Re: [Leica] Two more scans (Oh no!)

["George Kenney" <georgekenney@earthlink.net>]

On 5 Sep 2001, at 9:24, SonC (Sonny Carter) commented:

> A couple of thoughts about the Soapstone Valley, and these are newly
> acquired prejudices (postjudices?).  A picture like this can always be
> improved by the inclusion of people, or animals, or anything except
> plain old scenery.
> Soapstone Valley has no context to me.  I really am not sure what I am
> looking at.  The tones seem ok, but I am not primarily a Black and
> white guy, so I can only go by my subjective feelings.

Plain old scenery. Well, I thought it was a stairway by a creek lit by 
scattered sunlight. With some imagination it could be part of an 
enchanted world. (No, it's not like the interior of a church with a 
beaming choir in full-throated worship.)

I defer to your years of wire service and other professional 
photography but I would point out that a human presence is not 
necessary for art to work on the imagination. Indeed, I wasn't 
aware that that school of thought could exist in the art world. So 
thanks for bringing it to my attention.


> The truck is terrific, but I REALLY want to see the whole truck.   

Sorry, no can do. You only get the front 2/3s of the truck. But if you 
look closely, you can see almost the entire truck shadow, beneath 
the truck. Hope this helps.

> The picture could be improved hugely with the
> inclusion of people.   It is clearly someone's pride.   Even a posed
> shot would have made this a wonderful picture.

Some people are interesting. Some really, really aren't. Wouldn't 
you be disappointed if it were just some jerk standing by his truck? I 
like it a bit better without, since it allows me to think optimistically 
about what might be. Of course, if the owner were a really cool 
person I might want to include them. Kind of depends on a lot of 
different things. 

> Finally, the bread shot. 
> My thoughts on the shot is that
> the mixer and things around give clues to what the shot is about, but
> it does not say "BREAD" to me.   Too much ceiling and too little bread
> is shown.  A lower angle with lots of product would do the trick here.

Thanks again, but this was not a 'product' shot. It's a black African 
guy, surrounded by white stuff, making white bread. It's like a little 
joke -- get it now? (Maybe this kind of allusive image doesn't go 
over well in the South, Sonny. Sorry.) 

> Since you mentioned the controversial pinhole shot, I'll comment on it
> too.  I once had a contract  with a real estate firm to shoot the
> pictures that appeared in their ads in the newspaper.   The goal was
> to show the building.  When the minilabs came to town, they did not
> renew my contract, because they could give agents point-and-shoot
> cameras  and realize their goal.   Your pinhole picture looked like
> those real estate agents' efforts.

News flash: pinhole photographs do not look like the output of point-
and-shoot cameras. To realize this requires sort of an eye-brain 
thing. I'd suggest glasses but I know that won't help. Biofeedback in 
a lab might get you there. I dunno.

Thanks, Sonny, for taking time to review my pix.

G.