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Memories

You can look at a picture for a week and never think of it again, you can look at a photo for a moment and remember it your whole life- Joan Miro

Have you ever looked photograph and had it trigger a raw emotion? Did that photo bring you back to that time and location? Was the photo able to invoke stories, jokes, scents, tastes? 

These photos were taken the summer of 1991, on a family vacation.  A quick snap shot, but it’s much more then a snap shot to me.  When I look at these photos they take me right back to that warm summer night, the four of us & our dog Zak loaded into our oversized blue van.  The smell of campfire on our clothes, warm pizza pies in our tummies and singing songs along with the radio. 
I remember the long road trips, the sibling rivalry, the funny accents, the laughs, the stories, the inside jokes & the arguments! These two photographs remind me of the amazing family adventures we had while I was growing up!

This photo is actually the first time I actually remember taking a photo, on my mother's old 33mm camera!

Click, windy-windy-windy…..

I believe I got my love of photography from my mother. Up stairs in my parents house, tucked away in the spare bedroom closet, is the photographic memories of my life. Shelves upon shelves of photo albums, all dated and labelled. Vacations, Christmas, Birthday Parties, Graduations, Snow Days, Halloween… My mother was there with her camera.  It didn’t need to be a ‘special occasion’ my mother’s camera was easily at hand.  

My Mother has taken on the task going through her albums one by one, and has starting scanning each picture.  She wants to have a digital photo back up, and also wants to be able to share them via social networking.  She has been posting them to Facebook, and it has been quite a trip down memory lane! I’m excited to see what photo album she scans next! Will it be our trip up north to Algonquin park? Christmas 1988? Grade 8 graduation?

Is there a photo that stays in your memory? What is the photo of?

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Stealer
This is the fifth rule of Jim Jarmusch, an independent film director, his golden rules:
Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: “It’s not where you take things from – it’s where you take them to.
To read more on Jim Jarmusch check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Jarmusch

The above quote says it all. I would like to believe that being original can exists, but it cannot. How far back in history do we have to go to find something purely original?  We would probably have to go back into pre historic times, back into the caves. An artist copied the idea of a hunting story and carved it onto a caved wall to share the glorious tale with others.  Or perhaps it was the person telling the story that stole the idea from the cave drawings, we will never know.

Borrowing ideas has been going on from the beginning of time, we need something old to create into something new. Mark Zuckerberg, may have stolen the basic idea of social networking from Tom Anderson, but he added his own perspective to it.  Now on Facebook there are over 500 million users on facebook at any given day, and 50% of them are online at the same time. Facebook similar to Myspace, but it was been completely redone & turn into something more substantial (I actually borrow this quote from a friend, but I recreated it to be my own words)

I'm one to admit that I find my inspiration for my photography everywhere, I know that the ideas that I use have been created before and I know that they probably will be created again.  I've taken ideas from the internet, billboards, magazine,  and random objects on the ground. One my goals is to put my own perspective on it and create something that is genuine to myself.  Another one of my goals is to not offend anyone, however sometimes it is impossible not too..

All I can do is put my whole heart and soul everything that I do, like no one else ever has!

Picasso once said “good artists copy, while great artists steal”

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​Perception

Photography is a total constant.  I think that is why some of us have such a strong instinctive connection to it.  A photo can take you back instantly to a moment, a place or even a person. No matter what else has changed in you or the world. That one photo stays the same, just like that moment. 

The digital age has made it possible for an artist to do virtually anything to a photograph, it can be edited and altered, adjusted & enhanced.

I personally believe that "Art" is anything. It's dynamic. It's fluid. It's straight out of the camera, or it can be straight from the final edit. Poetry can be art and yet you can't touch it. Music can be art yet you can't see it. Stained glass can be art yet you can’t hear it.
If an artist can seriously manipulate an image in a highly skilled way that requires time, education and years of practice, then yes I would consider that to be art. 

Art sometimes is defined as being purely an aesthetic expression, communication or contemplation. If you consider this the definition, then it should be a form of communication, a feeling or mood, or even just a situation. Photography is a medium to express these even greater then painting, or sculpting out of marble.  A camera a never lies, and it captures these people, places and things perfectly in time.
Some people may ask; Are we that insecure in what we do?  Do we need to be defined?
Perhaps, but it’s a single trait that most defines us as humans, it is our need to name things, define them and put them in some sort of category.

What makes art, art? Perception? Interpretation? Or is there something more?
I read somewhere about a Former US Supreme Court Justice, by the name of Potter Stewart. He famously said “I know it when I see it” speaking on the topic of pornography. A lot of people would probably say the same thing about Art. It is impossible to pinpoint an exact verbal definition; most people would be able to identify art, as art, when they see it.  Therefore this would make art a matter of perception, much like beauty. Some forms of art are clearer then other, while some may be debatable.

I can’t help to think that there will always be people out there that honestly don’t believe that photography is a form of Art. Nothing is more exact then snapping a photograph to persevere a moment in time.  I'm not saying that I am an artist but I most certainly feel that my photography is a perfect way of communicating my thoughts and my feelings. Anyone should be able to look at my photographs and be able to piece together how I was feeling at the moment, and base their conclusion on what they see.

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Portfolio​

I have decided to get on the task of creating a portfolio of my photography, and by portfolio I don’t mean facebook. I want to bring my portfolio somewhere, and hand to someone, and they can actually flip through the photos, a physical piece of photo paper with my image on it, and my signature in the bottom left hand corner.

I dug through my chest at the foot of my bed, looking for my external drive I tossed in there a while ago. Finally after about twenty minutes of digging, and a found missing sock later, I spotted it. With hard drive in hand I settled down onto my unmade bed and began to reminisce.

I was shocked when I see 230 albums, seriously two hundred and thirty, which is a lot of pictures. Where are these pictures? They are uploaded on facebook, my webpage & a hard drive that is sitting in the musty old chest.

The abilities to post and share photography through social networking is a great way to gain exposure! However there is something more prestigious about having a photograph in hand, being able to physical touch it, or even hang it up on a wall. I’m pretty sure facebook will be around forever, but what happens if something catastrophic were to happen and social networking sees to exist. My two hundred and thirty photo albums would be gone, and all that would be left if my external hard drives.

My teacher made a very valid point in one of his very first classes. He said that after he dies, he highly doubts that his children are going to go through numerous hard drives too look at his photos. However if he has albums of photos, they will in fact sit around and flip through the pages, and talk about all the stories of his life.

We need to make a solid effort to print more photos; this is an art that is being lost.

Over the past few weeks I have been going through shoot by shoot picking out my favourites. Deciding which picture in each album it the best of the best and deserves to be sent to the printers and transform into something substantial.  This is a very hard mission; I spent forty five minutes looking between two pictures deciding on which one is superior, only in the end having my self send both pictures through.

I think now a days in the world of SLRs & facebook, anyone can call them selves a photographer. Take a few artsy shots of a flower, and create yourself a fan page. I think what separates photographers from soccer moms with camera’s are the physical images that we print.  Being about to brand yourself, and create an image of your photography outside of facebook is something that definitely needs personal drive. It makes the people who really have photography as a passion to push out the flood gates into something other then social networking.

I am excited to have a completed book of my work, I am thrilled to bring it to interviews, client meetings and having them sitting on my coffee table. I always put all my energy into my photography, creating a portfolio of these images is something that I am going to be 100 completely proud of! I have never been completely proud of anything I have done before. I mean I have been proud of certain things, but not as much as this portfiolo. I think this is how I know that my calling in life is being a five foot photographer!

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​General Possessions

To me, photography is an art of observation. It's about finding something interesting in an ordinary place. I've found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.

To some one a brightly painted fire hydrant, sitting in the snow… is just that. To someone else they see the composition in that and they see a photograph that is worth taking. A rusty or fence, maybe just be a rusty fence, but at a certain angle with the certain lighting can make this an outstanding image.

I was in Detroit last summer at a contemporary art gallery; A group of young kids were walking out as I was walking in. The one young boy looked over at his friend and said “You call that art? I could do that”. The old gentlemen that was collecting donations at the door looked at the young boys and said “Yeah, but you didn’t and probably wont”

Modern Art + I could do that = Yeah, but you didn’t.

I feel this also applies to photography. Anyone can take a photograph, but not everyone has the desire too! These people who have this thirst for photography are the ones that take the most beautiful images of the most common things. 

I’m constantly looking for things that are so common that photographing them, would make them un-ordinary. Being able to take a picture of a broken phone booth, and turning into a photograph definitely requires desire.

Nothing is more accelerating to me then jumping in my car, with some good friends and heading to a small desolate town. Roaming the down town streets, venturing in and out of their ally ways to find interesting places, and strange things to photograph. Taking off on a photo adventure is the highlight to my weekend, it makes the week worth living.  Creating images that will last a life time, on film and in our memories. Checking off on a map the places we have ventured too and circling the places we want to go in the future.

Once photography enters your blood stream, it is impossible to cure it.
There are no antibiotics, from this point on; this is the way your brain functions. If you so slightly feel the desire for photography, don’t fight it, and don’t push it aside, embrace it and let it grow.

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Growth Spurt

Irony!
I have never really outgrown anything before, being less than five foot tall.
I still fit into the same clothes that I wore in high school and I have a pair of boots from when I was 14.

Lately I am beginning to feel as though I am outgrowing my camera. I could grow a lot more as a photographer, with more prestigious equipment. The thought of buying something new frightens me.

I have been having a hard time admitting it!

I can’t abandon my Pentax, this isn’t just a camera, it’s an actually appendage of myself. It would be like removing one of my arms, or pulling out all my teeth.  I’ve done countless amounts of photo shoot with it, and it has never let me down. I just know that her time is getting close to the end and I have been preparing my self for this devastating.

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Debate

I know my camera better then I know myself. I could program it with my eyes closed, and one hand tied behind my back. I know what every single button does, and how all the menus within the menus work. I know the sound the shutter makes, with it opens and closes. I can feel the static run through my body when the flash charges up, and the hum from the exposure is relaxing.  The camera strap always feels comfortable around my neck, and the icons on the button are worn off from use.

I recently just ordered in a new 28-200mm & 28- 80mm K mount Lens for my camera. Ordering new equipment is always exciting; I have a feeling that I am going to pounce on the mail man when I see him coming down the street.  I’ve never shot with any other lens on my camera, simply because I wanted to learn with what I had. This is going to be a whole new experience for the both of us, I can barely even wait!

I’m not ready to give up on my Pentax yet, I know a lot of people harp on them because they aren’t the most accepted brand. I am having a hard time deciding what to buy.
Canon? Nikon? Or would I stick with Pentax?

I really don’t know yet, I haven’t really given it any thought….

Every time I start to research brands, I see my Pentax sitting on my table.  Begging me to take her out, and I always do. I throw my Pentax around my neck, I grab my Ipod and I head out the door.

I’ll do some research later for now I’m going Photoging!

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​Inspired

Over the past year I have met some of the most talented & influential people through the photography community.   Photography is responsible for a lot of solid one of kind friendships.
PWA, maybe it was a fluke that you stumbled upon my photography page, or maybe it was just faith.   I'm extremely grateful to have become a singular solider in your fleet of creative minds. I truly hope that your vision for The Porthos Images becomes a huge success.  You are the most talent person I have ever met, you have the abilities to use both sides of your brain. You are one of my greatest supporters, even though you push you capitalist ideas onto me! You see something in me, which I can’t even see in myself.  I can’t thank you enough for everything you have done for me. I look forward to the future with you…. Meerow!
I have always been a social butterfly. Being social in a circle of ingenious minds makes for interesting stories.
I wouldn’t have imaged ever ending up on a Saturday night chilling with, two local photographers, a few models at a local trendy coffee shop. Listening to some fresh modern blue green, and talking about the side effects of lemons. I’m not one for being trendy, but sipping organic tea, and talking photography is something I could totally get use too.
Some people think I have strange relationships with my clients.   I feel if you can come over to my studio and drop your pants at the door then when we aren’t clients, we are actually friends. These pant less photo shoots always turn into an up roar of laughter, and the creation of beautiful photography. Some which have been band on social networking sites.
I love meeting new people and listening to their stories of where they have been and what they have done.  From the cooky photographer who always has a short joke up their sleeve, but has the underlying knowledge of a wise old owl.  Always willing to lend a technical hand, and give creative advice, and is there for you when you are in a “photography jam”.
Or the insanely intense model, who reaps emotions once the shutter goes off. Who can turn a spur of the moment photo shoot into an outstanding image.  Always willing and ready to attempt any fanatical idea that I throw at them, even though it may sound like a crazy mess. A model when the back drop is down and lights are up, but a friend when the camera is packed away.
It almost feels like a secret door has been opened for me, and on the other side is a society of artistic citizens. When I walked through that door, I was able to kick off my shoes and finally relax,  I 'm home!
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​Five Foot Photography

First off, I would like to state for the record that I am not five foot tall, in fact I am 4-10”, However Four Foot Ten and a Half Inch Photography, didn’t have the same ring.

I’ve never been first rate with words, in fact it is something that I have always struggled with.  Writing never came easily to me, always struggling to find the right words, and make a complete sentence was an all night task.

Today is different I sit here on top of my unmade bed with my lap top on my lap, creating this blog. The word come easy today because when there is something you are passionate about, it makes even the hardest tasks seem like a breeze. For example, my completed sentences!
But what is passion?
Passion is a feeling; it’s an emotion about something. It leaves you with compelling feelings, enthusiasm, and desire towards something or someone.

In the case of me, its towards something.
Photography; The activity and the art of creating a still image.
It drives me in everything I do, it’s the first thing on my mind when I wake up & it’s the last thing that runs through my head at night. It’s the only thing I want in life, and it’s the only thing in life that has made me completely 100% happy! 
In my life there is only me and my camera, I am truly sorry boys but my heart belongs to photography. I know that my camera wont wake up one morning and decided that it doesn’t love me anymore and leave me, alone & shutter less. My camera is faithful to me!

The flaws that are in my photography are flaws that are within me, hateful words towards my photography are hateful words to me. Hateful words to me, are hateful words to my photography, it is a pretty perfect balance.
Every ounce of who I am, I pour full heartedly in my photography, trying to hunt down knowledge and search for ways to better my photography and in return, better myself.

Having passion in life is relatively new to me, something that I am beyond animated about. I feel that the only life worth living is one with passion!!