Through The Viewfinder

Stacked.
Originally uploaded by Corey (a.k.a. ten0fnine)

Through The Viewfinder (TTV) is a neat way to use old cameras. A lot of cameras are out there that are neat old relics, with great styling, and they can be had cheaply. Unless you're like me, chances are those cameras are pretty useless in your digital repertoire. Useless as cameras that is, but perhaps not as lenses.

Basically all you need to do is take a camera with a nicely bright and large viewfinder, say an Argus Seventy-Five, and point your lens into the viewfinder. Take a picture, and you have a TTV shot. To be done well, you need to make a somewhat elaborate mask for the finder so that your camera is attached to the vintage camera in a way that makes shooting simpler. Most people use cardboard.

There are lots of folks out there doing this, and as you might expect, I've tried it myself. I find I enjoy actually shooting film through these cameras, but many others have gotten some great shots TTV. Many, like this one, feature strange colors (done in photoshop), and lots of dust (a relic of using these old viewfinders as lenses. I like the effect in some circumstances, though some folks use a photoshop action to simulate the effect. To me that's cheating, because half the fun is knowing you're doing something that requires a bit of effort on the photographer's part, with a creation you've made yourself.

So next time you see an old camera in a junk store, and you're a bit low on creativity, try some TTV photography. It might get you hooked.

Octoberoid Update

Corn Stalks in the Autumn Evening
Originally uploaded by Apocaplops

I've done quite well following my prescription to come out of the photographic doldrums this month, keeping my promise to use the Polaroid SX-70 as my only camera. There have definitely been some situations that I would have been better off with another camera, like a late night party, but on the whole I think I've learned quite a bit from this experiment. Things like composition, timing, and knowing what is and isn't a good photo before pressing the shutter release.

To be honest, I'm not looking forward to putting the camera down at the end of the month, I think I get along quite well with its limitations. Still, I miss some of the other cameras, and Polaroid film is getting expensive!

If you'd like to see every photo I've shot this month, all with the SX-70, just check out my Octoberoid set on Flickr.

Perspective 2 Studio is open!

Many budding photographers I've talked to have expressed an interest in "studio photography." That's normal, of course, because most of the photography we see in everyday life is churned out using a studio. Magazines, newspapers, weddings, websites; they all utilize studio photography. If you want to get paid in this field, learning to light and stage properly isn't just a suggestion, it's a must!

In the past I've taken to Strobist for all my lighting advice and needs. The work of a studio photographer is unique - we need special lighting equipment, special camera equipment, and often an indoor environment that we can control for the shoot. You can always buy the right equipment, so long as you have the money, but where can you find a good location?

Well, locally we now have Perspective 2 studio, located in Lansing's Old Town. It's a community-driven space that hosts photographers in two studios. I like the idea so far, because they seem to have a knowledgeable staff, great equipment for photographers to rent, and classes for those of us who are lighting-challenged. There is also a vintage store on-site, so if you want to, you can rent vintage items to be used as props for a shoot.

Studio A is a huge space that sometimes doubles as a theater for local acting troops. It's about 1100 square feet, has a solid chicago-style brick wall, with high ceilings. Studio B is smaller, at about 800 square feet, and can double as a classroom for photographers. You can rent in hourly blocks or become a member, where you pay monthly for free time and discounted rates.

I wish the studio the best of success. It will be an important resource for area photographers, especially if they offer useful classes.

Back to Basics: one camera, for one month.

Haiku, for Keturah
Originally uploaded by Apocaplops

If you have ever set foot in my apartment, or met me while I was taking photos, you'll certainly know one thing about me; I have a lot of cameras. I got caught up in the whole camera-collecting thing at about the same time as I became interested in photography. While they may seem to go hand in hand, I've begun to think that having so many cameras is detrimental to my progress as a photographer.

See, I've always been a gearhead. First it was cars, and believe me when I have a laundry list of strange and rare cars I want to own someday. I found photography as a hobby, and suddenly I was doing something where I could afford a lot of the gear. It started innocently, with cheap thrift store finds, but lately it's gotten out of hand. Don't believe me? I count 17 cameras that I can see from where I sit right now, in my living room.

Obviously they don't all get used too often, and that's a shame, because many of them really are nice cameras that could take wonderful photos. Many of them are more decorative than useful. And with so much choice, a photographer can bog down and not shoot much of anything, as I have been doing recently. Each camera has a different shooting style, and if I can't decide what camera to pick up, I can't easily decide what to shoot.

I've talked with others about working within tight limitations, and I think it's time I acted on my conversations to see if they could be more than just words. I'll use only one camera for all of October, starting today. Maybe I'll learn better what I can do with it, and what I can be capable of.

So I've chosen the Polaroid SX-70. It's one of the most limiting cameras I own - the photographer controls only the focus and the composition. You can't do much about the exposure, development, or aperture, because the camera and film take care of all that. And of course Polaroid film is quite expensive, so I can't just go around shooting everything I see, or I'll go broke. I believe that these limitations will force me to work more creatively, and to explore and push the limits of what the camera and I can do together. I'll let you know at the end of the month how it goes.

A Fit City?

The Racers
Originally uploaded by Apocaplops

If there's one thing I've been struck by in Lansing, it's that the city seems serious about physical fitness. We have a few great bicycle shops - Riverfront Cycle and Velocipede Peddler - and a great fitness store as well - Playmakers. There are many events in the summer geared towards the fitness-crazed among us, from triathlons to 5K races to half-marathons.

Today was the running of the Capital City River Run, which includes both a 5k and a half-marathon. For those not in the know, that's a little over 3 and 13 miles, respectively. This year attendance skyrocketed to 2,000 from last year's 900 because the city has done a good job promoting it in the outlying communities. My wife and a friend had been training for the 5k, and I was lucky enough to have the morning off from work, so I joined them down at the Lansing Center, to take photos of course. Not that I can't run, but given the choice I'll grab the camera any time.

Races like this start in the morning, and this time of year that means the light can be iffy for people shots. If I were doing it again, I would have used an on-camera flash for fill lighting to balance out the deep shadows. You really need a digital SLR to get the best out of the situation - having a zoom lens and quick shutter response is helpful - and you can change your settings on the fly to get different effects, like the blurred runners pictured above.

I'm starting to really enjoy taking photos at events like this. I could see myself covering events for a small local paper, although I don't know if my preferences in photography would totally intersect theirs. Perhaps I should take a class...

Michigan State Shutdown Imminent

An appeal to reason
Originally uploaded by Apocaplops

As negotiations continue in the Capitol, it is becoming clear that partisan politics will not allow legislators to agree on a budget for the next fiscal year, causing the state to suspend all nonessential services. Sounds awesome, don't it? Well, not surprisingly most people I talk to see this as a bad thing, and are embarrassed at how their elected leaders are conducting themselves; putting politics before the welfare of the state.

Luckily, I live in the state capital, so I figured I'd go on down to the Capitol building to see what was going on. I packed my digital SLR (with fresh batteries), expecting to see perhaps some protesters, news crews, and angry citizens voicing their concerns. I hung out for about an hour and only saw the woman pictured here protesting, however. There were about a dozen news vans parked around the Capitol, all just hanging out waiting for a break in the story. I asked one passer-by what they thought about the state being shut down, and he had no idea what I was talking about.

I may go back up again, as one of my favorite things to photograph is a protest, but the prospect of one happening seems dim. Perhaps that could change, should the lawmakers actually shut down the state.

UAW on strike in Lansing

UAW Strikers
Originally uploaded by Apocaplops

As of 11 this morning the United Auto Workers went on strike from General Motors facilities. Anyone who has been in Lansing for any period of time knows that the city is tied indelibly to General Motors, and as a result the UAW. For many years it was GM and the UAW that provided a living wage to the area residents, and to a large extent this is still the case. Of course, General Motors has fallen on hard times, and as a result, Lansing and its citizens have felt the pain.

I decided to go out and take a few photos of the people directly affected by this strike, so of course I reached for my digital camera. As happens often, the batteries were completely dead and I reached for a few more reliable, if antiquated, pieces of equipment: Olympus XA, Konica I, and Polaroid SX-70. It is, of course, the Polaroid you see here - more later when I get the 35mm film developed.

It was odd, me using a Konica from 1952 to photograph an organized strike. An old rangefinder has been the camera to use for journalistic photography since about World War II. I realized that a lot of what the UAW fights to preserve are the values that went into the making of my old Konica. High level of quality, hand-crafted precision, these are qualities that have since been replaced by automated manufacturing processes, cost-saving materials, and overseas construction and assembly. There is no way you could build a camera like the Konica today, things just aren't made that way anymore. What was once done by skilled labor with metal is now done by computer and robot with plastic.

It's much too late to turn that boat around, as the UAW and its members long ago realized. The media has reported that this strike is about retiree benefits, but the real meat of the matter has to be long term job security. These workers are rightly concerned about staying employed, as they have watched countless coworkers sent packing in the last couple decades, their jobs replaced in foreign countries by fewer workers, paid less.

It's not a problem I can solve, but I do support the UAW and its members. Nobody wants the strike to last forever, and people wrongly blame the union for GM's downward spiral. As one of the strikers put it, "I'd love to see GM make a billion dollars next quarter." These people don't want the moon, they want a reasonable compromise that makes sure both parties can stay afloat in difficult waters.

As a note about the photography, most of the strikers seemed upbeat and eager to talk and have their photos taken. From my experience the early hours of the strike are when people feel the most optimistic and free to cooperate, if you're inclined to take photos. A digital SLR would probably be the best for this kind of photography, but any "normal" lens will do, and just work with what you've got. Don't try to get people to pose for you as they are in this Polaroid - rarely will that work.