Baby Clark

Here are a couple more from the same roll as the three below, just Clark solo this time. I printed these in several sizes in the darkroom at the time; I remember being very pleased with the exposures on this roll, and I really liked the shallow depth of field. These new scans don't do true justice to the detail and contrast of negatives, however the best of those prints from 1999 are too big (11 x 14) to fit on my flatbed scanner (8.5 x 13). But the detail of these scans are pretty good, for the web, at least, and the gray balance wasn't too far off, either, so with a little clean-up and color correction, here we go...

He was so cute! But at two months old, Clark had this intensely serious face that he could pull on and off at will, even though underlying all that fur was a permanent smirk.

You see? All he has to do is lift his head and you'll see that he's laughing, as well as trying to read the paragraph above him.

When They Were Cute...

Every ten days is a lousy schedule for updating this blog, but the school year has dropped upon me hard and fast this fall; already I've done about nine senior groups (two forming '09) and at least a dozen undergrad groups. Three hundred or so informal portraits, a homecoming and numerous sports, all in the last two weeks.

I haven't had so much as a moment to do any shooting for myself, and I really should be cleaning the sensor of the 30D right now (it is filthy; I can't shoot over f11 without the sky looking mottled), but for some reason I starting thinking about these pictures the other day...

Clark and Betsy were about seven weeks old when these were taken in April of 1999. We had closed off the doorways in the dining room of the house in Long Beach with gates, and they had the run of the room. Without a table in it the only furniture were the antique chairs lining the walls, some blankets and a seat cushion.

Molly was sleeping while these two were making a ruckus. It's funny how often one of them would be asleep while the others were playing. This was also the period when Betsy was more socially adjusted with the other two; as time went on she became more of a loner. It is rare that I see her sitting this close to Clark anymore.

These were shot on Ilford XP2 film with a Pentax ZX-5. Probably used a 35-70 or a 28-105, I really don't remember what lenses I owned back then, I had a mix of manual and autofocus, since the ZX was my first AF camera. What I do remember is how nice the light was in that room in the late afternoon: The sun would bounce off the side of my house onto the house next-door, which would then reflect through a giant 6 x 6 foot window, completely filling the room with beautiful, soft light.

Surfwatchers

April 1997

Ah, September. The end of summer, a time to sit on the beach and stare at the horizon, and wonder where the months all went. A time to think about the coming days of early darkness and autumn's chill. You could easily imagine that the figures in the picture above are doing just that, and perhaps even pondering their own mortality.

You'd be wrong, though, since this picture was made in the middle of the spring, in 1997. Of course, the figures could still have been thinking dark thoughts on that bright April afternoon, I don't know, but something compelled them to drag their resin lawn chairs out to the waters edge to watch the churning waters. My eye was drawn to the single line just about even with the horizon, and the head of the solitary standee poking above it. Shot on Ilford XP2, exposure unrecorded.

Cliffhanger

Here we have a picture to give any mother pause, if not outright heart failure. You wonder if the child's mother would ever trust his care to her brother again. But like me at his age (13), Brian has the nerve and agility of a mountain goat. Still, I'm glad he was sitting down for this picture. We were at Prim Point, overlooking the Bay of Fundy, outside Digby, Nova Scotia. This is the cliff in the background of the picture Sherry on the Rocks, in fact, Brian was originally in that photo, heading towards this spot, but it was somewhat distracting to the overall composition, and I deleted him. So to make it up to him, here's his very own picture and post on the Talking Pictures blog.

InfraRebecca

I haven't had a chance to use the InfraRebel for anything but landscapes since I got it, until yesterday, when we went to the Marks' for the Labor Day weekend. Ten-year-old Rebecca has always been one of my most agreeable subjects, although today she was a little concerned about my choice of locations for our informal portrait session.

I wanted to shoot her in open shade, which in her backyard required us to stand on the side of the garage. No problem with that, except that getting there meant we'd have to walk across the grass, which was something of a minefield thanks to the tireless work of Bosco, the family Lab.

But we were able to tiptoe our way through, and she struck a few poses for me. Notable about the infrared process is the way it smooths out the skin tones. Unfortunately in Rebecca's case, this means we don't get to see the cute smattering of freckles across her nose. It also does something a little weird to the eyes, dramatically darkening the blue of her irises, and slightly darkening the whites.

MEGO Info: It's a little grainy, and looking at the EXIF data I see that the camera was set at 1600 ISO. I don't remember why I set it so high, but it's just another thing I need to check before shooting. Lens was the 17-40 at 40mm, f8, 1/500, exposure compensation minus 1-2/3 stop.

Addendum - September 2, 2008:

The first image was posted in a gallery on another website where a fellow photographer commented on the yellow skin tone and darkness of the eyes, saying it was a little too creepy for a portrait. After about two seconds of consideration, I agreed, but rather than try to color-correct it, I decided instead to reprocess the RAW file to a neutral monochrome. In Photoshop I used the magic wand to select the whites of the eyes (not an easy task given the graininess of the image) and lightened those areas.

Overall I think the black and white processing gives a better result when using the IR for portraiture.

Rockville Cemetery

Rockville Cemetery sits on a large swathe of land at Ocean Avenue and Merrick Road, right on the border of Lynbrook and Rockville Centre. It dates back to the late eighteenth century, and was once a churchyard. Today it's a non-sectarian burying ground, still open, and noted for several things, among them a large eastern section of ground-level markers (with a smaller section on the western border), numerous zinc markers, and the stele (above) marking the mass graves and memorializing the victims of two great shipwrecks off the coast of Long Island in the late 1830's.

The zinc markers, I think, are my favorite finds in any cemetery. They were originally marketed as 'white bronze', and sometimes are mistakenly referred to as cast-iron. They weather well, and nothing grows on them because of the chemical reaction of zinc and organic material. It seems that families would purchase a marker and erect it with the first death. As more family members joined the reserve, the decorative panels on the other three sides would be removed and replaced with names and dates and epitaphs. Occasionally there will be granite footstones nearby.

Legend has it that many of these hollow monuments were used as drop points for bootleggers during Prohibition. Perhaps some were, once or twice, for small amounts, but the absolute bother of moving bottles in and out of the small openings makes the idea rather unlikely. If they were used at all it was more sensible that they'd be used as money drops.

Tale of the Whales

The day started sunny and clear on shore, but any fisherman or sailor will tell you that such conditions will never hold true at sea, and true enough, the fog rolled in as we chugged out for a three-hour tour...

The weather never got very rough, though, the tiny ship was never tossed, and we were able to make contact with three humpbacks not long after we arrived. Foggy, Flamingo, and Willow were just finishing up a show for two other boats when we got to them, and they quite happily continued cavorting for us as the other boats went back to shore.

They know our boats pose no threat to them, so they're comfortable having us around as they feed on the plankton and krill in the water. They come to the surface in gradually increasing arcs, filtering their feed fish through their teeth. They each make several leaps, gathering food, before making a final plunge to the bottom. They'll spend ten minutes or so on the bottom, then make their way to the surface and repeat the performance.

There are two ways for the marine biologists to identify each individual whale. All their tail markings are unique, so the patterns can act like human fingerprints, and the dorsal fins are distinctive from each other. In the top picture, for instance, the whale on the right, in the back, is Foggy, who has a serious hook. The tail above belongs to either Foggy or Willow.

More From Peggy's Cove

Peggy's Cove, a little west of Halifax, Nova Scotia, is probably the best-preserved and most well-regulated tourist town you'll ever see. I was all set for something right out of the Jersey shore, with dingy souvenir stores and custard stands, crowded streets with no place to park, and teeming humanity swarming everywhere.

Canada disappointed me in all but the last item on that list. Peggy's Cove is a beautiful fishing village with a visitor's center, an ice cream shop or two, lots of docks and boats and boathouses, acres of glacial granite extending out to the sea, and not a single skee-ball arcade or pizzeria in sight.

Just a beautiful day, and we managed to get the tail end of the good morning light. The sun was getting high and harsh; next time I want to be here much earlier, just after sunrise would be perfect. It's only a short drive from Halifax, and it would be nice to get some lighthouse shots without having sixty to a hundred and thirty people milling about.

Canadian Signage

Sherry and I took an early morning walk around the grounds of the Digby Pines after breakfast one morning. There are several well-maintained hiking trails through the woods, although I wonder how many visitors get lost, given the curious way the paths back to the main buildings are marked:

I'm thinking these were put up by the Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz.

Further on, we found this even stranger notification about certain underground utilities. Or maybe not. I guess it's a work-in-progress.

We didn't have time to explore further, but I'm sure that additional searching would reveal another message, perhaps "Warning: Concrete Slab in Path".

Three Ways That Canadians are Becoming Like US

They're beginning to use stupid, trendy abbreviations in the most unlikely places.

They're encouraging gastronomic cultural aberrations from the fast food industry.

They're starting to leave graffiti and garbage on their beautiful landscapes.