I find it hard to separate the years of looking at other people's images with the act of making of my own. The references get so tangled. The red truck above is one of my ripostes at the endless adoration of William Eggleston's color work. Homage to banality. But once you see the red trike it's hard to forget the power of something new. I'm also a sucker for deck plate. That's the pattern on the metal utility cover show below. I love deck plate. I like industrial stuff. I'd happy for days in some sort of SteamPunk clock factory, just snapping away.
And...by the way....
Have you seen the "Steampunk" A.I. videos all over YouTube these days? I find them fascinating. And in a few years we'll collectively probably stop making TV shows and movies with real actors and flood the market with A.I. constructions. Interesting to know that the reason home video players took off in the 1980s was all down to the pornography industry. (The link here doesn't fall under that category....). But the video I'm linking sure makes use of my love for complex, mechanical, brass constructions as well as beautiful women.
Mike will hate this "new" media because it's not pure. Not handmade by humans. But it is the future of mass media whether you play along or not. And it's going to displace something....
Go see for yourself and make up your own mind. It's okay if you disagree but I'm not sure these short videos are anything more than proof of concept. Mini-portfolios as it were: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3V6VikmWKPw
Sure. We can all talk a good game about how A.I. will never replace: fill in the blank but if you sit down and look at what is already out there, and out there in a really short amount of time, you'll have to admit that the potential of the new technologies is more or less only limited by one's imagination. Finally, a reason for 8K monitors? Or you can dismiss it as did many critics of the original iPhone...
Not that I'm planning on melting down all my Leica gear and buying a bigger monitor and an easy chair, but I think it behooves both the people who are into photography as an art, as well as people who are into photography as a commercial business, to take off the blinders, ignore the Luddites and see what's out there for ourselves. Then, if you want to scurry back to your analog darkroom and unload those sheet film holders you can aptly label yourself as a contrarian or a keeper of the flame(s).
My take is that mass media is going to go in one direction and people in my generation will publicly rail about it ad infinitum but will also be sneaking another peek. You know, just for research...
