Duesenberg Photography - As the Wrench Turns - Cheap Matinee
One of the common problems at outdoor events photography is the contrast between shiny reflective surfaces and those areas in shade. I use a circular polarizing filter and mild fill flash as much as possible. Some car show shots remain very tricky. That white reflective plastic on some identification placards and the "glow white" paint on license plates are a plague. Its like having a mirror in the middle of a photo reflecting your fill flash. These surfaces may catch the sun or interior lights. You actually need to carry a black drop cloth to cover those license plates or in some cases the signs and markers. I always get a separate shot of the placards and signs. I do two or three close-up no flash angled shot of the placard to insure it fills the whole frame in sharp focus and does not pick up sun or light reflections. I even shoot placards using my own shadow to dampen reflections.
In the photo above, the area under the bonnet is lit by fill flash, yet the white wall tires remain in moderate contrast and the glare from chrome and windscreen is reduced somewhat by the polarizer. This is a very reduced resolution thumbnail for the purpose of this illustration but the full size photo allows a detail study of every part of the car.
I've been listening to discussions by pro-photogs
on Pixel Corps TWIP, and most of them who take
live event shots and outdoor nature and
opportunity shots carry only one filter, a top
quality circular polarizer. The problems of
setting white balance for indoor lighting is ugly,
literally and figuratively. I just don't
photograph in bad light. It is not that important
to me. When the photography begins to detract
from the experience of the place I'm visiting, I
just drop it.
This Week In Photography
This Week in Media
http://www.pixelcorps.tv/
http://www.imaging-resource.com/
http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/G9/G9A.HTM
Unfortunately the equip it takes to set-up an
indoor shot with poor light can't be carried in a
jacket pocket on an MC and frankly I just don't
bother with it. Great museums like the Henry Ford
Dearborn are so poorly lighted that I would take a
film company with banks of lamps and giant
umbrella reflectors to fill a 20x20 space with
light. Huge objects like the giant steam engines
just fade away into a murky infinity of smudged
shadows. Carriages made from lacquered wood and
leather soak up enough light to illuminate a ball
field. The typical convention hall with an indoor
Hot-rod show or New Car show is lighted with
combinations of overhead neon and merc and
incandescent - 200-300 points of light at all
angles messing up shots. The cars are thirty feet
below the lights in a relative darkness with
hundreds of annoying reflections repeated on every
glossy surface. That is why real pros get th big
bucks (maybe).
In fact I'm thinking of simplifying and turning
back to a very high quality point and shoot like a
Canon G9 which many pro photogs carry as their
grab-shot spare camera. I want more-or-less
"thoughtless" photography where I only have to
subsume myself into the composition and not worry
about exposure and depth of field.
My naming conventions keep all associated photos
sorted together in a folder so the shot of the
sign or placard is always included in a series
sequential to the car it describes. I use an
initial and number series to describe time and
place, then the name of the mfg, then year &
model, then coach maker, then body style, then
detail of the shot. I can sort any makes and
models or anything I shot at any particular event
or location, or search by year etc. individual
car series come up in sets including the signs and
placards. It is critical to have this kind of self
sorting convention as the memory fades into old age.
Gilmore Museum 2007, 1929 Duesenberg Model J dual
cowl phaeton, La Grande Union City Body, shot from
the left front.
CCCA07 Duesenberg 1929 J DC phaeton LagrandeUC LF
CCCA07 Duesenberg 1929 J DC phaeton LagrandeUC placard
Inserting photo dat into the meta-data fields is pointless because it won't sort in an ordinary folder. I suppose there are some proprietary utilities that can keep track of this. I'm sure the new GPS protocols will add some usability here and be enable sorting on time and place, but not by object. My naming conventions will sort an any folder hierarchy without proprietary tagging.
At some point equipment and software, like the
up-coming new Microsoft RAW protocol, will help
eliminate these problems for ill equipped
amateurs. Some super-powerful automated photoshop
action in combination with a camera mode setting
called "Lousy Museum RAW". Until then, photo sites
and archives will remain full of murky-glaring-ill
focused unrecognizable blots with the occasional
accidental perfect dramatic capture. Its about a
20:1 work to result ratio to get anything usable
and I'm too lazy and relaxed to make the effort.
Outdoor shooting static objet d'art like vintage
cars and architecture is about a 5:1 reward ratio
- pretty happy results usually.
The history of photography and motion video is one
of gradual independence from a prepared set and
bulky static equipment. We're getting there. The
problem is the camera cannot infer what is implied
in a shadow as can the human brain. We
unconsciously complete the image of a known or
assumed object in out minds even when we can only
see a portion of it. This condition adds drama
and artistic ambiguity to some photos but merely
leaves out critical information in others.
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As the Wrench Turns
This may be a non-starter. Zip and Zap have
little to say that is factual about anything.
They may appeal to a small segment that make the
tiny NPR audience seem large in their experience.
Their very specialized audience laugh at humor
based on the presumptive canards of the arch
Jacobins who believe their own legend of elite
infallibility. Yip and Yap's annoying self
deprecation is painfully false and is a cover for
incompetence. They would be much funnier had they
a grasp of automotive history and solid factual
understanding of the subjects they discuss. There
audience is a class who watch PBS who live in a
realm of frozen Leftist stereotypes initialized in
the 1960s.
There is a superb British automotive series called
TOP GEAR which has been on BBC for about a decade.
It is supposed to be due for Americanized
syndication on NBC. I can only imagine how an
irreverent, wildly humorous, utterly
disrespectful, thoroughly critical bunch of hard
drinking, hard driving Brits will adapt to a "no
criticism" detroit approved pablum adaptation
sqeezed between twenty minutes per hour of
insulting advertising.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/topgear/
http://youtube.com/watch?v=WaWoo82zNUA
PHILOSOPHY OF PBS CARTALK SNOIDS
Any foreign car is better than any American car
The car was invented by fascists (conservative capitalist entrepreneurs)
All cars made prior to 1995 should be destroyed except a few Volvos
All cars not Volvos should be destroyed
Auto racing, auto restoration, auto collecting, historic auto enthusiasm is a trivial mindless pursuit for dangerous ignoramuses who should be arrested and tortured. Stupid ignorance of these interests is a sign of advanced "progressive" enlightenment.
Mass transit must replace individual autos even if
it does not go anywhere
A few cars will be preserved for the convenience
of academics, social workers and auto mechanics
We love high fuel prices just like Europe - it cramps the insufferable conservative yokels and hot-rodders
Anyone not from the northeast elite corridor and educated as a liberal arts major is a non-person, to be exploited, possibly somewhat amusing but to be largely ignored
SUV and PU Truck owners are criminals and should be shot in the basement of the Lubyanka
CARTALK CALLERS;
are social workers, teachers, veterinary
assistants, Nat'l Park guides, lesbian
Episcopalian clerics and mental defective welfare
drop-outs
give their cars cute names
cant find a hole in a donughnut or walk and chew gum
converse with their pets
are confused by Newtonian physics - the difference between momentum, inertia, gravity and centrifugal force
are experts on tarot, astrology and Zoroastrianism
Pip and Dip the Humbug Brothers can't help callers with their car maintenance, but can advise them on massage therapy, colonics, whoopie cushions and plastic turds
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Tonight's Movies
(8-1-08)
Double feature DVD - Heady Lamar
DISHONORED LADY http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0039324/
STRANGE WOMAN http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038990/
Still available from Netflix on DVD
ECSTACY http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001443/
These are trivial Sat matinee women's fantasy pieces, yet an amusing change of pace. Heady was
quite a looker. She was born in Austria and hated
Hitler. She and her piano composer boyfriend
George Antheil, created the concept (and patented)
the frequency "hopping" encryption (anti-jamming)
guidance system for radio controlled torpedos and
bombs. Yes for our side, WW2. This stuff cracks
me up no end. She does a full frontal nude scene
in one of her earliest movies, Extase 1933.
Read the excellent history/biog of Lamarr and Anteil at INVENTIONS.ORG
http://www.hedylamarr.org/hedystory5.html
http://www.inventions.org/culture/female/lamarr.html
Hedy Filmography
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001443/
She had a supporting role in the Steinbeck -
Victor Flemming - Spencer Tracy TORTILLA FLAT.
She also had a role in SLAUGHTER ON TENTH AVENUE,
but her scenes were deleted!?? This film was an early Walter Mathau work, with Dan Duryea.
Possibly the greatest dramatic sound track of any film, in my opinion equal to any Gershwin or
Copeland modern orchestral piece. Music was from
a Rogers Ballet - SEE BELOW
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http://www.answers.com/topic/slaughter-on-tenth-avenue?cat=entertainment
Though Slaughter on Tenth Avenue's background
music relies heavily on the Richard Rodgers
composition of the same name, the film itself
bears no relation to the ten-minute ballet for
which Rodgers wrote the piece. Instead, this
Albert Zugsmith-produced crime meller attempts to
expose waterfront union racketeering. In trying to
solves a murder on the docks, deputy DA Richard
Egan runs up against the stevedores' code of
silence. It also dawns on Egan that his own boss
(Sam Levene) shows little interest in pursuing
justice in this instance. The DA is finally able
to mount a case, but at the crucial courtroom
moment he may have to pull out due to lack of
evidence--a lack engineered by crooked boss Walter
Matthau, who has several local politicians in his
pocket. A last-minute dockside battle enables Egan
to bring the racketeers to justice. Slaughter on
Tenth Avenue was based on New York district
attorney William J. Keating's memoirs The Man Who
Rocked the Boat. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Yesterday's surprise discoveries. A DVD from Public Library contained several 50s TV detectives
Craig Stevens PETER GUNN (Blake Edwards Writer Creator Driector)
Gene Barry BURKES LAW
David Janssen RICHARD DIAMOND PRIVATE DET
And a Bulldog Drummond English mystery and a fantastically funny sarcastic and well acted Boris Karloff as Mr. Wong. Detective!!! Absolutely the
whole cast was lit up and haveing a whopping good time - HILARIOUS ON PURPOSE with underplayed supporting roles rich with sarcastic humor by Maxine Jennings and George Lloyd
http://www.dvdverdict.com/reviews/mrwong.php
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000472/
MR. WONG DETECTIVE
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030473/
