Author: nixonphoto

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Island Bound

I’m getting ready to head off for a long weekend at the beach again.  It feels like one last summer adventure before Autumn gets her grips into  us.  I’m hoping for clear skies so that I can work more on my project capturing still things such as rocks in moving water like the image above.  This image was taken at the beach earlier in the summer during a longer stay that I had.  I got up early many mornings, taking full advantage of the fact that since I was only moments away from the beach I could get precious extra minutes in bed.  I generally like to arrive well before sunrise and generally shoot until sunrise.  I like the amount and quality of the pre-dawn light which allows me to easily blur the water as I did here.  This morning I once again learned the lesson that you need to be very careful when shooting around water – a rogue wave soaked me to the skin, fortunately I got my camera safely out of the water, and though I was a little shaken up I continued on shooting to get the image above.

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The Future of the Book

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I’ve been on the road a fair bit over the last week or so. One the topics that we kept returning to was the future of the book. I find it hard to imagine that the book will completely go away. At least I don’t want to imagine that future but it’s increasingly likely that the majority of new books will be electronic.

It seems that there are amazing opportunities here – electronic books can be a much richer experience than a physical book, with the ability to link out to the web, to incorporate still images or video to illustrate a point the future looks very interesting. Bookstores are going to have to adapt to this new reality and are doing so by producing their own e-book readers. Of course not everyone gets this right.

I do wonder how small bookstores will adapt to the rise of e-books. Will they essentially become electronics retailers like their big box counter parts? Will most small bookstores be shuttered? Time will obviously tell, but I can certainly envision a place for the smaller specialty bookstore that meets the needs of a very specific group of customers in a way that can’t be met online.

For author it’s now quite cheap and relatively easy to skip the publisher and publish your own work. That has to be a good thing but it also shifts more of the burden of publishing the work onto the author. The author now becomes the content creator, editor, book designer and marketer. It would be rare to find someone who’s abilities cut across all of these areas. The sensible author would be one who looks to partner with editors, designers and marketers. Perhaps this is how the specialty book store comes in – to help with marketing.

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Friday Inspiration: Danny Gregory – An Illustrated Life

Danny Gregory’s book ‘An Illustrated Life‘ arrived this week.  This is part of my continuing exploration of how visual artists engage with their chosen medium on a daily basis.   Keeping a visual journal seems to be a common way to keep the energy up and to stay creative.  ‘An Illustrated Life‘ is not a new book, rather it was published in 2008, is a collection of example pages of the journals of 50 illustrators, artists, and designers with a short introduction from each.  After a quick flip through, I’m part of the way through it in more detail – it’s going to be something that I’m going to enjoy dipping into on a regular basis over the next few weeks.  A video for the book is below.

Danny’s other books are well worth checking out as is his website, where you can find examples of his journals.

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Going for a Spin

I have had a lot of fun so far this year looking for ways that I can bring a sense of motion into my photographs.  To do that I have been experimenting with moving the camera.  One series of experiments involved panning with a slow shutter speed, both vertically and horizontally, a variety of different subjects.  Some of the results I quite liked and I will continue on with those ideas.  On the day I took the photograph above I was headed back to the car after a morning shoot.  Although I wasn’t ready to be done, the sun was too bright for the kind of photographs that I prefer.  As I walked back down the road I noticed a patch of rocks that had interesting colors.  The straight shots I made were okay, but wanting something different I tried both panning the camera and rotating the camera.  The result of rotating the camera is shown above.

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Watching the Weather

As a photographer and a sailor the weather has a major impact on my activities. As a photographer I look for weather that suits the style of photographs that I’m currently working towards and plan appropriately. As a sailor I’m watching the weather and modifying the sails to match changes in wind and changing plans to account for storms.

We need to be equally skilled at looking for and responding to the winds of change in our careers and personal lives. We must change and continue to innovate if the hope is to build and sustain our business and career. Being creative, looking beyond the obvious, offering something more than just what the camera is able to bring seems to be the way to succeed. Opportunities abound for those willing to try small experiments, review the feedback from those experiments and try again until something is found that works.

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Friday Inspiration: Eliot Porter

I find Eliot Porter’s style of intimate landscapes particularly powerful.  I recently came across the video below, ‘A Look Back’, a documentary put together shortly after his death in 1990.  I quite enjoyed it and hope that you will too.  You can find out more about Eliot Porter on the web here.  Many of his books can be found used on amazon.com and are well worth looking out for.

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Fogged In

It always surprises me that summer days along the coast can start off very foggy. This is typical of summers in Maine but also happens often in long island sound. Perhaps you already understand the phenomenon, I didn’t but after getting up at 3 am on a couple of mornings to find myself socked in with fog I thought that I ought to understand how to predict whether the morning will be foggy or not. This link seems to provide the answer.

Of course we can’t control the weather and with limited time sometimes you just have to roll with what nature serves up. This is exactly what I did on this morning. I was at a new beach and although I had a general sense of where I was going wasn’t 100% sure. I could hear the ocean but couldn’t see it. I headed along the beach until I found the rocks that I’d seen using google maps. Once on location I played around for a while and made the image below.

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Friday Inspiration: Joel Tjintjelaar

I’m continuing on with my theme of photographers that shoot long black and white exposures today with Joel. Joel has an interesting website that has features tutorials for those people interested in pursuing the long exposure images that he’s known for.

I first became aware of Joel’s work through the Nik Software ad for Silver Efex Pro. In fact the video below is a Nik Software promotional video in which Joel discusses his intent and the process for realizing it.

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Trees in Motion

I have been playing with the interaction of still and moving, generally trying to combine the two into a single photograph.  When I saw these trees together on my way down to the beach recently I wondered whether I could build on my interest in motion to create an image that I was happy with.  I took a lot of frames but was happiest with the one above.  I may try more of these!

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Friday Inspiration: Michael Levin in Japan

I first came across Michael Levin‘s work last year when it was featured in George Barr‘s book – Why Photographs Work: 52 Great Images Who Made Them, What Makes Them Special and Why. Michael works in black and white using long exposures, as long as 60 minutes, to create images that have been described as ‘soulful and evocative’. Read an interview with Michael in ‘The F-Stop Magazine’ here.

The video below was shot in Japan by Brad Kremer and is a showcase for who Michael is and what his work is about.

KI: Michael Levin from Brad Kremer on Vimeo.

More videos featuring Michael’s process can be found here.