Orange Salamander

Orange Salamander.

December 2024

When I was a kid we had a really long country driveway and in the 80’s and 90’s we got a lot of snow. From what I remember, snow came in on Halloween and didn’t wave goodbye until March. One time it snowed on my birthday in late April.

Life where I lived, when I lived it was pretty boring, the internet wasn’t a thing and we only got about 3 channels on the TV. Sometimes I would get stir crazy at night, and pull on all my clothes and try to shovel the driveway. The snow ate up all the sound and it was quiet and cold but it gave me time to think. Mostly I thought about snow plow contraptions, or better shovel designs.

When my hands got cold, I knew I had lost the fight. Cold and wet hands on the metal shovel almost always signaled it was time to give up. You just can’t work with cold, wet hands. Dad would have to get the rest of the driveway with the big tractor.

In the barn where we kept the tractor was a green salamander heater. Or at least that’s what we called it.  Salamanders look an awful lot like a jet engine missing an airplane. Salamanders are loud and smelly but put out a lot of heat.  If the old tractor wouldn’t start, dad would aim the business end of the salamander at engine block and in a few minutes the tractor was running.

Dad showed me how to carefully put your hands close to the business end of the heater and warm them up. As a kid I learned that too close and you melted your gloves, but if you did it just right, your gloves would soften and feel amazing. Sometimes Dad would hold his bare hands in front of the salamander. When he took his hands away from the heat they would steam in the cold air of the barm. It looked like his hands were on fire and I loved watching that. As I got older, I got brave enough to do it too.

The other night when I was out for a walk with the camera I saw the light pouring out of that shop. I stopped to take a picture and asked myself what my subject was, as I often do, and realized with was that orange salamander. Somewhere inside I wondered if those mechanics, did the same trick with their hands on cold days.

Dorthea

There is this thing, that happens, if you wander. Nearly impossible to explain in 2024, in this country, in this culture. It doesn't always happen, but if you set out with no intention you get shown things. Maybe they are things you need to see. Or maybe you just notice the things, you're wondering about.

I tend to carry a camera, and people often stop to ask what I am doing. Last night a man in a rusty black pickup rolled up slowly and asked if I was OK. I pointed to the sunset and explained and he said, "I'm sorry," as he pulled away. No need to be sorry, sir.

What probably would never make sense to a sensible person is, you have to get lost, really disconnected, to find things. When I am out there, I am searching. When I am out there, I'm working on being lost.

Most people don't have time for that.

North Country Cemetery.

September 2024

Pretty Sick

I've been pretty sick for the last few days. I got just sick enough to actually miss moving. Despite capitalism's best indoctrination the greatest gift still is a healthy body. Lose it for a few days and you'll know.

When I was finally able to get upright I grunted my sneakers on and felt the sparkle of weakness in my back. Off I went for a slow neighborhood walk with the trusty Canon camera. I was rusty and I wasn't moving fast but something distinct happens to a humans spirit as they move through the particles of space and time. The novelty of adventure is like swing oil for the soul.

The sun itself started to do that thing that only photographers notice it does. She was setting golden spotlights on dusty uninteresting stuff. I love it when she does that.

I noticed the neighbors yard on the corner. A long chainlink which was frequently adorned with the annual of the season stuck out first. The bluish grey chainlink and the warm morning sun made for the perfect compliment. The warm picked up the cool and made a perfect friend. I clicked a few frames and kept on.

Ask any seasoned photographer and they will tell you photography is mostly about the light. Sure you might have the perfect subject, but if it's in poor light it won't ever be a great photo. But sometimes, just sometimes, if you have great light even a mechanically produced artifact like fencing looks nice.

I guess that's the beauty in being mobile and having the ability to notice. It's such a simply beautiful thing, being able to move and see new things and appreciate them. But I guess being sick for a handful of days, unable to climb out of bed, helped me be able to see it too. And that's the greatest thing about life.

The Log Cabin

The Log Cabin

2019

My family didn’t really say much about him anymore, but that wasn’t really unusual.

Grandpa owned a dark blue dump truck, and a green backhoe that used to sit under an old walnut tree at my grandma’s house. He died before he got to use them much, I think.

In the summer the leaves would flip and roll in the wind and the light would shimmer on that barely used dump truck and backhoe. I remember thinking about how lonely that backhoe must have been, chained tight to that homemade trailer with no one around to use it. I think Grandpa died in the 1990’s when I was about nine. I remember the day he died, meeting at my grandma's, and later cleaning out the apartment on the end of his bar but not much else.

On Sunday mornings when we would visit him at his bar, he would get me a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup, and I would sit right on the corner and happily eat it. He would take me into the kitchen to show me the French fry cutting machine followed by lifting the cover on the ice machine to marvel at all the ice. I would pull the handles on the cigarette machine, and shoot the shuffleboard puck down the alley on the fresh shuffleboard wax from the night before. The bar he owned had a lot of stories, I’m told, and almost always smelled like cigarettes and spilled beer.

I didn’t really remember Grandpa well, but in pictures we have, he put me on his backhoe and showed me how to dig. He would take bar debts in trade sometimes, and the farm equipment he got was everywhere on my grandma’s farm. As I grew up I learned how to operate on most of that equipment, and somehow, I think part of my landscape business hinges on those machines he left behind when he died.

Today that old bar is falling in on itself, long since abandoned, and I am afraid it won’t be there much longer. I wanted to go back inside one more time and look at the place that gave me so many fuzzy vignettes. I can remember the space, the smells, and the small physical details, but I really can’t remember him.

For old times sake I bought two Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups at a gas station down the road and brought them back with me in my camera bag.

After I had finished up shooting pictures, I used my finger to write “thanks” in the dust on the old bar and left a Reese’s right in the spot I used to sit. I walked out and happily ate the other one on the ride home and marveled at how complex and interwoven life is.

Slide Film @ Home

Today I developed my first roll of E-6 Slide film at home in the kitchen sink. I now understand why everyone says you must do it at least once in your life. Pulling those positives out of the tank and running water on them and seeing the image was amazing. I will say though, the cost and difficulty of developing has me thinking about sending the chrome films out for processing, but time will tell on that.

Panorama

Winter is a tough time to be a photographer. Your hands are cold, your bed is warm, and everything just looks bleak and uninteresting. During lean times, I use a few tricks to keep me motivated. I typically switch to panoramic images, and like to shoot expired film for a bit of mystery and difficulty. Anyway here is one from a nice sunny winter walk with the Mamiya 7 and the 80mm lens.

The mighty FUJI GSW690iii

When it rains all day I think of a camera near and dear to my heart. I think of the mighty Fuji GSW690iii which was my first medium format camera. The large and unusual looking camera shoots a nearly large format image and the quality of the optics are impressive. I got the camera in March of 2020 just before lockdown started and many days I just drove around in the rain/sleet with it just looking out at the world. The camera is rugged, incredibly simple to use and it gets the weirdest looks for its sheer size, but wow is the lens and the size of the negative impressive. Here is a shot I took at Beaver Lake in Baldwinsville NY. The detail won’t show in Insta, but on a computer screen these images are hard to beat.

View fullsize

Panoramic

The Mamiya 7 has this amazing thing.

It’s made by Mamiya and it is a fantastic addition. What I am speaking of the the panoramic adapter for 35mm film that converts your medium format camera into a panoramic beast. What is important to understand is these images are wider than the xpan and can be made for a fraction of the price. That is, if you happen to have a Mamiya 7 laying around and didn’t want to spring for a very very expensive xpan.

Roughly the adapter is 400 on eBay, so you can get a medium format camera, plus an xpan killer for less than the cost of an span alone……wow.

Anyway here is an image from a lazy walk around town:

Old San Juan and Puerto Rico

I did something that I usually don’t do on our anniversary trip to Puerto Rico this year. Usually I bring a bunch of cameras, film, and bulky accessories. I carry so much that I usually bring a huge camera backpack with multiple compartments and most of the time I bring at least 2 camera bodies. It is a huge hassle in every sense of the word, from pulling the film for the TSA to inspect, to getting a sweaty back from lugging a heavy backpack.

This year I decided to just bring one camera, my favorite camera, the fuji x100v. I brought it in a tiny little go pro case with a lens hood, sd card dongle (fuji’s software is not that great), and a spare battery.

Rationale

1. My rationale was the Fuji x100v is small and light and I could use the film emulations both in camera and in Lightroom at home to make the images have that filmic look.

2. I was super happy with the camera and how light and portable it is. I love the fact that it charges via USB-C just like the iPad I always carry.

3. I love the limitations such as a fixed lens and also the jpeg emulations built right into the camera as it saves editing time.

4. While traveling it is inconspicuous, stays out the way, and more importantly my wife does not have to wait around for big lens changes, gear stowage, or large drawn out productions.

   Results:

   I used the Lightroom Kodak Portra 400 UC++ even though its a bit heavy handed.

What drawing can teach you about killing a dragon.....

Timber Scene

Timber Scene Dec 2021 Redfield NY

Go slow to go faster......

I just had an idea I thought I would share after buying a new photobook by Joel Sternfeld. It’s messy.

“The faster I try to go, the slower, I get great pictures.” Take your time and slow down. Henri Cartier-Bresson said “that things made with time, time respects.” I think that this applies in so many areas but even photographic study. Here are 3 examples:

1. If I walk somewhere with my camera I get a lot of good shots but if I drive I get considerably less. Our brains process visually at the speed of walking, not of driving. SLOW DOWN.

2. Joel Sternfeld supposedly took 30 years to make his “Stranger Passing” book. I can’t get over that. How amazing is it that people today, driven by social media, think a project can be completed in 3 months. I do this to myself.

3. I shot a wedding once and shot about 1600 images in 4 hours. That is almost 7 pictures a minute. The big takeaway? I had very few keepers. Now this isn’t a strict scientific study because I had never shot a wedding before so that was also a factor. I can’t help but think that my strategy of spraying and praying was just plain fear and it forced me into a creative corner. Now fast forward to today and some of the old film cameras I am shooting for the North Country Project. I should medium format cameras which have about 8-10 images per roll. I shoot one roll per Sunday. This intentional limiting and slowing of the process has forced me to see and work so differently that I am seeing huge benefits in my seeing and also in what I don’t shoot. That is huge.

-Chris

Cape Cod April 2021

I decided to take the Mamiya 7 and the fuji x100t on a short 2 night vacation with my family this April. I am always amazed and how different the looks are out of both cameras but how capable they are. I am constantly blown away by the x100 series. What a phenomenal little camera. I find pairing the large medium format camera with the light nimble x100 the best of both worlds.

Supernormal Stimuli

In 1969 famed biologist Nikolaas Tinbergen won the noble prize for his work on understanding animal instincts and ultimately stimuli that caused these actions. His famous experiment involved realizing that gull chicks would respond to red dots on their mothers yellow beak as a signal to open their mouths and chirp for food. He was able to run a series of experiments where he discovered that using a yellow knitting needle with 3 red dots would super charge their response, even more than say their own mother’s beak. The chicks would chirp louder and longer when presented with the yellow needle and three dots. When the mother would come back they would chirp less loud and for a shorter duration. 

This work led to the discovery of what is called Supernormal stimuli. Basically biologists found out that animal instincts could be manipulated and super charged to illicit a greater response. What was so interesting is that upon studying humans we found we could do the same thing to humans  and supercharge our responses to stimuli too. 

One popular example is the creation of Brat dolls with super huge faces and eyes that supercharges our standard draw to human faces and made the toys incredibly successful as a toy line. We see this today with apps that use filters that distort the human face, plump the lips, and increase the size of eyes or other features of the human body on sites like instagram. 

Carried over to advertising we also see this in hyper feminized or hyper masculinized images of men and women on say, television. By showing off curvy parts of the body or the “V” cut chest of a male this supercharges our normal reaction to mating and mate selection biases. 

In clothing design we see the placement company logos and slogans with certain color combinations on the seat of the pants manipulates our hardwired evolutionary biases. Think about that the next time you see something written on someones caboose.

Food and the way it is marketed is also supercharged  by playing up the fat, salt, and sugar as ingredients.  Food scientists know this manipulates our hardwired proclivity toward these ingredients in our bias as a survival mechanism. 

If you decide to look supernormal stimuli manipulation is literally everywhere. So how can you use this idea in your creative or photography work?

1. Realize that modern media and images are highly distorted to make sales and you are likely falling prey to these subconscious traps. They are everywhere.

2. Realizing that certain poses of models either play up or play down this hyper masculinity or hyper femininity and this can have drastic implications for you work and how it is received.

3. Understanding the power of the human face and how they can be manipulated is important for say portrait photographers.

4. Always be looking for supernormal stimuli and understand its effect on marketing in social media and the web.

Zeigarnik Effect

In 1927 a soviet psychologist and her professor noticed something interesting about waiters. Waiters often remembered the detail of a patrons orders if the bill was unpaid. If the patron had paid for the order then the waiter simply wiped it from their mind. 

What they hypothesized is that our subconscious mind likes closure, and will work at all cost to close out a undone task. This is like handing a half done puzzle to a person. This effect also drives the magic of to do lists. You just have to check the box!

We like closure so much that the absence of closure can be a strong motivator for humans to take an action. Take for example the TV shows that roll the last scene of a TV show with the words “To be continued…..” Or think about season finales on any of your favorite Netflix binges. I bet most of those shows employ some form of this trick.

Which brings to photography. How can you use this in your photographic and creative life?

Some ideas:

1. Use a partial story to get people to go to other platforms or videos?

2. In photo books use a series blank pages to stop the flow information and drive your reader forward.

3. Leave out a few essential items in your compositions to create tension in the viewer.

4. Unbalance the composition in a story set and the re-balance it later in the sequence to add resolution.

5. Create gear checklists so you have motivation to get things packed before leaving.

Abandoned Hospital.

The core

At it’s core the Tug Hill Plateau has a beating heart of heavily forested land. Estimates range from 235 to 800 square miles but there is no denying that this area is heavily wild and not very heavily populated. I can always tell when I get near the center with my truck, as the pavement ends and signs start pointing to seasonal roads.

The best way to see this striking heart is by hiking or by ATV, few roads exist in its interior.

And while it pales in comparison to the size of the Adirondack park hundreds and hundreds of miles is nothing to sneeze at. I guess what I am saying is it is ruggedly beautiful country and only a short drive from Syracuse.

Cross 2020

When I was younger I often thought that communication meant what, “I said,” to someone. As I have gotten older I have realized it’s more about how the other person has heard or in most cases felt the message I tried to convey. In my mind when I share a story or thought with someone I imagine my story going in their ear and running over the complex machinery of their lives and coming out totally different than the way I intended it. Sometimes it lands more beautifully than I intend and sometime more ugly. The reception of that idea often comes down to how well I know that person, but not always.

It is for this reason that I love the study of symbology. Moreover, I think, I love the mechanics of how it works differently in all of us depending on the spectacularly varied intellectual luggage that we all carry. Like all forms of communication it is up to the interpreter and not the sender to understand the message. The crux of it is visual symbols can often seem obvious, but are anything but. Symbols still have to abide by the common law of interpretation and run over a lifetime of complex thoughts, feelings, and experiences. The machinery of our lives does the real heavy lifting here. I like that.

Cross 2020

Transportation

I have this crazy theory that photography is changed by the speed at which you are transported through it. Put simply if driving in a car I can only see maybe 3% of the possible pictures I would take. If I ride my bike and therefore move more slowly through the particles I can maybe bump that up to 30-40%. But it really isn’t until I walk that I see 100% of the shots I might take on any given day. My hypothesis is that photography on foot is more granular, more detailed, and more thoughtful than anything you can achieve in a car. You move slower and at a pace that can allow creativity. Driving is simply too fast to get good ideas.

This Sunday I decided to park my truck on this project and walk the little town of Ellisburg and see what I could get on foot. I started at this interesting little mechanic shop and I just loved the signage here.

Mamiya 7ii with Panoramic Adapter and Kodak Gold 200 speed film (expired)

Deaf Dog. November 2020

Limitations

Today I decided to go up to the North County to shoot some film. The only issue was I have not been “feeling” it lately. Partly I think this has to do with the changing of the seasons. Partly I think when a project starts to get less compelling that is a good sign to carry on. Whenever I get bored with my current photography project I try to give myself limitations. The limitations can be fun and also challenging forcing you to think on your feet. It often helps break up those inner negative voices as well. I decided not to bring any medium format film today but instead shoot only panoramic 35mm using expired Kodak gold 200. It’s a much cheaper stock than I typically use and I could tell by the canister it was 5-10 years old. Anyway here is some golden morning light and a longer exposure to get a bit of a streak.

Try these ideas you get bored with you current project:

Switch up the camera.

Try video instead of photo for the day.

Use a different film stock (or switch to digital, GASP)

Use a different aspect ratio (PANO!)

Only bring one lens (Bring a really tight lens if you use big wides most of the time)

Only use your phone

Try an instant camera like a fuji instax.

Canon 20mm f2.8

I bought a cheap used Canon lens about a year ago and I have really been surprised how great of a lens it is. Actually so much so that I have left my L series zooms at home, and have been devoted to primes ever since. One interesting piece of lore is that this lens is one of the only lenses with a curving plane of focus that Canon ever made according to Ken Rockwell. Here is an example of the quality this lens can render in tough lighting conditions.