Landscape – Page 651 – Woody Campbell

Monday October 31, 2011

NEW YORK NEW YORK – I took a walk today in Central Park looking for storm damage with my Alpa TC and 35mm Schneider lens. The camera provoked a number of conversations. There were a lot of tree limbs down, but nothing very dramatic. I needed up shooting a pretty conventional rocks and trees image but the high resolution medium format files make it seem important:

I’ve taken this picture before, actually quite a few times. Here for example is an olive tree from the Pelopnnesian Peninsula taken in 1970 with my twin lens Rollei 2.8F. The tree was probably a couple of thousand years old when I shot it. I hope the intervening 40 years have been kinder to it than they have been to Greece in general.

Here we go with the “Its all about me” part of this post. I’m now actually embarrassed that I started out posting these things, but having started I need to finish. Here’s 7:01 AM on February 14, 1999.

Sunday October 30, 2011

WARREN CONNECTICUT – It finally stopped snowing around noon. We got a devastating 21 inches of wet, heavy snow. Most of the trees still had all of their leaves so the snow collected on them, breaking or uprooting trees in absolutely record number. Power, telephone and cable and internet are out over most of the state. This is been called the most damaging storm in Connecticut’s history. We have a backup generator for occasions like this (we loose power several times each winter; without power the heating system doesn’t work; if the house gets below freezing there is massive damage to the plumbing). Anyway, I took my Alpa (with the 35mm Schneider) out after the storm cleared. Here’s what it looked like – a typical January scene on October 30.

These images exploit the amazing dynamic range of the Phase One IQ 180 back.

It’s me again, this time at 6:03 on February 14, 1999. As I’ve said quite a few times now this is one of a series of hourly self-portraits shot with an Arca Swiss 8×10 view camera.

Saturday October 29, 2011

WARREN CONNECTICUT – Well here it is, not quite November yet, and we’re suffering a blizzard. Our preparations for winter were not quite complete, but we have replaced our backup generator that failed during this fall’s hurricane. I went out into it with my Alpa, Here are two typical images – the first a monochrome and the second in color (the idea was to record the point that the trees still have their fall foliage). It was a monochrome day – you almost can’t tell the difference. This is classic “be there” stuff.

More of me. This series is making me increasingly uncomfortable – it’s just not in my DNA to post pictures of myself. Anyway, here’s 4:54 AM on February 14, 1999. One of a series of hourly shots taken with a Arca Swiss 8×10 camera.

Friday October 28, 2011

NEW YORK NEW YORK – A great day for late fall light. I found myself at Columbus Circle with my Alpa. This was an easy day for me, photographically. The subway image prints at 24×36 nicely and has a vigor that I’m trying to achieve in every image, but actually don’t often realize.

So dear reader, here is my self-portrait from 3:58 AM on February 14, 1999. We’ll come to the end of these soon enough. I generally disapprove of blogs that feature pictures of their creators, but since we got off on the subject of appropriation in art in an earlier post I just thought it would be interesting to post my own examples.

Wednesday October 26, 2011

NEW YORK NEW YORK – Another busy day for my day job. Managed to have my leica with me as a walked home from 86th Street. I tried a lens that I rarel use, a 40mm Summicron-C. It was designed for use with the Minolta CLE. It’s character is similar to the 35mm pre-asph Summicron, but it lacks the creamy out of focus areas of the 35mm. The 40mm lens is the most compact M-mount Leica lens that I know of. The composition of today’s picture in uncomfortably tight – a result of the 40mm focal length.

Still running through the hourly self portraits, this one from 2:00 AM on February 24, 1999.

Tuesday October 25, 2011

NNEW YORK NEW YORK – So I’m using my Alpa and a 35mm Schneider as my walk-around camera. This only works on sunny days – I’m a sunny day kind of guy so I prefer these anyway. Here’s in image from Madison Avenue and 55th Street

Here’s the next in my series of 24 self portraits taken in 1999. This is from 12:58 AM on February 14, 1999. I slept on a cot in my studio, setting an alarm to wake my hourly for a picture. I clearly haven’t been to sleep on yet because I still look fairly well put together.

Monday October 24, 2011

NEW YORK NEW YORK – More fussing around with my new iPhone 4S. I tried my classic out my window brick wall torture test, shooting with the phone braced against a window sill to approximate the effect of being on a tripod. I used the “HDR” (high dynamic range) mode given the phone’s tendency to blow highlights and the long dynamic range of the scene. It turns out that this was a mistake – on close inspection there are ugly white bands where the buildings meet the sky. After a bit of digging online I came to the conclusion that Apple dramatically over sharpens in HDR mode – so for future reference I’ll be avoiding it. Later in the evening I shot a Martini at the Monkey Bar – odd that this famous bar serves a Martini in a sherry glass. Whatever . . .

The next installment in my 1999 24-houe self portrait project – this one from 12:08 AM on February 14, 1999. As always taken with an Arca Swiss 8×10 inch view camera.