The personal quest for images. Why it's different than working to a formula, a style or for a client.

 

Sweetish Hill Croissant.

Working for a client is a difficult process of sublimating what you think will be the best images into what the client thinks they want. Every so often you'll get a client that really hires you for "your style" but for the most part, at least from my experience, there is a raft of expectations about how the work will turn out and that provides a momentum towards safety and tradition. Generally work has to be sharp, composed in certain ways, and exposed to work well across different media. For most clients. The imposition of real visual excitement is actually far down the list for most buyers. Especially those far enough down the ladder to be fired if a commissioned photograph is not homogenous and universal enough. 

Jana at Little City Coffee House.

Developing a conscious style and then adhering to it regardless of the situation, the subject or even the way you feel in the moment is more or less an obsession. And as often as the strict obsession to repeat and repeat helps an artist (gee! I can tell that's an authentic Banksy!!!) it also locks an artist into becoming more like a Xerox machine than a creative spirit. In my mind every "style" plays out over time and the courage is in the abandonment of a contrived style with which you are bored but which everyone loves and the embracing of your next new thing. Moving on. Exploring.

An unconscious style is a whole different animal. It's the way you breathe, the way you stand, the way you cock your head and how you take your coffee. It's an unthinking way of existing and creating. It's fettered only by your intrinsic sense of self. It's the only true style.

Jana on 2nd St.

Then there's the personal quest for images. You make these because you are profoundly interested in how they will turn out; what they will say. These are images taken because you are interested in the subject, the event, the design, the light or the feeling of being in the middle of all those things. You would photograph this kind of work even if no one else ever saw the images or patted you on the head for your good work. They are the pieces of work that sometimes your friends don't like or your partner doesn't understand. But you make the work because you feel self-compelled to do it. And it makes you feel good about being an artist because it fills the scrapbook of your mind with great visuals and it can fill your stack of images with a readout of who  you really are. Shared or not. And it may be work you capture because you find yourself constantly in love with what's in front of your camera and the endorphins feel so good.

So, when I find a landscape-only photographer, or a black and white-only photographer, or a large or small format-only, or a documentary-only photographer I pause and wonder what is holding them back from the joy of trying it all and being free of the straightjacket of working to a formula. Or a small basket of formulas.

Parishioners at the Vatican Colonnade 

In the end, unless your work is so amazing that you change the course of art history, in a few short years, or maybe a decade or two after your death, all the work will have turned, metaphorically, to dust. No one will remember you walked around with a camera. Any money you may have made doing so will have long been spent. And any money you lost "investing" in all the trappings of your era of photography will be forever gone.

Something to think about when you toss a camera over your shoulder and head out to make an image. The famous magazine designer and teacher, Alexey Brodovich used to say to his students: "If you look through your camera and you've seen the picture before don't click the shutter."  

How long does it take to make the perfect photograph? The answer, depending on who you ask could be: "about 1/125th of a second." But just as easily one could say, "It takes a life time." 

I think we all eventually find out that we surround ourselves with ritual, tradition and gear because we have a fear of really trying something different. It's not just you and me; it's everyone. That's why when an artist really rises to a different level it's understood that somehow they pushed themselves over that line between what they had done before and what was really scary to do for the first time.

Or I could have it all wrong. But I think a photograph is both a document of a time, place and subject but also a window into the psychology and intellect of the photographer. 

Spanish Steps.

studio on San Marcos St.

Real camera. Real lens.

Teenage version of the boy.

Hot day in a cool stream. At Pedernales Falls State Park.

A glorious and happy lighting mistake.

Campaign photo for the Kipp School.

Schlotzsky's CFO cast as a baker.

Dance studio with Romi. Down on 6th.

Portrait work horse.

Siena.

Verona.

Just out of the pool and right onto the studio canvas.

The most perfect assistant in the history of the world.

Martin.

In the Kitchen at Sweetish Hill Bakery. 

Back when it was really Sweetish Hill Bakery.

After all my bitching and moaning about the 50mm f2.0 TTA lens I realized I really liked this shot and I should have just written some droll things about my personal life and then posted this photo along with it...

 

We were going to go to Germany but Putin made that harder. Too hard. There are a million people trying to leave Russia and they are heading straight for the E.U. Oh, and I'm pretty sanguine about saber rattling but when you have a crazy person with the ability to deploy hundreds or thousands of short range, tactical nuclear weapons at a moment's notice I'm not anxious to roll the dice and see how it's all going to play out. Added to that I'm low on iodine tablets....

We'll save a trip to Berlin and environs for the Spring. Maybe the Russian people will have figured out how to replace leaders by then. 

We switched plans and are now headed to Vancouver and B.C. at the last part of October and early November. I know it will be cold but realize that you're talking to a Texan who has just lived through the hottest Summer on record here in the central part of the state and the idea of being cold, or cold and wet, or just chilly seems enticing. Alluring. Luxurious. Reservations have been made. Plans solidified. Cameras not yet chosen. Might just turn into my first family vacation with nothing but an iPhone 14Pro as a camera...

Swimming continues apace. We've got three different coaches that are great at devising interesting and challenging workouts that keep the team continuously coming back for more. Lots of fast yards. Lots of inventive sets and cool, clean water to boot. Still trudging around town with a camera in my hands as well.

My fever seems to have broken as far as camera and gear acquisition goes. I cancelled an order for a camera last week and I've been indifferent to cameras ever since. We'll see how that plays out...

I was admonishing myself for buying a full set of Panasonic GH cameras last year and this year, including a GH6, but then one of my swim buddies called this week to see if I could produce some videos for his company's website and I was overjoyed to see that I had all the parts for great video work already in hand. Today I updated the GH6 firmware to version 2.2 which allows me to write files (photo and video) to a USB connected SSD drive. How fun!!!

I pulled out the Sennheiser wireless microphone gear this afternoon to refresh my knowledge and was thrilled to see that I'd removed the batteries before packing it all away last time I used it (around the Spring Break) so everything is still clean and working. No leaky battery issues.

Our shoot is a basic testimonial production for a geo-thermal product and we'll be doing it as a three camera scenario with a bunch of b-roll added. We have a scouting trip scheduled but we're still working on scheduling the principal videography and aiming for some time in the middle of the month. I'm heading out "street shooting" video with the GH6 for the next week or so just to get very familiar with the camera and the new capabilities. Might even shoot open gate in Pro Res. Exciting. 

Pissed off about the stock market. I liked it better when I felt richer. If we were back in the recent heady days of the market I'd already have that Hasselblad X2D ordered but now I'm trying to find coupons for pumpkin spice waffles at Trader Joe's. 

And wouldn't you know it? The minute I clicked on payment for our vacation flights and hotel my email started to blow up with requests to book projects right up until the day before we leave. It's the crazy universe.

An interesting lens that I would not buy again. It's not that bad. But it's not all unicorns and puffy clouds either. What lens? The new TTArtisan 50mm f2.0 for full frame.

 

I've always been a sucker for 50mm lenses and this tiny disappointment won't deter me from taking chances on cheap lenses in the future. But first, what is it?

TTArtisan, a Chinese maker of manual focus/manual exposure lenses for cameras introduced this lens earlier in 2022. For a few weeks it was sold out on all the popular sites but is now more widely available. It's a simple lens that's claim to fame is being the smallest, most compact, lightest 50mm f2.0 lens that covers full frame and is available in a wide range of mirrorless mounts. And it costs a whopping $69. 

In many regards it clicks the boxes I think are fun for a lens like this. It's all metal construction. The focusing ring is smooth and well placed. The aperture ring clicks nicely and with authority as you move it around. And the lens is tiny. It's almost capable of making a Leica SL seem light and carefree when this lens is attached. Almost.

It has six glass elements in five groups. It features 10 aperture blades for happier bokeh. And one of the amazing attributes of the lens is that even wide open it is exceptionally sharp in the center frame and at f5.6 it's sharp everywhere but in the extreme corners. So far, no really bad news. Right?

But it seems to have a fatal flaw. If you look at the sample images just below the product shots I've posted here you'll see that the corners have a green cast to them. I first saw it in a few of the images I made with the lens at its maximum aperture of f2.0 and I thought it would resolve as I stopped the lens down but that didn't happen. The green cast stuck around. And against lighter, non-blue/green backgrounds it's very noticeable. Noticeable enough that I would not use the lens at all for any sort of commercial work. Or, in fact, anything that a paying client might see. 

I tried using the various tools in the lens correction palette in Lightroom but I wasn't able to wrangle the green cast out. The Sigma fp has a lens optics correction sub-menu and in that sub-menu called "color shading." You can calibrate a lens by aiming it at a uniform subject (white card?) and clicking the AEL button. Then you can name the profile for each lens. There are four slots to fill. Doing that helped reduced the green corner cast but didn't take it out altogether. And, even if it did work it would only work in conjunction with the Sigma fp and not other cameras I might have wanted to use with the lens. Keeping in mind that I was testing the lens using raw files so it's possible that their might be a Jpeg automatic fix in some cameras out in the market. I just don't know about them. 

Given that the lens is small, cheap and mostly sharp I'll keep it around and play with it when I'm shooting black and white. When you go monochrome no one can see your corners color shift.... As though that's supposed to be some consolation. At any rate I marched around with the lens yesterday so you could see what it's all about since it got a bunch of buzz last month. 

One more thing. The lens has some geometric distortion and there is no current profile for the lens in Adobe apps. I found that moving the lens distortion slider in Lightroom Classic to minus five (- 5) cleared up the majority of the distortion but it's not a simple concave or convex distortion pattern; there are some slight wavy lines that remain in spite of the overall correction.

If you haven't bought one of these but were considering it and asking my advice I'd probably steer you clear of it. That is, unless you were vitally interested in the getting the smallest and cutest 50mm lens currently on the market for mirrorless cameras of all kinds. Then it's between you and your camera. 

I'll test it one more time with a different camera body and also use the Jpeg format instead of raw to see if one of my other cameras can auto correct for that color shading glitch. No promises of success. But, still, $69.

TTArtisan uses metal lens caps that screw into the filter rings.

Some people absolutely hate them. I'm ambivalent. 

On one hand I like the way they look. But on the other hand I mostly just use them for 

protection in camera bags, etc. and when I'm out shooting the cap comes off for the day

and lives in a pocket till we're through with our adventures in photography. 

It's not like I'm putting it on and pulling it off dozens of times in an 

afternoon. So, there's that. 

this was my best correction for the dreaded green corners. 

But notice: the lens is sharp and well behaved otherwise. f5.6

See the green in the lower right and all along the left side of the frame?

Me too. 

I tried working out the green with a radial adjustment but only succeeded in 

turning the green to a darker teal.

Man. that guy has baggy pants...

Should probably eat more. Send cake.

(no. please don't...).

Obvious green cast in the bottom corners. 

OMG. So much green cast in the bottom left corner. 

Masked on the right by the green of the building trim.

Perhaps a taunt about my lens buying habits. 

Or a more general message about clowns. 

At least they are not mimes.... (See the movie: Shakes the Clown). 

visible green cast in all corners except where it is masked by blue sky in the top

right corner. Untenable to me. 

And this is the most obvious example of all. Green all along the left side of the frame

with emphasis on the bottom corners. And extending well into the frame.

Not a great performance. 

Glad I'm not looking for affiliate cash.

Fun, cheap flash. Godox Lux Senior.

 I wrote the other day that I liked flashes that featured the older, "automatic" settings which use a sensor on the flash to measure exposure. My luck with TTL flash has mostly been hit or miss. My keeper rate when using manual flash has always been much higher. And when I'm doing quick P.R. or event work I tend to work almost always in manual. But in my experience "automatic" modes are somewhere right in the middle of the mix. Not always perfect but usually closer to the "right" exposure than TTL even if it's not as good as a well tested manual setting. 

TTL flash fans will probably jump in to say that with high dynamic range cameras and flexible RAW files they've never had an issue with TTL and can quickly fix photos in post. Sure, I can fix a few dozen under exposed flash pictures in post but I sure don't want to go through four or five hundred photos, correcting each one for over and underexposures. Not if I can help it...

With fully manual flash exposure you are basically just solving simple math. Guide numbers work well. If the flash puts out a certain amount of power and you are a certain distance from your subject you can shoot hundreds of frames with little or no variation in flash output or exposure. Much easier to batch process after the shoot. 

So why Automatic? Because at heart I'm pretty lazy and wish the flash would do most of the work. With this in mind and with the prices of Leica dedicated TTL flashes equal to an international airfare I decided to give a new, funny looking flash a try. It clicked two boxes: It's intriguing and it's relatively cheap. $119. 

The flash is a Godox Lux Senior and it folds down for travel but when you are ready to use it you engage the circular, metal reflector by fanning it out, pop up the flash tube and you are ready to shoot. It's not an exceptionally powerful flash but I intend to use mine on camera and direct. There is only one way to bounce this flash and that's to use the included sync cord and take the flash off camera and point it up toward the ceiling. Not interested in that for the uses I have in mind...

I got two of these yesterday and took five minutes to read the instruction manual. It's pretty straightforward since there are no custom functions or extra "features" to screw up your progress toward simple lighting. The units come with internal, non-interchangeable lithium batteries which are charged via an included USB cable. I've only opened up the box and charged one of the two units. It took about three and a half hours to hit a full charge. 

When the flash is plugged into a USB charger and starts charging the ready light on the back lights up red. When charging is complete the same light switches to green. If you use the flash for a while and want to check and see how much battery power you have left you can turn off the flash and "quick touch" the test button/ready light button once and you'll get a slow flashing series of indicators. Four green pulses tells you that the flash is at 75-100% charged, three pulses tells you that the flash battery is at 50-75% charged and so on. It's not as accurate as a numerical indication (ex: 73 %) but it does let you know in a more general way how you're doing on battery juice. 

The automatic feature is primitive but straightforward and easy enough to use. It's based around an exposure within 4 meters from the direct flash. The manual tells us that it's calibrated for correct exposure in that range when used at ISO 100 and f2.8. It takes no great math skills to understand that you could also set ISO 200 and f4.0 or 400 and f5.6 or 800 and f8.0. I tried all of these combinations using the flash on a Leica SL2 and they all worked just fine. I've only taken 20 or 30 test shots but they are exactly what I was expecting. Since the flash and camera don't communicate at all (other than to trigger the flash) you can "drag" the shutter as slow as you'd like to balance out ambient light and flash ratios. 

I like Godox products. I've purchased many over the years and have yet to regret any purchase. I was hesitant to buy this wonderfully nostalgically designed unit for only one reason; I want to use the flash for a fundraising gala one of my clients puts on every year at the Four Seasons Hotel. I normally shoot between 500 and 600 candid shots during the cocktail hour, the VIP reception, and with casual groupings after the show concludes. I have no fears whatsoever about shooting direct flash but I do have a well grounded fear of running out of battery charge. 

I almost passed on the Lux Senior since the battery is built in and can't be exchanged during an evening shoot. But then I looked again at the price ($119, free shipping) and realized that I could buy two of the them, set them up identically, and be covered for the full event. Being extra cautious I'll bring along a USB Anker battery pack in case I want to put the first, exhausted unit on to charge in order to continue to have a back-up source. And being incredibly paranoid I'm sure to have a manual Godox YN-XXX flash in the bag, sitting in the corner of the ballroom, just in case everything else goes to hell. 

So far the flash is working perfectly and I like the general look of the light coming off the round reflector. 

I can't wait to hear the comments from the photo aficionados at the gala. The nostalgia factor is palpable. 

Taking the flash with me on a walk today to see if I can do some fill light out in the bright sun. The SL2 syncs at 1/250th so we'll see what we can get. And no. There is no HSS on this flash.

Sigma Contemporary 30mm f1.4 lens is a nice "fast normal" lens for the Leica APS-C cameras (TL2 and CL).

It's been a weird camera week. I have a good friend who is a very bad influence when it comes to wasting money on unneeded camera purchases. He made a great case to me for Leica Q cameras and before I knew it I was off looking at various versions of the camera at my favorite Leica dealer's website. By the end of the day on Saturday I'd tracked down the one I thought I wanted. It was a minty Q-P (a stealth Q that came out in late 2018 with a matte black finish, no red dot (or indeed, dot of any kind...) and a revised, quieter shutter. The package would come with three batteries for the camera as well as all the usual stuff. It looked so cool. And it was a bit less than $4,000. The cherry on the transaction? The camera had just come back from a Wetzlar, Germany Leica Clean, Lube and Adjust visit. 

I was excited about it but also felt a little uneasy. I've already spent a small fortune on Leica stuff this year and I think my Calvinist upbringing was playing havoc with my guilt gland (not being a hedge fund manager or attorney I've never had mine removed). When I woke up on Sunday morning I was feeling some resistance to my unplanned purchase. I talked it over with my much more rational (and patient) son and by the end of our conversation he convinced me that while the camera might be really neato there might be some emotional value to resisting the desire for yet another material purchase and that maybe the exercise of restraint would have surprising positive benefits. 

By Monday morning I had (for the first time in years) actual anxiety about a camera purchase. What the heck was I thinking? Did I think I really needed yet another Leica? Or for that matter did I even need another camera? Then there was the obvious bump in my buying logic when I remembered just how awkward the 28mm focal length is for me. Not a focal length I'd choose for myself unless my back was up against the wall and a client needed the shot. And the Leica Q features a fixed, permanently attached 28mm lens.... yikes.

Finally I considered the opportunity cost of spending the money on yet another luxury item when I could invest in something better while the market stays down. Maybe, over time, I could turn the cost of one Leica Q-P into an amount equal to 2 Q-Ps if I just plunked the cash into my Roth account. 

In the end I called the dealer and cancelled the sale. They were gracious and helpful. I felt relieved. It's wasn't the cost, per se, so much as it was the irrationality of buying a camera with a beautiful body wrapped around a failing (for me) focal length lens. 

Instead of another camera I reconciled myself to optimizing my current Leica CL APS-C system. I'm a big fan of the Sigma Contemporary series of lenses and Sigma have started delivering the really cool, smaller than full frame, Contemporary lenses in L mount configurations. I bought two of the lenses earlier this year. The one's I've been using are the 56mm f1.4 and the 18-50mm f2.8 zoom lens. They're both great.  I wanted to add the 30mm f1.4 to the mix and then, once its been assimilated into the mix, I'll grab a 16mm f1.4. 

I ordered the 30mm f1.4 around the same time as the Q-P and the lens arrived on Sunday afternoon. I stuck it on a CL body this morning and shot a few test shots with it. I had a version of this lens once before when I was deep into the m4:3 cameras so I already had an idea of its potential but I wanted to make sure I got a good copy in the L mount before we got too far down the road. The 30mm is the angle of view equivalent of a 45mm lens for full frame. Just about perfect for lots and lots of stuff. 

The logic for fleshing out the CL system is that it's pretty much the perfect travel camera system for me and I'll be doing some traveling this Fall. I can fit two camera bodies, the zoom lens, and the three primes into one very small shoulder bag. The system is lightweight. And the Sigma lenses are pretty darn good. With the fast maximum apertures and my nerves of steel I don't feel the need for holiday flash units nor do I feel the need to travel with a tripod. 

Here are some test images from the CL + Sigma 30mm f1.4 Contemporary lens. It was on sale. I'll keep it. 

Just thought I'd write this to at least direct attention to the reality that I can exercise some restraint. But...Damn....it's hard. 

that's a RED truck.

One must now be vigilant when using the public sidewalks as legions of people on Segways, having not yet learned to walk, are zooming around with impunity. Tragic. 

Single file? That's for suckers...

MM is an instructor at the University of Texas at Austin.

I hear he also dabbles in movie acting. 

I am always a bit cautious around vans. I always get a 

Hannibal Lector vibe around them. 

the lens handles blue sky. That's a good thing.