Week 22 - 2017 in Photographs

Day 148

I was going to open this photo blog with a sentence about this being a week of black and white photography. But that is not entirely true. Day 149, the photograph directly below, is in fact a color photograph. And Day 151 is a sepia treatment. Sepia is a color. As a painter I can say that black and white are also colors. 

This week I decided to focus on the bones of the composition. The tones. The lights and dark. And that is easiest if the brilliant colors, my usual favorites, are stripped or minimized. I used to hate it in college when my instructors forced me to work with black and white film. But that is the bare bones of photography. And a cheaper dark room. And Ansel Adams was the master to follow.

And color film was not that dependable then. And when I got out of college and had to take my black and white film to developers I had no control of the product. I dropped black and white and switched to color slides.

Digital DSLR's have given me the freedom to return to the lessons I learned in college and add a few more. Winter has helped too. I am back in control of the post processing of the image. And my camera is not loaded with a whole roll of color film I have to complete before loading black and white.

Day 149

When I decided to begin again to practice black and white I read lots of articles on it. One tip was to consider black and white from the moment you take the picture as if your camera has only black and white film. Well, that didn't work for me. Except in winter where snow storms erase color.

Another tip was a noisy sky. Not in the photo above, and no sky in the one below.

Day 150

The two photos below have noisy skies. But the last photograph, my favorite in this series, does not. After a winter of playing around with this discipline I have decided it is all about the light. But then photography, color or black and white, is all about the light. And the bones of the composition.  

Day 151

Day 152

Day 153

When I am reviewing my captures on the computer the questions I ask myself are whether color is necessary, and is it a better photograph without that distraction.

Day 154

Night Run - A Creative Process Blog

Night Run
18 x 24 Mixed Media
$1050

The trouble with becoming known for a specific subject or theme in your paintings is coming up with a new take and not duplicating yourself. I first faced this issue with the canyon lands of Utah, and then with the Mission churches of New Mexico. Now it seems to be horses. Churches of the southwest follow an architectural formula and horses a biological one. So it comes down to color and arrangement and interaction with background to achieve uniqueness in each new composition. 

Unlike my mission period I am no longer doing four to eight art fairs a year and so do not have to "cookie cutter" my horses to produce volume. And I am working in larger formats so each painting takes more time and thought.

I stepped back from horses recently do produce a few paintings in my Fat Grass Country Series which has a different subject and palette. I was inspired to do another horse painting by a photograph of a snow sculpture on the internet. It was, of course, white and so I got to choose my colors. I decided on night sky.

Sky poured

 It is not my first night painting of horses. Tres Amigos was my first and I was very happy with the result.

Tres Amigos
20 x 20 diagonal Mixed Media
$900

My problem after the sky is poured is always what color to make my horses. I don't feel I have to stick with the colors they come in naturally but lately I have been sticking closer to those. I still want to do one with carousal horses one day. After laying down India Ink on outlines of the horses and then under them to define them further I washed in basic colors with watercolor.

Horses defined

Laying in foreground color

I like obscuring the hooves of my horses because it gives more a sense of movement. And I would rather spend my time on other details. Like stars and manes and grasses.

Grasses filled in with Oil Sticks

And after spending time filling in the foreground and a lot of details on the horses I arrived at this sticking point. As I gathered the progress photos into a folder to be able to do this blog and delete from my photo files the numerous other photographs I took of the progress of this painting I realized how quickly I had worked. And then how long it set at about this point because something was not right. I call it my Is-It-Done-Yet phase. It sat on the easel where I couldn't avoid looking at it while I worked on the drawing for my next painting.

In fact, I cleaned up the studio and stretched two canvases and transferred the new drawing to one of those canvases and the painting Night Run sat there until I could define what bothered me. In no particular order they are: large silver metallic spot over palomino, the palomino stallion drew my attention too much, the color of the grey mare seemed to fade into the sky, the red horse had no tail.

So the red horse got a tail and that reduced the amount of palomino neck you see and made the buckskin more more prominent. And the blue mare became a dapple grey which oddly enough makes the red mare stand out more. Oh, and I put gold glitter on top of the silver spot.

I posted the completed painting again so you do not have to slide back up to the top to compare.

I am not totally sure why it takes me so long with some of my paintings. Maybe if I was a better artist I could turn them out faster. I did when I was doing cookie cutter missions for fairs. An artist friend says I think too much. And at the moment I am at the Is-It-Done stage on the painting I began while this one sat on the easel being contemplated.

Week Two of 2014 in Photos

Day Eight

Art is a journey. I have believed that for a long time, and that belief is why this blog is called Creative Journey. This week I have been traveling on that journey with both photography and painting. My painting is going through a metamorphosis and so is my photography.  And photography in general is evolving because of the dry darkroom possibilities with digital technology.

I have been going through my recent photographs selecting photos for a show called Insight where it only has to begin with a photograph. It is not about how good your photograph can be but how artistic the end result is. So it is not surprising for me that this week I was looking at four subjects, each in two different ways. Day eight was subject number one. I loved how this city wall looked like a canyon wall especially when colors were enhanced.

Day Nine

But to me it looks far more monumental in black and white. These two photos were taken one right after the other. In the film days you could say the occupied neighboring cells on the strip of film. I am a camera turner. Not unusual for me to stand in one spot and move the camera rather than me. The play of light and the oblique angles in this building attracted me. The question was first how best to capture them. And then once on the computer how best to translate those images.

Day 12 - Same building/other side

Another example of me standing in one place and just turning the camera or me or zoom lens is Day 12, and a photo which will be posted most likely in the coming week.

Day 15???

I treated both photos differently in the dry darkroom of my photo processing program and they look like two different buildings. BTW you can twist the images in your computer rather than your camera on location. I have played with these piano key windows quite a lot.

I have said before that every photographer needs to turn away from their subject and see what is behind them. With buildings you also need to walk totally around them. These windows were on the right side of the first two photos. And the ones below were on the left side or back of the building.

Day 11

I loved the play of shadows on the ramp and wall. I am posting the original of this photo right off the camera below. I am not done with this image. All good digital art must begin with a good basic image. You may note that other than changing it to black and white I digitally straightened the most dominate vertical line in the finished photo.  I have seen some really good photographs fail because it makes the viewer uneasy because of a lack of anchor. Oddly you can make viewer really off balance like the two window pictures but not just a little tipsy. I am playing with that in a sketch for a painting I am hoping to finish today: How far is too far?

The original of Day 11

One of my frequent fans on my Facebook fanpage thinks I have gone a bit too far with the photo below. She believes the viewer has to work too hard. And that is a definite legitimate concern.

Day 10

I liked this treatment because it becomes more about the drip lines down through the misted window than the image behind that window.  And I was drawn too that because the drip lines look like the trees the droplets of water conceal.

Day 14

In the image I posted today of the same subject from a more oblique view the photograph is more about what is behind the glass rather than the glass. Color helps but also making the horizontal lines in Day 10 more angled draws the viewer beyond the glass. Horizontal lines are static especially in the bottom third of the photograph.

I am sometimes amazed at how much of my four years of fine arts I remember. And it is one of the reasons I shy away from photography workshops. They seem all too much about F stops and all too little about art.

I didn't put Day 13 on this weekly blog because it was off the topic. Visit Binford-Bell Studio on Facebook to see it. Better yet, become a fan and see the photos as I post them daily.

Week 47 - 365 Day Photography Challenge

Day 323 - Melting snow on windshield

I do not do layers. Yet. But I do find myself taking photos of patterns I think would look good as a future layer. This one may certainly be that. It was also a new camera challenge. There are a lot of reasons to take pictures. And even more if you are on the cusp of being a professional photographer. The photo below was an audition for new characters in winter still life photos. Last winter was one of my first explorations into still life photos and I really enjoyed myself and learned a lot. I want to do it again. But I want to use different objects. Frequent followers of my blog will remember the silver cream pitcher.

Day 324

The cast is a sheep skin, a rusty table which was once tiled and which I plan this winter to re-tile, a hand made pot from a friend and various rocks and weeds, and of course the ever present candle stick. I have tons of them of different sizes and shapes.

Day 325

But when the weather is good I plan to be out in it. I guess I am basically a landscape photographer. I hate doing portraits, will not do weddings, catch wildlife when it presents itself in my landscapes, and try to capture the nature of a beloved pet in an unguarded moment. I also use photography to record my paintings. This next year challenge I am going to include some of those in my challenge. And perhaps a blog or two about how to take pictures of your art work.

Day 326

In last week's blog I mentioned needing to know your subjects. And being just a little bored can be a plus from time to time. I do a lot of reflections in ponds of my acquaintance and I am always looking for a different approach. Early spring and late fall just before the ice closes them in ponds are like mirrors. It is hard to resist taking a picture even when you know you have stood at that same place before and taken one.

There is a lot of debate in photography books about where to put the horizon. In pond reflections it is where to put the edge of the pond because putting sky and water in a picture usually makes the sky look sick. I generally to by the rule of thirds or not at all. Photo above has pond edge vertically on the side. Below it is in the upper 1/3 of the photo. That is probably my favorite placement.

Day 328

The photo below is out of sequence so I could put the two reflections together but there is still the horizon placement to consider. And it is not an even Kansas horizon. If you have an uneven horizon placement is more of a guess. Remember the "horizon line" does not have to be the horizon. The bold line in this photo because of clouds and mountains is really the band of snow beneath the trees. It is in the bottom 1/3 just above the straight line of a path through the meadow.

Day 327

Decided to end the week with a bright green house blossom.

Day 329

So many flower pictures put the flower right in the center. If you have one of those digital cameras with the little flower icon as a choice on setting you will find it often focuses right in the center. I prefer my flower just a bit off center. The mass of this flower is to the right and in the background are balancing pinks of other flowers.

Balance, weight, and horizon are parts of composition which need to be considered if not when taking the photo then when cropping it. What is the horizon in the first photo?

Week 30 - 365 day Photography Challenge

Day 204

Week 30 I was out and about with my photography friend, Terry Atkin Rowe, from Virginia. Photographers do not ask why you are taking another picture of just pots, or boards or painted metal roofing because they are right beside you taking pictures too. I cannot say same pictures because even if to the untrained eye we are standing in the same place aiming at the same grouping of pots at Jackalope in Santa Fe I can guarantee we are taking a different picture.

Day 205 - the one and true cross

I would love to take a photographic workshop at Jackalope. It would be so much fun to roam around the piles and displays with say 20 other people with cameras and later look at the pictures they took. I bet there would not be two the same. And it isn't all about the picture taken but the post processing afterwards. Day 204 required the removal of a lot of price tags - true cloning practice. And there were also several in Day 205. I missed one, however. Can you spot it. It would be difficult to take out with the clone too but it could be cropped out easily. And I am not totally happy with this crop for another reason. What do you think that is?

Day 206 - New Muffler Needed

Another stop for Terry and I was the old Dirt Floor Gallery that is abandoned. We did not break in because there was plenty to occupy our artistic eyes on the outside of the creative junk yard establishment. The photo above was part of a wind break?

Day 207 - Meanwhile back at Jackalope

The Dirt Floor Art Gallery and Jackalope were to different days. But while I cleaned my scan disc of images from the day along the Rio Grande I did not have time to post process any photos until after Bandeleir National Monument which was the day after Jackalope. Photos taken at popular tourist stops often fail to win my heart. So I lapse back to giving my attention to Jackalope pots or rusting metal walls. First they are the photo less taken and second they are more what I want them to be.

Day 208 - the Second true cross?

I love patterns to the point of almost abstraction. And I confess to reducing some of the Canyon Walls to just that - abstractions. But that will come in Week 32. I took enough photographs during the few brief days my photographer friend was about that I can fill several weeks without taking another new digital image.

Day 209 - Cloning graduation exam

The above photo did not have as many price tags as the first image but they were in more difficult places. And I did not miss a one. Note to Jackalope - put them inside the pots.

Day 210 - Heavy Metal Pollack

And then there is my masterpiece for the week - a photo that took absolutely no post processing or digital manipulation. But it is a masterpiece of framing your shot. I really want to print it on canvas and hang it on my studio wall and mark it sold for the first copy. There really is no explaining what an artist will take pride in.

Second favorite is the leading photo and I worked hard at getting all the price labels off those pots. Every single one had a white price tag. But again it is the framing of shot I am most proud of. I had to cant the camera and bend over just so to get the composition just right. So I repeat: It is not about your camera or even your mastery of the dry darkroom. There is no substitute for the artistic eye.

What Makes a Winner

Lamentation of the Spirits - Best of Show Illusions

It is that time of year again. No, not just the holidays, but when artists have to come up with some new work to submit to fairs, shows and exhibits. Judges for major fairs do not want to see the same work again and there is always this little line in judged exhibits - work must be completed in the last two years. To complicate matters one of the galleries I am in is having a retrospective of the original six female artists for its seventh anniversary. And the Moreno Valley Arts Council is calling for entries for a January exhibit. So while others are making the rounds of endless holiday parties I am trying to come up with at least three new and innovative works.

This always raises the question as to what makes a winner. A group of friends and I got into this discussion with photography recently. First it has to be a good. And this is true for all artistic endeavors, including poetry and music no doubt. Composition, which I would define as balance and proportion, is all important. And in painting or photography that balance and proportion extends to color and not merely the layout of shapes. A photographer can frame his shot and on the computer crop it to improve the composition. A painter gets total freedom over their composition.

The most important role of composition (and here I am going to expand and recklessly include poetry and music) is to catch the eye (or ear) of the viewer and draw them in. And move them deeper into the work and then release them. A static composition causes a subtle irritation in the viewer - a dissatisfaction. Admittedly their have been some movements in painting that sought just to slam the viewer against the canvas. Museums collect a lot of those.

I guess because I write I also believe that message or content is very important in the visual arts, but unfortunately has become rather back-staged (maybe it has something do do with those Slam movements). Art is so often today something pretty to hang on your walls. And those of us trying to make a living in these rough economic times are libel to pander to the masses on this. But this time of year, especially when entering a juried exhibit, we get to insert more message. It is by no means as obvious as in an essay but for those that are engaged in the work through composition it is there to be read.

When I am in the role of judge for an exhibition I always look for content. Does this very well crafted painting or photograph also say something to me? Those works that do make a statement will always win out over those which are just nicely practiced compositions of light and color. But judges are fickle. All viewers of art bring to the art their own experiences which alters their relationship to the work. Hey, I know people that don't like the Mona Lisa. Even the best of artists get rejected from time to time. And a prize winning piece can lose in the next competition.

Composing a New Work

For the last few days I have been in my studio drawing. Working on both new compositions and improving the compositions of drawings I have done previously. Per Wiki: The term composition means 'putting together,' and can apply to any work of art, from music to writing, that is arranged or put together using conscious thought. In the visual arts, composition is often used interchangeably with various terms such as design, form, visual ordering, or formal structure, depending on the context.

I like the term flow. The painting should take the eye of the viewer through the images on the canvas or paper. A good composition flows and draws the eye into a journey. A bad composition is static. It can be the reason you sometimes look at a painting and feel stuck or irritated. But you don't want to make your composition so rude that the viewer feels manipulated either.

Jan Vermeer was one of the masters of subtle composition. Line and light were his tools to draw the eye to the focus of the painting which was never in the center of the work. There is the rule of thirds and the rule of odds, perspective and view point to consider as well as source of light. And when translated from drawing to paper - color.


Some of this is almost second nature once you have learned it. And learning can be quite complex. There is unconscious learning from just having viewed a vast number of works of art and analysized why some pleases you and why some does not. And then there are fine art classes. And books. We must not forget books.

But you can also learn a lot from your own drawings. I never throw a sketch or drawing away. Or for that matter a tracing of the drawing for transfer to the canvas. I find that in working from the sketch to the canvas my mind will make subtle changes often that alter the finished work for the better.

The sketch in conte on the right is a new one from a photograph. It is the second sketch of the same subject. The photograph as it appeared in the magazine was rectangular on the horizontal. I thought it was flat. Editors in magazines love to crop and not always for the bettering of the image but to allow space for copy. I wanted it square and drew it first to be in a 12 x 12 canvas but it felt cramped. So I drew it again. Now I was far enough from the original image it began to have a flow of its own.

The drawing on the left is a subject I have done twice before. I like the theme but don't think I totally have what I want from it yet. This time it will go on a longer canvas - 28 x 18. I think that will allow more room for a more complex flow of the eye. The same sketch cannot just be applied to a taller canvas. Elements must be moved - rearranged.

Sometimes you get lucky and the very first composition is the right one. But often you have to tweak and tweak again until you have reached sympatico. That is what erasers and tracing paper are all about.