Well, this one was taken in Jan.
Well, this one was taken in Jan.
Very nice Hugo, thanks for posting it. Is the lens for sale?Originally Posted by Hugo Zhang
Yes. The sentence was referred to by someone else and I quoted what Cartier-Bresson wrote in the original French."Nothing in the world has a decisive time"
That's not waht the french sentence means, Mark.
The french sentence: "Il n'y a rien dans ce monde qui n'ait un moment desicif." means:
"There is nothing in this world that doesn't have is decisive moment!"
I don't know if this is relevant, but the meaning isn't the same!
To Mystery Jig, who attacked me for my use of the original (instead of an English translation) as "an arrogant bastard", and to eddie who found Mystery Jig's comment terribly funny, I am a former resident of France and currently a resident of a country in which French has equal status with English. This may not be true where you live, but where I live, speaking French, and using original French instead of an English translation, is not cause to call someone "an arrogant bastard". That is to. understate matters
Allen from Montreal,
I'd love to meet sometime, perhaps on my way back to the Rock, via Montreal and the Gaspe, in a couple of months. I'm working on a project about rural Newfoundland that so far I'm feeling reasonably good about, and on which I'm getting good feedback. So far, I'm using a Leica and Mamiya 7 II, but I'm thinking about working 4x5 into it. This takes a bit of planning, and the establishment of a good deal of credibility, in what is a very small community.
From a 4x5 point of view, the work that I see here leads me nowhere, indeed tells me to forget it. On the other hand, every time that I see a Paul Strand or Talbot or Newman or Jeff Wall photo, I feel challenged and start to see the possibilities. As you may know, the National Gallery is currently showing Hine's work. Never having seen one of his prints outside of a book, I'm going to see it tomorrow. It isn't where I want to go - in fact, it would be way too easy to be overly influenced by it - but I think that I may learn something from his work.
By next week, I'll have a few photographs up on a website, and I'd be interested in your views. I'm also working with an important Newfoundland photographer, now in his 80s, to preserve some of his work, especially as it relates to the community that is the subject of my project. Apart from being good, his photographs are historically important, and the photographs of this particular community have never been seen before.
After a fair bit of research, I think that there may be no more than about 20 original negatives, taken by professional photographers, in existence for this community, and I think that he did eight of them. As for amateur photographers, negatives don't exist. There are small prints, that's it. There are people from this community who, like many Newfoundlanders, and the Miohawks, were heavily involved in building the great New York skyscrapers. I know what local photographs exist about this part of history because I have gone through the local photo albums. The problem is that the biggest print that I have seen is about 2"x3", and there are no negatives.
To the guy who said that you can't do video with 4x5:
There is an important French film, sort of futuristic, from the early 1960s, that consists entirely of still photographs. I can't recall the name right now, but no doubt someone will pipe up with it. When I see some of the current work that combines stills and video, both generated from a still camera, I am very much reminded of it and very much aware of the fact that what is being done now has some old roots. To me, that is important/interesting. I am also very struck by the technology, and what it means if one wants to communicate to a wider audience.
Sorry to those who found what I had to say annoying. I know that I was being provocative. Perhaps it was for selfish reasons, wanting to know how people would respond as input to my own direction. At the same time, I just have this feeling, a lot of the time, that what goes on in this forum is stuck in a time warp.
Cheers
Last edited by r.e.; 1-Mar-2009 at 23:08.
La jetée.
"Say wha'?"
But polite discourse is welcome any time, critical or otherwise, as long as respect is shown towards others; we're all only trying our best and hoping to learn from those making positive contributions in the forums (not of necessity only positive remarks at all times) to our growth in an arena most of us feel for passionately. For the most part, we're only in it for the image, and the ideal can vary widely from one member to the next without negating the work of another.
And some of us are pathological and unashamedly gear heads, and this we can enjoy too; there is room for all types of (polite, constructive) loons here.
Welcome,
Larry
Allen from Montreal, you are writing in an American based international English-speaking forum, people from around the world participate and English as a language, is very often a second or third language.
Generally speaking, when one is writing in a language and quotes a foreign language in a set of text, you give a translation directly after. Perhaps not a direct translation, but a correct translation to ensure that the gist of what you are attempting to get across, gets across.
That is more or less politeness to the great unwashed who struggle with another language, as I’m sure you must struggle sometimes between the languages you comprehensively understand.
Mick.
I don't think being a student of equipment and making art are mutually exclusive. I get a little tired of that saw.
Umm, Hugo, even though it's not politically correct, what lens did you use on the lovely lady?
O.K...but the same effect could be had with your nice new 5DII...depending on the size of enlargement of course. Masking and radial blur works wonders for this effect.I was going to use my nice new Canon 5D II for this shot, but then I realized that in order to turn it into a true work of art I had better haul out the Darlot Petzval and the Canham 5x7.
Nice image btw.
Quote RE...
To the guy who said that you can't do video with 4x5:
There is an important French film, sort of futuristic, from the early 1960s, that consists entirely of still photographs. I can't recall the name right now, but no doubt someone will pipe up with it. When I see some of the current work that combines stills and video, both generated from a still camera, I am very much reminded of it and very much aware of the fact that what is being done now has some old roots. To me, that is important/interesting. I am also very struck by the technology, and what it means if one wants to communicate to a wider audience.
You might be interested that my current project (independent film production) is a merging of still images and HD video...however my HD is shot with a video camera.
Its amazing what can be done once a person steps outside the box of ones constricted thinking.
Tri and Jim,
That shot of my mom was actually quite underexposed. The lens is an Apo-Lanthar 30cm lens with Chamonix WP camera.
Thank your guys.
Hugo
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