A new window brings new light

I’ve been inspired by may things to create new work. This time, it’s a new window, that I have access to whenever I want it, in all manner of weather and times of day.

Old objects take on new life (yes, I have a cabinet full of rocks and boxes and bowls and…  ahem), and new finds offer their history. Here are a few images made in this new light.

 

Still Life #9521

 

Still Life #9533

 

Still Life #0904

 

Still Life #0941

 

Still Life #0947

 

Still Life #0954

 

Still Life #0955

 

Still Life #0960

 

Still Life #1160

 

Still Life #1187

 

Still Life #1224

 

Still Life #4805

 

Still Life #4900

 

Still Life #4914

Still Life #5076

Lately it has struck me that all my images seem to be about sex, or death, or sex and death and this is both metaphorical and literal.

Perhaps that’s in hindsight, or it’s a subconscious predilection. Probably both.

 

Why make portraits at a wedding?

The role of today’s wedding photographer is a complex and focused one. Current expectations are of a documentary, observational approach, much different from the previous era’s tradition: an enforced, formulaic recording of arranged scenarios. Deliberate portraits at a wedding have become a vestigial concession, primarily made to appease the elders.

But given the overarching self-awareness that weddings bestow on any family, it is hard to imagine a better time to have a deliberate portrait made of these rare groupings. People assemble at weddings from all contexts of the couple’s life; from different generations, geographic distributions and social networks. They are brought together by this singular event, and may never all be together again in the same place, at the same time. A portrait made in this context, in a classic, enduring style, would be treasured for years and generations to come.

Mother and son at a wedding, Kimball House, Roswell Georgia

At weddings, these people (who are, or will be extremely important to each other) are gathered in rare concentration. Happily, they tend to dress in the best clothes they have, their hair is “fixed” to the degree that it can be, and collectively they share a feeling of camaraderie, good will and optimism…

Groom with groomsmen (he was fine), Kimball House, Roswell Georgia

In collaboration with the modern photo-journalist wedding photographer, a good portrait photographer can produce deliberate yet unscripted images that provide a valid and complimentary window into the family’s history and their experience of that day. In sudden, brief and almost spontaneous portrait sessions, surprisingly candid and insightful moments can be found that give tremendous insight into how these people came to be who they are, and how they arrived at this moment.

Family at a wedding, Four Season’s Hotel, Atlanta Georgia

Such portraits provide a contrasting compliment to the artful spontaneity of a photo-journalist’s images.
They are more suitable to a wedding than those from the trendy photo booth. With their random timing, static compositions, feather boas and goofy hats, photo booth pictures too often mask the expression of close personal connection with clownish behavior. The photo booth has its place in a more casual context.
Plus, these more deliberate portraits endure, present in professional resolution and format within the archives and galleries of the primary photo-journalist, available for a printed album, and stored with the portrait photographer.

8 friends, Decatur Georgia

The first wedding I ever photographed in this manner was that of an ex-girlfriend, in 1999. She knew what skills I had with a camera, light and people, and she asked me to make portraits of anyone who came to her wedding, without regard to any hierarchical order… to treat them all with the same attention she had seen me apply at other gatherings.

Polaroid 600SE camera

At that time, I was using this Polaroid 600SE medium format camera and Polaroid’s Type 665 pack film that produced monochromatic images of great clarity, and a negative of substantial size (6x8cm).
I set up a small studio in the lobby of the reception hall, lighting people with soft light and a gentle fill, setting them against a deeply toned, understated backdrop.

I made portraits of the bride with her father and brother, with her 83 year old aunt, with her brother and his future wife. I photographed families who were unrelated to her… I photographed her ex-boyfriends with their new girlfriends. I photographed  anyone who even hesitated near me. I gave everyone small folios containing their 3×4 inch prints.

Several years later, I was contacted by one of the bride’s guests. His brother in-law had just died. His sister still had the Polaroid I had made of her family that day.
She showed it to him saying “this is the best picture we have of all of us together”.

Family at a wedding, 1999 Huntsville Alabama

They called the bride of that wedding day, and asked for some way to contact me. I found the negative and sent them three 8x10s.

It was a lesson I have never forgotten; treat everyone with seriousness when they are in front of your camera. Never underestimate the value of a simple portrait.
Back up your work.

I’m still doing this, but the Polaroid 600SE is now a full frame dSLR, and the prints are 4×6 inches. It’s how I have fun with a camera. It’s art with meaning.

To see more of my recent work in this fashion, visit btapb.com.
Better Than A Photo Booth, in so many ways.

Name(required)

Email(required)

Website

Comment(required)

Submit

Δ

still life, masquerading as portraits – October 14, 2011

The benefits derived from turnip husbandry are of great magnitude; light soils are cultivated with profit and facility; abundance of food is provided for man and beast; the earth is turned to the uses for which it is physically calculated, and by being suitably cleaned with this preparatory crop, a bed is provided for grass seeds, wherein they flourish and prosper with greater vigor than after any other preparation.

Brassica rapa #1

The first ploughing is given immediately after harvest, or as soon as the wheat seed is finished, either in length or across the field, as circumstances may seem to require. In this state the ground remains till the oat seed is finished, when a second ploughing is given to it, usually in a contrary direction to the first. It is then repeatedly harrowed, often rolled between the harrowings and every particle of root-weeds carefully picked off with the hand; a third ploughing is then bestowed, and the other operations are repeated. In this stage, if the ground has not been very foul, the seed process.

Brassica rapa #2

The next part of the process is the sowing of the seed; this may be performed by drilling machines of different sizes and constructions, through all acting on the same principle. A machine drawn by a horse in a pair of shafts, sows two drills at a time and answers extremely well, where the ground is flat, and the drills properly made up. The weight of the machine ensures a regularity of sowing hardly to be gained by those of a different size and construction. From two to three pounds of seed are sown upon the acre (2 to 3 kg/hectare), though the smallest of these quantities will give many more plants in ordinary seasons than are necessary; but as the seed is not an expensive article the greater part of farmers incline to sow thick, which both provides against the danger of part of the seed perishing, and gives the young plants an advantage at the outset.

Brassica rapa #3

Turnips are sown from the beginning to the end of June, but the second and third weeks of the month are, by judicious farmers, accounted the most proper time. Some people have sown as early as May, and with advantage, but these early fields are apt to run to seed before winter, especially if the autumn be favorable to vegetation. As a general rule it may be laid down that the earliest sowings should be on the latest soils; plants on such soils are often long before they make any great progress, and, in the end, may be far behind those in other situations, which were much later sown. The hot turnip plant, indeed, does not thrive rapidly till its roots reach the dung, and the previous nourishment afforded them is often so scanty as to stunt them altogether before they get so far.

Brassica rapa #4 copyright T.W. Meyer 2011

The first thing to be done in this process is to run a horse-hoe, called a scraper, along the intervals, keeping at such a distance from the young plants that they shall not be injured; this operation destroys all the annual weeds which have sprung up, and leaves the plants standing in regular stripes or rows. The hand hoeing then commences, by which the turnips are all singled out at a distance of from 8–12 inches, and the redundant ones drawn into the spaces between the rows. The singling out of the young plants is an operation of great importance, for an error committed in this process can hardly be afterward rectified. Boys and girls are always employed as hoers; but a steady and trusty man-servant is usually set over them to see that the work is properly executed.

Brassica rapa #5

In eight or ten days, or such a length of time as circumstances may require, a horse-hoe of a different construction from the scraper is used. This, in fact, is generally a small plough, of the same kind with that commonly wrought, but of smaller dimensions. By this implement, the earth is pared away from the sides of the drills, and a sort of new ridge formed in the middle of the former interval. The hand-hoers are again set to work, and every weed and superfluous turnip is cut up; afterward the horse-hoe is employed to separate the earth, which it formerly threw into the furrows, and lay it back to the sides of the drills. On dry lands this is done by the scraper, but where the least tendency to moisture prevails, the small plough is used, in order that the furrows may be perfectly cleaned out. This latter mode, indeed, is very generally practiced.

from the Instructions for Field Cultivation of Turnips, in the 1881 Household Cyclopedia