6.21.2022

Learning to enjoy the hot afternoons. Bring comfortable shoes. New 100°F workshops!!! Learn how to suffer better. Sponsored by Gruff and Associates, Experts in Provocation.

 


Finished painting the fence this morning, ate left over Father's Day BBQ for lunch and then got bored with staying indoors. Grabbed some comfortable sandals, the Leica CL with the 23mm f1.4 lens and one of those obnoxious hats and drove downtown. The heat wasn't that bad. You learn to walk on the sides of the streets with the most shade. Seems obvious but it's taken me a lot of tries to get it right.

At the end of the walk I found myself at REI buying my favorite REI t-shirts because they were on clearance sale. Still too expensive but whatcha gonna do? I bought six more. They're soft and cool. They're UPF 50. They wick moisture. They're antimicrobial. And did I mention they were on sale?

Today's exercise was to figure out how I make the skies in my urban landscapes so nice and dark. I didn't set anything special so I have to tell you that I don't have a clue. Maybe I'm generating some sort of electro-magnetic field that makes skies bold and sassy. Or maybe all those "elitist scum yuppie Leica owners" are actually on to something here. Who knows?

We took the day off from "real" work but the week looks like non-stop post production. I guess it could be a lot worse.

Go snap up a Leica CL before they disappear altogether. Or wait five years until everyone decides they've become collector's items and you can snap one up for twice the price. But don't forget to buy the super-cheap TTArtisan lenses to go with yours. That's the secret magic ingredient. 


B. Scolded me last year when I told her I was thinking about Crypto. 
Since she scares me a little because she's so smart I decided not to 
take the plunge. I asked her about it again  in January but she was too
busy shorting the market overall to answer me....

And if you believe in Crypto I'm here to tell you that Lawrence Welk had the 
presidential election stolen from him back in 1956.


no. The sky was not stripped in...





A mannequin with intensity.

Austin City Limits drops the hammer on cellphone addled fans.






and one in color as the "control group".



13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Numbers 4,5 and 6 are, for want of a better word, perfect. Those are exactly the tones you should see in black and white photos.

R.A.

Anonymous said...

Will a CL be noticeable "better" than a Fuji X? They are much cheaper and fit ex. lenses.

Anonymous said...

What are the shirts brand and name…i need some new tshirts. Nice b& w’s

karmagroovy said...

Can you ask that mannequin if she has a sister? ;-) I'm intriqued by the shirts as well... do they come with their own WIFI hot-spot?

EdPledger said...

Interested in the tshirts if they serve expresso.

Re the b&w skies…do you use spot metering, or…?

Eric Rose said...

Your B&W's are always a treat.

Mike Mundy said...

He would have won if the Bubble Machine hadn't been hacked.

Kirk, Photographer/Writer said...

Mike. So true.

Kirk, Photographer/Writer said...

anonymous....all modern cars are good. All modern cameras are good. The operator is more important than the brand.

Gary said...

You had to do something to get those dark skies. Camera settings, filters, postprocessng? Fess up!

Kirk, Photographer/Writer said...

Gary, No filter. Nothing in a Leica but contrast and sharpness. Contrast and exposure tweaks in post; sure.

I think it's the profile in the Leicas called Monochrome HC which is a high contrast setting. That's all I can guess at.

Chuck Albertson said...

My stock response to anyone pitching crypto (or any of the other inane "investment opportunities" that come my way) is, "Do I look like some '90's day-trader with 'Born to Lose' tattooed on my neck?" I'm not afflicted with MOFO, or whatever the kids call it.

Tell B that a couple of the hedge funds that were starting crypto ETFs a year ago are now flogging ETFs that short crypto.

Tom Farrell said...

Thanks for the phrase "The sky was not stripped in...". Brought me back to the days whenI worked as a pre-press stripper, compositing 4 color halftones on four clear base sheets so that the dots superimposed exactly and there was no moire, then burning these and the text block negatives onto printing plates, also registered exactly. And yes, sometimes compositing the image itself. One of the best parts of the job was telling new female acquaintances that I was a stripper...ah, youth.

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