On Dec 31, 2012, at 7:22 AM, Doug Brewer wrote: > On 12/29/12 1:22 AM, Larry Colen wrote: >> >> On Dec 28, 2012, at 8:00 AM, Doug Brewer wrote: >> >>> year-end survey of representative work: >>> >>> https://plus.google.com/u/0/115347824062413314605/posts/dL2uXjoYvRj >> >> Very nice. Some of them look downright film like, though it might just be >> what I can only describe as "retro composition". >> > > Thanks, Larry. I'm curious which one you thank are film-like. Also: can you > explain "retro composition"?
Going back and looking, I'd say 3 and 6 are the most film like, 4 also has some of it. I suspect that it is a case of exposure issues looking more like the weaknesses of film than the weaknesses of digital. As to retro composition, some of the photos have the feel of photos taken when I was much younger. Looking through, 3,6, &7. I can't say what makes them look like they might have been taken forty years ago. I suspect that there are two factors at play. One is that any activity where you make aesthetic choices will have styles and fashions. People do what they see/hear their social circle doing, because that is what seems right. A corollary to this would be, if you want to take better pictures, look at better pictures. I think that another factor is that the care and thought that goes into a photograph is generally in proportion to the cost, in money and in effort, of taking that photograph. Also, when each frame cost a perceptible amount of pocket change (click, that cost as much as a cup of coffee), the people being photographed took a bit more care either because they didn't want to screw up the photo and cost the photographer extra money, or because they knew that they wouldn't get a second chance and if they looked dorky, that's how they'd be memorialized. I'm not saying that people consciously thought of these things, or that everyone did, but over time, photos have become far less formal. People don't get dressed up every time someone is going to take a photo of them. It could be entertaining to do a series of anachronistic photos. Have a couple of women dress up in 60's cocktail party fashion and do photos with them holding the camera at arms length and making duck face. Get kids dressed up in 1980's punk, and pose them like a photo from the 1880's. Dress a couple of people up like hippies, in front of a psychedelic VW bus, and HDR the photo past all bounds of taste and decency. > > >> Number 8, what seems to be some NCWA folks, is a wonderfully evocative >> composition. Almost dadaesque. > > Just having some fun out at the local battlefield. It's great when the > elements line up like that. > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- Larry Colen [email protected] sent from i4est -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
