Light Leaks Magazine

Transcription

ISSUE 8
Light Leaks
L o w
F i d e l i t y
P h o t o g r a p h y
Publisher | Rachel Morris (Light Leaks Press)
Supervising Editor | Steph Parke
Operations Manager | Michael Barnes
Gallery Photo Editor | Gordon Stettinius
Editors | Janet Penny, Mr. E. Cipher
Contributing Writers | Steph Parke, Neha and Christopher
Luhar-Trice, Jay Heuman, Gordon Stettinius, Wallace
Billingham, Tom Debiec, Michael Barnes, C. Gary Moyer
Design and Production | Michael Barnes
© Light Leaks Press ISSN # 1911-429X
E-mail: lightleakspress@rogers.com
Web site: www.lightleaks.org
Fax: 1-866-220-0480
Issue 9 Contents
2 The First Word
By Steph Parke
3 Review
Holga 135
By Michael Barnes
6 Trippin’
Moundville, Alabama
By Neha and Christopher Luhar-Trice
8 Treadly Speaking...
By Tread
10 Interview
Across A Sacred Bridge: Wayne Martin
Belger’s Holistic Approach to Pinholes
By Jay Heuman
18 Gallery
Printed in Canada
by The Lowe-Martin Group
www.lmgroup.com
Happy Hour
Photo Editor, Gordon Stettinius
40 Technique
The Holga View Camera
By Wallace Billingham
44 Showcase
Elizabeth Soule
48 Showcase
Daniel Grant
52 Technique
Sports Photography With The Holga
By Tom Debiec
54 Gary’s Toy Box
Don
Cover photo by John Mann
Savoy Mark II
By C. Gary Moyer
Issue 9, Happy Hour Across A Sacred Bridge:
Wayne Martin Belger’s Holistic Approach to Pinholes
Interview by Jay Heuman. Images by Wayne Martin Belger (unless otherwise noted).
Third Eye Camera
Wayne Martin Belger has pursued an interesting life of variety. He has worked
as a camp counselor, stock boy, professional treasure hunter, child recovery
specialist, rock climbing instructor, scuba instructor, L.A. Kings Pro Hockey
team mascot, Anaheim Mighty Ducks Pro Hockey team mascot, hockey player,
musician (touring with Wicked Tinkers and in studio), machinist, and manicurist.
He is also an artist who designs, fabricates, and uses pinhole cameras in a holistic
approach … from concept, through process, to print, as the following conversation reveals.
E
10 Issue 9, Happy Hour
Two Hearts,
Wayne Martin Belger
Ken Merfeld, (1 of 1), 9¼”x9¼”, wet plate Collodion print on black glass.
from Roadside Altar series, 11”x14”, gelatin silver print. Taken with “Third Eye” camera.
Issue 9, Happy Hour 11
at a depth of 105 feet. Because my light meter
reading said it was going to be an hour and a half
exposure, the one photo required two deep dives
at 105 feet, two tanks of air, about four hours of
swimming in 56 degree water, and a healthy case
of nitrogen narcosis at the bottom of the ocean.
But the photo came out beautifully. Greens,
turquoises, and blues that I did not expect and,
from what I’ve read, shouldn’t be there because
at 105ft you lose almost all your color bands leaving you with gray. Then again I guess no one
else ever mounted a camera on a tripod at the
bottom of the ocean for an hour and a half.
Yemaya. (Underwater) Camera
A good example is San Francisco, a photo
taken with the Third Eye Camera … inside
the skull of a thirteen year old girl. After
about two months in the aging box, the right
hand corner of the negative developed a
strange light blue pattern. At first I thought
the negative wasn’t usable, but I gave it a
shot in the darkroom. The light blue pattern
produced what looks like a child’s face looking
down from the sky. The image of the child’s
face was not in the sky when the photo was
shot.
JH: Third Eye and Yama are pinhole cameras
made with human skulls. How did you conceive
of using human remains, what is the symbolic
significance, and how did you acquire the skulls?
JH: Another question about paradox. Pinhole
cameras are an old technology, yet you have
C-prints and work with digital files. How do
you feel about the conflict or convergence of
old and new technologies?
JH: By now you seem to have perfected the design and fabrication of pinhole
cameras, leaving nothing to chance. However, making photographs with a
pinhole camera is very much up to chance. Could you talk about this paradox?
WMB: I’ve eliminated a lot of chance by being massively obsessed with my
photographic process. I start a photo by constructing my composition with a ton
of spot meter readings. Then I adjust the camera’s focal length, aperture, film
speed and type to fill the needs of the spot meter readings. I do leave two items up
to chance. One, the direction my subjects lead the shoot … the other is the way I
handle my type 55 Polaroid negatives. Most shoots I’ll use ten to fifteen Type 55
Polaroids which produce a usable 4x5 negative. When I get back to the studio I
toss the negatives in a box without cleaning or fixing them, to let them “age”, and
I check their decaying progress every month. Some of the results are my favorite,
most mysterious photographs.
WMB: I really don’t have an issue with
blending old and new technologies, but I do
have a clear view of how much technology
I do and don’t want in my work. Though I
make cameras from some of the most hightech materials in the world, my prints are a
different story. All the black and white prints
are analog and I create them in my darkroom
using a combination of old school techniques
and some rather bizarre techniques of my
own. Most of my color prints are on Fuji
Crystal Archive using a digital light jet
process. My 4x5 negatives are scanned on a
high-resolution scanner. The image is then
transferred with light to photographic paper
and processed traditionally. I crop and adjust
the contrast of the image as you would using
traditional lab techniques. But that’s it. I
feel if Photoshop played a major role in the
creation of the image it wouldn’t be true to
the subject. That would defeat the purpose
of the project.
WMB: The symbolic significance of using human
remains in any of my work is exactly the same as
any of the other artifacts or relics. They were all
just appropriate for the piece.
Monterey 2
20”x24”, C-print. Taken with Yemaya
JH: Pinhole cameras incorporate your skills as machinist and
artist, but you are also a master diver. Could you describe how
you have merged photography and SCUBA diving?
WMB: About three years ago I was watching a National
Geographic program that showed scuba diving beneath a
frozen ocean. The still ice on the ocean’s surface didn’t allow
the sun’s rays to flicker below, removing the distinctive signs of
underwater photography and leaving the divers hovering in a
vast void surrounded by what could have been any medium of
space. Fascinated by the image of the “void”, I wanted to recreate
that image in my work which led to the creation of Yemaya,
the underwater 4x5 pinhole camera. It’s also the world’s most
impractical camera. The first time I used it, it was mounted on a
tripod anchored with bags of rocks on the deck of a sunken ship
The first skull came from a guy in England. It
was part of a medical school kit from the turn of
the century and had been in the attic for about a
hundred years. When I received it, it was extremely dirty. When
I cleaned it up I found some beautiful patterns of decay. I had a
doctor take a look at it and he said it was the skull of a European
girl in her early teens. The feeling I had from the skull was that of
a young girl full of the possibility of what could be. So I created a
way that she could see, teach, and be the full spectrum of beauty.
From her third eye, surrounded by silver and gems, she can see
and show the beauty of decay.
The skull for Yama came to me after a trip to India, seeing
the Tibetan culture that has been relocated into refugee cities.
I bought it from a guy in Beijing who was selling Tibetan
artifacts. Before I bought the skull, I talked to a Tibetan Lama
about what I was thinking of doing with it and what might
be the Tibetan Buddhist view of the project. He said the skull
had the same relevance as a bird’s feather blowing in the wind.
Gallery
Happy Hour
Photo Editor, Gordon Stettinius
Every now and then I get put off by photography of
I feel that ‘Happy Hour’, as a concept, can be
and causes often find their way into the artworld’s
when life speeds up a little and you wish you
and living life, making a record, cracking jokes and
get it back again. Exhilaration, sentimentality,
grade. In the hopes of full disclosure, I have to confess that I sometimes get
dinners and flirtation and seventh grade recess
essay about the Transparent Children of West Philadelphia or the Singing
stuff of red noses and loud talkers and hurt
mine that I am sort of interested in everything and so I am happy to have been
have so long that you can kick up a cloud of
happy accidents - albeit with a couple of emotional left turns into the mix.
laughs, I think.
high-mindedness. Photographers with their concepts
loosely construed as any or all of those times
consciousness while those who are less focused
could slow it down and have it last a little longer,
otherwise screwing around don’t as often make the
belly laughs and bad puns are the stuff of family
‘project envy’ when I meet photographers who are doing the moving extended
and new situations. Happy Hour is also the
Neurosurgeons of Chatham or what have you. It is a personal deficiency of
feelings and salted nuts. In short, you only
given this opportunity to give you an eclectic appreciation of pleasant folks and
dirt before it buries you. We should have a few
Smile
Nanthawan Chalermchai, Thailand
Nanthawanc@hotmail.com.
(Diana)
Rio Nizuc
Marydorsey Wanless Topeka, Kansas, USA
wanlessmd@aol.com
(Holga)
GALLERY
The Golden Hour
Nina Westervelt
Brooklyn, NY, USA
www.flickr.com/photos/psychic_heart
(Holga 120N)
Chelsea Piers, 2005
Mary Ann Lynch
Greenfield Center NY USA
www.maryannlynch.com
(Diana)
GALLERY
Wanna Play?
Rebecca Pendel
Farrell, Pennsylvania, USA
http://rebecca.my-expressions.com/
(Holga)
Idlehour
Cameron York
Heltonville, Indiana, USA
jayseeyork@hotmail.com
(Diana)
Technique
The Holga View Camera
About this time something flashed in my head (since I was using
By Wallace Billingham
on me was that although Ralph and I were using two very different
a Holga perhaps it flashed two times, or not at all). What dawned
cameras that produced two very different results, our ways of
This article had its genesis back in September 2007. I was
When we got to the lake, the dozen or so people in our group
working were exactly the same.
group of friends from around the USA (who were also
I wound up at the same spot, interested in some reeds and other
Workflow is a term that gets tossed about quite a bit these days
He told me to go ahead first while he set up his bellows and lens
DVDs on the latest version of some Adobe product. At its most
tripod, and placed the Holga on it. Experience has taught me the
and making photographs. I should also state at this point that
the best of my ability to frame my shot. Only having a single roll
is not better than the other, they are just different. I also think
fortunate enough to be spending a few days with a great
photographers) in the woods, streams, and hills of West
Virginia. Most of the group was shooting with digital
gear. I was shooting mainly with a Holga and my friend
Ralph was using an 8x10 large format view camera. One
afternoon we went for a little hike along a small lake and
then on to a waterfall. If I had been using my Canon 30D
DSLR I would have had several memory cards with me
and like most of the rest of
pulled out their gear and began to take photographs. Ralph and
emergent aquatic plants that were growing in very shallow water.
in photographic circles, usually in an effort to sell books and/or
board. So I pulled out my meter and metered the scene, set up the
basic form a photographic workflow is simply a system of working
strengths and weaknesses of the Holga viewfinder and I used it to
I firmly believe that there is no right or wrong workflow. One
of 12 exposures for the whole afternoon I wanted to make sure
that a workflow is a constantly evolving process. On the internet
“workflow” is often talked about in terms of what to do with your
the group, I would have been
digital files, usually created by a DSLR. For me (and the rest of
and everything. By the end
Workflow, and how to go about it, has been written and talked
Not a lot seems to have been written about “toy camera” or “low-
several hundred shots, and
example of this is Ansel Adams’ trio of books about his workflow,
mind is perhaps Lomographic’s “10 Golden Rules”. Have you ever
snapping away at anything
this article) workflow begins before you even press the shutter.
of the day I would have taken
about by photographers for many years. Perhaps the most classic
fidelity” photographic workflow. The only thing that comes to
after editing those down I
called “The Camera”, “The Negative”, and “The Print”.
thought about your own toy camera workflow? Do you follow the
would have been happy to
Lomo 10 rules, or something else? I admit that before that fine
one or two “keepers”. Along
thought. Since that day I have given it quite a bit more. For me, my
had
backpack
approach it. For example, my workflow would be very different for
wide to super telephoto. I also
of my kid’s birthday party. However, since this is a column on
heavy tripod with my heavy
for landscape photography, with my own set of 10 Golden Rules.
have had ten decent shots and
September day in West Virginia I had really never given it much
with the DSLR I would have
workflow changes with the subject matter and how I am going to
with 5-6 lenses from a super
a nature scene or landscape than it would be for say taking pictures
would have been carrying my
using toy cameras for landscape work, let me share my workflow
ball head. In addition to that I
You may find, as I did that day in West Virginia, that these could
my
camera
would have had a bunch of filters and other miscellaneous
that each one of them was as perfect as I could make it.
on this trip, I had just brought a single Holga loaded up
metered the scene then he set up his tripod and placed his camera
gear. Not wanting to lug thirty plus pounds of gear around
with a roll of Efke infrared film and fitted with a Hoya
IR filter. I only had three other pieces of gear with me:
my handheld light meter, a cable release, and a very light
tripod. My goal was to travel very light along the steep trail
we were going to hike down and back.
easily apply to other types of photography as well, no matter what
type of camera you are using. Some types of cameras, like large
After I took my shot it was Ralph’s turn. He took out his meter and
format gear, pretty much force you to use a certain workflow and
slow down. One of the joys of using toy cameras is that you are
on it. After that he used the camera’s movements and ground glass
free to use lots of workflows or none at all.
to frame his shot. Since 8x10 sheet film is very expensive, very
large, and has to be placed in large holders, he only had a few
So without further delay, I present the Wallace Billingham 10
Golden Rules of Plastic Landscape Photography!
sheets with him. With only limited film for the afternoon his goal
was to make each exposure as perfect as he could make it.
Showcase
Elizabeth
Soule
o
Showcase
Daniel Grant
Cypress Hill
Trumpet 4
Pension
Café
Ponte Veccio
Technique
Sports Photography With The Holga
By Tom Debiec
Once my addiction started I carried my Holga everywhere, taking
photos of all the usual toy camera subjects. I soon realized how
much I was limiting myself. I’ve enjoyed suffering on my bike
for years, so when a professional race came to town I grabbed my
cameras and headed to the course. The results from this first try
were pretty good, so the next year Light Leaks agreed to sponsor
me for press credentials. The pressure was on.
At the race most sports photographers carried multiple camera
bodies attached to massive lenses. Once the race started I never
saw them again. With their long lenses they were standing
comfortably at a distance, snapping away at 8 frames per second.
I carried four Holgas that day, three with B&W and one color.
By clicking the shutter and switching cameras I was able to take
an astounding 3 frames per minute, for one minute. The 60mm
lens forced me to get close to the action; I tucked myself into the
corners, crouching low. It was a thrill. I could feel the rush of air
from the pack as they passed by at 25 miles per hour. So much
force it almost pushed me over.
Playing with shutter speeds, I would sometimes set the camera
to “N”, the next time they came around to “B”. I would get
confused, “N” or “B”? Then I realized, it doesn’t matter: just take
the picture. I was having too much fun. Of course, sometimes I
did pay attention; wondering how the background would look as
I panned, climbing a lamppost to get different angle or to the top
of the parking garage to get a bird’s eye view.
Uncertainty is a big part of experimentation. The first time I went
through the negatives I was very uncertain. I saw the same shot
over and over—the racers coming around the corner, just a little
blurry. I felt empathy for digital photographers editing thousands
instead of a hundred similar shots. Mixed in with all those
snapshots, every once in a while, something amazing happened:
the riders lined up perfectly, the composition worked with just the
right amount of blur, in a way that no other camera but the Holga
can capture.
Issue 10 Gallery Theme:
Cliff-Hangers
Images that leave you wanting
more or tell a story without giving
away the ending.
Guest Photo Editor: Aline Smithson
www.alinesmithson.com
Visit www.lightleaks.org/submissions.html for
submission details
The Bad Man
Aline Smithson
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