A couple of weeks ago I was sick of the hype aspect of this and other blogs.
I’ve come back to my senses. After all, what is a blog but hype?

So I guess I’ll be posting about what I know best, and that’s what I’m up to.
I am, though, going to try to feature other photographers work here as well.
People who I bump into during my interweb travels who’s images strike me.

That way, if you get bored of me there’ll be something else.

But first: the hype…….

COMMERCIAL WORK

A while back I did a bunch of shooting for The Public Health Agency of Canada.

Here’s a couple of frames from all that shooting…..one’s an out take, the other
one was published.

Jane Billings, ADM and Dr. Robert C. Clarke

PERSONAL WORK

The Ottawa Art Gallery is mounting a big show to celebrate their 20th anniversary.
Show’s titled: EVIDENCE. Opens September 5th and runs until November 16th.

I’m pleased to be able to report that they bought some prints from my series USER
and that these will be included in the show. Plus, they used a detail from one of my
shots on the cover of their newsletter.

Junior, Ottawa 2007

Junior’s a meth addict. He’d been up for 3 days when we shot this.

NEW NEW JERSEY

There was a technical problem with one of the shots I wanted to use in my
BESIDE THE PASSAIC project. I only took one frame of that particular set up
(the perils of shooting 4×5) so I had to go looking for a replacement shot.

One of the things I love about photography is the idea of sequencing images.
Thing is, once you replace (or move) one image there’s a domino effect. You’ve
got to shuffle a whole bunch of images around. That kinda happened when I pulled
the “defective” shot. The good thing is that I got to include a couple of shots that I
really liked. The bad thing is that the shot that got pulled was just about my favorite
shot from the whole project. Sigh!

Anyway, I said I wasn’t going to post any more of the Jersey pix but, what with the
additions and deletions to the final edit plus the fact that the initial slide show I posted
was done from fast preliminary scans…..well, I have no choice. All in all I swapped
out 3 photos.

So here it is: BESIDE THE PASSAIC, new and improved.
.

click on arrow bottom left

THE SECRET TO PHOTOGRAPHY

Here it is…..I’m sure you’ve all been waiting:

Take a lot of pictures, only show people the ones that work.

the fine print:
- talent, passion, perseverance and half a brain are prerequisites.
- context rules…..what works in one situation might just suck in another.
- you’ve gotta have an ego, just don’t fall in love with it.

SIMON NORFOLK

Norfolk drags his large format camera all over the place, specifically to
war zones and other scenes of conflict (which even include the American
presidential campaign).

He recently gave a talk at the New York Photo Festival. When asked about
his approach to photographing conflict and other terrible things he replied,
in part: “Beauty is a tactic”. Man, I wish I’d said that.

Anyhow, this guy’s work is amazing. Check it out…….

Below are two of his photos from Afghanistan.