Quit bitching About the Cost of Technology Kids..

I read Tom Hogan's blog piece today about the cost of technology:

http://www.sansmirror.com/newsviews/2020-mirrorless-camera/stop-being-a-technophobe.html

and I have to say right on! Really, quit bitching about  the cost of tech i.e XQD and CF express media, as digital photographers its baked into the medium now. I've been working digitally since around 2002 and its never been cheap. I have the Syquest drive carts to prove it along with hundreds of so called "gold archival" DVD's which are all going bad and it seems plenty of Jazz Drive backups that I can't access anymore. It's the game we're in and if your not up for that, perhaps you should be working with analog, perhaps a 5x7, oh I forgot the price of 5x7 film from Ilford just went up........($59.99 for 25 sheets)

Oh yes, and to end this rant I just purchased a 8TB 3.5" spinning drive this weekend for $199.00, that's like $25 a TB which not too long ago was a hopeful fantasy.

Happy New Year Everyone!

Holt Cemetery, New Orleans

The value of gear

This week I had one of my Nikon F2's serviced and re-stored by Sover Wong, who is like the Patron Saint of Nikon F2's. He only works on F2's and does complete restorations to them. He has in the past rebuilt one other camera and two meter heads and this is my third body he has restored for me. Its not cheap, his typical repair is $250. and you can buy a pretty clean used F2 for less than that but there is something especially nice about a fully accurate meter system and shutter. Which brings me to the point of all of this, I am sure a used $100 body would work well enough but there is a special satisfaction with using gear that just works well and without complaint. I guess that's what separates the really practical shooter from the person who's art making experience extends to the art making object. My friend Carol talks about her water color brushes with a level of enthusiasm that I do not fully comprehend but I do appreciate. Walker Evans spoke about how the tool takes on some of the personality or spirit of its long time user, perhaps thats part of it for me.

Photos by Sover Wong of my F2 shot as he repaired the camera.

I did not shoot a lot of 35mm this past year, mostly it was large format and digital but I am hoping to get more work done with my new restored F2 in 2020. In 1974 I worked in an all you can eat seafood restaurant in R.I. to earn enough money to buy my first real professional camera and it was a Nikon F2 and ever since then I have had a soft spot for that camera. I like to think that the F2 and my first photo teacher taught me about being an artists.

Six Muses shoot

For the third year I did a shoot with six models at the studio, its a challenge working with six people but this group all knew each other before the shoot and everyone was very comfortable.

Studio shoot with Ellen

Ellen has worked with me for at least 16 years now, first as a department model and now as one of my regular subjects.

Last R.I. photo day

Beavertail Point

Last shoot at Black Point

Quonochontaug Breachway

Breakwater, Camp Cronin, Pt. Judith, Narragansett, R.I.

Learning to paint in the fog

Black Point fisherman

open air movie night, Beavertail Point

Beach Landscape, Scarabough State Beach

Last stop in the boatyard before the junkyard

Along I-44 rural Missouri

Pool shoot in the CWE

My favorite "muse" and collaborator Carol like to do a pool shoot during the summer, its often a logistical headache arranging the schedule for myself, Carol and the pool owner not to mention dealing with the weather. Today it all came together in a very special location in the CWE.

New figure work from June 2019

It's been a busy June at the Tyson studio, my goal for May-June was to get in 20 shoots at the studio and I made it!

Here's a small selection from some of that work:

My work on the Oxford American site: "A Matter of Faith"

After 13 years I have closed the books on the last of my Post Katrina projects, "A Matter of Faith" tracks the rebuilding of the faith based community in the lower 9th ward of New Orleans.

https://www.oxfordamerican.org/item/1738-houses-of-worship

Beatrice on the road

River Tug in the fog

Spillway in the fog

New work from "Portfolio for Bart"

In pulling for for a grant, I found this image that I never converted from the RAW file. I am thinking I'll be doing more work like this in the spring once the studio gets back on line again.

Earliest Example of Digital Figure Studies 2002

My very first digital camera as a Kodak 4800, a camera with so many compromises I did not have it long, I soon acquired in 2002 a Nikon Coolpix E5000. It was a 5 mp camera with terrible shutter lag (yes that was a real thing in early digital) and questionable AF, but it was a start. I think it cost me close to $900 (the price of the bleeding edge of tech).

I do not think they even made RAW files, it only shot in jpg and tiff (8 bit) formats. I originally opened the files in Photoshop 7 (not CS 7 either kids) but these files were opened in Capture One 12 and then post processed into B and W using NIK Silvereffects.

Wetlands, St. John the Baptist Parish, La.

Frenchman Street, New Orleans

Madonnas of NOLA

Tyson double exposure

Aimee 2004

I've been lucky enough to have been able to photograph my friend Aimee since 1994, she is for lack of a better word, a warrior in many ways (but not in a literal military way). This one is from some early digital studio work & shot with a Nikon D100, my first DSLR. This file was RAW converted with PS 2018 and then converted into a B & W image with Silver Effects Pro.