Impulse » Photo of the week

Solarize me, baby

Rob McKaughan — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 15:15:53 +0000

I used to think that solarization was just some goofy technique photographers used to show how cool they are in the darkroom. (The process of generating these in a darkroom is tedious and difficult on a good day). Then, Ron Hammond said something clever while presenting Forgotten but not Gone, “Solarization is wonderful when the image is all about shape.” A light went off in my head.

Back in ’02, I tried repeatedly to shoot photos of the land-orca fins of Magnuson Park here in Seattle. I was never happy with the results. I could not capture the otherworldliness of the place (it really does feel like you’re amidst a pod of subterranean whales).
Enter Ron’s inspiration. About 30 seconds in photoshop later and I had a photo that much better captured the mood of the place, far better than anything I had previously taken.
Since then, I’ve been wandering around shooting things with solarization in mind. I think there’s something here. They’re dark and moody. They do emphasize shape. But, I haven’t quite got it worked out yet.
The first thing I’ve learned is that a nice, medium-contrast photo is best. It gives you more planes of tone to play with. My first idea had been to shoot high contrast stuff — Gasworks Park at sunset — since I wanted the end result to be very contrasty. Not so. The images were too difficult to manipulate because the tones were compressed at the ends — either nearly white or nearly black. What would’ve been much nicer is to have a nice Gaussian bell-curve for a histogram — medium contrast with smooth graduations between tones. The smooth curve makes it much easier to control what falls in which final tonal range.
Anyway, here are my first experiments. What do you think?

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Seattle Flickr Meetup

Rob McKaughan — Tue, 24 Jan 2006 00:15:57 +0000

I went to my first Flickr meetup this weekend and had a blast. I was thoroughly amused at wandering around Fremont with 30 or so photographers, cameras ablazing. It was very, very hard not to take pictures of people taking pictures, and alas, I was not strong enough to resist. Nobody was. Here we have the talented Ras and Kelly gunning me down in broad daylight. Oh, the humanity!

Picture time: old school

Rob McKaughan — Fri, 06 Jan 2006 16:40:29 +0000

Time for another picture; this one, another restoration I’m starting. Meet my grandfather and his sister. The photo is hand colored by my great-grandmother (she’d paint on the toned print).

Time for a picture

Rob McKaughan — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 18:58:10 +0000

Haven’t posted a photo in a while. Here’s one that I just finished playing with in photoshop from the University of Washington student film At the Back of the North Wind.

Restoring Bettye

Rob McKaughan — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 23:07:31 +0000

This week’s picture is from the 1930’s, so I guess it doesn’t technically count as having been taken in the last week. I did, however, do the restoration in the last week for my dad for his birthday. It’s a photo of my grandmother when she was at most half my age. Mouse over the picture to see the original.

border=“0” vspace=“0” hspace=“0” src=“http://www.artisticwhim.com/blog/media/portrait-crop.jpg” alt=“Grandma” width=“263” height=“400”>

At this size, you can’t really see the work I had to do on the restoration. The original photo’s emulsion was cracked severely. Here’s a detail so you can see for yourself:

border=“0” vspace=“0” hspace=“0” src=“http://www.artisticwhim.com/blog/media/portrait-crop-detail.jpg” alt=“Grandma detail” width=“400” height=“400”>

The Day After

Rob McKaughan — Wed, 17 Aug 2005 22:34:14 +0000

It’s been a while since I posted a Picture of the week, and I’ve got a little backlog developing. This is one from a few weeks ago. My friend Mike invited me along on a photo shoot. I had no idea what I was going to shoot, so I goofed off a bit. Here’s one of my favorites from that shoot.

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Young Love

Rob McKaughan — Tue, 31 May 2005 15:23:15 +0000

Taken at Seattle’s Folk Life festival this weekend.

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Faces in a crowd

Rob McKaughan — Fri, 27 May 2005 13:48:18 +0000

The Picture of the Week is a bit late this week, but I had to fly to California to celebrate my brother finally getting his degree! (Go Jefe!).

This was taken during the University Street Fair last weekend and also for the upcoming Group f/5.6 show 48 Hours. It is part of a series I’m still exploring — Faces in a Crowd. I am intrigued by the varied scenes that appear while walking through a crowd — fleeting moments that appear then vanish in the waves of people. I haven’t quite figured out what exactly grabs my attention or how to communicate it visually. They seem to have most effect (to me) as a series, interspersing photos of scenes with photos that show nothing — just like a crowd.

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Treble clef

Rob McKaughan — Tue, 03 May 2005 00:10:22 +0000

Alright, the Photo of the Week is back with this image from my back yard.

I sorta thought the leaves formed a sort of treble clef. Maybe it’s just ’cause it’s late…

British Museum ceiling

Sunrise

Rob McKaughan — Mon, 07 Mar 2005 23:25:17 +0000

Ok, I’m back.

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