Isn't it some unspoken rule that upon recieving a new camera you take a picture of your pet?
I suppose usually you get the camera to take pictures of the pet, but in my case, the camera came first, then the pet.
A freind came and found me at school the day before graduation and told me they had found a kitten in a drainpipe who needed a home. A few minutes later I had a kitten in my satchel bag hitching a ride home. Meet Sophie, the coolest, most laidback chill cat ever. She reminds me of Jazz.
Well, with graduation I got a new camera, the Canon 40d. This is a huge step up from my little point and shoot, and a small step from my other film SLR's which keeping calling me jealously from my camera bag.
I remember when Napster came out. I downloaded it and soon had access to basically anysong I wanted. But once I had that, the music became less valuable to me. Having all of it at my fingertips made it seem a little cheaper. I speculate that this is because it became divorced from a context of appreciation and shifted to a form of musical gluttony. I don't want this to happen with my new camera.
For a long time I really wanted a digital SLR, but after taking mainly film for the past six months or so, I feel a little guilty at the ease with which I can take pictures now. The luddite in me makes me contemplate the aesthetic and creative differences between working with film and digital mediums, and so far I've come to several conclusions. As far as I can see in my untrained thinking about photography, I can seperate photography into two categories, Photojournalism and Fine Art. These lines inevitably cross and blur, but they are distinguished in my mind as such: Photojournalism is the attempt to communicate an idea,event, or situation to other people effectively. This includes weddings, events, journalism; all which can be very artistic and abstract but are intended first with an eye to more concrete communication. Fine Art is an attempt to communicate abstracts and ideas that are more personal reactions to culture and life. One begins with an event and captures the ideas, the story taking place; and the latter starts with the idea, and then tells the story.
So my intent is this, digital photography excels beyond film's capabilities in the photojournalitic areas, but film allows for (in my humble opinion) more creativity and finer quality. (Please don't hear me as devaluing the wonderful creative aspects of photoshop and digital technology, I'm not.) My new camera is a tool to sit beside my film as an equal, set aside for different purposes, One I will use for weddings and events, the other I will use to try to stimulate my creative side.
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Monday, April 14, 2008
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Friday, March 14, 2008
Once Home...
Its strange going back to Charlotte. Particularly South Charlotte, where I grew up.
This is Stonecrest, a shopping center just a few minutes from my old house where I grew up. I worked my first job at the Harris Teeter (A wonderful grocery store) behind that far bulding. This courtyard is flanked by a Dean and Delucia's, Qdobas, Marble Slab Creamery all kinds of wonderful places to eat. its all very yuppie. Theres alot of money in the area, although I never had it.
My first break up happened here, while shopping for a wedding present for my brother. High School was stupid. Later I would build a box and fill it with memories to give to another girl. It was made of red oak stained with linseed oil. I had carefully arranged photos and inside jokes. She smiled as she sat at the edge of the fountain just behind me, now dry and empty except for coins that sit on the bottom like spent dreams.
All of this was once home to me. My family moved away. I went to college far enough away to know distance. Things have changed. New houses, new shops, everything growing like the kudzu that it replaces.
The other day I became incredibly disoriented driving on a nearby road. It was one of those roads that wound through several farms and demanded that you drive way over the speed limit with the windows down and the radio cranked. Now there is an elementary school and five or six new neighborhoods with earthy names to remind people that it used to be a farm. I didn't see any Horses, or even a field.
A place that was once home is like an old friend you knew as a brother. Someone you shared life with. Then, after years of not seeing each other you meet up again at a familiar place. The old friend is recognized, but theres so much more to his life now. These two images conflict in the mind's eye, a dichotomy of intimacy and time .
.
This is Stonecrest, a shopping center just a few minutes from my old house where I grew up. I worked my first job at the Harris Teeter (A wonderful grocery store) behind that far bulding. This courtyard is flanked by a Dean and Delucia's, Qdobas, Marble Slab Creamery all kinds of wonderful places to eat. its all very yuppie. Theres alot of money in the area, although I never had it.
My first break up happened here, while shopping for a wedding present for my brother. High School was stupid. Later I would build a box and fill it with memories to give to another girl. It was made of red oak stained with linseed oil. I had carefully arranged photos and inside jokes. She smiled as she sat at the edge of the fountain just behind me, now dry and empty except for coins that sit on the bottom like spent dreams.
All of this was once home to me. My family moved away. I went to college far enough away to know distance. Things have changed. New houses, new shops, everything growing like the kudzu that it replaces.
The other day I became incredibly disoriented driving on a nearby road. It was one of those roads that wound through several farms and demanded that you drive way over the speed limit with the windows down and the radio cranked. Now there is an elementary school and five or six new neighborhoods with earthy names to remind people that it used to be a farm. I didn't see any Horses, or even a field.
A place that was once home is like an old friend you knew as a brother. Someone you shared life with. Then, after years of not seeing each other you meet up again at a familiar place. The old friend is recognized, but theres so much more to his life now. These two images conflict in the mind's eye, a dichotomy of intimacy and time .
.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Me and Caffiene
Ok, I think its fair to say caffiene makes me more productive.
Today I:
1.Made signifigant progress in some classical pieces I had been stuck on
2.Restrung My guitar
3.Patched my favorite Jeans
4.Read a 300 page Novel (The Bean Tree by Barbara Kingsolver. Excellent.)
5.Turned in film to Walgreens
6.Bought a new toothbrush (a two pack on sale)
7.Wished my Grandma a happy birthday.
8. Ate a healthy breakfast (Yogurt and Tortillas)
Success.
Now hopefully I can sleep enough to be ready for tomorrow.
Today I:
1.Made signifigant progress in some classical pieces I had been stuck on
2.Restrung My guitar
3.Patched my favorite Jeans
4.Read a 300 page Novel (The Bean Tree by Barbara Kingsolver. Excellent.)
5.Turned in film to Walgreens
6.Bought a new toothbrush (a two pack on sale)
7.Wished my Grandma a happy birthday.
8. Ate a healthy breakfast (Yogurt and Tortillas)
Success.
Now hopefully I can sleep enough to be ready for tomorrow.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Garfield Minus Garfield
Okay, my new favorite comic strip, I just have to share.
garfield minus garfield
Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life? Friends, meet Jon Arbuckle. Let’s laugh and learn with him on a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness in a quiet American suburb.
Saturday, March 08, 2008
My New (old) Camera
Well, its spring break. That time of year when I'm looking forward to going home and spending some time in Charlotte.
More exciting news, I got a roll of film back from my Kodak Duaflex II. I got this camera from ebay a couple of weeks ago and its pretty much one of the funnest cameras I own.
Made somewhere between 1950 to 1954 this camera is beautiful in its simplicity. It has no light meter, nothing run by electronics, it is completely mechanical. You push a button and the spring loaded shutter pulls back for 1/30th of a second to expose the medium format film that runs through the back of it.
This camera is basically a consumer grade point and shoot, one of the nicer models with a manual focus (3.5-inf) and three aperture settings (f.8 f.11 f. 16) for hazy, sunny, and extra bright (snow or sand) conditions. When I first got it in the mail everything appeared to be in working order so I shot a roll through it.
620 film and 120 film are exactly the same except for 620 rolls being wrapped around a smaller spool. So with a pair of scissors i managed to trim it down enough to fit into the loading area of the camera, and wrapped the film around to the 620 spool that came with it. After a little confusion at the local Ritz Camera store, which involved an all out search for Mr. Peter's missing role. Right after I told the clerk my name was Oakes. 
The results from this camera are pretty fantastic. Soft and dreamy, barely in focus, Plus some awesome light leaks from when I took the film out.The first shot to the left is a light leak across the frame that just happens to look really cool. Note the ethereal quality of the photos, the dream like quality may be a result of either dirty lens, a non reflective lens shooting into the sun, or possible just fog from light leaking in. I'm really not sure, but I am tempted to shoot another roll to figure it out.
Unfortunately shooting rolls of 120 film is expensive to buy and to process. Thankfully, the kodak is more versatile than it first appears. By combining it with my point and shoot digital, the everfaithful canon A620 I can shoot through the viewfinder of my duaflex to achieve a new level of distorted awesome goodness. Click on the pictures below to see more on my Flickr.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Through the Looking Glass
I found myself drifting today. Floating between dreams. I feel so detached from my university, so close to leaving this stage of my life, that my heart and mind cannot find restt in the spaces between these red brick buildings. Instead I wander, hope and dread both weighing equally heavy on my mind. Focus. The struggle of my life.
So I stop. My thoughts keep going.
I repeat these two steps
for the tenth time today.
!. breathe. (more than a simple intake of air, my heart lets go and breathes in air that warms the soul like communion wine, like a that song your mother sang, like a kiss on the forehead. )
2. go. (a step taken. Not in any direction but rather the kind of step that you take only when you know what your legs are really for.. Its like the feeling of running, the exhilaration of your muscles responding and pumping as they were meant to cool air against your skin and the glorious burning of your muscles. Its being alive. Its being in God. Its just being.)
So I stop. My thoughts keep going.
I repeat these two steps
for the tenth time today.
!. breathe. (more than a simple intake of air, my heart lets go and breathes in air that warms the soul like communion wine, like a that song your mother sang, like a kiss on the forehead. )
2. go. (a step taken. Not in any direction but rather the kind of step that you take only when you know what your legs are really for.. Its like the feeling of running, the exhilaration of your muscles responding and pumping as they were meant to cool air against your skin and the glorious burning of your muscles. Its being alive. Its being in God. Its just being.)
Thursday, February 14, 2008
An Empathetic Note on Valentines Day
For those who haven't always been romantically infatuated with St. valentines maligned day of celebration here is a poem.
THE BROKEN HEART.
by John Donne
He is stark mad, whoever says,
That he hath been in love an hour,
Yet not that love so soon decays,
But that it can ten in less space devour ;
Who will believe me, if I swear
That I have had the plague a year?
Who would not laugh at me, if I should say
I saw a flash of powder burn a day?
Ah, what a trifle is a heart,
If once into love's hands it come !
All other griefs allow a part
To other griefs, and ask themselves but some ;
They come to us, but us love draws ;
He swallows us and never chaws ;
By him, as by chain'd shot, whole ranks do die ;
He is the tyrant pike, our hearts the fry.
If 'twere not so, what did become
Of my heart when I first saw thee?
I brought a heart into the room,
But from the room I carried none with me.
If it had gone to thee, I know
Mine would have taught thine heart to show
More pity unto me ; but Love, alas !
At one first blow did shiver it as glass.
Yet nothing can to nothing fall,
Nor any place be empty quite ;
Therefore I think my breast hath all
Those pieces still, though they be not unite ;
And now, as broken glasses show
A hundred lesser faces, so
My rags of heart can like, wish, and adore,
But after one such love, can love no more.
But for all those who are hurting, or have been hurt, I offer this, So that you don't become overwhelmed in your heartbreak...Twice or thrice I loved thee, before I knew thy face or name.....
AIR AND ANGELS.
by John Donne
TWICE or thrice had I loved thee,
Before I knew thy face or name ;
So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame
Angels affect us oft, and worshipp'd be.
Still when, to where thou wert, I came,
Some lovely glorious nothing did I see.
But since my soul, whose child love is,
Takes limbs of flesh, and else could nothing do,
More subtle than the parent is
Love must not be, but take a body too ;
And therefore what thou wert, and who,
I bid Love ask, and now
That it assume thy body, I allow,
And fix itself in thy lip, eye, and brow.
Whilst thus to ballast love I thought,
And so more steadily to have gone,
With wares which would sink admiration,
I saw I had love's pinnace overfraught ;
Thy every hair for love to work upon
Is much too much ; some fitter must be sought ;
For, nor in nothing, nor in things
Extreme, and scattering bright, can love inhere ;
Then as an angel face and wings
Of air, not pure as it, yet pure doth wear,
So thy love may be my love's sphere ;
Just such disparity
As is 'twixt air's and angels' purity,
'Twixt women's love, and men's, will ever be.
THE BROKEN HEART.
by John Donne
He is stark mad, whoever says,
That he hath been in love an hour,
Yet not that love so soon decays,
But that it can ten in less space devour ;
Who will believe me, if I swear
That I have had the plague a year?
Who would not laugh at me, if I should say
I saw a flash of powder burn a day?
Ah, what a trifle is a heart,
If once into love's hands it come !
All other griefs allow a part
To other griefs, and ask themselves but some ;
They come to us, but us love draws ;
He swallows us and never chaws ;
By him, as by chain'd shot, whole ranks do die ;
He is the tyrant pike, our hearts the fry.
If 'twere not so, what did become
Of my heart when I first saw thee?
I brought a heart into the room,
But from the room I carried none with me.
If it had gone to thee, I know
Mine would have taught thine heart to show
More pity unto me ; but Love, alas !
At one first blow did shiver it as glass.
Yet nothing can to nothing fall,
Nor any place be empty quite ;
Therefore I think my breast hath all
Those pieces still, though they be not unite ;
And now, as broken glasses show
A hundred lesser faces, so
My rags of heart can like, wish, and adore,
But after one such love, can love no more.
But for all those who are hurting, or have been hurt, I offer this, So that you don't become overwhelmed in your heartbreak...Twice or thrice I loved thee, before I knew thy face or name.....
AIR AND ANGELS.
by John Donne
TWICE or thrice had I loved thee,
Before I knew thy face or name ;
So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame
Angels affect us oft, and worshipp'd be.
Still when, to where thou wert, I came,
Some lovely glorious nothing did I see.
But since my soul, whose child love is,
Takes limbs of flesh, and else could nothing do,
More subtle than the parent is
Love must not be, but take a body too ;
And therefore what thou wert, and who,
I bid Love ask, and now
That it assume thy body, I allow,
And fix itself in thy lip, eye, and brow.
Whilst thus to ballast love I thought,
And so more steadily to have gone,
With wares which would sink admiration,
I saw I had love's pinnace overfraught ;
Thy every hair for love to work upon
Is much too much ; some fitter must be sought ;
For, nor in nothing, nor in things
Extreme, and scattering bright, can love inhere ;
Then as an angel face and wings
Of air, not pure as it, yet pure doth wear,
So thy love may be my love's sphere ;
Just such disparity
As is 'twixt air's and angels' purity,
'Twixt women's love, and men's, will ever be.
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