When I want to learn more about the properties of a lens, or a specific focal length lens, my first thought is that in the case of lenses a picture is worth thousands of words.

Moving around is fun. Moving around with a camera is more fun.

Yesterday was the first full day of SXSW. Sure, last week we had SXSW-Edu, but that's an add-on to the main conference meant to sell school administrators more and more useless software and gadgets. Not even a wind-up for the actual music, film, and technology conference. 

What SXSW means to me is more opportunities to take cameras out and photograph lots and lots of people and scenes. Mostly for my own pleasure. And, as a sometimes bonus, I use the ample photo opportunities presented as an excuse to get re-acquainted with a focal length I've slighted, or a particular type of lens the potential of which I haven't yet realized. I like to find out if it's sharp enough, small enough to handle for hours at a time, and if the photographs it helps me make look good. 

So, being able still to walk for hours and hours with a small camera bag over one shoulder and a fat camera and its lens over the other I headed downtown with the plump package of imaging potential to bang away at a mostly street oriented event. Why "street oriented?" Because so much of the attendees' time is spent standing on sidewalks waiting in line, sometimes for hours, for a chance to see "the latest thing" for five or ten minutes. And if people are just standing around then they are wonderful subjects for photographing. 

Yesterday's camera was a Leica SL2 and the lens in question was the Sigma 85mm f1.4 Art lens. It was a nice combination and yesterday I tried out lots of stuff I never/rarely use in my usual practice. Like: continuous AF, body and eye detection for street photography, and sometimes even shooting with the aperture at its widest settings. All fraught with the potential for failure --- but as it's not a job, just a busman's holiday --- they are generally happy failures. 

One takeaway for me after watching so many of my peers lose mobility and enthusiasm is this... if you can walk around without pain or fatigue and happily photograph a fun world around you ----- don't put off the opportunity to do so every day. All the time. The smile on your face will come naturally. Sitting alone in an office, no matter how nice, is deadly boring and entropic.  Move, move, move. And it's okay if taking photographs is just an excuse for being present.  

There is no longer any promise of being able to exist in the modern world without a cell phone. Is there?

Lucy Lumen was correct when, in a recent video on her sometimes interesting YouTube channel, she decried the problem with modern street photography. Her take? People just don't dress up any more. Everyone looks the same when it comes to clothes, fashion, etc. 

Until you find someone with a pink hat. 

Blading is the practice of turning one's body to have the smallest profile.

Best used for working one's way through crowds but also useful in presenting

to an opponent the smallest target possible. Some blade some don't. 

The one's who don't are the oblivious amongst us....

If more people wore stuff like this out in the street it might be

a glorious thing for street photography.... 

This line wrapped around the corner and continued for an entire city block. 

I asked one of the staff at the venue about the presentation. His response?

"Meh." 

I have no idea what this poster is really for but I sure love the saturated colors and the 

chance to have a static subject for which I could use a wide open aperture to 

blur out the entire background. Don't know if that's "bokeh" and I don't really

care much. You know, I invented the word, "arigato." 

In my usage it refers to the condition and subtlety of the click stop on a rangefinder lens....

About a week ago the Rivian people deposited tons and tons of dirt in a downtown 

parking lot on Congress Ave. They formed it into little hills and valleys. 

Now you can get in line and ride around in one of their trucks to see how

it handles "off-roading." Off Roading is that thing that mostly only 

Subarus do well. But the Rivian is certainly better at playing well

in dirt than is a Tesla CyberTruck.... (AKA: P.O.S.).

these folks thought almost sideways trucks were worth capturing on phones. 

No real cameras anywhere in attendance yesterday...unlike in previous years. 

This organization would like to see more women on corporate boards/leadership positions and fewer white men named "Dick" in those positions. Seems fair to me. 

The mannequin squad lined up to watch the SXSW attendees march down the streets with their heads bent, almost as in prayer, while staring obsessively at their phone screens. Sad....as it was a nice day out yesterday and there was a lot to see in real time. Perhaps this is why birthrates are falling all across the Western World. 

This mannequin used partial nudity as a protest against people dressing like crap....

The man in the center of the frame works at a downtown restaurant. 

He was genuinely happy. I asked him if I could photograph him. 

He thought it might be fun. I hope tips are wonderful this week.

Random street crossing...

and the studious among them...

Man with five or six small dogs on a tricycle.

They were a big hit at all the crosswalks. 

dogs are cool. 

Power vaping.

I will be downtown today teaching a workshop about how to walk places. Close by places. On safe sidewalks.

Observation after seeing the images large on a good monitor:

The Leica SL2 medium size, Jpeg images look pretty darn good.

The 85mm lens is a lot of fun for street photography. More to come.

On the whole, people have gotten much heavier over the years.

Austin's downtown is pretty darn safe this week.

 

What is a "Stunt Leica?" As explained to me by a good friend and fellow photographer...

First of all, I know most people don't really care about Leica This or Leica That. But most people don't really care about swimming, or snooker, or just exactly how we did our darkroom work in 1976. So I'll just proceed with today's interesting idea...  interesting to me at least...

I had lunch with a well to do business person and photographer. He's owned and used all kinds of cameras; from Canons and Sonys to medium format Fujis --- and many stranger cameras. He's got a collection of nearly 100 different cameras ---that I know of. But lately (mea culpa) he's fallen down the Leica rabbit hole. We meet for lunch about once a month and we always bring along interesting cameras that, old or new, are interesting to both of us, to share. Show and tell.  Today my (anonymous...let's call him "Bob") friend, Bob brought along several interesting new products for me to look at. One was the small and remarkably good Leica D-Lux 8. The finder in that camera is much, much better than I expected it would be. In fact, the finder is the one feature that sticks with me. That and dozens of photographs Bob has done with that camera in cities all over the place. Yes, in addition to collecting interesting cameras Bob shoots well and he shoots a lot. He's not the type to sit at his desk and pontificate if there is any potential at all to be out shooting instead. "Pictures...or it didn't happen!!!"

The D-Lux8 is not just a re-badged anything. Judging by Bob's black and white and color images it performs incredibly well. Great tonality and tons of sharp detail. Another bonus is a menu/user interface that mirrors the interface seen in Leica's Q2 & Q3 cameras, and all the later SL type cameras. Which is to say that it's the best or second best implementation of information display and control on the market today. It's close competitor? The Hasselblad X2D, of course. Just handling the DLux-8 again fanned the flames of my desire for one. Which I am currently resisting...

He also bought the Leica grip for the iPhone. It's charming in person and does make doing photographs on an iPhone surprisingly easier. It was fun to see in person. 

While Bob started his adventure into Leica with the purchase of an original SL he had always planned to get into the M system as well. He's a technologist by profession and in his research he dived deep into the M9. The M9 was the last Leica M camera to use a CCD sensor instead of CMOS sensor and his point of view is that its output is "more interesting" than the current crop of sensors. From an imaging point of view...

One day recently he came across a very nearly mint condition M9 which had had the CCD sensor replaced (some batches of M9s had CCD sensors that suffered from surface corrosion --- which was unsettling. But being Leica they dutifully replaced any affected sensor without argument). Those cameras were made in smaller quantities than the M240s that came afterwards while the variants post M240 are even more numerous. That makes a fully functional, fully vetted M9, with its handsome black paint finish and a new sensor, a bit of a collector's item. But not too expensive in the current used markets. 

He's been shooting the M9 with a 50mm Summicron and a 35mm Voigtlander Ultron and is now captivated and a bit addicted to rangefinder photography. Especially with his M9.

He's planning a trip to a major city which has a bit of a reputation for a recurring street crime problem and he's reticent to take his M9 because it's his favorite current camera and, if stolen, would be very hard to quickly replace. If he could replace it at all. 

Mind you, this has nothing to do with the money he'd need to spend to replace it and everything to do with getting attached to a rare and hard to replace camera. He can afford to replace it easily and surely has it insured as well but if it goes away and he wants to replace it in time for the next adventure he may be out of luck. Worldwide the supply is limited and dwindling daily.

It was at that point in our conversation that he mentioned he was now researching an appropriate "Stunt Leica." I laughed and asked for elaboration. 

In his mind a stunt camera would be one that is easily replaceable with ample samples in the marketplace. A camera with basically the same operating process as the "higher emotional and sentimental value" model and one that will make good use of M series lenses. I think, based on our back and forth, that he'll eventually land on getting an M240 or an M262 or even an M-P as a stunt camera. Although I think the M-P is now bordering on becoming a collectible rarity. This would be the camera he would carry into dicey neighborhoods, challenging environments and any place else where loss or destruction is a real possibility. This is not to say that he is paranoid or wimpy. After all, he's one of my few friends who practiced highly immersed and unguided street photography in Mumbai. And Sixth St. in Austin (kidding, kinda). He just doesn't want to take the chance of losing a camera he feels a special bond to. One that might be hard, or near impossible, to replace. 

That's his definition of a stunt camera. It's the stand-in for the irreplaceable one.  It can't really be a different brand because usability and familiarity is important for real artists. Feel and operation are not interchangeable qualities when one is deeply familiar with a certain line of cameras. Muscle memory is a real thing...  I totally understand his reticence to put his favorite camera in harm's way. 

On the way home I thought about his funny description; a Stunt Camera. And then I thought about my own habits with cameras. I have three SL(x) models that are more current, more expensive, and more potentially useful to me than the two original SL models I started out with on this adventure. I presume that most people, when buying new cameras, would immediately sell off the older models. After all, no one can shoot with five cameras at once... Even if you didn't mind carrying them all. So, why do I keep the older SL cameras? 

Because they are wonderful to use --- but also more "expendable" than the newer, pricier models. They are weather-sealed and sturdy and all the SL cameras take the same batteries but their initial purchase prices (bought used) were half or less than the newer SL(x) cameras. I use the newer cameras for work but if I travel to Mexico City or San Francisco for fun I think perhaps taking a couple of older SLs, that are currently available used for under $1500, is a better idea than dragging around much more expensive models.  Ditto with lenses. A $440 Panasonic 50mm f1.8 is a great image maker and available a fraction of the cost of a $5,000 (USD) Leica 50mm APO Summicron SL. 

I would also consider the older cameras a better choice for going "off road" on something like a hiking trip in Big Bend. If I had to hammer tent pegs or smack a rattlesnake I'd rather do those things with a convenient stunt camera than one of my more valuable work cameras. And I already know I'm a clumsy rock climber; I have mangled, older cameras to prove it. 

When I got back to the studio I thought to myself that it's only a matter of time until I hear from Bob, we meet for lunch, and he pops an decent M240 out of his camera bag for my inspection. Fun times for sure. 

When I look into my equipment cart I realize that I have been assembling "Stunt Doubles" for many of my favorite lenses as well, without conscious thought. If I go out with M cameras there are good lenses to chose from and great lenses in the same focal lengths to choose from. It all depends on how much damage potential there might be in the photographic engagement at hand. I guess it all boils down to the idea of not carrying around anything you aren't comfortable losing. Given actual the situation you are facing. 

A banker's conference in a five star hotel? Any gear is good gear. Very little risk. Canoeing the rapids? Might want the stunt cameras for that....

A nice dilemma to have. 

 

Why I still write a blog. Why you should be interactive with your favorite blogger...even if it's not me. "Re-Printed" from MJ's blog from October 2011. Amusing how the internet time machine works...

 I wrote this post for Michael Johnston's "The Online Photographer" blog back in October of 2011. While MJ recently referred to me as a "gadfly" I still like him. And I still read his stuff on a near daily basis. This particular blog post is the long form of why I like his blog, why I'm glad it still survives and why you should be more vocal in your support. 

The original of this is here: https://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2011/10/kirks-take-kirk-tuck-1.html  go there if you want to see how it (visually) first appeared and also to read the 140+ comments that resulted from its publication. And to say, "Hi. And Thank You!" to Mike

Saturday, 29 October 2011

Kirk's Take (Kirk Tuck #1)

Series Introduction: Photographer, photo book author, and once and future photography blogger Kirk Tuck will be writing a regular column on TOP that will appear on the last Saturday of every month. That's the plan, at any rate. Welcome, Kirk. —Mike

What I learned when I stopped writing a photo blog

By Kirk Tuck

I’m a slow learner. I started writing a blog about photography back in the early part of 2009 and I didn’t do the business school routine of "establishing metrics" or "laying out a concise framework of goals and concepts of monetization." I really started writing the blog because I was bored, felt isolated and got tired of reading so much really bad information about photography on the web. I thought it would be fun to write honest and sometimes self-deprecating but true articles about the fun and the folly of actually being a professional photographer.

After writing a few posts about the business or about inspiration I learned that it takes time to build an audience. Lots of time. But I also learned that you can accelerate the process by doing exactly what most readers say they do not want you to do. In the case of a photo blog the mantra of the typical reader is that they prefer articles of substance that feed their souls and help them to understand why photography seems so vital to their own lives. In reality, when I wrote articles about why I shoot in the streets or, why I like to do portraits without an audience in tow, the silence in the virtual reading room was startling; depressing. You could hear pins drop and I got the distinct impression that I could drop dumpsters full of cymbals and no one would hear.

But I mentioned above that you could accelerate the number of readers your blog garners with a secret technique. Give your readers what they say they don’t want to read. I started writing equipment reviews of the cameras, lenses and lights that I was interested in. Then the camera brand tribes would come out from their villages and go to war. Everyone had an opinion about the performance of the Olympus EPL2 and its relevance in the hierarchy of current gear. Volumes of vitriol were tossed like gasoline onto the "red dots" cover-up. The review of that seemingly benign camera is still the single most popular blog I have written to date. And every time a wave of brand "true believers" came washing up on to the Visual Science Lab shores a percentage of the wave liked what they read around the edges of the article that had originally drawn them and they stayed on and became loyal readers. And that’s how VLS finally found its momentum and its place on the web.

But as Mike and the one or two other good bloggers on the web will tell you, writing once a week won’t keep them coming back. Just like the coffee and newspaper I consumed this morning, readers want a routine. They want a morning ritual. And that ups the ante for the writer. You start looking around to try and find more relevant content to feed the machine. In my case I wrote every word and took every photograph. I was truly invested in the site and it came to consume as much of my time as my regular photo work. Why? Probably because I grew up with the idea that "If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well." The idea of cranking out something half-assed grated against generations of puritanical upbringing. Doing things halfway was antithetical to the way I learned to make images.

No filters
But there's a dark side to being a blogger. Especially in a field where everyone is an "expert" and most of your readers are in technical fields that require quantifiable measures. To many of the blog readers I seemed to be an anonymous corporation putting out content in exchange for eyeballs. And people seem to have no filters when they communicate with corporate entities. I got some comments that had enough venom in them to take down a mastodon. A large number of ad hominem attacks came barreling into the comments box over "issues" that I would carefully classify as "opinions."

But the worse part of all was the idea that the angry reader had permission to track down my e-mail address and send me their hate mail "off-line." So I did a little experiment and I wrote about a new camera announcement. I wrote it as a "gauntlet toss" and stood back to watch. It got tons of page views. Then I wrote something that I really cared about, in the genre that my commenters claimed they wanted, and the page views dropped like bank stocks. While the gear article garnered dozens of comments in twenty four hours the essay on the reason we photograph managed to cobble together only three or four comments over the space of a week.

My takeaway lesson was that I'd spent two years building a blog for nothing. If readers just wanted information about the gear they could go to the "big daddy" of gear sites and grammatically nightmarish, full-contact forums: DPReview. There they could dissect every camera down to its measurable essence and then argue about the composition of the screws that hold the camera together. I was done. I didn't want to be a camera reviewer; I wanted to write about something different. So I made the announcement that I would stop.

Thousands of bright, serious people
And a funny thing happened on my way to consigning the blog to the scrap heap. I discovered my "silent majority." You’ve all heard the old saw that, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease." Well, the naysayers and vicious commenters had gotten the grease. They'd shut me down because I didn't hear from the other side. To be fair, I had a handful of genuinely wonderful readers who would drop regular comments of support but they seemed, at the time, to be a tiny minority. But the day I announced my (premature) retirement my comment box was filled with hundreds and hundreds of posts. Most started with, "I am sorry I never commented before but...."

And what I found is that there were literally thousands of bright, serious people who started everyday with the same routine, almost to a person. And that routine consisted of fixing a cup of coffee, sitting in front of their computer at home or in their offices, and reading whatever I had written on the Visual Science Lab blog. Almost to a person they had just come from, or would next go to, The Online Photographer blog. That was (and is) still their ritual. They didn’t feel the need to comment, they just enjoyed the reading and the implied inclusion into a circle of people, international in composition, who enjoyed photography and knowing more about why and what other people enjoyed about the art. In the process I learned a very valuable lesson. I had never really invited them to comment and to give me feedback. I’d never come right out and asked for it.

One person was instrumental in the clicking a switch in my brain. Here is what he wrote:

Roy said... 
Kirk; You may feel that you have been wasting time better spent on earning a living; not so. Most folks have a sphere of influence that is only as wide as their family and a few friends. Reading these many comments must let you know that your influence is global. Appreciate that as we have appreciated you. I am in my eighties and have just accepted your admonition to walk up to people on the street and ask if I may photograph them. It is still a nerve twister but I've found out it works. Thanks Kirk. I'll drop by now and then to see what else you can talk me into.

Roy kicked my ego-butt and made me realize that I got a value from writing the site that at least equalled my efforts. Even if it was ephemeral and karmic rather than material and measurable. When I read his response, and 250+ others in the comments and another several hundred sent directly to my e-mail, I realized that I'd hit exactly the audience I'd really hoped for when I began.

Kirk Tuck, Self Portrait

I decided to re-start the blog. And it's interesting because I feel like I've gotten permission from my readers to be more personal. To write what I want to write rather than what I think will attract bulk readers. I'm reaching down a little deeper to write things that seem, at times, bittersweet or frightening to me. I'm writing about what happens to us as we become "older" photographers. I'm writing about the "double-edged sword" of our isolation. And I hope I'll continue writing about what amazes and amuses me in my everyday life as an artist. And while this material won't garner me instant numbers growth I hope it will resonate with more and more people who are more curious about the "why" of visual art than just learning how to turn the switches and which menu items to select on their new Turboflex D1000D.

So I’m back. I intend to write a column at least once a month, here, for Mike (who has been a wonderful sounding board in my process of coming to grips with my process...) and to continue my "Chaos Theory" schedule of writing at the Visual Science Lab. While I intend to concentrate on the "whys," I still have a sweet tooth for gear so I can’t totally give up publicly pondering new equipment.

Finally, a warning. If you value what you read each day at Mike’s TOP, remember to say so, often and publicly, and not just here. While writers will write because they must, they also write for an audience. What Mike has done here is to elevate the discussions about art, literature, music and their interwoven effects on our passion for photography, high above the diatribes and mis-information that slops across the web. He reminds us that there's more to it all than just an argument about some arcane slice of techno-crud and he does so in a way that's both enjoyable and challenging. Don't assume that, because he has a few small ads tucked away on the sides of his site, he derives all he needs from the material revenue. Every writer needs the feedback of his or her readers. Let the writers you like know that they're part of your daily rituals and routine and their vision adds fuel and fun to yours. I've seen both sides and I know how important the reader is to the process. Make sure you are committed to doing your part. Let them know they influence people around the globe.

Good morning TOP. It's a beautiful day for photography!

Kirk

It's just about time for SXSW and the posters are starting to go up around downtown....

 

The fine print at the bottom of each poster.