Paris, Breakfast

Breakfast in Paris

I traveled for many years for work and always had some sort of camera along. During a one year period I decided to photograph my "days on the road" with the working title of 'Room Service'. I made images out my window, flowers on room service trays and whatever else crossed my lens.

This image was in the lobby of the George V Hotel in Paris.....

After many years I am finally getting around to that shoebox of film to see what's inside.....is it like a box of chocolates? Feels like a sequence might be on the horizon.......

Peter Gabriel

Peter Gabriel, Genesis

Peter Gabriel from the concept tour 'The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. The original image was an Ektachrome transparency moved into the digital world using an Imacon/Hasselbald scanner.

Of late I have been using NIK software and Photoshop quite a bit and this image was re-processed with a new workflow - those who follow my blog know I am huge fan of re-working images in this manner - always something new to learn.

'The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway' was a concept album (yes album - round disk with grooves) circa 1976 followed by a tour of the same name...

Meet Thy God

One Eye Open.....

This image is from the 1995. I was driving back from the opening concert for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with my friend Liz Mahon and we were splitting the driving between major highway and back roads....This image wa made somewhere on a backroad in Ohio....

While the RRHOF was opening there was another event coming to closure - the OJ Simpson trial....I clearly remember being in a general store watching the verdict....

The words at the top of the structure say "To Meet Thy God".... Looking back this image seems rather ironic today. 

Captured with a Nikon F series camera, tri-x 400, lens unknown

New Hampshire

'

New Hampshire

'As soon as your're born they make you feel small
By giving you no time instead of it all
'Til the pain is so big you feel nothing at all'........John Lennon

I have avoided this image for about 20 years. I see it in my lightroom catalog from time to time but have never thought to put it out. On some level this image has always represented a sort of isolation and loneliness.

I do remember having to wear tall waders while standing in the freezing water with a wooden tripod a 4x5 camera and film holders in a backpack. Must have been in the water about 30 minutes before I finally got the shot.  Those were the days my friend - those were the days.....

Captured using a Zone VI 4x5 camera, 120MM lens, Tri-x  scanned into the digital world by JS Graphics in Chicago.

Childhood

Fire Island, New York

There are days when I feel like a photographic chameleon. One second I am working on or teaching iPhone imagery and the next I am into landscape with a high res digital camera. But the images that always touch me the most are personal and have historical value on several levels. Not due to the fact that I know or am related to the participants, but because they relate to periods in my life - whatever the underlying reason may be.

Today's image is from the series  'Childhood and other Neighborhoods' which I have been working on for several years. I am starting to feel the series is close to coming out of the darkness.

The image was captured using a Pentax 67 and Tri-X 400 film - scanned into the digital world using a Hasselblad/Imacon scanner, circa 1994.

Chiaroscuro

'You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm'.....Colette

Working through my black and white Point and Shoot series has me thinking of the photographers who influenced me when I first got into photography. I clearly remember the first time I saw Ralph Gibson's book 'Chiaroscuro' and became immediately intoxicated with his high contrast, grainy images.

Ralph Gibson would pull you into his  images using grain, contrast and texture.  Starting out as a photojournalist, he claimed,  caused him to have a lifelong relationship with grain. Additionally, and unbeknown to me until today, he worked with Robert Frank (another early influence with his book, The Americans) on a film in 1969, Me and My Brother,  starring Allen Ginsburg.

It has been quite rewarding for me to look back on these early black and white days  - not sure what prompted this but happy that it happened. Opens yet another dialog in my head regarding the direction of my work.

The image in the header is a scan from an original 12X20 black and white negative. 

Only in New York

New York, NY

Another Point and Shoot image, circa 199, back in the days of pay phones...

Can't help but wonder what the story is.