Fashion / PotD

All The Possibilities

July 5, 2015

Pondering Possibilities (2006)

I was the child who would leave school and take her clothes off the second I got into the house. I made my mom buy me lingerie when I was 5 years old. I was a sicko. My mother must have been mortified. -Alessandra Torresani

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Eleven billion dollars. Think about it. That’s how much revenue lingerie generated in 2014. Eleven billion dollars for bras, underwear, and related frilly things that cover less physical real estate than a bath towel. Oh, but we love every minute of it. Since the mid-70s there hasn’t been an adolescent boy in the US or Britain that didn’t somehow manage to get his hands on the Victoria’s Secret catalog. Before that, there was always the Sears & Roebuck catalog, which could get surprisingly racy for two or three very important pages. Lingerie is that one thing on which both men and women are willing to spend severe amounts of money with rarely any complaints.

Okay, women complain more than men do. Bras are uncomfortable and depending on where purchased never seem to fit exactly right. Of course, lingerie shops counter that most women don’t know how to buy bras correctly. Most young men I know would happily volunteer to help women figure out just exactly how to find the perfect bra, but women have never been too terribly keen about taking them up on that offer. In fact, when I’ve specifically gone to a lingerie store to help a friend or model, the store hasn’t been all that accommodating to my services. Lingerie clerks seem to doubt our intentions. I can’t possibly imagine why.

Still, lingerie is one of those things on which most men and women can agree help define sex appeal. As much as we might find nudity enticing, there is still something about the tease, about the hint of what might be there without actually seeing it, that drives men crazy and elevates a woman’s self-confidence. I would dare say that with the right lingerie a woman can get a man to do her complete bidding with eagerness without the poor sap ever realizing the degree to which he is being manipulated. Lingerie puts women all the more securely in the driver’s seat for any sexual activity their lover may desire with an element of beauty and fashion that is every bit as high-end as the fanciest evening gown.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Yes, there is the practical aspect of lingerie. Some women need bras to help prevent sagging, especially after they’ve nursed a child or 15. Some women use bras to make up for the fact there really isn’t much there to hold. Others use lingerie to help define their shape and there are even lingerie pieces that help those who’ve had surgeries maintain a sense of femininity. Not everything within the lingerie segment is meant to be sexually enticing. In fact, the practical element is most likely the larger part of that eleven billion dollars, though if there are any real numbers in that regard I couldn’t find them.

Still, say the word lingerie and it is the sensual side of the business to which our minds most immediately turn. We think of lace, silk, and satin, carefully design and crafted to entice, to capture our attention, and arouse our senses. We want lingerie to be sexy whenever possible. No one likes wearing boring underwear, though every woman has some. There are, after all, laundry days, or that time of the month when the last thing one wants is to attract attention on which one cannot follow through. Women would much rather slip on the silk and the lace, to feel the soft fabric next to their even softer skin, and to think throughout the day about the encounter that might come at the end of the day.

So, this week we look at lingerie and consider just a few of the more common possibilities. We won’t cover everything, mind you, and if you look around the Internet you’ll find plenty of lingerie designers that even more enticing and provocative than Victoria’s Secret ever thought of being. Lingerie gives women the chance to be naughty beneath their nice, soft beneath the hard, and sensual beneath the strict. What could possibly be more wonderful? We hope you won’t miss a day![/one_half_last]

PotD

Independence For Myself

July 4, 2015

Princess (2011)

“I think it’s neat you do what you want. Not enough chicks do that, if you ask me–just tell society and their expectations to go fuck themselves. If more women did that, we’d be better off.”― Cheryl Strayed, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Independence Day. As a country, we are very loud, very proud, and nothing short of ostentatious in proclaiming the anniversary of our nation’s birth. I’m not sure any other country in the world is quite as over-the-top in their celebrations as are we. I’m okay with the annual pomposity to a large degree. Yes, we have a multitude of problems and we’re damn sure a long way from perfect, but that the wheels have yet to come flying off this experimental bus is, in the perspective of political history, quite amazing. So yes, let’s celebrate what we have that separates us from other countries on the planet.

Equally important, though, is that we celebrate our own independence, who we are as individuals and what separates me from you and you from the rest of the pack. We are taught that, at the most basic genetic level, no two people are alike. Yet, we still struggle to differentiate ourselves, men from other men, women from other women, photographers from other photographers, clowns from Republican Presidential candidates (I’m sorry, that last statement really is insulting to clowns and I hope they’ll forgive me). Our world is so overcrowded that it is difficult to find our own voice in an environment where too often we can’t even hear ourselves think.

We also have to face the danger that in our effort to separate ourselves from the pack we lose sight of the fact we are all still human. For all our talk about individuality, there are still some aspects of our existence where we must join together and act as a unit, putting all our differences aside. We do this to protect our common good, provide for the general welfare, and to secure the liberty we hold so dear. When we become so separate as to not participate in the necessary aspects of humanity, we sacrifice not only our independence but our common brotherhood. [/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Anytime we declare independence on any level, we have to realize that we are bucking a system that would prefer we all be homogenous, follow the rules, and do what we’re told. Just as the British fought back against the colonists, we often find ourselves at war to establish our own rightful place in the world. Sometimes that battle is against tradition, values and belief systems that have been handed down from generation to generation. Others fight against strong biases that say, “you can’t ….” Still others end up fighting against their own family when they choose to do or be something that no one in the family has done or been ever before. Fathers scold sons. Mothers chastise daughters. Honor is questioned.

I’ve known more than a few people who had to strike out on their own at an early age, leaving behind what barely passed as a family in an effort to somehow survive the conditions into which they had been unceremoniously dumped. Crack babies can grow up to graduate college with honors. Abandoned children who were almost twelve years old before they found out food was supposed to be hot went on to become strong, solid, caring individuals. A young man whose father was murdered in a drug deal goes on to be a successful entrepreneur. A little girl who was told she’d never amount to anything becomes CEO of a Fortune 500 company.

Independence. Mine. Yours. Some wear it in their hearts. Others wear it on their skin. No matter how your independence evolved or how it presents itself now, that do-or-die individuality within you is worth celebrating. Go ahead, light a sparkler or two, set off a brightly colored rocket, or put a match to a string of firecrackers. Celebrate our Independence. Celebrate your Independence. As different as we all are, when it comes right down to it we’re a great country.[/one_half_last]

PotD / Social Commentary / Uncategorized

Independent Thought

July 1, 2015

Tied To TV (2006)

“No man is great enough or wise enough for any of us to surrender our destiny to. The only way in which anyone can lead us is to restore to us the belief in our own guidance.” ― Henry Miller

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Our obsession with media was predictable, and widely predicted. Even by 1964, when television was allegedly in its Golden Age, children’s author Roald Dahl saw the enslavement factor so obvious as to include it in one of the characters in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Saying matters have only grown worse since is a severe understatement. Not only have we become more enslaved by media, but we continually create new forms of media to keep our minds, and our opinions, closely tied to whatever output mechanism manages to keep our highly unreliable attention for more than five seconds. We know we’re addicted and that our habit is bad for us, but we are absolutely unwilling to even attempt to break the cord, firm in the belief that we are better off with the knowledge that media imparts.

Granted, there was one a time when media such as printed pamphlets and newspapers were beneficial. In fact, one can reasonably argue that our country’s Declaration of Independence from England would never have happened if not for the influence and information distributed by Thomas Paine is his Common Sense pamphlet. Since 1837, the press has wielded sufficient influence as to be referred to as the fourth estate (a reference to pre-revolution French society divided into the estates: the clergy, the nobility, and the commoners). As the reach of the press grew, so did its influence. In 1897, Francis P. Church validated the presence of Santa Claus by telling little Virginia that, “If you see it in the Sun, it must be true.”

As the reach of the press grew, so did its influence. In 1897, Francis P. Church validated the presence of Santa Claus by telling little Virginia that, “If you see it in the Sun, it must be true.” Edward R. Murrow was the voice of all that was true in the 1950s and following him Walter Cronkite became known as “the most trusted man in America.” Not that everything in the field of journalism was always reliable, but there was a basis of trust and expectation of honesty that allowed people to ingest their information with a sense of security.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]The media monster to which we are now tied has no sense of security to it at all. We have gotten to the point that we allow the media we consume to do all our thinking for us. If something is not validated by our preferred source, then it simply cannot be correct. That multiple sources are never in agreement doesn’t seem to bother us. We choose sides and assume that one is always wrong while the other is always correct, when often the truth of a matter is nowhere near what we’re being told by any major source.

Thomas Paine said something that I think is poignant:

There are two distinct classes of what are called thoughts: those that we produce in ourselves by reflection and the act of thinking and those that bolt into the mind of their own accord.

Notice what is missing from that definition: external influence. Not that Paine expected people to just automatically know everything, but rather he expected that they would take information, such as what he produced, and use that to think, reflect, and come to a reasonable opinion of one’s accord. There’s not accommodation here for allowing any external party to make our opinions for us. In fact, Paine and his peers would find the degree to which we’ve surrendered our thought process to be quite alarming.

Declaring Independence from media is difficult. One has a need to be reasonably informed and the expectations of today’s society are such that one’s need for information is almost immediate. At the same time, though, we should never allow that media to do our thinking for us. Talking heads spouting opinion rather than fact need to be severed from the public arena and not fed their diet of shares and likes and hashtag mentions. We need to take time to step away, to reflect on what we’ve been told and form our own opinion, then see what thoughts might bolt into our minds of their own accord. [/one_half_last]

PotD / Uncategorized

The Independence of Equality

June 30, 2015

Think Pink (2010)

“With the spread of conformity and image-driven superficiality, the allure of an individuated woman in full possession of herself and her powers will prove irresistible. We were born for plenitude and inner fulfillment.” ― Elizabeth Prioleau, Seductress – Women Who Ravished the World and Their Lost Art of Love

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]When 70s model Kelly LeBrock purred the words, “Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful,” women everywhere suddenly rushed out and purchased Pantene™ shampoo. While the line was fully intended as a reverse-psychology ploy to sell beauty products, the problem LeBrock and every other attractive model faced then, and faces now, is that people do hate them because of their beauty. There is this mistaken idea that being beautiful somehow discounts one’s intellect. Sadder still is the fact that too often that anti-beauty bias comes from other women.

I can’t speak for every model, of course, but have the advantage, having photographed the young woman in today’s photo on numerous occasions, to know that she is a strong, intelligent, extremely creative, entrepreneur who, yes, is very attractive and, yes, has enough self-confidence to stride naked into a room full or horny men and leave with their balls in her Gucci® handbag. There is no putting her in a box. She appreciates a sincere compliment, but will verbally eviscerate anyone who tries to patronize her, especially in a sexual context. The fact that she is attractive is a bonus that compliments who she is, not retail wrapping that attempts to define her.

Where we run into problems is that taking pictures of one’s personality is rather difficult. Capturing intelligence on film is playing to a false stereotype at best. I could, in theory, take pictures of her working, but that would require considerable explanation and in the end does no better job telling one who she is than does the picture above. I grow rather tiresome of the crowd that seems to think that physical beauty and being a respectable person of intelligence and depth are two separate things. To disparage beauty for intelligence is just as wrongly biased as those who would mistakenly disparage women in favor of men. Both are equally wrong and equally damaging.

Part of being independent is being able to step up and say, without quiver nor anxiety, this is who I am. Period. No justification, no apologies, and no conditional qualifying should ever be necessary. A woman who dresses in Prada is no better than one who duct tapes the inside seam of her pants together each morning. One of the most brilliant mathematicians I’ve known, a person whose command of numbers makes my head spin, was bare-ass naked when I first met her and didn’t give a rat’s ass what I thought about the matter. We forget that bias too easily runs in both directions and shaming a person for being attractive by assuming she is lacking in intellect is one of the most dangerous mistakes one can make.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]The proposed Equal Rights Amendment has been introduced to every Congress since 1924 and fell only three states shy of ratification in 1982. For reasons I fail to even begin to understand because they are so inherently foolish and ill-considered, these words are not yet law:

Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

The fact that it has taken nearly a century and we still are not any closer to seeing those words in the Constitution than we were when they were first introduced is beyond shameful, an example of just how firmly entrenched social biases become. While we’ve made progress in the area of women’s rights, until those words become immutable law everything we think exists, every step forward we think we’ve made, is temporal and can be erased. The concept is so very simple, and the benefits so astonishingly plentiful, so as to make this amendment’s lack of ratification yet another very embarrassing stain on the United States’ record of civil rights.

At the same time, those who would champion women’s Independence hurt their own cause when they allow something such as position or physical beauty to become the basis of judgment. This isn’t a new battle, either. Consider these words from the 16th century:

“If I follow the inclination of my nature, it is this: beggar-woman and single, far rather than queen and married.”
― Elizabeth I Tudor

If even Queen Elizabeth I felt that the judgments of place and standing impeded upon her Independence, we cannot expect attitudes and practices to change simply upon the force of a social campaign. Attitudes must change, children must be taught, and we must stop looking at beauty and nudity as the antithesis of intelligence and worth.

Being Independent must give one the right to be exactly who and what they are, even when that means being fabulous.[/one_half_last]

PotD / Social Commentary

Beyond The Declaration

June 29, 2015

Patiently Waiting (2011)

“I will not be “famous,” “great.” I will go on adventuring, changing, opening my mind and my eyes, refusing to be stamped and stereotyped. The thing is to free one’s self: to let it find its dimensions, not be impeded.” ― Virginia Woolf, A Writer’s Diary

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Ah, Monday; that point in the week in which boss’s try desperately to pull employees back in from the distractions of the weekend, and last week, to focus on the work that lies ahead, focusing on what needs to be done next. The task is not easy. When such celebration has occurred on so many different fronts the temptation is to try and keep the party going for as long as possible. After all, who doesn’t like a party? Sure, we know one can’t party all the time, but do we really have to go back to work just yet? Can’t the celebration go on just a little bit longer?

Fortunately, there’s Facebook where we can be as shallow and meaningless as humanly possible and therefore totally deny the fact, on a cosmetic level, that there is work to be done. Half my friends have rainbow-fied their profile picture so that, as more than one person has pointed out, my newsfeed looks somewhat like a Skittles™ factory just exploded all over the place. That alone will keep us from ignoring the important strides that were made last week. Everyone jump on the bandwagon, even if you can’t plan an instrument.

Independence doesn’t stop on one event, though, and for many people today is just another Monday. The kids are off to daycare. The car needs a tuneup. Don’t forget to call and make the baby’s six-month appointment with the pediatrician. Sure, Mommy and Mommy may have gotten married over the weekend, but on a practical level the commitment was already there and this morning, well, it’s pretty much back to work. The presence of a ring on a finger doesn’t change the fact that the newlyweds could, in some states, still lose their jobs, be denied seating in a restaurant, or have difficulty adopting. [/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Independence is an every day declaration that one will not let the world overwhelm them, that one will not allow themselves to be injured by the biases of others, that two steps forward does not then require one step back. While the label on this liberty may be new, the challenges of upholding this Independence are much the same today as they were this time last week. One still has to stand firm, one still has to be defiant in the face of ignorance, and in some states one might even still need to engage in acts of some civil disobedience to simply get their government to abide by the law.

Look at the date on today’s picture. When it was taken in 2011, what they were doing, having a baby as a lesbian couple, was groundbreaking. They couldn’t marry. Their families weren’t necessarily supportive (some members were, others not so much). Society totally shunned them. Healthcare laws worked against them. At that point, less than 15 percent of Americans said they supported equal marriage rights. For couples like this, the freedom gained last week merges with, and perhaps adds some glitter to an independence that has been growing for several years.

Make no mistake, there is a shiny newness to the Independence now available to our LGBTQA friends, but as they claim that Independence that realize that this is just a marker along a journey that is not yet complete. An important marker, to be sure, but just as that Declaration of Independence ignited some difficulties between those new US citizens and King George III, this Independence also faces challenges. Maintaining Independence is often more challenging that its declaration. Welcome to Monday. Time to move forward.[/one_half_last]

PotD / Social Commentary

And The Living Is Easy

June 27, 2015

A Quiet Moment (2012). Model: Sarah Harris

“All in all, it was a never-to-be-forgotten summer — one of those summers which come seldom into any life, but leave a rich heritage of beautiful memories in their going — one of those summers which, in a fortunate combination of delightful weather, delightful friends and delightful doing, come as near to perfection as anything can come in this world.” ― L.M. Montgomery, Anne’s House of Dreams

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]So much has happened this week. Global media and the Internet hardly know where to turn because the amount of excitement, and in some cases concern, is overwhelming. We do well to focus on one thing at a time and this week has seen the country grapple with issues of race and symbolism, healthcare, affordable housing (hope that one didn’t sneak past you) and marriage equality. We’ve been so very busy with what’s going on in our own country that we’ve largely ignored anything happening elsewhere. Greece appears to be going into default. The self-proclaimed Islamic State killed dozens in France, Tunisia, and Kuwait. China has been selling 40-year-old meat. The Vatican officially recognized the Palestinian State. This has not been the quiet summer week I had anticipated when we started on Sunday.

In fact, if this is how the summer is going to start, I’m rather fearful of where we might go next. Both of the really big Supreme Court rulings have been handled now. There’s no more good news left to immediately anticipate. Should we be setting ourselves up to deal with disaster, death, and destruction? Certainly, there are some who are calling for such in the wake of this week’s rulings, but we tend to look upon those as extreme views, and, like almost everything Americans say, we don’t actually expect anyone to follow through on those threats.

Summer is that time we want to just live in the moment, not worry about what happened yesterday or might happen tomorrow, but throw caution to the wind and enjoy what is happening right now. Certainly, we need those moments. We need a lot of those moments. Our minds do not respond well to this constant overflow of information and we desperately need and long for days where the valve is shut off for a few minutes and we can just soak up the sun and give our minds time to process. If we keep going at full tilt, then we put our health and perhaps even our lives in danger. Stress kills and has a large arsenal of weapons at its disposal. [/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]At some point in the future, maybe ten or even twenty years from now, we might look back on this summer and remember something, but what will it be? Will this week’s SCOTUS decisions be the highlight? For those directly affected by the outcome, perhaps so. I have friends from high school who were quite anxious about applying for a marriage license yesterday. For the rest of us, though, there remain several weeks of summer where we might still find even more monumental events. If so, I do hope they are happy ones.

Not everyone gets happy summer memories. Another friend’s father died today, rather unexpectedly. I don’t have to wonder how he’ll remember this summer. The obituary page is never empty and for every name listed there is someone whose summer has been devastated. So it is with every summer. Some win. Some lose. Some are fortunate if they come out even. Kat’s little ones might remember this as the summer of their first garden. Some will remember this as the summer of the great floods, while others remember the severe droughts, dramatic water rationing, and life-threatening heat. Everyone’s experience is different and everyone’s memory unique, even when it’s faulty.

So, perhaps it best that we end this week of summertime joys with a moment of reflection, looking back on all that has happened this week and pondering what might yet come down the road. If you are lucky, perhaps you can do that pondering while sitting on the end of a springboard, dangling your feet in a pool. Maybe you can have the moment of reflection while sitting in the shade of a great tree or snuggling with a pet. Whatever your situation, take a moment to turn off the intake valve and rest. There’s still a whole lot of summer left to enjoy.[/one_half_last]

PotD

To Lie Sometimes On The Grass

June 26, 2015

Afield In Summer (2013)

“Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.” ― John Lubbock, The Use Of Life

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]One of the greatest joys of summer is taking the time to just be. Not easy, I know. That whole “work so you can eat” thing keeps interfering. Even with the garden beginning to yield produce, that still takes a considerable amount of time to tend. And there are children that demand attention as well. Boy, do they demand attention. “Can I have a snack?” “I need a drink!” “When are we eating lunch?” That last one usually comes within ten minutes of having finished breakfast. Kids being needy at home during the summer is why so many parents favor year-round school, you know.

When you can find the chance to sneak off for a few moments, even if it’s only for a half hour or so, just being able to take that time to yourself is just as good as a healthy dose of medicine. Unless, of course, you have allergies, in which case you might actually need to take a healthy dose of medicine before enjoying your healthy dose of medicine. I mean, really, who wants to spend all their alone time wiping their own snotty nose? You don’t want to be the one sneezing all over the place, either. All that noise scares off the wildlife and drowns out the babbling brook. If you’re going to spend quiet time out in nature you don’t want to ruin it with your own noise.

There’s nothing quite as peaceful as sitting in the sun, surrounded by tall grass, leaning back, watching the clouds go by. Go ahead and get naked if you want, feel the summer breeze blowing across your skin. Just be sure to use plenty of a high SPF sunscreen while you’re out there. Even if you tan easily like I do, you’re skin only produces a limited amount of melatonin and when it’s gone there’s no replacing it. Cases of skin cancer have been steadily increasing over the past 30 years. My father died from complications due to skin cancer and he never sat naked in a field. You just have to be careful about those things.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Ah, just to have a moment to unplug and dream, to let one’s imagination soar as high as the summer sky. Is there anything as glorious as watching eagles and hawks swooping and gliding overhead? Critters closer to the ground are something for which one has to watch out, though. Especially ants. Man, let me tell you, nothing ruins a quiet moment quite like setting your naked derriere on a mound of ants. You’ll be needing to call the doctor and have him prescribe you some cream for those bites, and good luck getting anyone to actually put it on there for you. Even if you are lucky enough to have a nicely shaped butt, there’s no one who wants to see a mess of ant bites.

Maybe you can find a cool stream to sit beside, kick off your shoes and dabble your toes in the water for a while. You can just feel all your troubles and worries melting away, flowing downstream where they’ll never bother you again. That is, as long as there are no snakes in the area. We are in North America, after all, and even Alaska has snakes this time of year, I think. They’ll sneak up on you, too. They may not be there when you first sit down, but you stick your toes in the water and they look just like ten pretty little fish to a water moccasin. You don’t hear them coming, you know.

Yes, the outdoors in summer sounds like a wonderful place, doesn’t it?

Okay, let’s get real: that shit’s dangerous. You want peace and quiet? Lock yourself in an air conditioned closet and make sure it can’t be unlocked from the outside. Nature will kill you. I swear, it is out to get you and will bite your ass every time. Mosquitoes. Spiders. Suicidal squirrels. They aim for you the moment you step outside. They’ll get you. They’ll get you every time.

I’m kidding, of course. Probably. Go ahead. Try it. Let me know how it works out for you.[/one_half_last]

PotD

Like A Loaded Gun

June 25, 2015

Bikini Boating (2005). Model: Jade Lynn

“A girl in a bikini is like having a loaded gun on your coffee table- There’s nothing wrong with them, but it’s hard to stop thinking about.” ― Garrison Keillor

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]My late parents were amazing. Considering where I grew up, rural Kansas and Oklahoma, and when I grew up, through the 60s and 70s, they did a remarkably wonderful job of making sure we were exposed to important issues such as civil rights, conservation, and the importance of getting a good education. On those issues, they were surprisingly liberal.

On other issues, however, they could be conservative to the point of leaving my brother and I extremely naive. Of course, baby brother had the advantage of coming after me and usually knowing where I kept my stash of adult magazines. Still, there were many areas, especially in regard to sexuality, that were never considered ripe for any level of conversation beyond, “If you think about it, don’t do it; better yet, just don’t think about it.”

Not everything they did was intentional. Mother was almost deathly afraid of water and didn’t learn to swim until she was in her 40s. So, there were no afternoon trips to the pool when we were little. When I took swimming lessons, the instructors were, of course, dressed in conservative one-piece suits and when one is six one isn’t necessarily concerned about the physical qualities of the person promising to catch you if you jump into the pool. On rare occasion, Poppa might take us to a public pool, but when he did he dominated our attention. He was our life raft, our pool toy, our swim instructor, and favorite playmate all rolled into one. We barely noticed anyone else at the pool.

Then, there was the summer I was 14. Being 14 may be the most painfully awkward age for a boy to be, especially in the summer. There was always someone in the group who was more mature looking and talking about “making it” with girls. The rest of us tried to match his banter, but a quick look in the swim trunks revealed we weren’t remotely ready for anything much more intimate than, “hi.” Even if a girl had kissed us, none of us would have had a clue what to do next. I’m pretty sure a couple of the guys might have fainted. Fortunately, no girl ever put us in the position of finding out.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Being 14 meant our parents weren’t afraid of just dropping us off at the city pool and picking us up later. As long as we stayed in the shallow end of the pool, everything stayed nice and appropriately within our parents’ values.

Everything changed the day some kid dared us to jump off the high dive. Two of the guys in our group immediately chickened out because they didn’t know how to swim that well. Randy and I could, though, and Randy wasn’t about to chicken out on a dare … and he made sure I didn’t chicken out either. My heart was pounding as we climbed that twelve-foot ladder that felt every bit like it reached half-way to God. Randy went first and made it look so easy. I stood at the end of the board, thought, “If the fall doesn’t kill me, Mother will,” and jumped.

I hit the water, hands folded just as I’d been taught, and was pleased to feel no pain. I came to the surface, checked to make sure nothing was bleeding and swam for the side. I grabbed hold of the ladder on the side of the pool, looked up, and there she was. Her tan legs were long with water beading deliciously on her skin. Her teenage bottom was covered by her swimsuit and then my brain screamed inside my head, “OH MY GOD I CAN SEE HER BELLY BUTTON!” I looked up a little further and my head screamed again, “OH MY GOD, ARE THOSE REALLY BOOBS?” I was afraid to keep looking. Had she looked back my head just might have exploded.

Feeling something stirring in my swim trunks, I opted to just swim back down to the shallow end. I had, for the first time in my life, just witnessed a girl in a bikini, and it was glorious. Since then, I’ve probably seen tens of thousands of girls in bikinis (or less) and nearly all of them have been absolutely wonderful young women. None, however, was able to induce that same feeling of euphoria mixed with astonishment and sheer fear the way that first girl did more than 40 summers ago. One thing is certain, though: since discovering girls in bikinis, my summers have never been the same.[/one_half_last]

PotD

Skinny Dipping

June 23, 2015

A Morning Dip (2005)

“If it could only be like this always – always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe and Aloysius in a good temper…” ― Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]One of the joys of growing up in the country was slipping off on our bicycles in the middle of a summer afternoon to the low-water bridge about a mile from our house and going skinny dipping. Not that we ever actually admitted that we were skinny dipping. I’d get my shorts wet anyway so that Mother wouldn’t be suspect. Still, the joy wasn’t just in being in the shallow pool of cool water that flowed over that crumbling slab of concrete; the delight was being naked, au naturale in nature as though, just maybe, the gods had intended for us to be that way all along.

According to Poppa’s sermon, technically, that philosophy was right. While I didn’t have any direct proof that Adam and Eve ever went skinny dipping, if they didn’t have any clothes then they wouldn’t have had much choice, did they? The only other option was that they didn’t bathe at all and that would have just been gross, even if they were, in all likelihood, totally fictional. Even fictional characters should be clean, shouldn’t they? And little boys need to be clean, as mothers are so often fond of reminding them. Going skinny dipping always seemed like the perfect solution, especially if we had spent the earlier part of the day getting absolutely filthy.

Skinny dipping in that tiny little pool made our summers right up to the point when, mid-way through the summer we were 16, someone saw a water moccasin in our pool. I didn’t see it, but the scream of “SNAKE!” was all I needed. We were all out of the water and pulling on our shorts as quickly as possible while simultaneously, every one of us, trying to hold our hands over our family jewels. If there was one place on our body we absolutely could not stand to be snake bit, it was our penises. They had only just recently grown to a point of not being totally embarrassing. We didn’t want to lose them to a damn snake.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]That was the last summer in that little watering hole. We moved the next year and I was far too upset at the lack of attractive girls my age to be terribly interested in skinny dipping. There was that place way back on Turkey Creek that was suitable, but driving all the way out there was a pain and if it had rained in the past couple of days one was likely to get stuck crossing the pasture. I did sneak off a couple of times with that blonde I met at church camp. I’ve often wondered whatever happened to her… if only I could remember her name.

Skinny dipping is a bonus that comes with living in the country in the summer. City dwellers are much more uptight about being naked in their public pools. The model’s boyfriend let us into the pool at their apartment complex before the sun was fully up for us to catch today’s photo. We were early enough we didn’t think anyone would notice. Someone did, of course, and he damn near lost his job over it. City people really get stressed and worked up about these matters. Perhaps, just maybe, if they spent a little more time skinny dipping they might be better able to relax and enjoy their summer. If one can’t kick back and relax a bit when the weather is this lovely, when is it ever possible?

I’ve not been skinny dipping in over 30 years now, I’m sorry to say. It’s not as easy to slip off, not as easy to find a place suitably secluded, and as an adult if one gets caught it tends to result in the police getting called. That’s almost as bad as a snake bite; no one really needs either one. Still, I have some wonderful memories of those carefree days from my youth and even an old man can still fantasize a bit. Who knows, maybe one day I’ll stumble across the perfect little pool of water while no one’s looking. Who’s down to join me?[/one_half_last]

PotD

Summer Rain

June 22, 2015

Reflection in the Rain (2012)

There is more to sex appeal than just measurements. I don’t need a bedroom to prove my womanliness. I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples off a tree or standing in the rain. -Audrey Hepburn

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]This summer is getting off to a rather damp start, at least for the middle and Eastern parts of the continent. The West, well, not so much, but we’re not surprised by that. We were warned. But here, there is a river flood warning for some of the places around town that are a little too prone to the White River leaving its banks. And in Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana, anywhere along the Red River is a very dangerous place to be as flooding there has been higher than anyone can remember. While we’ve not had enough rain to set any records, at least none that I’ve seen, it certainly is unusual for use to be entering the heart of summer with the ground soggy, the grass still green, and local authorities talking about a water ban.

What has been frustrating, though, is trying to work around the rain and the fact that weather forecasts have changed several times a day as to whether we’re going to get wet if we venture outside. Most days, I check the forecast when I first get up of the morning and let my aches and pains fill in the blanks. The past couple of weeks, I’ve been checking more along the lines of every hour and finding that rain chances are bouncing up and down like a yo-yo. At one point yesterday the barometric pressure dropped a bit and I was more than ready for a brief but heavy downpour to soak the little urchins setting off fireworks in the neighborhood. Didn’t happen. The one lone storm cell went to our South.

Of course, when we want to take pictures in the rain, it doesn’t happen. At least, not where we need it to happen. Today’s picture was scheduled on a “drop everything and get over here” plan, which was only possible because the model was working evenings and didn’t live too terribly far away. As soon as it was evident that rain was inevitable, we made the call and still had to wait. On another occasion, a male model and I drove all over town trying to get in front of a heavy downpour. We missed it every time. Trying to get the weather to work with your concept plan is rather difficult. The skies just don’t want to listen.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Standing in the rain can be sexy as hell. Wet clothes cling to the body, outlining its curves, and sometimes giving us a hint of what lies beneath. Being wet also makes one appear vulnerable and as humans we respond to that apparent need to be rescued, brought inside and comforted. The romantic rushes to the rescue, towel in hand, hoping that a little kindness shown might lead to thankfulness in the form of intimacy. Unfortunately for the romantic, most people are remarkably independent and self-sufficient, not at all desiring any form of assistance, so not only will they not be needing your towel, the chances of any unplanned intimacy are practically nill. Poor chivalrous romantics never can catch a break, can they?

Playing in the rain is fun and the fact that we’ve seen a resurgence of rubber rainboots as fashion accessories emphasizes that point. There’s a freeing, cleansing, child-like quality to being out splashing in the mud puddles like we did when we were two, but without anyone yelling at us for getting out clothes muddy this time. Playing in the rain is carefree. If the hair style is ruined, so be it; we’re having fun, dammit! We can act grown up later if we must. For now, we just want this brief moment of splashing and frivolity while we can. We would much rather pretend, for a moment, that we haven’t any responsibilities and that there are milk and cookies waiting when we decide to go indoors.

Yes, yes, we must be careful of lightning. There’s nothing sexy at all about being zapped into a coma, or worse, while playing in the rain. Don’t take any chances. If you can hear the thunder you probably need to be inside. While being rain and wind swept can be sexy, especially if one looks like Ms. Hepburn, being dead in a pool of water isn’t quite so attractive and really can ruin one’s summer. Be safe. Have fun. Stay sexy. Enjoy the wetter part of this summer. [/one_half_last]

PotD / Social Commentary

Anonymously Yours

June 17, 2015

Properly Accessorized (2011)

“I am glad that I paid so little attention to good advice; had I abided by it I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes.” ― Edna St. Vincent Millay

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]How bad is it that we are still a good 18 months or so away from the 2016 presidential election and already I’m tired of the whole thing? With so many candidates having already announced their campaigns, each additional name added to the roster feels more like adding to the list of extras at the end of a bad movie no one really wanted to watch in the first place. Sure, eventually we’ll have to vote for a couple of these clowns, but at this point there’s too much noise, too much grandstanding, and too much absurdity to take any of them seriously.

I wonder what would happen if we forced candidates to run anonymously through the primaries, unable to present a name, a photograph, or even appear on Sunday morning talk shows in person. How would it change the process, and the number willing to run, if they were initially assigned a number and were forced to run strictly on the merits of their platform, with no personality involved? Would we be more careful about who we choose as our president? Certainly, we would want to reveal the names of the candidates at the party primaries, but in the circus leading up to that point what benefits might there be in ignoring names altogether and having everyone run anonymously, with no indication of race, heritage, gender, sexuality, or religious beliefs? I cannot help but think the process would be much better served.

Personality and ego are a detriment when one is considering who should hold public office, but yet those are the two aspects voters get heaped upon them the most often. In a crowded field such as what we are already experiencing in this cycle, we are forced to endure a constant battle of who can say the most socially provocative thing in an effort to get even 15 seconds of time on a newscast, or perhaps a small storm of controversy on social media. When over half the field of contestants is more well known for their ridiculous statements and social media gaffes than their actual platforms, we have a serious problem.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Sadly, one of the most frequent areas of unacceptable stump speech involves slut shaming and victim blaming on the part of candidates. We saw it too often in the 2012 election, and already the habit is rearing its ugly head in this one. Candidates mistakenly believe that by pandering to the very lowest and most ignorant form of voter that they can appeal to an under-educated and socially inept base to push them forward in the election. What they fail to realize is that the rest of the civilized world would really like to put those two issues to rest. There is never such a thing as “asking for it,” especially in regard to rape, and what a woman does or does not wear is not indicative of her sexual proclivity.

Such inappropriate attitudes toward sex and violence are one of the reasons we have had to stop giving names, even pseudonyms, to models who appear nude. We have had too many instances where technology allowed a model to be stalked after her name came up in some random Google search. With the increase in facial recognition software, I worry that, without any change in public attitude, we may be forced to limit figure art to anonymous forms such as today’s picture. Yes, today’s picture is quite lovely, but I’m always saddened by the fact I’m forced to crop out the model’s beautiful and expressive face because she rightly fears both social and professional backlash.

Anonymity can work both for us and against us. When it prevents ego and personality from obscuring fact and reality, anonymity is a good thing. When it allows shaming and inappropriate blaming to continue, though, anonymity is something that should perhaps be stripped away. I would dearly love to never have to crop another photo or avoid giving credit to another model to prevent putting them in any form of danger.

Maybe I should just run for president. Anonymously, of course.[/one_half_last]

Art / PotD / Social Commentary

Waste Not

June 16, 2015

Leave A Tender Moment (2010)

“I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being–forgive me–rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger.” ― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]I hate waste. I don’t hate trash, mind you. There are things which, once expired, definitely require disposal. Waste, though, the deliberate misuse or ruination of something still usable, angers me. I hate wasting time, because there’s no guarantee that there is any more of it coming. I hate wasting of resources, especially those purchased with someone else’s funds under the expectation they would be managed efficiently. I loathe large, opulent displays of wealth wasted in the face of massive poverty.

As much as anything, I hate wasted food. I had to throw away a package of bagels today because moisture had gotten into the package and caused them to mold. Five perfectly good bagels gone because care wasn’t taken in preserving them properly. Those emotions crop up a lot and I’ll blame my mother in part for the constant reminder that there are always starving children somewhere. But then, my own brushes with poverty and hunger are an even more recent reminder of just how valuable a single bagel is to someone who hasn’t eaten all day.

The words “waste not, want not” are etched into my brain so strongly that almost any level of waste I observe stirs a negative emotion. Seeing massive amounts of food in a restaurant dumpster makes me momentarily swear off dining out. Observing whole rivers of polluted water makes me curse industrialization. Seeing the Coke lot the day after a race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway makes me detest racing fans everywhere. Even this past weekend I was severely dismayed to look at the street after the Pride Parade and see it not merely cluttered but severely trashed with smashed candy and other litter.

We sadly live in a world where waste of every kind is far too common, far too excessive, and leaves far too large a footprint. Getting anyone to care is almost impossible.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Waste in photography fares no better and is one of the reasons for focusing on missed imagery this week. There are some shoots where the amount of genuinely strong imagery we capture exceeds the limits of reasonable display. I prefer to keep presentations between seven and ten images, since that is pretty much the sweet spot for the average person’s attention span. If we have a really strong set, I might go up to twenty. Beyond that, though, people stop looking. Their eyes glaze over as though you’ve just brought them a fourth serving of parmesan chicken, to which their bodies groaned in despair. No matter how strong the images are, beyond a certain point they’re just waste.

Perhaps the worst, though, is seeing wasted talent. Now, I have to be very careful here. I know there are some people whose talents are multiple and for reasons of sanity they are forced to choose; focusing on one or two while letting others lie dormant. I have sympathy for those people. What bothers me is someone who can clearly do well, either in front or behind a camera, and yet lets someone who fails to understand the artistry of either talk them into doing something far less creative, far more temporary, and far less fulfilling. I come into contact with those people sometimes multiple times a day and when I see them not doing what they could clearly do so well I want to cry.

Today’s picture is one from a set of gems that could easily fill a very large wall. I won’t attempt to over-analyze why this particular combination worked; the models didn’t have an especially intimate relationship, in fact they giggled through the first several minutes of shooting. Everything just clicked and the number of frames worth saving far exceeds what should be displayed in a single exhibition. So, today’s #POTD is an example in preventing waste.

Still, I must ask you to consider: what are you wasting?[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

Shooting For Exposure

June 9, 2015

Through Different Lenses (2011)

“If you follow the rules, it’s your own fault.” ― Marty Rubin

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Life is busy for everyone and it is quite nice that we have at our disposal now a variety of tools and applications to help ease just a little bit of the strain here and there so we can better focus on the truly important aspects of whatever it is we’re doing. One of the applications I have installed assists me with catching common grammar errors. More than just spell checking, it looks for proper subject/verb agreement, makes sure the verb conjugation is correct, and that I’m putting the most appropriate punctuation in place. When I’m typing quickly, and especially early in the morning when I’m still on my first cup of coffee, the tool saves me a lot of time going back and proofreading, especially since I’m really lousy at proofreading.

There’s a problem with this application, though: it doesn’t like the Oxford Comma. Personally, I quite like the Oxford Comma and find that the meaning of some word lists changes significantly depending on whether the comma is used. If I have a sentence, or thought, or fragment, or phrase such as this one then I am going to use the extra comma every time. Unfortunately, the application marks it wrong every time and attempts to correct the matter. I end up having to take extra steps, and time, to keep the comma in place and assure that the list is going to infer exactly what I intend.

Image processing software is no different. Applications such as Lightroom and Photoshop are full of little guides and measuring devices to provide photographers and graphic artists with multiple checks and balances so as to, hopefully, prevent errors that might result in bad print. However, none of those tools is accurate 100% of the time and relying on them too heavily can sometimes result in even larger errors than if they hadn’t been used at all. Certainly, the tools are helpful and are included with the best of intentions, but in the end there’s no substitution for pulling a hard print and going with what your eyes tell you is best.

Today’s image is a perfect example of the tools not always being the best judge. This is also an example of just how much the appearance of an image can change from one computer monitor to another. [/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]When I shot this image in 2011, I processed it using the most current version of Photoshop, but on a Frankenstein computer I had been carefully rubber-banding together since 2005 using a monitor that dated even older than that. While the monitor was calibrated to the best of its ability, I knew from experience that what I saw on the screen was not a true match when pulling a print. So, I tried making adjustments as best I could and most of the time I was at least within the ballpark.

The primary challenge of this image is one of exposure. The model’s hair is jet black, to the point that one has to dramatically open the shutter to even begin picking up any highlights. Without a high level of exposure, her hair would appear to be nothing more than a black mass sitting on her head. In a studio, that problem is easily resolved by putting a light specifically on her hair. We’re not in a studio, though. We’re using natural light and even with a reflector there wasn’t enough natural illumination to pull out the highlights in her hair without risking over-exposing the entire left side of the image. I made specific choices and was pleased with the result.

Then, a couple of years ago, I got a new computer and monitor and loaded newer software. Going through the archives to see what needed to be revised, I brought up this image and it instantly showed a warning that the left side was over exposed. I tried correcting the image to what the software said was appropriate, but doing so left the photo flat and dull. Finally, I had no choice but to pull a print and, wouldn’t you know it, the over-exposure was still within gamut (barely), and the image looked fine.

Exposure can be a very tricky thing at times and while generally running highlights out of gamut is a no-no, there are times, arguably including this one, where the risk is worth the effect. Are we going to make mistakes? Yes. Is everyone going to agree with our choices? No. But again, what matters is whether the image generates the emotion the photographer intended. At the end of the day, perhaps a little too much light is better than not enough.[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

Of Highlights and Shadows

June 6, 2015

The Other Side (2010)

Light makes photography. Embrace light. Admire it. Love it. But above all, know light. Know it for all you are worth, and you will know the key to photography. – George Eastman

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]I chose today’s quote quite carefully and with deliberate intention. I’m not sure anyone has ever understood light in relationship to photography quite as thoroughly as did George Eastman. When a friend suggested he make a photographic record of a trip he was about to take, Eastman found the wet plate camera and equipment so bulky and difficult that he ended up never taking the trip! Born from that frustration, though, were innovations such as fixed-lens cameras, rolled film, and a chemical development process that was significantly less likely to kill the photographer. Eastman saw what photography could become and then took the steps to make sure it got there. The bulk of his contributions to our profession are unparalleled and quite likely will never be surpassed by any one person.

Eastman knew, among many other things, that photography needed to be accessible, that people needed to be able to capture all the moments of their lives, not just those for which people had time to sit and impatiently wait. When he introduced the Brownie camera in 1900, it sold for a mere one dollar and while a dollar was still of significant value at that time, Eastman’s invention put cameras in the hands of more people, and made it possible to capture more images, than anything or anyone had done prior. In his opinion, Eastman felt that there was absolutely nothing, no single aspect of the human existence, that was not worth photographing.

One of the challenges Eastman faced, though, was the fact that many of the people buying these new cameras of his had absolutely no concept of what photography was, how it worked, or how to take a good picture. Those early Brownie users had no idea that a subject sitting fully in the sun was likely to be over-exposed, while those sitting in the shade were going to be quite in the dark. A very high number of unrecognizable pictures could have very easily caused the new inventions to fail in the market. One of the most under-recognized aspects of Eastman Kodak amateur film was its ability to balance out some of those lights and shadows so that errors of ignorance would be less severe.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Over time, we’ve come to understand more about highlights and shadows and how to manipulate the two so as to achieve different styles and tones and ranges of depth in our photographs. We are able to meter with relative position the best camera settings for images such as today’s photo. Our highlights are high enough to be bright, but not out of gamut. Our shadows have nice, measured gradients that gently define curves and muscles. Eastman would have unquestionably been amazed by the ability of contemporary cameras to translate and manipulate highlights and shadows to such accurate levels.

Highlights and shadows are not only part of photography, though. They are part of business and they are part of life. Eastman Kodak has struggled to adapt and find its way in a digital world. The company that once defined photography for a large number of people around the world is now but an afterthought and many younger photographers don’t even recognize. George Eastman had his own shadows as well. Faced with increasing pain from a spinal disease that made it difficult to walk, on March 24, 1932, Eastman penned a short note:

Dear friends —

My work is done.
Why wait?
GE

He then shot himself through the heart, ending an era of some of the greatest innovation photography has ever seen.

Natural light is an amazing tool and certainly the more we understand light better able we are to create stunning photographs. We do well, though, to mind the highlights and shadows, to use them effectively and be careful to keep them in balance, both on camera and off.[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

Riding The Wave of (e)Motion

June 5, 2015

Removing the Afternoon (2010)

I always thought of photography as a naughty thing to do — that was one of my favorite things about it, and when I first did it, I felt very perverse. – Diane Arbus, On Photography by Susan Sontag

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]When I first started taking pictures, holding so tightly onto a Canon F1 to the point it couldn’t help but shake, motion blur was my most common menace. Figuring out how to work the combination of f-stop and shutter speed with whatever ASA film I was using (usually 400) so that I wouldn’t get blur was a severe obstacle for me to overcome. I don’t even want to think about how many potentially great pictures were lost, or how many rolls of film I wasted, simply because I could not, for the life of me, keep the damn camera still. The bad news: I still can’t, even though it’s for much different reasons now. There are days when having a tripod, even for simple shots, is a lifesaver.

What has changed over the years, though, is our attitude toward motion blur. While there has always been some acceptance of the error under very limited circumstances, such as pictures of flowing streams of water, it is generally considered a mistake. The most common one I caught then, and still often have problems eliminating, is that the subject will move, just a hand or maybe shift a foot, right as I’m clicking the shutter. I hate having to count aloud before taking each shot, but there are some people who cannot stand still for more than a split second, and some toddlers who can’t stand still at all. For them, warning exactly when the shutter is about to click is the only way to get a clean shot in environments where one can’t work with a super-high shutter speed. Otherwise, you’re throwing away the frame.

Today, we’re more forgiving of certain kinds of motion blur, such as in today’s photo. We are more likely to understand that the motion is necessary to communicate the story of the photo effectively. Capturing just the right amount of blur confirms for us that the subject isn’t just posing for a picture, but that something is actually happening; that we’ve captured an event as it was taking place, something that will never happen exactly the same way ever again.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Natural light indoors makes motion blur practically inevitable. Shooting natural light indoors always requires a higher ISO (we used 800 for this shot) to capture the light, and a slower shutter speed/f-stop combination (we were at f/2.8, 1/125 for the series from which this shot is taken). If we put the camera on a tripod, which is generally what I would suggest, then those settings are probably workable for most portrait situations. But if you’re not shooting portraits, if there is actually something happening in front of you, then blur is inevitable. That puts the photographer in the position of asking themselves, “Is it worth the blur?”

Honestly, when I took these shots, I fully expected that it was the fringe on her top that was going to give me the most problem, and there’s not a shot in the set where every strand is staying still. Could I have fixed that on camera? Sure, but doing so would have left us with a much less emotional image. With the motion, we have a greater sense of what is going on. We are closer to understanding the story (or creating our own) and connecting to the energy of the image. Without the blur, especially in her hair, this picture comes off bland and a bit boring.

This is an example of natural light sometimes giving us what we don’t know we want. Experimenting, being willing to risk some mistakes, knowing from the start that nothing you’re about to shoot may be usable, is one of the things that makes photography exciting, and that excitement becomes part of the fabric of the resulting image. Motion blur still isn’t something we want to see too often, and the majority of images do better without it but, don’t be afraid of the emotion that comes with a little bit of blur; it may just make the whole picture worthwhile.[/one_half_last]

Art / Photography / PotD

Best Thing Next To Being There

June 4, 2015

Morning Dance (2010)

Any photographer who says he’s not a voyeur is either stupid or a liar. -Helmut Newton

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]We, photographers, like to talk and behave in public as though we’re all about the art. We’ll extol the virtues of natural light as though it is the holy grail of photography. We’ll compare our work to that of truly great artistic masters as though anyone will actually give a damn about our work once we’re dead. We try to take an academic approach to what we do and find some philosophical justification for every shot we take whether it actually exists or not. To talk to some photographers, one might think that it is possible for a photograph, the right photograph, to solve all the world’s societal problems.

What really makes me laugh is when a young photographer who never had a chance to actually meet him attempts to invoke the name of Helmut Newton as though they were good buddies. It almost always happens during a conversation about natural light, and how they’ve “studied” his work and apply his “philosophy.” I value the time I had with Helmut, whether working or just having lunch, like no other. He certainly had much to teach and opinions about everything. But, you know what? Helmut was every bit as real as you and I and the exact same struggles and challenges we face were those he had to tackle. Want to know what Helmut was really like? Try this on for size:

I say to a person, I want to see you naked, and in my head I say, Well I would like to fuck her but the reason I don’t is because I’m scared to gets AIDS or something…

Helmut really struggled with finding the line between what was socially acceptable and what wasn’t. He tended to blame his German upbringing. Even though he contributed to Playboy for some twenty-odd years, he had a tendency to sometimes go too far, to be too provocative for even a men’s magazine. He claimed (magazine publisher) Hugh Hefner once told him to shoot something nice, not that “kinky stuff you do for French Vogue.” Helmut also despised anyone calling photography art and one might want to duck if they even uttered the words “good taste.” Those were two things that would get his temper up in a hurry.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Want to know the real power of natural light photography? It gives the viewer the feeling that they’re actually present. Art nudes may be popular with the intellectual crowd because of the studies in form and light, juxtaposing muscle and tissue with highlights and shadows. Let’s not pretend, though, that there isn’t a salacious element to what we shoot, especially when we do it in color and especially when we do it with natural light. While I may want to proclaim the artistic value of today’s photo, and I do believe it has more than a little of that, don’t think for one moment that I’m not aware of the base appeal found in the fact that it is ultimately a picture of two people who, as far as we can tell, are fucking.

Stop and think critically for a moment. When digital photography started putting “real” cameras into the hands of more people, why was it so much popular among young men than it was women? There have been many women, such as Eve Arnold and Annie Leibovitz and Diane Ackerman and Diane Arbus, who could shoot circles around any male photographer. Why didn’t more women jump at the chance to pick up a camera as quickly as did young men? Easy: young men were less interested in the art and more interested in the possibility that a camera might be an easy way into a young woman’s pants. The same answer explains why more men give up on chasing a photography career after two or three years. A camera is not an aphrodisiac.

After 30 years of this mess, I still love photography and still prefer natural light but don’t think for one moment I don’t consider how “sexy” a photo is before I post it. I watch the statics for these pages carefully and you can be sure I’ve noticed how much more attention is paid to a nude photograph versus a non-nude. Tuesday’s photo, as lovely as it is, received less attention than any image the past 30 days. I’ve all but stopped posting landscapes because they’re often ignored altogether. What makes natural light photographs popular? Because they’re the best thing next to being there.[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

A Casual Intimacy

June 3, 2015

All Wet (2012)

It doesn’t matter if you use a box camera or a Leica, the important thing is what motivates you when you are photographing. What I have tried to do is involve the people I was photographing. To have them realize without saying so, that it was up to them to give me whatever they wanted to give me… if they were willing to give, I was willing to photograph. – Eve Arnold

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Good photography isn’t about things. It’s not the cameras, the studio, the auxiliary equipment, the makeup, or the wardrobe. While all those fun things are nice to have, they do not make the picture. What’s more important are the relationships. Inviting someone to come and shoot with us is an unexplainable cross between having someone over for tea or coffee and a therapy session. Please, have a seat. I hope you’re comfortable. Now, tell me about yourself, your past and your present, your hopes and dreams, difficulties and disappointments, achievements and failures, challenges and success. Oh, and did I mention that I want you to do that without verbally speaking? Let your face, your posture, and maybe your wardrobe, or lack thereof, be the means for communicating.

One of the great aspects of working with natural light is that it is not pretentious. One does not have to create an environment for the photograph that is daunting, fearful, or incites anxiety. Many people get quite nervous enough the moment I pull my camera from its bag. For those people, there’s almost always an instance in their past where someone has criticized how they looked in a picture. The comment, at the time, may well have been innocuous, but the emotional effect was lasting. Other people, though, see the camera and come alive in ways we might not have expected. That seemingly shy, quiet person steps in front of a camera and has suddenly found a voice no one knew they had.

Working with natural light enhances communication by allowing one to feel more comfortable about expressing themselves. Studios too often have a sterile, business-like feeling to them and that is certainly appropriate for some situations. But when one is looking for a photograph that communicates, that implies a story, that tells us something about the subject, the best setting is that which is most natural to the subject: a barn, a living room, a kitchen, a field, or any other number of places that are not a studio.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Photographers cannot make great photographs of people who are unable, or unwilling, to communicate. Expression is key. Consider today’s picture. Fresh out of the shower, still dripping wet, the series of which this image is a part runs a gamut of emotion from fear to questioning to relaxing. But to deliver those poses, to say those things in a strictly visual context, was up to the model, not the photographer. I could have suggested things (but didn’t need to), and even given precise direction had I wanted. I rarely do either, though, because I prefer to see what is natural versus what is forced.

I firmly believe that taking pictures, especially portraits, in natural light gives people more freedom to open up and express themselves, but how the photographer responds is just as critical. People begin communicating with their bodies the moment they walk through the door and it’s the photographer’s job to watch and interpret that non-verbal message. If a person is excited then plug into their anticipation and run with it. Where we see anxiety requires a more careful, less hurried, and cautious approach. It is up to the photographer to introduce the subject to the light, to let them become acquainted and comfortable with how it feels. Take your time. Find this is a safe place with no judgment outside your own. Now, talk.

By the end of a productive session, the photographer and their subject have created a sort of casual intimacy; certainly not as deep as lovers, but at least slightly more than passing friends. We have shared a moment of expression, perhaps one that the person we’re photographing has not expressed before, and may never do so again. The photographs capture a special moment that do more than present an image, but preserve a story. Natural light helps those moments feel real and fresh every time we look at the pictures. Nothing fancy required. Just light.[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

But Soft! What Light …

June 2, 2015

Comfortable With Here & Now (2010)

When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I’d like to know them. Anyone I know I photograph. – Annie Leibovitz

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Shakespeare may not have been a photographer, but he certainly understood the emotional impact of a subject bathed in soft, natural light. Juliet, caught in the rays of a full moon, quickened the heart of the smitten Romeo to the point of tragedy. Dinner is most romantic when a couple has only the softness of candlelight illuminating their meal. Sitting on the porch in the soft light of a fading sunset may be the perfect end to a summer’s day. Light can take many forms, but when it is at its softest is when it makes us look the most beautiful.

Painters have known for centuries the benefits of a soft, natural light and how to achieve such without needing special equipment. While not appropriate for action shots perhaps, portraits benefit from the softest light we can give them. Photoshop hasn’t been around forever you know, but natural light at its softest works a magic that makeup and software could never achieve so accurately. Look at today’s photo, for example, and notice how soft the complexion is. Did we airbrush her skin in any way? No. First, her skin was quite healthy from the outset. But then, the gentleness of natural light diffused through lead glass at just the right time of day worked a magic that makes any thought of post-process manipulation preposterous.

Good photographers often struggle with finding just the right light for portraits. One needs shadows to help define features, so a light that is too bright or all-encompassing doesn’t work. Yet, too much shadow, or shadow from the wrong direction, can distort features, make a face look harsh and more angled than it naturally is. Light coming in at too high an angle can have the appearance of re-shaping features and is especially tough on noses or anyone with bags under their eyes. Good, soft light rarely just falls onto a photographer’s set. Even chasing that mythical “golden hour” is no promise of good light.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Soft light, such as in today’s image, is a diffused light. Light is diffused, or spread out, when it passes through some material that is at least partially opaque. In this case, it was an old window of lead glass. Despite how it appears, leaded glass has a graduated opacity in that over time the lead in the glass pulls the material toward the bottom of the frame, making it thicker at the bottom than at the top. When working with a window composed of sixteen smaller frames (four rows of four frames), the shifting lead lets more light in from the top of the frame than the bottom imprecisely so there is variation within each small frame. This effectively diffuses the light when the subject is at least two feet from the window.

Many different materials diffuse lights at different rates, giving one a lot of choices to get just the right light for just the right portrait. My personal preference is for white cotton, but that doesn’t work as well if the sunlight is not directly positioned at the material. I’ve also gotten wonderful results inside an old taupe canvas army tent, surprisingly enough, and almost always carry a commercial diffuser as part of my reflector kit. Of course, clouds are a natural diffuser and at times can be the perfect answer to a challenging portrait, but they also tend to reduce or eliminate shadows as well as muting color. Other natural diffusers, such as tree leaves, might work depending on the type of leaf, but can also give a green tint to the warm light.

Ultimately, we want a soft light on our subject, though, because it makes them appear approachable, friendly, even kind. Portraits captured in softest light can have that same effect as moonlight did when Romeo saw Juliet, bringing out the natural beauty in a subject. A portrait has done its best when it causes one to feel that someone we don’t know, somehow, has become our best friend. Even Shakespeare couldn’t do better.[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

In Defense of Color

June 1, 2015

A Splash Of Yellow (2010)

And if a day goes by without my doing something related to photography, it’s as though I’ve neglected something essential to my existence, as though I had forgotten to wake up. I know that the accident of my being a photographer has made my life possible. – Richard Avedon – 1970

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Color has been the Rodney Dangerfield of photography, struggling for respect from the moment the folks at Eastman Kodak labs tried selling it to the general public. Before then, it was considered highly experimental, one of those things that couldn’t be trusted, was hardly useful in a practical manner, and hardly worth the time it took to make it a reality. Black and white was where it was at, especially if one wanted a crisp, clear photograph. Anything else was just wasting your time.

I should probably clarify that when we talk about color photography now, more often than not what we are referencing is color process photography similar to what is achieved using negative film processing during the 1940s. Prior to that, there were plenty of experiments going all the way back to 1861 when physicist James Clerk Maxwell achieved a form of color reproduction by shooting three black and white frames using a different color filter, red, green, and blue, for each one and then superimposing them together. Through World War II, that stacking method dramatically improved but still lacked accuracy and refinement necessary to be effective on a large commercial scale.

When color negative film was first developed, the critical issue was the relationship between the negative and the dark room solution known as fixer. It was up to the fixer to accurately translate the negative and produce the correct color onto the specially coated paper. Results varied dramatically from one fixer to the next and even from one person to the next. Color labs began popping up with their reputations lying on their ability to accurately reproduce color negatives. Color reversal film, or slide film, finally came along in the 50s with dramatically more accurate results, but to achieve a print they still had to be translated back to negatives where the process was still less than accurate.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Given all the problems surrounding color film, it really is no wonder that the people who made their living in photography wanted little to do with the mess and uncertainty. Even museums and galleries refused to show color photography any respect for the longest time. The first gallery showing of color photography didn’t occur until 1976! When the Museum of Modern Art in New York showed William Egleston’s Guide response was still based more in curiosity with the medium than acknowledging it as a medium that had finally come into its own. For the best photo possible, photographers still turned to black and white film.

Digital photography has actually helped change color’s reputation. Unlike film, digital cameras capture a color image right from the start, even if the camera has a black and white setting. Digital imagery removes some of the guess-work, so images are more likely to come out looking closer to what our minds remember our eyes saw. Digital imagery using natural light may be the most accurate translation of color achieved on a regular basis to date. While everything can be manipulated and corrected during post processing, natural light and color photography are the best buddies that have been looking for years to find each other.

Yes, there are still plenty of challenges, not the least of which is the fact that most computer monitors are not accurately balanced to produce true colors. Yet, can you imagine how incredibly boring today’s picture would be if it were in black and white? Color conveys emotion, warmth, and contrast. We look at the picture and can wonder why in the world I would put powdered cheese dust over half the model’s body, and be intrigued by the effect it has on our eyes. In natural light, color photography finally begins earning the respect it deserves.[/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD

The Joys of Natural Light

May 31, 2015

A Little Gaga (2010)

It’s that I don’t like white paper backgrounds. A woman does not live in front of white paper. She lives on the street, in a motor car, in a hotel room. -Helmut Newton

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]There will be no white paper backgrounds this week. White paper has its place. I have whole sets of images shot on it, but they will never be among my favorites. I am, fundamentally, at my happiest when I’m shooting with natural light. We are looking specifically at natural light photos this week for just that reason: to make me happy. While I hope they make everyone else happy as well, I’ve not been able to shoot a great many of these images in a while so it’s nice to take a look back and be reminded.

Specifically, the images we’ll share this week are all indoor with natural light. There are two important distinctions here. First, there is a difference between natural light and ambient light. Ambient light can include artificial light, reflected light, and any other light source available. With ambient light, one can have light coming from several different directions at the same time, which can diminish the appearance of shadows. Natural light is strictly that which comes from the sun. When shooting natural light indoors, that means it is being diffused at least through glass and often through some form of drapery as well. The light is about as soft as we can possibly make it, which in turn makes for very soft edges and easy motion blurs.

We’ve also made the decision to not include any black and white images this week. Helmut would not be happy about that; he quite disliked color transparency film and the difficulties that came with processing. We’re not working with film, though, and have an infinitely greater number of processing choices than did Mr. Newton. To that end, we did re-process all of this week’s images using the identical processing on each one to provide some visual continuity and minimize some of the less appealing factors of digital processing.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Natural light, indoors, in color, has some very natural challenges. The first is noise, or grain if one is still shooting film. While newer cameras minimize the amount of noise in low light, that’s not the instrument with which I’m working and to some degree I like that. There has always been noise/grain in low light images and to some degree I find it disingenuous to expect natural light imagery without it. This race for the “perfect” image is unnecessary and removes from the natural creativity of the medium. There’s something to be said for working with the light to minimize the noise effect using things such as pose and position rather than technology.

Motion blur is also a frequent issue with natural light, because of our need to use slower shutter speeds. I have mixed feelings about blur. There are times when I feel it adds a sense of motion to an image, especially when the image is of a more editorial nature. At the same time, it is admittedly frustrating as hell when every aspect of a portrait is perfect except for the movement of a couple of fingers or the jingle of dangling earrings. You’ll see a couple of images this week where I think the motion works, but know that sometimes, especially when the subject is not a model, the blur isn’t always attractive.

Natural light photographs are, in my opinion, their own form of beauty. They are, especially in this digital age, a very separate and distinct genre. Low processing, no air brushing, and an emphasis on the relationship between the subject and the light are factors distinctive to this week’s photos. Taking pictures in natural light is one of the most basic forms of photography, and it can almost be the most enjoyable. I hope this week’s pictures make you as happy as they do me.[/one_half_last]

natural light

I was the child who would leave school and take her clothes off the second I got into the house. I made my mom buy me lingerie when I was 5 years old. I was a sicko. My mother must have been mortified. -Alessandra Torresani

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“I think it’s neat you do what you want. Not enough chicks do that, if you ask me–just tell society and their expectations to go fuck themselves. If more women did that, we’d be better off.”― Cheryl Strayed, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

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“No man is great enough or wise enough for any of us to surrender our destiny to. The only way in which anyone can lead us is to restore to us the belief in our own guidance.” ― Henry Miller

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“I will not be “famous,” “great.” I will go on adventuring, changing, opening my mind and my eyes, refusing to be stamped and stereotyped. The thing is to free one’s self: to let it find its dimensions, not be impeded.” ― Virginia Woolf, A Writer’s Diary

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“Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.” ― John Lubbock, The Use Of Life

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“A girl in a bikini is like having a loaded gun on your coffee table- There’s nothing wrong with them, but it’s hard to stop thinking about.” ― Garrison Keillor

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“If it could only be like this always – always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe and Aloysius in a good temper…” ― Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited

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There is more to sex appeal than just measurements. I don’t need a bedroom to prove my womanliness. I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples off a tree or standing in the rain. -Audrey Hepburn

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“I am glad that I paid so little attention to good advice; had I abided by it I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes.” ― Edna St. Vincent Millay

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“I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being–forgive me–rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger.” ― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

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“If you follow the rules, it’s your own fault.” ― Marty Rubin

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Light makes photography. Embrace light. Admire it. Love it. But above all, know light. Know it for all you are worth, and you will know the key to photography. – George Eastman

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I always thought of photography as a naughty thing to do — that was one of my favorite things about it, and when I first did it, I felt very perverse. – Diane Arbus, On Photography by Susan Sontag

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Any photographer who says he’s not a voyeur is either stupid or a liar. -Helmut Newton

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When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I’d like to know them. Anyone I know I photograph. – Annie Leibovitz

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And if a day goes by without my doing something related to photography, it’s as though I’ve neglected something essential to my existence, as though I had forgotten to wake up. I know that the accident of my being a photographer has made my life possible. – Richard Avedon – 1970

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It’s that I don’t like white paper backgrounds. A woman does not live in front of white paper. She lives on the street, in a motor car, in a hotel room. -Helmut Newton

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