New York Photography Blog

Lester – don’t tell me that the FDR has been renamed to the Edward Kennedy Thruway.  3 fused shots / asa 800 / 40d / 30mm / middle shot 1/6th of a second, f2.0

Later on I did longer exposures, but these shorter ones turned out better.  Who would’ve known that the light in the foreground had a different color temp. than the rest of the lights.  I’d like to put a large mural of this one on my wall.  Lots of fun stuff to look at, such as the current, that you can’t make out here.  But over the three shots you can make out some a circular current about halfway up on the right.

like this – and may hope not to see anything like it again…

This has the kitchen sink thrown in.  Digital infrared camera, infrared flash! and hdr!  the only thing it’s missing is a manual with a glossary of terms and raison d’etre.  But not to worry, I have some ideas for this technique that won’t read like a heat chart…

One of the great benefits for people like myself who change styles frequently, or at least at some point may change styles for a while, is shooting raw.  It’s just something that pre-digital photographers couldn’t do, or at least couldn’t do well.  It was possible to shoot color and print on special b&w paper (as an example) but you just couldn’t get the same results as if you had shot with your favorite b&w film.

Another benefit of working in digital, is that the tools keep changing.  So long as you began with a raw image, the chances are good that as you go along you’ll find a newly developed tool that again – has one aim – to give the photographer more control over the final image.

Of course, this is also a possible downside to the digital experience.  When we were shooting fine-art b&w, the common technique as espoused by the man – Ansel – was to pre-visualize your final print, and to expose and develop to try and make that final image a possibility.

You would typically use a spot meter, and measure the extremes of the scene: the highlights, and the shadows, and a few other things like the middle tones, and then you’d put your Zone thinking cap on, and think about what you want to achieve; whether the negative tones needed to be compressed or expanded.  In other words, if the tonal range was too wide and you couldn’t get it all on the negative if you exposed for the middle tones, then you might decide to bring the highlights down and the shadows up during the film processing.

Again, when you got to the actual darkroom phase.  Commonly you’d make test prints, and then a working print, and eventually a final print where you’d do a sort of ballet with your hands or cut outs to dodge and burn various areas.  You would need to keep careful notes, with little stick-like figures to remind you about which areas need more or less exposure; and what your time was, and what ratio of water to developer you used, and whether you might have bleached an area or how much toning you did.

If it was a complicated print, you might not be able to completely duplicate two prints.  You tended to do one print several times, so that you’d work in batches so you could remember exactly how to expose the prints.

And then you come to the digital print world, and it is the exact opposite.  First off, given that you are working with a nicely calibrated system, with the same output and same inks, profiles and papers – you really can do prints that are virtually the same.  That is one obvious benefit.

However, in real life, at least for me – I don’t work with batches at a time, and in fact prints that were shot years ago, that you’ve been printing digitally for many years – other options become available, or strike you as your printing the 30th print.

The digital workflow, for the artist, is actually closer to the painters experience than to the old photographers darkroom.  Assuming that the artist is learning new techniques, or even that he/she is changing emotionally, or artistically through the years – that print that you’ve done 30 times may suddenly present new possibilities.  Whether it’s the HDR thing that happened to me, or even if you are still using the same tools – it is so easy with contemporary tools to tweak some area of the image, change the contrast in one area – or sharpen something — the list is virtually endless – that you find yourself making printing changes to the 31st print.

These changes can be subtle, or drastic.  For some people, this freedom is something that you shouldn’t mess with too much.  You had an idea when you originally shot the print, and the idea is to try to stick with the original vision.  For the tinkerers – it’s just the opposite.  You look at the same starting point – and have ideas about how the original idea can be presented more effectively.  There really is no right or wrong for this type of artist.  Just change.

This is all by way of saying that what interests me now, is redoing older prints that were all originally presented as b&w images – and using hdr to do a color rendition, or a different take on the b&w rendition.

I’m often asked – but don’t you miss shooting film.  Not at all. Not only don’t I miss it, but the longer I work with digital output, the more opportunities present themselves.  Sometimes by accident.  Sometimes after a lot of careful planning.  In other words – there really are no “final prints” anymore.  There are variations on a theme.

It’s not that one rendition is better than the previous one.  As I say, I don’t feel any obligation to stick with the original print.  They are just variations on a theme, which is common in the music world.  Think of it as the cadenza at the end of a classical piece of music where the musicians are encouraged to improvise.  The same technique has come down through the ages to become improvisation in jazz.  Play the melody so the audience knows where you are starting – and then close your eyes and run with it.

This was three handheld shots.  You can use alignment tool with handheld shots so long as the subject isn’t moving and it helps to have vertical or horizontal lines for the alignment program to grab hold of. But it is preferable to use a tripod if you can.

ASA 400 / f8 / 1/125 base shutter speed.

Workflow: preset in lightroom where I zero out just about everything to achieve flat images.  The images are bracketed, one over and one under.  Into PhotoMatix where they are Image Fused according to horizontal / vertical lines.  I can tweak it during the fusing process but I usually just choose average.

Then into tone mapping.  This is where the majority of choices are made: saturation, high- and low-light saturation and smoothing; mirco-contrast, and just about anything that effects the overall effect you are after.

Into Lightroom where I may do some minor things, but usually nothing heavy.  Export to web as an sRGB.  Lose detail, and the color gamut is less than the Adobe 98 gamut I was working with.  Tempted sometimes to show 100% crop, but it’s a pain and takes something away from the mystery of the shot.

I just wanted to prepare myself for the snow which is coming soon, i.e. should I go for the tripod or not.  I think I have more choices with the tripod.

After the week from hell, and six months of packaging and printing, I bought myself a treat.  I canceled my account with Verizon / Blackberry and bought an iPhone / AT&T.  I’ve only made a few calls – but at least the numbers are BIG and it makes nice noises and in my apartment I get all the bars.  So looks good.  There are wi-fi connections all over the place, but I’ll set my own up again… need to look for that router / wi-fi thing.

Once again, they say a big snow storm is coming.  I’ve gotten out the last of the prints that had to be done quickly; I’ve had a nice chat with WCI and we’ll see what comes from that in terms of turnaround time, but frankly, you really can’t spit out art the way you can spit out run-of-the-mill prints no matter who you are.  And it’s no accident that I inform, or try to inform customers to expect a two week turnaround, and WCI lets you know that for inkjet printing it will be 10 business days, though it can be less than that depending on the work load, and that’s exactly what I say.

Other than going back to the darkroom, there really isn’t any magical way to produce reasonably priced b&w prints.  None of the Chromogenic (sp?) processes are going to do the trick.  And Lambda on Fiber Paper – which really will be as good as any darkroom fiber print, maybe better, is very expensive.  In fact, it may cost more than hiring a darkroom worker.  Over the years, I have had people say that such and such a paper with Chromogenics works well, and even had samples sent to me, and it just isn’t the same as a good b&w inkjet or darkroom print.  Color is a whole different story, or at least that’s what I’ve been told.

I recently followed a huge thread somewhere about what the meaning of a C Print was.  It used to mean this, then it meant that – and now people use it to mean a color print.

The one thing I did learn is that you can define a Lambda print, because it was done on a Durst Lambda machine.  Though they can also be churning out RC prints as opposed to fiber prints (Ilfobroom).  I switched from RC to Fiber about 20 years ago, and I don’t expect to go back.

Tone Fused

3 images /asa 400/ canon 40d / 20mm prime / f8 / base shutter speed 1.5 seconds, all in-camera noise reduction off.  Unfortunately, the degree of detail in these shots is not something that comes across in the web image.  This sort of work has given me a touch of salvation while I was in printer hell.   I’m eager to find time to do more experimenting with this process.

And from the same night, similar setup…

Bike and Benches

Okay, now as you get into outsourcing fine art photography, you’ve got some issues to deal with:

1. Signing the print.  If the print is going to be drop / shipped to the customer to improve turnaround time, you obviously can’t sign it.  You can put a digital signature in the border and you can send a certificate of authenticity for the prints through regular postal mail… but frankly, it’s not the way to go.

2. If you are going to buy several prints at one time, you can’t have that drop / shipped to the customer.  So again – drop / ship doesn’t make sense.

WCI does a fantastic packaging job, and you really want to re-use that packaging to send it to the customer.  It saves you time and packaging costs.  The more I think about it, the less sense drop / ship makes.

What makes sense, in terms of saving money, is to order more than one of your most popular prints.  I don’t remember the exact number of prints – I think when you hit 10 of the same the price really goes down.

And finally – you really do want to see what is going out to the customer.  So have it shipped to yourself so you can inspect it, add your certificate of authenticity, sign the print, add promotional material etc. (I put a business card, a photo card and framing instructions) and then re-use the packaging to ship to the customer. Yeah, that’s the way I’m going to do this.  I already have two prints in the queue at WCI and it is a pleasure to think that I won’t print or package them anymore.  That is living large.

* * *

Feb. 8, 2010

Following up with West Coast Imaging – I had a nice conversation with M. who then went on to talk with the production staff, and they are going to give me a better turnaround time when I need it.  What a great bunch of people to work with.  And frankly, I totally understand their turnaround time for inkjets as they can have the same issues that I have.

So let’s see how it goes.  The first thing I’m going to do is prepare a bunch of my most popular files to do in quantity with WCI.  Then as orders come in I’ll have them shipped back to me so I can a) check them and b) add my promotional material and sign them etc.  I’m feeling very hopeful about this arrangement.

After being stuck with a non-functioning printer, not to mention the amount of time I’m spending prints and shipping, I came to conclusion that it was time to outsource my printing to WCI (West Coast Imaging).  Take my word for it – they are the best around.

They’ll do the prints on the same paper that I use, and I’ll let them deal with the printing, and when prints don’t need to be signed, they can drop ship directly to the customer.

As a result, new prices and sizes are in effect.  What effect this will have on orders I don’t know, but my guess is that they will drop off substantially.  On the other hand, my workload will also decrease substantially.  Or, it may work the other way and attract an audience with deeper pockets.

The new prices range from $100 to $400.  Still not crazy expensive for the sizes being offered, but the inexpensive stuff is gone.

If it works out, I’ll be able to spend more time with the creative side of the business.  And for those of you who bought prints in the past, your investment has just gone up.

STATUS:

I’m making it back to a state of equilibrium.  The 4800 is working (though about to run out of ink in two cartridges), but I was able to catch up with the smaller prints that need to go out tomorrow.

And I just uploaded a few files to WCI, and ordered three of each (i.e. the more you order, the less it costs, although I think you don’t hit a big discount until you order 10 prints of the same image.)

For now, I’m having the prints sent back to me because I am promising to sign prints on the site; but maybe there’s some way around that as it would be much more efficient to drop ship to customer.  That’s what I’ve done with the very large prints I’ve done at WCI.

Now, if I went with their Express Lab, I could have very fast turnaround and much cheaper prices, but of course you can’t do fine art inkjets like you can do those chromogenic (is that the right word?) prints.

Price List and papers in Express Lab at WCI

Now, if I could live with b&w prints from the Express Lab – then I could a) have great turnaround time and b) more consumer friendly prices.

That’s really the bottom line – art costs more money because more time and skill are involved.  I’m going to download the ROES software (I might have it already) and order prints on each of the offered papers in the Express Lab.  I know I’ve done this before, but it may not have been with WCI.  I’m going to take the tough one, Night Storm that depends on good blacks, and print it on each paper.