Monday, July 23, 2007

Portraits




When it comes to photographs I do not consider the photos that I publish as being photographs, if they were they would have taken hours to compose and they would be a different kind of animal. These are snapshots. Real photographs can really knock your socks off and every time you look at them you see more.
I love that first communion shot the young boy surrounded by his bigger sisters.
The lighting and focus in the other portrait are as always superb.
The photographs featured were on display in photographers shops here in Dublin.
Nixon on the Clontarf seafront and the other guy is situated in Dalkey dart station.
Each of them display stunning portraits from time to time. Well worth a detour if you are passing.
Henri Cartier Bresson went off every day with 4 or 5 cameras and boxes of film and snapped all day and surprise surprise, lots of good photographs resulted.He then became the founder of the Magnum photographic agency. When you go to the website take a look at Eve Arnold. Now theres a woman with a good eye for a great shot. Click on Magnum then the name of photographer then to portfolio on the bottom left. Enjoy.
Black and white is still the best medium for photography.
Bavid Baley took some fantastic photographs he probably invented the supremodel. He fell in love with a lot of his models and his divorces cost him a lot.
His photos of Jean Shrimpton and Twiggy are legend.
These two ladies still look great today by the way.
Photoraphers who are not known by name will instantly be known by their work Steve McCurry took this haunting photograph
Dorothea LangeA chance encounter at a side road placed the suffering of the dust bowl migrant people into the minds of the American people.

Though the banks own nearly all the farms now.

Nearly 40 years ago I was in Madrid, it's a very social town and I met many people. Harry Cardonez Santos still sticks in my mind, played cards for a living,started me in magic.
But there was this guy we met who had a penthouse apartment in a good area, with balcony and good furniture."Show John How you got this apartment"
Story was he had taken photos at a Grand Prix.
"It was just by chance, I was walking to a vantage point with my camera in my hand,suddenly Bang! A formula one car came flying into the sky and I just started taking photographs" His photos were syndicated all over the world and were even on the cover of Life magazene.
The funny part is that he MIGHT have had his lens cover on or the settings on the camera may not have been correct. But on this day all his numbers came up it was like winning the Lotto!!!

Thought you would like this, "hats off to photography".

Its been great getting back into the swing of things again, the all nights really fly on at a pace.
You can get from A to B in no time and interesting things happen.

I picked up a girl at 4 am who was looking for a hotel.
Drove her to Bewleys hotel which was full.
The porter told us that all the hotels will be full tonight and it was 4 am.
So I took a chance and brought her home to my place. She protested , but when she herd that my wife and son would be there she relaxed a bit.
There was only a few hours left in the night anyhow, so I went back to work.

My wife nearly dropped dead when I said that there was a girl in my bed !

Still she was a great girl and if my own kids were stuck I would like to think that someone would look after them.
She got on well with my wife and Madeline asked her to stay another night if she wanted, she did not contact us again so I guess she got fixed up.

I reckon that your instinct can tell you whats the right thing to do.

Still you only have to get things wrong once and pick up an axe murderer !!!!

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:07 AM

    t Magnum site was great. Show us more photos.
    Enjoy the blog here in Sydney,

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  2. Bresson's shot of a child skipping across a flooded ground, with an iron gate in the foreground always sticks in my mind. He said he picked a location, and waited for the picture moment to come.

    I love steve McCurry's famous picture of the woman in Afgahnistan too. I wanted to intern for him, but alas I wasn't accepted. I still respect him, they were nice enough to send me a letter instead of just ignoring me.

    ReplyDelete