friend Wouter. Moment, composition, and lighting are all important but its my humble opinion that you can’t really separate it from another aspect – the actual printing or post processing. What good is to have a wonderful exposure if it lacks on the print or processing quality. Some may argue that it needs very little but its my contention that even great exposure benefit tremendously from post processing. Just look around but if you must just look at photography images from just about any photographer, what we see, is the glorified printed or post processed version. So that discard post processing as not “photography” is a tricky path to follow.

A little known fact is that even the greats but we’ll focus on one, Cartier-Bresson, didn’t print any of his images. Yes, the iconic images we’re use to seeing all over the web, photography books, posters, and more. It turns out HCB et al. delegated such a task to a master printer. Someone that could extract all the image had to offer in the most creative and representative manner in accordance with the artist’s vision. His name, Voja Mitrovic, a Yugoslavian master printer who dedicated his life to printing the masterpieces of many world renowned photographers. To quote a paragraph from a post published on the great site “The Online Photographer” titled Voja Mitrovic, Printer to the Greats (Part I). [Part II here]

A large number of the signed prints of H.C.-B. on any wall in the world printed from 1967–1997 were made by Voja—this fact is little known. He also printed at various times for many of the world’s other master photographers: Sebastio Salgado, Werner Bischof, René Burri, Marc Riboud, Robert Doisneau, Edouard Boubat, Man Ray, Atget, Helmut Newton, Raymond Depardon, Bruno Barbey, Jean Gaumy, Frederic Brenner, Max Vadukul, and Peter Lindbergh to name a few. I have had the great fortune that Voja has been my printer for the past twenty years.

So to conclude, by saying “its not photography” I beg differ, its just as important as the actual process of capturing the images. I don’t think we can separate the two, photography & post processing, because what would these pillars have done without their Mr. Mitrovic. Certainly there were other great printers but I think its clear that these giants trusted the hands and also the vision of set forth by Mr. Mitrovic work to such a degree that they delegated such an important part of the creative process.

Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base. All men are afraid in battle. The coward is the one who lets his fear overcome his sense of duty. Duty is the essence of manhood.
 
- George S. Patton

Prime Lens Eyes

Ricoh GRD3

Photography gives me another view, a prime view we can call it. Our eyes are like to two prime lenses, always active, always surveying, and always photographing. Also, I want it to clarify, that I don’t take a long time to write the narratives that go along with the imagery. These words are simply my own words as I type them across my desktop, laptop, and yes even mobile phone. I write in moments, sometimes getting a thought and quickly writing it down on my blackberry and just letting it run loose. I suppose that’s called freestyle writing and that’s the aim of this journal. Its actually quite a cathartic process — just writing what you feel, without editing anything, just letting go and that’s how I like to write these. I suppose some may label me as a bad writer but its not my main focus and I certainly don’t want these posts to be a drag.

Ricoh GRD3

With that said, another week came and went and its almost unbelievable how these frames develop. They must be the most mundane of places and because of this, its exactly what intrigues me the most, that our eyes [and our camera lens as an extension in and off itself] can ravage a scene in a micro second and create a different perspective of life. A perspective that can sometimes be representative of the truth and at other times be something completely different.

Ricoh GRD3

Panasonic GF1, Olympus 17mm f/2.8

Disconnected Fragments

Rain was the protagonist this week. Everyday was cloudy and the light simply was not the best. Well, not the best but at least it felt that way for me so inspiration was certainly very low on the radar.

A particular surprise came this week as well. An old friend called and wanted to know if I could take a couple of portraits in black and white to use as his main image for his law firm. To say, I was extremely humbled would not accurately descibe how I felt. It turns out he’s been secretly following a few post here and there and took notice of some street portraits and liked the look.

I’ve taken many street portaits and candids before and generally these happen in a fraction of a second with no contact from the subject whatsoever. So having the opportunity to actually control the environment and light will be an excellent exercise which should provide some excellent candids. So I’ll have more to report when that project finalizes.

This week also marked a departure to my previous camera, the very good Panasonic GF1, and the introduction of its sibling, the updated Panasonic G2. As time permits, I’ll start a review of both the GF1 and the G2 but suffice it to say, that the G2 handles just like a GF1 and has all the glory from the original G1 with an added touch screen that I have yet to use.

Following the acquisition of this new body also came a complete overhaul of my native m43 lenses with the new addition of the Panasonic pancake 14mm f/2.5 & the Panasonic 14-42mm f/3.5 — 5.6. So gone are the Olympus 17mm pancake and the 14-42mm IIR, new adventures lie ahead. Why the switch? Well, for starters I wanted to have the great Panasonic Image Stabilization and also I wanted a sharper pancake.