Photography – Page 8 – Thomas Hawk Digital Connection

February 3, 2009February 3, 2009

Had a Good Time Hanging Out at Last Night’s Photowalk

I had a good time hanging out last night at the Miss Aniela photowalk in San Francisco. We met a the Ferry Building at 6:30pm and about 40 or so of us spent a fair chunk of the time out shooting on Pier 14 at night in the dark. It was a great clear night in San Francisco with a great vantage spot to shoot the city. Afterwards we shot around Jutin Herman Plaza for a while and then headed over to Harrington’s for a little dinner and beer.

We weren’t actually able to make it inside the Ferry Building as I think a group that large sort of spooked the security guards there.

Thanks to everyone who came out. I enjoyed the company, photography and conversation. These shots are a few of mine from a small set of my images that I put together here. If you have photos from last night’s walk up online please tag them with photowalk020209. Thanks!

January 30, 2009January 30, 2009

Come Hang Out and Photowalk on Monday Night at the Ferry Building in San Francisco, 6:30 pm with Miss Aniela

I had the opportunity to hang out a bit with Natalie Dybisz (pictured left) last summer at the Microsoft Pro Photo Summit in Seattle. Natalie also goes by Miss Aniela on Flickr and has some really interesting self portrait work among other things. Natalie’s coming to town next week and hosting four photowalks sponsored by Microsoft, Samy’s Camera and Eye-Fi. I think it’s pretty cool to see some of these companies getting involved with sponsoring photowalks.

I’m planning on showing up and shooting at the Ferry Building Photowalk on Monday night at 6:30pm. If you live or are visiting San Francisco on Monday, come on out and shoot for a while. It should be an interesting group of photographers and a great way to catch up in person. I’m not sure where the walk from the Ferry Building will be headed, but the Ferry Building itself is very photogenic and there’s lots of interesting things to shoot around the downtown area there. Here’s a link to my set of images from the Ferry Building. Hopefully there will be beer involved at some point later in the evening 😉

I set up an upcoming event page for Monday night’s walk if you can make it and want to RSVP here.

The other four walks that Natalie is hosting in the Bay Area will be in Berkeley on Monday afternoon, at the USS San Francisco Memorial on Tuesday morning and another walk up in the Haight on Tuesday aftternoon.

In addition to the four Bay Area photowalks Natalie is doing, she’s also hosting two additional photowalks down in Los Angeles on Wednesday as well. I’ve shot at both Union Station and the Santa Monica Pier in L.A. and think both are fantastic places to shoot. Time and details for all the photowalks below:

Berkeley � Eastbay/Berkeley Photowalk
Date: Monday, February 2
Time: 12:00 pm to 1:30pm
Place: UC Botanical Garden, Berkeley

Ferry Building – San Francisco Photowalk
Date: Monday, February 2
Time: 6:30pm to 9:30pm
Place: Ferry Building entrance, San Francisco

USS San Francisco Memorial – San Francisco Photowalk
Date: Tuesday, February 3
Time: 7:30am to 9:00am
Place: USS San Francisco Memorial, San Francisco

The Panhandle to Haight Ashbury – San Francisco Photowalk
Date: Tuesday, February 3
Time: 3:00pm to 5:00pm
Place: Meet at Oak and Cole, San Francisco

Union Station � Los Angeles Photowalk
Date: Wednesday, February 4
Time: 12:00pm to 1:30pm
Place: N. Los Angeles St., Union Station, Los Angeles

Santa Monica Pier � Santa Monica Photowalk
Date: Wednesday, February 4
Time: 4:00pm to 5:30pm
Place: out on the end of the Santa Monica Pier, Santa Monica

January 29, 2009February 27, 2009

Johnny

Recently I blogged about a new project that I am starting called $2 portraits. The idea is that I will offer $2 to anyone who asks me for money from now on in exchange for their portrait.

Earlier this evening I went up to shoot some “Adios Douchebag” George Bush graffiti that I’d seen earlier this morning by the off ramp from the Bay Bridge from my carpool on the way to work. When I got to the graffiti I ran into Johnny.

Johnny was sitting immediately below the George Bush graffiti and asked me for money. I told Johnny about my $2 portrait project. Johnny told me that I could take his portrait as long as he got to keep his sunglasses on. I said that that would be fine and took a few shots of him. Johnny kept his sunglasses and tie on, but he had his shoes off.

I asked Johnny if he voted for President, and he said back to me, “Me, nahhhh, people like me don’t vote for the President. We’re the underclass.” While I was shooting Johnny he asked me if two women on each of his arms would look good. I told him I thought they would and he laughed.

I asked Johnny where he slept and he said out at the bank. I asked him what bank and he told me that he couldn’t tell me but that it was one of the 1,400 banks out there with a wide gesture of his hand.

I asked Johnny if he was from here and he said he was from all over. I asked him if he had a favorite place to live in the world and he said, all over man, all over.

Finally I asked Johnny what his favorite song was and this time I struck a chord. Without skipping a beat Johnny immediately shouted out “Neil Sedaka!” and with that began belting out the song. “Ooooooo, I hear laughter in the rain, walking hand in hand with the one I love, Oooooo, how I love the rainy days, And the happy way I feel inside.”

Johnny had a great voice. After he sang for me a bit I gave Johnny his $2. He said thank you brother and held up a fist for me to bump him back with instead of a handshake. I gave him the bump with my fist and then headed on out my way.

This one’s for Johnny.

January 28, 2009January 29, 2009

More Job Cuts Coming for Kodak?

“Kodachrome. They give us those nice bright colors. They give us the greens of summers. Makes you think all the world’s a sunny day.”

Well everyone has known for years that the move from film photography to digital photography would not be good for Kodak. But after cutting about half their work force in the past four years it looks like still more job cuts may be in the cards for Kodak in the near future. From Bloomberg:

�To see any sort of meaningful turnaround, they have to get costs way more in line with their peers,� Standard & Poor�s equity analyst Erik Kolb said in an interview. �That means cutting jobs, cutting anything wherever they can.�

Kodak sliced its projected 2008 operating profit in half in October and withdrew the forecast altogether in December. The moves have caused some investors and analysts to doubt the success of Chief Executive Officer Antonio Perez�s overhaul that eliminated 28,000 jobs by the time it ended in 2007. “

Since Eastman Kodak’s (ticker EK) high of a little over $90 per share over a decade ago, the stock now is down about 92% to $7.17 per share. The once great company that once was a part of the 30 stocks that make up the Dow Jones Industrial Average was removed from that Index in 2004. Despite a significant initiative to move from a film business to a digital business made by the company over the past few years, the question that still lingers is can the company survive even the next few years ahead.

Especially given a bad economy right now, things will be even more difficult for the company which was already facing considerable challenges. Quite a different world than when George Eastman first invented roll film back in 1885.

On a related note, from the NY Times: “Polaroid Fans Try Making New Film for Old Cameras.”

Update: It looks like Kodak is in fact going to be laying off another 4,500 workers, per reports out today.

January 27, 2009January 27, 2009

The Light That Never Goes Out

I took the shot above at Oakland’s Mountain View Cemetery. I love cemeteries and spend lots of time exploring them. They are like parks to me. Mountain View Cemetery is within walking distance from my house and is one of the places that I shoot most regularly. I love wandering around the cemetery there with my kids, watching them play, wondering about the people who lived the lives buried there. A single one line entry on a tombstone seems so little to give someone for an entire life of living — and even then only the simplest of phrases “Thomas Hill, California Artist.” Turns out there’s a lot more to Thomas Hill than just that. He was making amazing paintings of Yosemite before Ansel Adams was ever even born.

I wonder about the other people buried in Mountain View and other cemeteries. We have no Pharaohs anymore, no King Tuts. It seems like even the grandest of figures in life oftentimes are ignored in death. Recently I visited William Randolph Hearsts grave at Cypress Lawn in Colma. It took me a long time to find it. The tomb is large as far as tombs go and impressive, but nowhere near something that you’d think about for the man who built Hearst’s castle.

When I was down in Los Angeles I went by one “Henry Charles Bukowski Jr.’s” grave at Green Hills Memorial Park in Rancho Palos Verdes. Bukowski got more than just a single line on his tombstone. Along with his nickname “Hank” he’s got an etching of a fighter, with the words “Don’t Try.” Somehow in his case that almost seemed appropriate.

When I visited New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, I visited Lafayette Cemetery up in the tone Garden District of the City. My friend Anthony told me that the cemetery used to be full of great statuary but that thieves had stolen most of the great pieces there a few years back. After we visited the cemetery we walked around the Garden District. Anthony showed me Nick Cage’s house there. On his front lawn was one of the most beautiful sculptures I’d ever seen. I thought to myself that it probably came from a cemetery just like Lafayette cemetery, and thought about the irony of the rich having their graves robbed so that their statuary could adorn the lawns of movie stars.

If you like exploring cemeteries like I do, you might like this site “Find a Grave.”

My collection of cemetery images is one of my works in progress. I plan to visit as many cemeteries as I can and shoot them before I die. You can see my cemetery collection, “The World Belongs to the Living,” here.

January 26, 2009January 26, 2009

U.S. Rep Pete King Wants Your Cell Phone Camera to Go “Beep”

U.S. New York Representative Pete King (Republican, Long Island) introduced a new bill in Congress this month H.R.414: “To require mobile phones containing digital cameras to make a sound when a photograph is taken. ” The short title of the bill is simply, “Camera Phone Predator Alert Act.”

From the bill:

” (a) Requirement- Beginning 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, any mobile phone containing a digital camera that is manufactured for sale in the United States shall sound a tone or other sound audible within a reasonable radius of the phone whenever a photograph is taken with the camera in such phone. A mobile phone manufactured after such date shall not be equipped with a means of disabling or silencing such tone or sound.

(b) Enforcement by Consumer Product Safety Commission- The requirement in subsection (a) shall be treated as a consumer product safety standard promulgated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission under section 7 of the Consumer Product Safety Act (15 U.S.C. 2056). A violation of subsection (a) shall be enforced by the Commission under section 19 of such Act (15 U.S.C. 2068).”

Now I’m a father of four young children, and nobody wants to protect their children from predators more than I do, but this is just plain stupid.

First off there are many times that you don’t want your camera to make audible noises. Let’s say your shooting your own kid in the school play. Having a bunch of disruptive beeps going off every time someone takes a photo is annoying. There are many times when you want to shoot something being less disruptive not being more disruptive. There are certainly plenty of times and places where it is perfectly appropriate to try and be as quiet as you can while shooting.

Secondly, this bill only applies to cell phones. So if some predator wants to try to sneak photos of kids in the locker room all they would have to do is use a regular old point and shoot camera which this bill doesn’t apply to. In fact, spy type cameras have been around for years and if someone really wants to try to take stealthy photos, they certainly can without the need to use their cell phone camera. The law also does nothing to address video.

Then of course there is the part of the bill that this would only apply to new phones. So let’s see, a predator then could, theoretically, still use any old cell phone that they want to take silent phones while millions of law abiding users have to put up with noisy beeps going off whenever they shoot.

I have no idea what the cost of implementing this technology would be, but I’m sure AT&T would figure out some way to make the “enhancement” a reoccurable fee every month on your cell phone bill.

It seems to me like this bill is yet another example of really bad ideas coming from government. It would seem that this is not the first boneheaded idea that Rep. King has come up with by the way. Another of his winner ideas was responsible for funneling $3 million in taxpayer money to a campaign donor for custom manhole covers that Con Ed said could be dangerous in — order to fight those pesky terrorists. At least that’s the way the Daily News reported it. I thought Republicans were supposed to be for less government not for more.

ArsTechnica has more on this new bill here. Thanks, Geoff!

January 22, 2009January 22, 2009

Was the Iconic Shepherd Fairey Obama Hope Image Taken by Freelance Photographer Mannie Garcia?

I shot the above photo of the HOPE posters back when Shepherd Fairey had a show in town late last year and plastered San Francisco with various images of his.

Tom Gralish over at the Philadelphia Inquirer has a blog post out today where he claims that the iconic and famous Obama HOPE Image, which now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery and is credited as being created by artist Shepherd Fairey, may have actually been taken directly from a photograph taken by Freelance Photographer Mannie Garcia. Although I’m not aware of Garcia ever being attributed as the source of this image, Gralish did a great bit of his own detective work to come up with this conclusion. I have not seen any comments anywhere yet from Garcia on the image which will likely go down as one of the greatest and historical works of art of the past century.

Interestingly enough, it also appears that the original photo was not taken at some philosophical moment where Obama was contemplating the future of our great nation or delivering some great speech, but rather when he was probably listening to either Republican Senator Sam Brownback or possibly actor George Clooney.

From Gralish:

“The photo was made by freelance photographer Mannie Garcia who was on assignment for the AP in April of 2006, where a National Press Club news advisory alerted the media that, Academy Award Winner George Clooney will address National Press Club on hisrecent visit to war-torn Darfur and will release video footage from his trip to Sudan. Clooney will be joined by U.S. Senators Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), co-sponsors of S. 1462, The Darfur Peace and Accountability Act, and co-sponsors of amendments to increase funding? for peacekeeping operations in Sudan.”

So, it looks like the image that poster artist Shepard Fairey said looked presidential, telling the Washington Post: “He is gazing off into the future, saying, ‘I can guide you,’ ” actually showed our new president listening to George Clooney. Or, probably more likely, fellow Senator Brownback.”

Richard Prince would be proud.

In related news today, it was also uncovered that the famous “Joebama” poster, created by artist Joe Reifer, interestingly enough, also was lifted from a photograph of Reifer taken by yours truly in 2007 at the Lucky JuJu Pinball Gallery. 😉 (If you’d like to create your own Obama Hopeish poster from your own image you can do that here).

Update: It seems, from Garcia’s website, that representatives of Fairey’s yesterday confirmed that the original image did in fact come from one of Garcia’s photographs:

The Danziger Gallery which represents the artistic works of Mr. Fairey contacted me on the 21st of January 2009 to inform me that my photograph was in fact the basis for the artwork that has become better know now as the �HOPE� and �PROGRESS� posters., thanks Claytonia!

Update 2: NPR has a podcast audio interview with Fairey where he discusses this image from yesterday here. Thanks, David!

January 22, 2009February 27, 2009

Zoom In Online Launching New Photography Video Show Viewfinders

The video above is a sneak preview clip of a new photography video series being produced by Zoom In Online. Zoom In Online is an excellent photography news and resource site and I’m excited to learn today about the new video series that they will be launching.

For their first video episode, Zoom In Online interviews photojournalist Keith Bedford. Bedford covered the Obama campaign from its beginning all the way through to election night as a professional photojournalist. Some of the images of the campaign in the sneak preview video above are fantastic, really strong reportage.

The new show officially premieres on February 1st. Congrats Sophia on the new series!

I love seeing more professionally created photography video series showing up online. My Pal Marc Silbur also recently just launched his new video series Photoshow as well. I blogged about that a few weeks ago. I did an interview with Marc while shooting the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco that you will be able to see there in the near future.

January 21, 2009January 21, 2009

Second Wave of Flickr/Getty Invites Being Sent “En Masse”

Today on the Flickr blog Flickr is announcing that the “second phase” of their partnership with Getty Images is launching and says that a new round of invitations to participate in the stock photography program are being sent out “en masse.” Flickr says that the new service will formally launch in March. Flickr has an updated FAQ on the program here.

An interesting side note to the new offering is that if you are selected for inclusion in this program you will need to change the license on any Creative Commons photos put up for sale to “all rights reserved,” on Flickr.

From the Flickr FAQ:

“There is a chance one of your Creative Commons-licensed photos may catch the eye of a perceptive Getty Images editor. You are welcome to upload these photos into the Flickr collection on Getty Images, but you are contractually obliged to reserve all rights to sale for your work sold via Getty Images. If you proceed with your submission, switching your license to All Rights Reserved (on Flickr) will happen automatically.

If you�re not cool with that, that�s totally cool. It just means that particular photo will need to stay out of the Flickr collection on Getty Images.”

As an advocate for the Creative Commons license personally I would have liked to have seen Getty/Flickr allow this license. There is no reason why a CC non commercial image cannot be sold and it would have been a good endorsement for this license if they could have figured out a way to work with it.

If you want to follow more of the Flickr Community’s reaction to this offering there are a few threads on Flickr that you can follow here and here. Note, you have to be logged into Flickr and allow yourself to see “adult” content in your settings in order to read the first thread.

Getty’s announcement on the new service is on their blog as well today where they say that “thousands” of invitations were sent out today. If you want to see what the invite looks like you can see this screenshot of it here.

Did you receive an invitations from Getty/Flickr today? If so or if not, what do you think of this new offering?

Related: Mike Arrington had an interesting blog post over at TechCrunch last week as well entitled, “The Photo Marketplace That Never Launched: Flickr Stock.”

January 20, 2009

Sony PS3 Launches Photo Gallery Enhancement Firmware Upgrade

Sony today announced a firmware update to their PS3 that adds significant photo functionality to the popular PS3 gaming console.

The system software update 2.60 becomes available tomorrow and now offers a new Photo Gallery application allowing users to better manage, sort and control the presentation of their photos on their PS3s. With the new upgrade users will now be able to sort their photos by color, age, and even facial expressions like smiling. In a video demo of the new technology Sony shows how parents might, for instance, pull together photos on their unit only of their children smiling and then run these photos as a slide show.

In addition to the Photo Gallery, firmware 2.60 provides guest access to PlayStation Store, enabling non-PlayStation Network members to browse the storefront�s downloadable content, including games, game trailers, and demos, along with more than 4,200 movies and TV shows. The firmware upgrade also upgrades the PS3 system�s video capability to support DivX 3.11 media files.

I wonder at what point in the future we might see Netflix Watch Now on the Sony PS3.

It is interesting to me to see gaming consoles more and more becoming home media boxes. Both Sony with their PS3 and Microsoft with their XBox360 seem to be increasingly going after both the gaming market as well as the home media market including things like music, photos and video.

One thing that both Microsoft and Sony still seem to be missing though is natural integration with the photo sharing site Flickr. Viewing your own photos on your XBox 360 or PS3 is a nice thing to be able to do, but being able to better display and share photos between friends and family through an online platform like Flickr would make an even more memorable experience. Imagine if, for instance, my parents could automatically subscribe on a PS3 or XBox360 to all of my photos tagged with my kids names on Flickr. Or imagine if you could pull up all of the most interesting photos of Barcelona Spain before going there on a trip. Integrating the photo experience with the vast archives of both personal and online photos ought to be what both Microsoft and Sony should be working on.