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Toronto Contact Photography Festival – May 1-31 2010

Last week I spent 2 days gallery-hopping at the Toronto Contact Photography festival. It’s always a treat to see so many photographic works being exhibited at the same time. This festival shows photography work all around the city of Toronto (from local and International artists)  but it’s mostly concentrated downtown.

I go to these events purely to see good photography and to get inspired. I LOVE seeing work that moves me even if it is outside what I normally consider to be ‘my’ subject matter. As with most photography festivals, the majority of the work does not appeal to me. Photography for the most part is a one frame deal and if I have to look too hard for the deeper meaning,  or work to see the greatness of the shot, then for me the photograph makes me go “meh”. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE symbolism, I love images laden with themes and I love double or triple meanings in an image but SHOW it to me. Don’t embed the gold too deeply in the image, make the gold shine. Don’t make me go back to a text on mythology with an obscurely titled photograph, show me something universal that moves me now.

There were far too many exhibitions to see them all but I did see a good 20 exhibitions. I should say that I missed at least 3 shows purely because I could not find them. Herman & Audrey is a show that I would have LOVED to have seen. I drove to address the on Dufferin, in fact I planned part of my day on that show since the gallery opened at 4pm….nothing there to indicate any exhibition there folks…and no phone number either.

So here were the shows that intrigued me the most with a brief review:

- Barbara Probst – Exposures – This was a cool show; 12 cameras all set up in different locations, photograph the same scene from different angles. The resulting large scale photographs all taken at the same moment, are presented in an interesting and cohesive way. 1450 Dundas St. W  – 416-537-3125

- The Skin you Love to Touch – Jodi Bieber, Lauren Greenfield, Zed Nelson – I thought this one was very intriguing showing the ’skins’ of very different people and their relation to marketing, consumerism, perception and self-perception. 80 Spadina suite 310

Ben Ng - Exposed: Pervasive Influence -  Gladstone Hotel on the second floor ( a great venue at 1214 Queen St. W. with MANY exhibitions). I found Ben’s landscapes extremely well done and very striking. In particular the printing quality is just fabulous. Most of the images were hand-painted; meaning they started off as black and white images and then selected parts were hand-painted. It looked to me like they were hand-painted old school (as opposed to doing this much more easily in Photoshop) which means that you apply paint to the actual photograph.

My fave – Sometimes you’ll walk into a Gallery that is showing one main artist and other artists intrigue you even more. This is what happened at Bau-Xi Photo with their main exhibition At this Moment by Zoe Jaremus, which overall, I liked. Bau-Xi is located at 324 Dundas tel # 416-977-0400 and their gallery was my favorite stop of the entire exhibition. I discovered 2 artists there whose work struck me immediately;  Heidi Leverty (whose image is featured in this post) and Anthony Redpath. Heidi’s work is AWESOME and has tremendous impact. She only had 2 (large – around 32 x40 inches) images that were exhibited but Robyn who works at the gallery showed me some additional work. Her work depicts large scale recycled materials presented in an abstract yet extremely compelling way. Anthony’s work was even larger in scale and his exhibited image Trailer Park Party (64.5 x 96 inches) is excellent and incredibly sharp. Special thanks to Robyn McCallum for the extra information she gave me.

My apologies to all the artists whose work I missed. If you are reading this and want to send me some links to your work, I’m all eyes. Special thanks to Joe Cormier who gallery-hopped (literally – he has a sore leg) with me on day 1.  He also showed some fab work at this festival atMoos Gallery.

Tags: contact, contact photography festival, exhibitions, photography

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29 other things to buy after your first DSLR

I recently did a photography podcast on buying your first DSLR. In that podcast I suggested NOT spending a whack of cash on your first camera body, and saving it for lenses and accessories instead.

Speaking of all those accessories…member masp from our photography forum started this thread listing other items you’ll need to go with that first DSLR if you want to get serious about photography. It’s a big list for sure but it will give newbies in particular a feel for what many advanced shooters consider to be essential gear, accessories and must have gadgets.

So hat tip to masp once more for this list! Feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments if you feel anything is missing.

Here’s a partial checklist I’ve put together from my own research and listening to the podcast. I’m sure I’ve probably left something important out here or there, so please let me know if you spot any omissions or useful things I should include. Asterisks denote the stuff that is more important or cheap enough to buy first.

A. CAMERA PROTECTION
* 1. UV filter ($10 to 30 to $60?)
* 2. Padded camera case
3. Camera armor?
* 4. LCD screen cover if not included. (Included for Nikons)
* 5. Viewfinder cover and magnifier
6. Fancy camera strap, like the Black Rapid straps?
* 7. Lens hood for any lenses that lack one. (Also keeps stuff from banging into your lens)

B. CLEANING
* 8. Microfiber cloth and a “huff of breath” (Can’t be more than a few bucks)
9. Air blower. Marko says to buy from a camera store, but Ken Rockwell says a $5 air blower from a drug store may suffice. Any reason to disagree with Rockwell here? (I’m kinda cheap )
* 10. Also consider a blower brush or lenspen. ($5-10)
* 11. Silica gel – it eats moisture in humid conditions (A few bucks)

C. PHOTOGRAPHIC TOOLS
12. Polarizer and ND filters
* 13. Tripod ($50? – $140 + + No reason not to buy used though, I think)
14. Maybe a monopod for portability, but a tripod seems more useful.
15. Flash (consider buying the most expensive one)
* 16. Reflectors maybe, or just a cheap piece of cardboard wearing white clothing.
17. Light meter. Useful for studio work mainly.

D. COMPUTER STUFF
* 18. SD or CF reader. Can you go with a cheap one here? As long as is a high speed one, I *think* it’s okay, but I’d hate to corrupt my data.
19. Photo printer. Pictbridge?
20. A decent monitor that isn’t excessively blue, contrasty or bright (referring to calibration podcast)
21. Monitor and printer color calibration tools.
22. Photography software (I’m going to stick with what’s free for now, but I suppose I’ll eventually buy some software when I figure out what’s most standard)
23. Color calibration equipment ($400-$1400?). Some may be available for $200 or under. Consider buying one before you start doing a lot of editing.

E. MISCELLANY
24. Spare battery ($10 to $30 on Amazon, more for brand name)
25. SD or CF card ($20 to $40 depending on desired size)
26. Extra lens and body caps (losing the originals may lower the resale value of your gear?)
27. Plastic trash bags to cover your gear bag if it’s not waterproofed and it starts raining. White ones may double as reflectors if you don’t mind looking unprofessional.
28. Zip lock bags for holding your cleaning supplies and other stuff maybe.
29. Baseball bat for when some guy on the street tries to grab your camera. J/K J/K I don’t condone violence, except for the Three Stooges variety.

Tags: photography, photography accessories

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1 bloody good reason to try the camera before you buy

The answer is PAIN.

I recently upgraded cameras and purchased a Nikon D700. It’s an awesome camera and I love it except for one thing…it does not feel great in my hand. In fact, after using it for a month it has been causing me a good deal of pain in my shooting hand.

SHAME ON ME.

I should know better, I council people to try before they buy and yet I did not fully listen to my own advice. Here’s what happened – I actually tried the D700 for a weekend 4 months ago. On that weekend I shot with the D700 for two periods of about 1 hour and my hand felt fine. I did notice that it was a heavy camera but I felt fine so I figured all was good.

SHAME ON ME.

I mean when I go out to shoot normally, on a gig or for pleasure, I USUALLY shoot for 3-4 hours (plus plus). So testing on 2 periods of 1 hour was a huge mistake. But I was in a “rush” to test the camera as it was only on loan for the weekend..and weekends are often busy.

PLEASE LEARN FROM MY ERROR.

Before you spend a whack of cash on a camera, test it for the length of time that you normally shoot with. Trying it in the store or for an hour is better than nothing but it’s not an accurate test. Rent the camera you intend to buy for a weekend especially if it is an expensive camera. Many larger brick and mortar camera stores will deduct the rental price off your new camera if you end up buying it. For my own case, I think adding a battery grip will solve the problem as it will take the excess weight off my shooting hand and divide it more evenly…..but this could have been avoided if I had fully followed my own advice.

Tags: buying a camera, photography

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Fed Up With Fake Photography ?

Whether an image is “too” photoshopped, or overly retouched is a huge issue for both photographers and non-photographers. We’ve talked about it many times on our forum. It’s an issue for photographers because our medium is in the midst of a dramatic change. Photography has gone digital. Everyone has a digital camera. Every image is fodder for manipulation. Many photographers over-manipulate.

The problem is that there is no consensus on how much manipulation is too much. Some photographers say over manipulation occurs with anything over and above basic editing (contrast and tonal control, cropping and some dodging and burning). Others say we are craftsman and that Photoshop is a tool like any other tool, so there is no limit. (Personally I don’t buy this for a second).

Certainly when you look at a photo, you often cannot tell what level of manipulation was done and nowhere is the level of manipulation revealed. Sometimes though, you can EASILY tell when an image is over-retouched or manipulated.

This is less of a big deal when you are creating a photograph for artistic reasons, but it’s damn serious when young girls want to look like models that don’t exist. The models exist of course but their images are over manipulated to the point of fraud. Impressionable girls want to look like these models hawking beauty-cream. They feel bad/sad when they can’t look like these models. Here is just one recent Newsweek article on this over-manipulation (hat tip to AcadieLibre from our forum). If this trend continues, it won’t be long till we’ll be selling anti-wrinkle cream to ten year olds or freckle remover for red headed babies.  All it will take is a couple of  before and after photos showing the ‘improvement’ in their appearances. Even babies and ten year olds want to feel ‘better’ about themselves.

But people are catching on, they are getting fed up with this manipulation/fraud/cheating. This week in London England, Conservative party leader David Cameron was blasted for a campaign election poster where he looks 20 years younger than he does. Here’s the original poster, a spoof poster and what Cameron looks like on a normal day.

Over manipulation in photography

So what say you? Are you fed up with fake photography………?  Or am I just whining because I have no Elvis hair to style?

Tags: over retouching in photography, over-manipulation in photography, photography

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75 – How to buy your first DSLR

Photography podcast #75 is geared toward photography enthusiasts that have not yet purchased their first DSLR camera. It encourages you to save money on your first DSLR camera body because you’ll need it for the lenses and accessories as you improve.

Links /resources mentioned in this podcast:
Canon 50D at B&H (Disclosure – Aff links – helps support our site)
Eos Rebel XSI (450D) at B&H
Nikon D3000 at B&H
Photography forum discussion on buying your first DSLR
December’s night photography assignment on the Photography.ca forum

Please join the Photography.ca fan page on Facebook
My Facebook profile – Feel free to “friend” me – please just mention Photography.ca
My Twitter page – I will follow you if you follow me – Let’s connect – PLEASE email me and tell me who you are in case I don’t reciprocate because I think you are a spammer.

If you are still lurking on our forum,
feel free to join our friendly Photography forum

Thanks to Greg Nuspel, Benny, jacklabel, Jimmy Brown, Michael Van der Tol, Aaron Hockley, raiven, Antz, Dominic, Bambi, Fortytwo, Crystalb, Yisehaq and Kent Wilson  who posted a blog comment about our last podcast. Thanks as always to everyone that sent comments by email about our last podcast. Although ALL comments are appreciated, commenting directly in this blog is preferred. Thanks as well to all the new members of the bulletin board.

If you are looking at this material on any other site except Photography.ca – Please hop on over to the Photography.ca blog and podcast and get this and other photography info directly from the source. I Subscribe with iTunes I Subscribe via RSS feed I Subscribe with Google Reader I Subscribe for free to the Photography podcast – Photography.ca and get all the posts/podcasts by Email
You can download this photography podcast directly by clicking the preceding link or listen to it almost immediately with the embedded player below.

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Tags: Buying your first DSLR

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My new logos – Thanks a ton Sylvain Grand’Maison

I’ve been wanting a new logo for my own personal photography for quite some time now. There’s just something about ’signing your work’ that I feel is important. For me, a signature provides a sense of closure. There are so many ways to tweak/modify/enhance a photograph that sometimes you’re not sure if your version is the finished version. A signature allows you to say, OK enough now, I’m done with this image, let’s move on.

I’d like to thank Sylvain Grand’Maison BIG TIME for the great work that he did for me. For those of you that don’t know Sylvain, he has one of the most popular French Podcasts (even though he’s perfectly bilingual) in Quebec called le Quebec en Baladodiffusion. He also helps businesses and individuals get started in the social media space and works as a consultant in this regard. So why did I ask him to create my logos?  That’s because his background is in graphic design and he still takes on the occasional graphic design gig.

So now I need YOUR help. I really dig both of these logos and I think I know which one I like best but I’d like some opinions. Which one of these above logos do you like better, the left one or the right one?

In choosing these logos Sylvain presented me with a bunch of different choices on totally different themes. Here is another design Sylvain created. I love this one as well – it has a serious Russian feel. I’m not sure what I’ll use this red design for, but I do know what my next Facebook avatar will look like.

Tags: photography, photography logos, Sylvain Grand'Maison

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The city and the people working as one – NOT

Every photographer has subject matter that interests them more than other subject matter. For me, what gets me going the most is fine art photography and portraiture. However…..every once in a while I’ll pull out my camera to shoot different subject matter. Gotta pay those bills. This morning however I pulled out my camera because I was simply pissed off at my city. Look at what they are doing with our recycling. Does THIS look like a recycling truck?

I love Montreal. I find the city VERY progressive, tolerant, fairly clean and great place to live. My wife and I love it here. We are community minded people who believe in the environment and we ALWAYS recycle as much as we can. We wash out containers and bottles and separate papers to make it easy for the recycling crew. We used to see our recycling going into a recycling truck, where it would get sorted on the spot. As far as I know, crunched up mixed recycling in a garbage truck is NOT recycling…it’s friggin’ garbage on its way to a landfill.

Does anyone know what is going on here? I mean as much as I love to do my part, I hate wasting my time, and I hate municipal bullcrap. If my recycling is going into a landfill, then why am I wasting my friggin’ time?

Tags: garbage, Montreal, photography, recycling

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