Happy 172nd Anniversary to Photography

The Fathers of Photography: Louis Daguerre and William H. Fox Talbot

Happy World Photography Day to all my fellow photographers, photo enthusiasts, and shutterbugs!

Today marks the one hundredth and seventy second year since the invention of Photography.  172 years ago, Louis Daguerre and William H. Fox Talbot gave the world the ability to capture images.  We have come a long way technically (from chemical processes, we now capture light digitally), but the basic premise of Photography has remained the same -- "fragments of life (light) captured for our contemplation."

Even though we now work with digital sensors and are far removed from the primitive Calotype and Daguerrotype, we must never forget the genius of our predecessors who formulated the original "key" to unlock the mysteries of "light" and the magic of the photographic process.  Daguerre and Talbot's legacy to mankind is truly immeasurable (specially to Art and Science) and is "Wizardry" of the highest order.

Can you imagine a world without photographs (it will have devastating consequences for Science, not to mention Art)?  So it is just fitting for us to remember the origins of our Art today, August 19 and whenever we click our cameras (and our cellphones) to capture an image... for it is a precious gift that was presented to us 172 years ago, but continues to be relevant in our lives today, and into the future.

10 Years Ago Today

Ten Years Ago...        I became a father.  It was a defining moment for me.

Today, my daughter turned 10, so I decided to give her something different.  Instead of the traditional card, I decided to give her a "Birthday Comicbook," chronicling her first ten years of life (through my eyes of course) and to celebrate a decade of fatherhood.

Interview: Esy Casey + "Jeepney"

Esy with "Thing With No Name" director and Co-Producer Sarah Friedland

Esy Casey is a 30 year-old Filipino-American filmmaker who has been making waves in the Indie film circle in the last 4 years.  A visual artist who also does graphics, illustration and photography, Esy loves telling stories and is genuinely interested in the lives and cultures of people from all over the world.

The daughter of a Filipina from Zambales and an Irish-American from Detroit (they met at the University of Chicago), she says that the "Jeepney" is the perfect metaphor for her (half Filipino, half American).  She was born in LA, but has lived in different cities growing up because of her parents' research work.

Esy is currently raising funds for her new film project, "Jeepney" - a feature-length documentary that chronicles the development of the Jeepney from a military relic to a "hotrod" mass transit vehicle.  The film will also contain vignettes of conversations and stories from drivers, passengers and policy makers to chart the iconic vehicle's uncertain future.

I interviewed Esy to give you a broader picture of the artist/filmmaker behind the "Jeepney" movie.

What made you become a filmmaker?

I fell into it in my mid-twenties, when my filmmaking partner Sarah asked me to shoot her film in South Africa (THING WITH NO NAME, 2008).

Did you make films when you were younger?

I've drawn since I can remember, and have been a photographer since my teens, but I'd never held a video camera before that first film.

I understand that you are also a graphic/visual artist. How has this influence your filmmaking?

Both share the same principles of composition, color theory, gesture and expression; it's all about subtle faces, emotions, visual cues that speak a thousand words, and catching them before they slip away.

Esy at work

Please discuss your photographic background.

My dad let me use his nice, heavy Nikon FE camera from the 70s since I was a teenager, and I loved understanding the mechanics of it, the winding and clicking and developing. It was a very material pleasure, something I wasn't sure would fulfill me with the moving picture. But I've always been attracted most to a sense of motion and rhythm in still photos and print design, and that was how I fell in love with cinematography. It tells a story, and can share a lifetime of someone else's experience in a matter of minutes, which is very exciting and can change your outlook on a certain area of the world, and in your own world.

What equipment do you use to shoot your films?

I use a Canon 7D, and sometimes a LitePanels Micro, but usually available light.

I read somewhere that you won an award?

I was nominated for the Wexler cinematography award for THING WITH NO NAME, and won a Book Design Gold Award with a group of fellow designers for the book SHOW ME HOW.
 

Last Space Shuttle + IPhone 4

The Space Shuttle Program's last flight blasted off yesterday in Florida for a 12 day mission to the International Space Station.  The lift-off of Space Shuttle Atlantis marks the end of America's 30 year old Space Shuttle program.  It has been a fruitful 30 years of labor, highlighted by the Hubble and the International space station, and I salute all the astronauts, engineers, scientists and support crews of NASA for a job well done!  Your work will benefit us all.

Here is brief video of that historical launch:


Here is a tribute video with Hi Def images of various shuttle launches:

Nothing combines photography and technology more perfectly than "space photography" -- the final frontier.  I happen to be an avid fan of both.

Speaking of technology, Space Shuttle Atlantis is carrying two IPhone 4s aboard its last mission loaded with the new SpaceLab App for iOS. The App is designed to utilize IPhone 4's cutting-edge capabilities including the 3-axis-gyro, accelerometer, retina display, cameras and A4 processor.

The IPhones will be used to conduct 4 experiments:
- An experiment will measure the distance and exact location of the iPhone in relation to the Earth’s center.
- Calibration of the three-axis gyro and accelerometer to make subsequent measurements more accurate.
- Calculation the longitude and latitude of the spacecraft multiple times to predict the spacecraft’s path of orbit.
- To monitor and categorize how radiation affects the iPhone.

The goal of the SpaceLab App is to gather as much data as possible now to aid in developing more advanced mobile applications in the future.

Here is a gallery of my favorite photographs from 30 years of Space Shuttle missions.  Enjoy!:

My Big Canon (humorous email)

My big Canon

When it comes to Photography, my father and I hardly see "eye to eye."  He considers Photography the hobby that has taken over my life.  But he sent me this email today that had me in stitches.  For the first time ever, we connected (about photography) and I thought it was worth blogging about.

WARNING - subject matter might be offensive to some people.

iCloud and Photography

It is Apple Computer WWDC (Worldwide Developers Conference) time again and the tech world is abuzz with the latest Apple tech news. This is the annual event most IPhone and Mac lovers wait for, since it has been the traditional venue where the newest version of their favorite gadget is unveiled.  But this year, the company decided to delay the unveiling of their latest hardware to give centerstage to their newest platform dubbed "the iCloud."

In yesterday's keynote address, delivered by Apple chairman Steve Jobs, Apple announced a new free service called the "iCloud" (in obvious response to the recent "cloud" music services launched by Amazon and Google).  Like other "cloud" services or 3rd party online storage services, iCloud will synch user content from their device/s to servers in Apple's data centers, where it can be readily available and distributed to all the user's other devices.  But unlike similar online storage services, which just backup and centralizes data, "iCloud's" smart system offers some added features like: purchases from iTunes (Apps, music, media) will be mirrored on all your other devices (IPhone, IPad, IPod and computer), documents created and updated on any device will be automatically stored in iCloud and updated on all your other devices and photos (and videos) taken by an apple device or uploaded on a computer will automatically be available in your other devices for a short period of time via "Photo Stream."    

This is great news for photographers and photo enthusiasts worldwide. Aside from the obvious storage space service (5 GB is free not counting music, photos, apps and books), photos taken by Apple devices or photos downloaded from your digital camera to your computer (including PCs) can be instantaneously available to all of your devices, and will be stored in "iCloud" for 30 days.  This automatic feature will save us the hassle of manually backing up and uploading our photo files to our online servers or to our individual devices constantly.  As soon as I found out about this, my mind started to think of the different ways I can use "iCloud" for my own photography.

The Winners of the 64th Festival de Cannes

The Jury headed by Robert De Niro

The controversy filled 2011 Cannes Film Festival ended yesterday with a Palme d'Or for Terrence Malick's  much talked about "The Tree of Life."  The eleven day (May 11 -22) festival of World Cinema also saw Jodie Foster's bizarre "The Beaver" starring Mel Gibson, Michel Hazanavicius' surprising black & white silent movie "The Artist," Lynne Ramsay's dark drama "We Need to Talk About Kevin," as well as "18 Days," 10 short films about the Egyptian revolution (that just happened 3 months ago), which resulted in the resignation of President Hosni Mubarak.  But the biggest controversy involved a formal statement by the board of directors of the Festival declaring Lars von Tier persona non grata at Cannes, after the director openly declared (in a press conference) that he was a Nazi and was glad that he was not of Jewish heritage.

Here is a list of the 2011 Awardees:

Palme d'Or - "The Tree of Life" by Terence Malick

Grand Prix - "Once Upon A Time in Anatolia" by Nuri Bilge Ceylan, "The Kid with a Bike" by Jean Pierre and Luc Dardenne

Best Director -  Nicolas Winding Refn for "Drive"

Jury Prize - "Poliss" by Maiwenn

Best Actor - Jean Dujardin in "The Artist"

Best Actress - Kirsten Dunst in "Melancholia"

Best Screenplay - Joseph Cedar for "Footnote"

Palme d'Or for Short Film - "Las Acacias by Pablo Giogelli

Jury Prize - "Badpakje 46" by Wannes Destroop

Camera d'Or - "Las Acacias"




--Picture courtesy of the Los Angeles Times.  Trailer from YouTube.com

Rock Photographer Jim Marshall

The master at work

Influences to our own photography comes from a wide variety of sources depending on our inclinations.  I count Jim Marshall as one of my main influences, not only because of my interest in 'Rock/Music Photography' as a specific specialization, but also because he was such a terrific master Portraitist.  Like the best portrait painters (and photographers), he captured the essence of his subjects superficially as well as subliminally.  His iconic portraits of 'Rock' legends graced album covers and the covers of music magazines, and are now highly prized as collectibles by music fans worldwide.

Inconspicuously present with his Leicas, shooting in 'available light,' he created a trademark look that are at once candid and vulnerable.  My favorite photos are the unguarded moments-- onstage, backstage and offstage, when Jim revealed the larger-than-life existence of these musical legends.  Intimacy was the key ingredient to his Art.

Jim with his Leicas

Jim Marshall was born in Chicago on February 3, 1936, but he grew up in San Francisco.  He had a Kodak Brownie camera when he was a kid, but only became serious with photography in Junior High.  He was working as an Insurance Claims Adjuster in 1960 when John Coltrane (Jazz icon) approached him in Berkeley by chance and asked him for some directions to a club.  Jim offered him a ride in exchange for a picture.

Chuck Berry rockin and rollin

Jim Marshall's photographs are some of the most wide known portraits of legendary Rock, Jazz and Blues superstars. Two of his most famous ones are the photos of Jimi Hendrix with his guitar aflame from the Monterey International Pop Festival in1967 and Janis Joplin lying on a couch backstage nursing a bottle of Southern Comfort Bourbon.

Jimi Hendrix burning his guitar on stage

2 Top Photojournalists Killed in Libya

Chris Hondros on Assignment

Tim Hetherington in the War Zone

Last Wednesday, two top photojournalists were killed in the rebel-held city of Misrata in western Libya.  Libyan dictator, Moammar Gadhafi had intensified his weeklong assault on Libya's third largest city.  The photojournalists were traveling with some rebel fighters to cover an incident in Tripoli street, where some of the most intense fighting had occured in recent weeks.  During a skirmish, Hetherington was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, while Hondros died from severe brain trauma from a shrapnel.

I admire photojournalists not only for their courage and commitment, but also for their invaluable service to humanity and history in general.  These dedicated chroniclers of our collective experience, gives us windows into the human experience, both good and evil.  I tend to concentrate on the good side of life, but I never forget the darker side of humanity -- thanks to the courage and dedication of fellow photographers who cover conflicts, wars and devastation of every type.  The News photographer/photojournalist is a special breed, half artist/half warrior.  Chris Hondros and Tim Hetherington were the best of this breed.  They went in harms way to give us a glimpse of the horror around us, through their uncompromising artistic eye.

One of Hondros's award winning images

Singapore Vacation

My wife and I took our family to Singapore for a minivacation last week with my mom. The kids have been working hard in school and we all needed a break from our regular routine.  Singapore turned out to be the perfect destination for all of us -- it was just three hours away and it had a lot of new attractions we have not yet seen.

I have been to Singapore several times, but my last trip was more than 10 years ago.  The city has grown considerably and is now one of the top Asian tour destinations in Southeast Asia.   We just stayed for a week, but we enjoyed every minute of it.

The Marina Bay Sands Hotel/Casino and Mall complex

One of its newest attractions is the Marina Bay Sands complex.  A bustling city within a city, which boasts of a one of a kind hotel/casino building with a ship-sized structure on top (worlds largest cantilevered platform) that houses restaurants, infinity pools and a spa with a 360 degree view of the city.

The "lotus like" Art & Science Museum of Singapore

The complex also has a beautiful mall (the Shoppes Mall) that houses luxury shops like Cartier and Louis Vuitton as well as 7 celebrity Chefs restaurants and a skating rink.  It is also home to Singapore's new state of the art Art & Science Museum as well as two world-class performing arts theatres and a huge convention center.

Shooting butterflies (shot by Anne)

Less picturesque but just as spectacular (occupying 121 acres), is Resorts World Sentosa which hosts Universal Studios Singapore.  The resort is still in varying stages of construction, but it will eventually be the home of 6 world-class hotels, a water park, a marine park and a maritime museum.  This certainly is not the same Singapore I visited 10 years ago.

Aside from these two grand resort developments we spent a lot of time in Underwaterworld Singapore, the Singapore Zoo and the Butterfly Park & Insect Kingdom.  Aside from the kids, I had a lot of fun photographing the different species of animals and insects for my own print series.  I came back with hundreds of photographs.  A lot of which, won't been seen publicly for years...

--Shot with a Canon 7D with various lenses.

More on Douglas Kirkland

Douglas Kirkland Shooting Marilyn Monroe

This entry is a follow up to my article last Feb.13 on Douglas Kirkland. Although I have written about Douglas even before then (Sept. 12, 2009), I find it hard to condense everything I would like to convey about this talented Artist in a few short commentaries.  So I am adding a short interview and a brief video that might give you a rounder portrait of Douglas as a photographer.

The American Society of Cinematographers interviewed Douglas Kirkland last October 25 after announcing their decision to award him the ASC Presidents Award this year.  In this interview he shares his earlier days -- his first picture, his first camera, his first photo job, appreticeship etc. A great read for any Kirkland fan.

ASC Interview: A Conversation With Douglas Kirkland

Here is a great clip on Douglas and his work. It was taken two years ago at the Calumet Photo (NY) Exhibit: Freeze Frame - 5 Decades of Photographs from the Entertainment Industry.

--Video from youtube.com courtesy of calumetphotonews.

Picasso And Matisse With Their Muse

The rivalry and friendship between Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse has facinated me for years.  These titans of 20th century art have influenced and inspired each other to push the bounderies of painting to its limits... and brought their art to its inevitable conclusion -- Abstraction.  "You've got to be able to picture side by side everything Matisse and I were doing at the time," Picasso said toward the end of his life. "No one has looked at Matisse's paintings more carefully than I; and no one has looked at mine more carefully than him."

Picasso's "Nude, Greenleaves and Bust"

These two artists have been in the headlines lately, side by side, as usual.

Picasso's painting, "Nude, Greenleaves and Bust," became the most expensive art work ever sold at auction last May, when it fetched $106.5 million at Christie's in New York.  It is currently on display at the new Pablo Picasso room on the third floor of the Tate Modern (gallery) in London.

It was announced about a month ago that Al Pacino has signed on to play the role of Henri Matisse, in the upcoming movie titled "Masterpiece" by Canadian director Deepa Mehta, who was nominated for an Oscar in 2006.  The bio-pic will be centered on Matisse's relationship with his nurse and muse, Monique Bourgeois.

In 1941, a 21 year-old nursing student named Monique Bourgeois responded to an ad placed by Henri Matisse for a “young and pretty night nurse.”  Matisse, then in his early 70's, was recovering from an intestinal cancer operation. He made a few drawing and paintings of her, and even taught her perspective after discovering that she was an amateur artist.  But war separated them for a few years.

They were reunited after the war.  But by that time, Monique already took her vows as a Dominican Nun.  Their friendship would culminate in what Matisse considers his greatest life achievement, the Chapel of the Rosary in Vense.

Matisse inside the Chapel of the Rosary

The Winners 83rd Academy Awards

It's Oscar Night once again and Hollywood is concentrated on the intersection of Highland Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard.  I am excitedly awaiting the results of this years hotly contested awards ceremony since this year's nominees represent some of the best new filmmakers and actors of this new generation (almost half of the acting nominees are younger than 40 years old).

Price Waterhouse Coopers with the results

Anne Hathaway and James Franco Hosting the event

I made my own predictions for this years race on the blog entry below: Best Picture, Best Directing, Best Cinematography, Best Original Screenplay, Best Actor (and Supporting Actor) and Best Actress (and Supporting Actress).

Here are the actual Winners:

Best Picture - "The King's Speech" (I was in different continent altogether:))
Best Director - Tom Hooper for "The King's Speech" (missed that by a mile)
Best Cinematographer - Wally Pfister for "Inception" (on the money)
Best Original Screenplay - David Seidler for "The King's Speech" (on the money)
Best Actor - Colin Firth for "The King's Speech" (on the money... slam dunk!)
Best Actress - Natalie Portman for "Black Swan" (on the money... yeah baby!)
Best Supporting Actor - Christian Bale for "The Fighter" (on the money)
Best Supporting Actress - Melissa Leo for "The Fighter"

Here are the winners from the other notable categories:

Lifetime Achievement Awards - Eli Wallach, Jean-Luc Goddard, Kevin Brownstow and Francis Ford Coppola (yeah Jean-Luc, Francis and Eli... I am a great fan)
Best Art Direction - "Alice in Wonderland"
Best Editing - "The Social Network"
Best Animated Feature - "Toy Story 3"
Best Adapted Screenplay - "The Social Network"
Best Foreign Language Film - "In A Better World"
Best Visual Effects - "Inception" (on the money)
Best Original Score - Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross for "The Social Network" (yeah Trent!)
Best Sound Mix - "Inception"
Best Sound Editing - "Inception"
Best Costume Design - Collen Atwood for "Alice in Wonderland"
Best Documentary - "Inside Job"

All in all, my picks were on the money... I missed out on three out of nine, 1/3 -- not bad. I guess I just have a totally different perspective on what a good movie is.  I definitely think that "Black Swan" and "127 Hours" are both better movies than "The King's Speech" from an artistic perspective and that Darren Aronofsky or Chris Nolan should have won for Directing because directing is also about "vision." Oh well, at least I got my radar straight when it comes to the technical aspects of Acting, Cinematography, Writing and Visual Effects!

It's party time, Hollywood.

--Pictures from Reuters and AP.

My Oscar Picks

Although I watch the Academy Awards almost every year, I am ecstatic about this year's race because the films competing against each other are extraordinarily good.  Almost all of the movies nominated for "Best Picture" are what most people would consider "Art House Films" -- my preferred genre.

This year's line-up also represents some of my favorite directors in contemporary cinema -- Darren Aronofsky, David Fincher, the Coen Brothers, Danny Boyle, David O. Russell and Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu.  These talented filmmakers are some of the best and brightest of this new generation.

I thought it might be fun to predict the winners four days prior to the actual event to see whether or not I am even close to the Hollywood consensus.

Best Picture:  Black Swan

In my opinion, "Black Swan" and "127 Hours" should tie for Best Picture.  But there can only be one "Best."

I fell in love with both movies for opposite reasons.  I thought "Black Swan" was brilliant because it is complex and abstract in the best tradition of Antonioni.  "127 Hours" was fantastic because it is unbelievably simple and direct, yet flawlessly executed by Danny Boyle.

I picked "Black Swan" over "127 Hours" because I desperately believe that Darren Aronofsky needs to win for this film.  Not only did he masterfully direct his actors (specially Natalie Portman) in each of their challenging roles, he also managed to create a compeling film about Ballet... an achievement in itself!

But in the end, I have a very strong feeling that "Inception" will win.

Darren Aronofsky with Natalie Portman on the set

Best Director:  Darren Aronofsky

I think that Darren finally deserves to win the trophy for Directing.  Don't you?  We better hand him one quick... he just agreed to direct "Wolverine."  If he does not get an Oscar for this movie, he might just keep doing commercially viable films from now on.  Remember the brilliance of Francis Ford Coppola before "Peggy Sue Got Married?"  Enough said.

But I have a strong feeling that this Oscar will end up with Chris Nolan.