Twitter Quitter

Well, there's a lot going on. I don't have time to write it all up just now. But I thought I'd mention:

It's Not You, It's Me

It's Not You, It's Me

I deleted my Twitter account. It's not for me.

I've also turned off the Flash plug-in for my Web browser. (Advertisements show up as empty white boxes for me now.) As well, I've unsubscribed from a lot of RSS feeds. I've started turning my cell phone off whenever possible.

Back in April, on my friend's blog, I said I would.

Ted and Internet

“Between your 16 blogs and everyone else telling me to Facebook and Twitter… I’m about to get rid of everything except one email account. It’s starting to look a bit empty. (I can’t think of one interesting thing I’ve seen online in the last two months anywhere. I don’t care about the Octomom, I don’t know anyone making decent money from blogging, and online video is generally weak crap.)

It might be time to return to the real world — just to tick people off.

Or maybe that was the plan: get the Internet started, wait for all the normal people people to get fully committed to it, then get off of it — so only the cool people will be offline.”

I'm not advising anyone to do this. I just think that people talking on their cell phones as they attempt to walk down the street look a bit dumb. I'm sure you don't.

My brief experience with social media was rather unsocial. Everyone was very friendly, they posted links to things I read last week, and told me that social media was the path to success. (Good luck with that.) When I responded, they generally ignored me.

My friend who posted my comment above knows: I'm not any sort of Luddite. I've been on the Internet forever. A lot of the things people send me excitedly as something new -- I did back in 1997.

The thing is this: I'm noticing that my students increasingly can't focus as well as I'd expect. That the media gets away, increasingly, with posting water cooler talk, easily debunked with any search or thinking, but right there in the big red headline. That as a culture we can't match the post-destruction resolve of the ancient Greeks -- who rebuilt the Acropolis -- and instead rebuild movies from our collective childhood.

I don't care about Star Wars, Star Trek, Transformers, G.I. Joe, etc. I'm not twelve years old, and I think there's a lot more to sophistication than better visual effects underneath improved marketing.

I'm noticing that things are getting shallower, and that folks seem happy with that. That's fine. There's someone just waiting for them. His bio says:

"I make stuff, actually I make up stuff, stories mostly, collaborations of thoughts, dreams, and actions. Thats me."

Go check him out.

Photography in the News

Are there any really unfortunate stories about photography in today's news?

Yes, yes there are.

Thief steals camera with couple's 800 wedding photos

"In a crime caught on tape, a thief dressed in a suit to look like he was a wedding guest snatched the photographer's camera when he set it down for a moment while shooting the affair Saturday. The camera contains nearly 800 wedding photographs on a flash card inside it."

Bitter on Twitter? Au Contraire, Mon Frere

I've been using Twitter, but perhaps not in the way it's intended.

Basically, whenever someone follows me, I take a quick look at their post timeline, and if it is at all reasonable I follow them back. (If they aren't posting, or seem to be a marketer, I don't.) That's normal, I think.

Then, however, I diverge from the social contract. I've learned some interesting things, seen many well-intended, positive posts, and understand that there's a community there.

But I can't help myself: the minute someone posts something naive and stupid, or otherwise idiotic, my radar switches on. If they do it again, I enjoy a slight frisson when unfollowing them.

It's fun: one minute, their quoting some idiot motivational speaker, the next, they are no longer in my universe.

Of course, people might do the same to me, and I'll end up with no followers. I'd be fine with that.

Soderbergh Speaks

I posted previously about Stephen Soderbergh use of the RED camera in "The Girlfriend Experience", so here's the word from the horse's mouth in an NYT audio slideshow.

I think the slideshow makes the movie feel darker than it reads on a television screen, but it's very interesting from the viewpoint of cinematography. As well, Soderbergh's approach here is very similar to that used in documentary production.

Seriously

Know anyone looking for an intermediate photo class in NYC? My Seriously Fun Photography begins Thursday. I believe you can still register today.

Report from the Met

We went to the Met on the holiday Monday, and saw three photography shows:

The Pictures Generation, 1974–1984

Walker Evans and the Picture Postcard

The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion

All three seemed to me on the shallow side. It's my opinion that none of these shows know when to stop, really.

Model as Muse would have been fine with just the photos and the clothes. More than fine.

Instead, its credibility is destroyed by an overlay of crap culture. An ill-considered and immature "era" approach is taken in which fake graffiti, bad pop songs and off-base cultural references distract us from the content so that we won't discover there's no material here that actually addresses the basic conceit of the show.

You can't present fantastic taste -- which is what fashion photography is, in the end -- underneath a frame that seems like an underinformed 19-year-old trying to encapsulate past decades. Using the unsophisticated idea of "the 1950s was this, then the 1960s was this, then..." is bad enough, but trying to then flesh that out with the weakest and least cool cultural touchstones reduces the show to a touristy, bland blanket, smothering fantastic images and clothes.

This is not a case of the Emperor wearing nothing. Rather, the Emperor turns out to be wearing a poncho, and hoping we'll say it's very nice.

It was, however, fun to see a connection to William Klein's Qui êtes-vous, Polly Maggoo? integrated into the show in the one room that worked. I just wished they'd paid more attention to what Klein was satirizing.

I enjoyed Francis Bacon: A Centenary Retrospective much, much more.

Above: an iPhone snapshot at the Met today.

Weekend Edition

Catching up on two news items:

The International Documentary Challenge DVD -- which includes our short documentary Bend & Bow -- is now available on Netflix.

My Seriously Fun Photography class starts this Thursday. I believe you can still sign up.

Above: iPhone snap from Saturday.

You Know, For Cuts

You know what's great about Fox News?

They always focus on the story you really care about, even when that story isn't true at all. Even when the newswriter says the story isn't true, right there in the middle of the article.

Wait. What?

Well, let me clarify. The important story this weekend is that Alexandra Pelosi shot video footage of her mother at a news conference, and that Fox News protested.

Alexandra Pelosi, daughter of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, has made such documentaries as Journeys with George and Right America: Feeling Wronged - Some Voices from the Campaign Trail. Now, according to this Fox News story, she "shot video of her mother at her weekly news conference" using a "cuts" camera.

Now, I know that's scandalous.

Because it's a cuts camera. Which makes people very uncomfortable. Somehow. The problem, according to the article, is that it's not a "straight-on camera." Which would be fine. Apparently.

But it gets worse. According to the article, "Pelosi's office later told FOX News that the filmmaker shot the footage for her own private use and does not intend to use it for a documentary."

Which is pretty shocking, considering that the first paragraph of the article makes it clear to us -- and by "us" I mean Americans who watch Fox News, waiting for stories about documentaries made with straight-on cameras, a group I include myself in -- that non-straight-on camera footage would be used by the younger Pelosi, somehow.

But don't take my word for it. Go and read:

Pelosi's Filmmaker Daughter Captures Mother's Weekly News Conference After CIA Flap

And note, that beyond using a "cuts camera" -- by the way, next week I will be posting on where to acquire one, its proper use, and also how to differentiate it from a "straight-on" camera -- the filmmaker also "continues to maintain her friendship with former President Bush." Again: shocking. Because he has a very clear don't-ask-don't-tell policy on non-straight-on cameras.

It should be noted that the two authors of this article -- TWO! -- also reveal the fact that her ex-President friend will be having a two-hour "conversation" -- that's right, in quotes, and we all know what that means, I suppose, or perhaps one of the two (TWO!) "authors" of the piece may, possibly, know why that's in quotes -- with another ex-President. (One who was definitely straight-on.)

The most shocking disclosure by Chad Pergram and Hadley Gamble, the two (TWO!) "journalists" involved, however, was that: "Alexandra Pelosi was at Johns Hopkins University Thursday to attend her mother's commencement address to some in the graduating class and her receipt of an honorary degree."

That's right: Speaker Pelosi only addressed some of those in the graduating class as she gave the commencement address. Somehow. Apparently. (I suspect she may have used a cuts microphone, which is not straight-on.)

And for videotaping that act of exclusion Alexandra was given an honorary degree.

Now, don't blame me if you're confused -- I'm just reading what Chad and Hadley have "written" here. I wasn't there. If they say -- in "words" -- that it happened, I know it did. Or that they ran out of time to include the necessary "verbs," "pronouns," or "facts" that might be of use in a normal article because they were defending the need for the second "her" in the sentence, which clarifies things. More or less. Less.

The real issue here, though, is not whether things are "true" or "false" -- heck, just use the straight-on camera if that's all you're concerned with -- but protecting Fox News from the challenge bloggers present to professional news production. You see, by writing complete gibberish, the news team of Chad and Hadley have single-handedly stopped bloggers from stealing the story to post on their blogs. Since it makes no sense at all, focuses on facts that turn out to not be factual, and leaves Chad pointing at Hadley and vice-versa regarding its incoherence, no self-respecting blogger will touch it.

It will be left for the commenters. So go and read the comments.

I have, and it's clear that there are many, many Americans who will not allow this use of a "cuts" camera to stand. As well, they will not let their inability to spell or use punctuation stand in their way of commenting on this important issue.

One day, they'll organize. They'll toss cuts cameras into the ocean, and refuse to attend the film that's not going to be made from the footage that was shot. There will be signs, praising Chad and Hadley.

The signs will be spelled wrong, but they'll be straight-on.

Now on Netflix: Bend & Bow

The International Documentary Challenge DVD is now available on Netflix. So check it out. It's got 17 great short films, including our short documentary Bend & Bow.

Blind Photographers Update

My friend Doug McCulloh's exhibition is in Time Magazine today.

The Art and Heart of Blind Photographers

"The whole trajectory of modern art for the last 100 years has been toward the concept of mental construction, and blind photography comes from that place," says the show's "sighted" curator Douglas McCulloh, himself a photographer. "They're creating that image in their head first — really elaborate, fully realized visions — and then bringing some version of that vision into the world for the rest of us to see."

Mentioned in the article are the Seeing With Photography Collective, Mark Andres, and Sonia Soberats -- and you might remember they all appear in our short documentary Blind Faith: A Film About Seeing.

RIP, Sid Laverents

I'm fascinated by the NYT obit for Sid Laverents -- a film "hobbyist" whose work is in the National Film Registry.

Sid Laverents, Auteur of Homemade Films, Dies at 100

Nine minutes long, “Multiple SIDosis” stars Mr. Laverents himself, and it begins as he opens a Christmas gift from his wife at the time, Adelaide: a recording device. For the rest of the film, Mr. Laverents puts to use not just the recorder but also his background as a one-man band, knitting together a soundtrack of several separate recordings of himself performing a jaunty Felix Arndt tune called “Nola.” He whistles, hums, blows across bottlenecks and plays instruments, including a banjo, a jew’s-harp and an ocarina.

It’s a witty performance, but what is really unusual is the imagery that accompanies the music. Using repeated exposures of the same piece of film, Mr. Laverents kept adding different shots of himself playing the different musical lines. By the end, there are 11 different Sids on the screen, including a couple wearing Mickey Mouse ears and fake whiskers.

New Sony Alphas Announced

New Sony Alphas, new lenses. Basically a refresh of the low end of the Sony line, but that's a good sign -- they'll update the midlevel and high end soon enough.

SONY INTRODUCES THREE MAINSTREAM ALPHA CAMERAS DESIGNED FOR FIRST-TIME DIGITAL SLR BUYERS

"... three new easy-to-use α (alpha) cameras (models DSLR-A380, DSLR-A330 and DSLR-A230), four new lenses, a flash and accessories."

See the cameras and the lenses.

Of interest: a 50mm F/1.8 and a 30mm F/2.8. I have a 50 F/1.4, but for those who don't it's likely the 1.8 will offer some bargain optical quality. The 30mm is interesting, though. I wonder how it will compare to the existing 28mm F/2.8?

Like Salinger, Except Reclusive

That last post on the Death of Indie Film got me thinking about those indie filmmakers who make a great low-budget film, hit it semi-big ... then disappear.

I'm thinking, for one, of Whit Stillman, maker of the Urban Haute Bourgeoisie trio: Metropolitan, Barcelona, and The Last Days of Disco. While there are rumors he'll be surfacing soon with a new film (currently listed as in pre-production), ten years is a long time away.

And I'm thinking also of Shane Carruth, who made Primer in 2004, did a few interviews, and then vanished. He surfaced a few times after -- one mention claims he was planning to make a "coming-of-age romance between an oceanography prodigy and the daughter of a commodities trader" -- but is seemingly hidden away today.

Filmmaker Magazine even wrote: SHANE CARRUTH, PHONE HOME.

Of course, they'll probably both be back. In 1998, I saw The Cruise and showed it to all my students. In fact, I did so for years -- and remember quite clearly wondering, circa 2004, where the hell Bennett Miller had disappeared to.

Death of the Indie Film?

I generally hate to point folks to Fox -- lest they begin to think torture isn't torture, the WMDs were found, and that ACORN is trying to kill Glenn Beck -- but I think it's safe to view this segment on Death of the Indie Film? featuring Ted Hope, Marina Zenovich and Reed Martin.

Yet More Photography in the News

Any stories about photography in the news? Yep. It's been a busy week for photographers, as they've been beaten, arrested and blamed slightly more than usual.

Updates on all fronts:

Gerard Butler Charged With Battery in LA

"City prosecutors have charged Gerard Butler with misdemeanor battery in connection with a scuffle with a paparazzo."

Carrie Prejean explains those new topless photos: Gosh darn wind!

"She explained that the photos were taken about two years ago for Bliss magazine, and that it was just her and a photographer standing on a cliff on a windy day. She added the photos should not "have been released."

Alt Weekly Paper Runs Photo That Got Photographer Arrested

"Why is it on the front of The Stranger? Becker got in trouble for this picture. The photo led to an argument between Becker and the ATM personnel, which led to the cops being called, which led to Becker being detained for half an hour and officially banned from REI. (An REI spokesperson says Loomis is welcome back in the store, though the police apparently ordered him to stay away for a year.) Read about it in The Stranger story or on Becker's blog."

What happened at REI. An Update.

"Here are a few quick updates on things that have happened related to that blog post that I wrote about what happened at REI."

Photography in the News

Are there any stories about photography in the news? Sure -- stories of lucky photographs, lucky photographers, unlucky photographers, and as always: the claim that everything is the photographer's fault.

The Unlikely Events of a Water Landing: New Photos From Flight 1549

"On a hunch, Mallon put down his drink to call Jason Marchioni, manager of Weeks' Heavy Lift Division. The next morning, the photographer confirmed that Weeks had been tapped for the salvage job, and the company offered to hire him to record the operation. By the afternoon the ecstatic photographer was aboard a tugboat headed to the scene."

PHOTOGRAPHER'S SCUBA-DIVING 'MURDER' PICTURE BACK IN THE NEWS

"A man faces a possible murder trial over the death of his wife whose motionless body was revealed in a photograph taken by a tourist during a scuba-diving trip."

Indian American Photographer Beaten, Camera Damaged

"In addition to his injury, two of his state-of-the-art cameras worth $25,000 have been damaged, and he is still trying to retrieve two memory cards which assailants had taken away from him.Mandal has been covering events for the South Asian community in both South Asia and the U.S. for decades."

Miss California: It was the photographer’s fault

"I’ve done many photo shoots, Matt,” Prejean told TODAY’s Matt Lauer Wednesday in New York. She said that sometimes photographers continue to take pictures when she’s dressing. It would be like a photographer going into my dressing room and snapping a photo of me without my being aware of it. If a photographer is willing to make an extra buck and did get a photo of me, so be it."

Fiction, Non?

One of the problems that has plagued photography since the 1980s has been the idea that celebrity photographs need to be publicist-approved.

It's made a lot of the practice of photographing famous people a joke. Or, perhaps, made it a process of "getting away with" making something that's actually better than a publicist could envision. It's turned a lot of great photographers out of the field, and led others to make making weaker work.

Can the same hold true in documentary production?

A few months ago, I watched Shine a Light -- Martin Scorsese's "documentary" on the Rolling Stones -- and was left with two reasons why I'd rather call it a "concert film" than a doc:

1. The interview material was completely safe, and completely in the well-polished control of the Stones.

2. The concert was changed by the filmmaking process -- which to me is the opposite of a "documentary" process.

I'm more excited to see what Scorcese will do with the added freedom he'll clearly have on his next -- non-documentary -- picture. I don't think there'll be any need to please the subject or a publicist or any limits put on access....

Martin Scorsese Set to Direct Frank Sinatra Biopic

Not OK Computer

Yesterday, just after I finished working with some photos in Adobe Lightroom and uploaded them for a client, I let my computer download an Apple security update and the updater for Safari. I'm not sure if the update killed it, or if the main drive went out coincidently, or something else happened -- but it would not restart. Couldn't get a restart from an Install disk, and when I tried to restart in safe mode it would shut down -- a bad sign.

I thought of this photo but had to shoot some photos for another client and had to leave the problem sit. Worked on my laptop to get those photos ready, but it was a much slower process.

I'm not sure if this is going to be an easy fix....

Above: an iPhone snap during the session.

From the Facepalm Files

Ah, this again. And again. And again.

Man Threatened, Arrested For Taking Picture Of Open ATM In Public

"After spending around 30 minutes handcuffed in a cell and being unsuccessfully grilled about why he snapped the photo, Becker signed a REI trespassing form that instructed him not to come back to the store for a year. In the end, the authorities never asked to see the photo, much less for Becker to delete it from his iPhone."

Perhaps they thought the photographer was a zombie? Will we hear more once he finds the right attorney?