Comparing

In the beginning I helped beta test Affinity Photo, but being a long-term Photoshop user I didn’t buy  the program because I wasn’t interested in relearning all the short cut keys and other ways that Affinity differed, to become as proficient with it as I was with Photoshop.

That was a few years ago now and my version of PS (CS6) is ancient and standing in the way of me updating my OS because CS6 wont work with the newest version, so it was either go to the cloud or look for alternatives.

At the beginning of the lockdown I began to receive offers to buy Affinity Photo for half price at €28, which, lets face it, is a bargain, but one I ignored, at least until now.

Yep, I splurged and bought the software, no big deal really.

My initial response was, oh no, it’s nothing like PS, I’m going to have to relearn every little thing, why did I do this?

But then, a few YouTube videos later, things became a little bit clearer and easier.

It became obvious that I had set myself up for failure.

I use a graphics tablet with all the P.S. short cuts already loaded, so adding layers etc. is the press of a button. I don’t even need to think about it.

I hadn’t done set the tablet with Affinity so things were difficult at first.

As of this writing, the program seems pretty impressive, especially for the price.

Long ago, when Adobe went to cloud-based monthly fees, I did say to all who would listen that it was a good thing, because a startup would eventually come along and give us photographers what we need at a price we could afford. Not every user is a professional re-toucher who needs all PS’s bells and whistles, some of us just want to do the same with a digital negative as we did with analogue ones.

The image only needed some light work with the inpainting brush and a few adjustments for contrast. A couple of minutes of work once I worked out where the brushes were.

Optional Pain

Pain may not seem to have a lot to do with the lack of creativity, but I would argue that anything that nags away at you on a daily basis, will eventually build up an internal resistance and just aggravate the hell out of you, thereby disturbing the meditative state needed to think.

OK, some might argue that pressure is better than tranquility and I wouldn’t nay say that.

But, no wait, I’m getting away from the point.

Let me explain.

For years (and I do mean many years) I have been using the computer to work with photographs. I don’t manipulate in the traditional sense, it’s more a replication of traditional darkroom techniques, but it is still labour intensive.

I actually thought using the computer was safer because messing with chemicals in a small, warm, darkroom, can often lead to health problems.

Here is what I know now.

Analogue processing may not be great for the lungs and skin, but digital is murder for muscles and joints. I have Repetitive Strain Injury/Tennis Elbow or whatever your doctor’s favourite term is from the years of abuse with mouse and graphic pencil my favoured right arm endured. I had had a 6 month hiatus from the computer before I began UT’s again. However, with the increased activity the pain crept back, and with it the sure knowledge that the only way to find relief is to stop using the computer.

Tough decisions are needed. I have already managed to teach myself to use my left hand for the graphics pencil in a effort to circumnavigate the problem, but it is slow and irritating to work with this option, which disturbs the thought process and….

Chasing the Lightning

It was with relief that I welcomed the lightning and accompanying rain yesterday. After a few days of heat it was nice to feel the rush of cold wind, and then there was the light show.

In the past I’ve often sat and watched lightning flash across the sky, but last night I wondered if it was feasible to actually photograph it without using either long exposures or a light sensitive shutter sensor that reacts to the lightning flash.

As you can see, the answer is yes if the storm goes on long enough, then one is bound to get lucky.

In total I managed three exposures with lightning streaks, which was enough. So I returned to my book and a beer and enjoyed the gusting cool breezes the storm created.

It seems, according to news reports, that yesterday much of the world was stormy in various degrees of severity. In Berlin it was pleasant, but I have plans for dinner in a beer garden tonight, so I’m hoping there’s no encore.

24mm, f2, 1/30sec, ISO320.

too good to ignore, but not needed at the moment

Today was an archive day, a day spent going through older photos searching for overlooked gems. I do this often, more to see what I was doing a year or so ago than anything else, plus revisiting pictures that had been post-processed but for which I’d found no use at the time. I have a large volume of pictures stored away that fit into a category I call too good to ignore, but not needed at the moment that I regularily revisit. Today’s picture was one I liked when I shot it, liked more after post-processing, but never found a use until today.

It has most of the elements of Dutch 17^th-century paintings, with its pools of dark, dominant bright area and a gentle disappearing perspective. So it will come as no surprise to learn that it was shot in Warsaw towards the end of a day spent at the National Gallery where the art is classical and there are a lot of Dutch masters on display. Clearly what I had seen that day influenced the way I framed and photographed this scene, but isn’t that true of many things in life?

Now, with the distance of time, I can appreciate the beauty and restful stillness in the picture, and find a use for it.

50mm, f5.,1/125sec, ISO 125

Rock and Roll Legend

40mm, f4, 3sec, ISO200

Yesteryear as Tomorrow

Nostalgia seems to be the order of the day in the art and fashion world. Everywhere I look things are so retro it appears we are accelerating forward into the past. Fashion cycles are so common that speaking about them has become a cliché, but these retro things seem to have legs, due partly I suppose to the fluidity and impermanence of the present.

Or the oft-repeated lament that things were so much better in the past.

Maybe they were, but I’m not so sure.

Things were different, but better, for me that’s a tough sell.

When we talk about photography in the past tense it’s usually about film and the special intangible it has, which is true, but then it was also true that to get a good print it needed to be printed on very nice silver rich paper. What’s also true and often forgotten is that the waste from the process was also one of the world’s major water pollutants.

Such is memory.

This picture for all intent and purposes looks like it was shot on film, but it wasn’t.

But it could have been, although it I would have then  needed to get everything right in the camera to be able to print the glowing skin tones like you see them.

Today it’s comfortable chairs and glowing screens.

Back then it was darkness, chemical smells and stains and headphones.

Sometimes I miss the way-back-when, but not at this moment in time.

The picture was shot with a large 1200 x 600 cm soft box as the light source. The flash was about 3 meters from the woman, this reduces contrast and eliminates hot spots on the skin. Technically this is due to the Inverse Square Law and this lighting style was very popular in the bygone days of the silver screen and with fine art photographers of the not to distant past.

 

50mm, f11, 1/100sec, ISO100

Find The Photographers

Have you ever wondered how many pictures are taken every day? I do, on occasion. The number must be staggering and aren’t we lucky we all went digital in time to save the planet. I like film, but let’s face it, photography was one of the major polluters of the planet until it became bits and bytes, ones and zeros.
No one ever talked about it much, but the amount of toxic chemicals that went into the sewerage system in the good old days was massive. Even the chemicals from labs needed to go somewhere and although companies specialized in extracting the silver from developer, the fixer and stop baths chemicals were flush-away waste.
A small thing to ponder.
How many photo-nuts like myself were once out there with their own little darkrooms, working away, processing film and printing prints. These dedicated photographers usually wanted the best possible negatives and prints, which meant constantly renewing the chemicals. With no other options, the exhausted chemicals were flushed down the toilet. This toxic cocktail of chemicals eventually progressed to the ocean, frightening isn’t it?
Nostalgia may make one feel warm and fuzzy, but it was the good old ways that are responsible for the mess the world’s in today.
If you look closely at the bottom of this picture taken in Taipei at the National Cultural Centre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Chiang_Kai-Shek_Culture_Center)
you can see there are six people with cameras taking photos.
Now pause and think how little of the world can be seen within this picture, in this brief moment and then extrapolate the daily potential for photographs globally, add the desire to show these pictures by the mass of people taking photographs every minute every second and what we have is information overload. A blizzard of pictures so dense the only way to stand out is via sensation and even that is beginning to pall.
It makes me wonder what the future of photography will look like. Will its popularity fade as video becomes easy to edit in your phone or tablet and upload times are reduced to seconds. Maybe photography will pass from the mainstream the way so many things have, leaving only a core of true believers, those ossified relics with an unshakeable belief in outdated technologies.
People such as me.
Shot with a Canon G12, set on program