31.12.16

Instead Of Ice Fishing I Take Photos Of Ice Fishing Holes

December 31, 2016

A number of years ago, during a particularly cold November here in Madison, WI, we received a call from a friend saying that I needed to go out on the frozen lake. This was a particularly cold stretch with no snow, so the lakes were just translucent ice.

Once I got out not the ice I could see what he was excited by. The patterns, both on, and in the ice were spectacular. However what I found to be the most mesmerizing were the ice fishing holes. Although I could not stand there and fish over a small hole in the ice, I found that when they froze over they produced some of the most intriguing images I have captured. You are looking at a round hole in the ice, but little imagination you could believe you are looking deeply into someones eye, or examining the furthest reaches of the universe.

Now every winter I make time to wander out on the ice and see what patterns are produced in these holes.

More info: steven-ralser.pixels.com

Fishing line frozen in ice fishing hole

Ice fishing holes

Ice fishing hole

Ice fishing hole

Maple seeds on ice

Maple seed on ice

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Over The Harbour In Dubai

December 28, 2016

There's no chance of falling asleep while hanging out of a helicopter. I can't think of a time I've been less sleepy, in fact. Come to think of it, the idea of taking a nap didn't even cross my mind.

Wow, I took so many photos on this day — probably over 500. And there weren't many stinkers in the bunch. It makes choosing the “best” ones more challenging, but it's a good problem to have!

Trey Ratcliff

This is the first photo of the sun ever taken

December 27, 2016

I was doodling about on the internet reading about various astronomical topics—as I do sometimes, and I highly recommend it—and stumbled upon an interesting fact: The first photograph of the Sun was taken on April 2, 1845.

The photo, shown above, was made by French physicists Hippolyte Fizeau and Léon Foucault. They used a daguerreotype, what was really the first kind of photography; a metal plate was treated with chemicals that made it light-sensitive, exposed to a scene, then treated with different chemicals to stop the exposure.

That vintage photo of the Sun shows our star’s relatively sharp edge as well as a handful of sunspots. The spots are pretty big, roughly as wide as Jupiter (for comparison, the Sun is 1.4 million kilometers across).

I was pretty surprised to see the date, though. Why? Because this came five years after the first photograph of the Moon!

The exact date of the first lunar photo is unclear (many attempts were made, with varying results, and apparently some were mislabeled) but chemist John Draper announced he had made the accomplishment on March 23, 1840. At least one photo from around that date still exist, so the claim is probably acceptable.

I would naïvely think the Sun’s portrait would be taken before the Moon’s, since it’s brighter and therefore shorter exposures were necessary. But in fact that may have been the issue; remember, this was more than 170 years ago, and the mechanism to take a very short exposure may have been difficult to create. It’s far easier to take, say, a two or three second exposure than one that’s a fraction of a second if you lack the engineering to make the latter. The solar photograph above had an exposure time of 1/60th of a second.

A photo of the Sun I took holding my iPhone up to my solar telescope on Sept. 16, 2015. Slate/Phil Plait

Once the two brightest objects in the sky were captured on photographic plates, though, fainter ones followed. Although I’ve seen different dates listed, it’s generally accepted that on Sept. 30, 1880, astronomer Henry Draper (John’s son) took the first photograph of the iconic Orion Nebula. How far we’ve come—the same photo can be taken easily and in moments using a phone cam held up to a small telescope.

I dabbled in astrophotography when I was in high school (I rolled my own Tri-X film and developed it in my bathroom, for those of you who speak 20th-century photography nerd), and that led to a somewhat meandering path to eventually working on processing images from the Hubble Space Telescope, and calibrating a camera launched into space and placed in the venerable observatory in 1997. Even now I still love it when I can get a decent shot of an astronomical object with my own equipment.

What progress we’ve made since the 1800s! Professional observatories peering deep into the Universe, and “amateur” astronomers create jaw-dropping and scientifically interesting images. It’s thrilling, and it never stops being thrilling.

I tip my lens cap and dew shield to Fizeau, Foucault, Drapers 1 and 2, and all the others who pioneered this field. They may not have realized what they started, and that, nearly two centuries later, their work would still be known, respected, and recognized as one of the most important scientific advances in history.

Photographer Uses Ordinary Tea Kettle to Capture Reflected Self-Portraits Around the World

December 25, 2016

Instead of constantly reaching for her phone and snapping her reflection in selfie mode, Michigan-based photographer Esha Biswas prefers to capture herself and the world around her in a more unconventional kind of mirror. For over four years, Biswas has taken over 30 self-portraits through the shiny surface of a tea kettle. For her, it is this unlikely prop that instills the mission of her project—to find the extraordinary in the most ordinary places.

“I was fascinated by the way the kettle stretched and transformed the world around me; it seemed to contain a whole little world inside of it, with my figure always at the center of the globe. Even familiar places, like bedrooms and backyards, were warped into whimsical reflections,” Biswas told us in an email. Her first portrait was taken at a transitional time in her life—just before graduating high school. The tea kettle has continued to travel with Biswas on her journey through time and space, and provides a comfort and a unique lens to keep her outlook fresh at all times. She’s carried the kettle with her to various settings, from her hometown to her dorm room at University of Michigan to the lamplit streets of Paris where she spent two months photographing French life and culture.

Biswas’ ongoing series, The Tea Kettle Adventures, is growing as it lives and breathes alongside her. The artist’s portraits document the significant changes in her own life—from the changing of seasons to the many travels she embarks on, as well as the most significant moments and memories, such as graduation. Through her photography, Biswas’ hope is to “urge people to look more closely at the world around them—even if it means looking at a pot of tea.”

You can see more of The Tea Kettle Adventures on Esha Biswas’ website.

A LOOK BACK ON THIS UNITED PHOTO PRESS 2016 EDITION

December 23, 2016

WHAT A YEAR!

A LOOK BACK ON THIS UNITED PHOTO PRESS 2016 EDITION

It’s been the kind of year you don’t forget! Between nods to history and new discoveries, the United Photo Press celebrated its jubilee with exceptional moments.

We would like to warmly thank the UPP artists, the partners, and the public who contributed together to make this 26 years so special.

The next year go be also marked by amazing project "FACES" in Portugal, Spain, Germany, Czech Republic, Russia, among many others. In August 2017, we celebrated the 27 years of international cultural activities and the completion of a milestone project: the digitization of 5,000 hours of photographic archives!

Before we moving on to the next project "FACES" , we would like to invite you to relive this year through our international exhibitions, artist interviews, our series archive, and many more surprises!

Kind Regards

Carlos Alves de Sousa

President of United Photo Press

Your best shots of Los Angeles

December 23, 2016

The beauty of Los Angeles as documented by Instagram photographers

From its ocean sunsets to its eclectic architecture, Los Angeles is the perfect canvas for photographers, amateurs and professionals alike.

Each Friday we'll highlight some of the best shots of the city, as captured through your lenses. After combing through Instagram, here are our picks for this week:

anthelion.helicopters

steven.lau

supersonicnoise

A ‘Stonehenge,’ and a Mystery, in the Amazon

December 19, 2016

CALÇOENE, Brazil — As the foreman for a cattle ranch in the far reaches of the Brazilian Amazon, Lailson Camelo da Silva was razing trees to convert rain forest into pasture when he stumbled across a bizarre arrangement of towering granite blocks.

“I had no idea that I was discovering the Amazon’s own Stonehenge,” said Mr. da Silva, 65, on a scorching October day as he gazed at the archaeological site located just north of the Equator. “It makes me wonder: What other secrets about our past are still hidden in Brazil’s jungles?”

After conducting radiocarbon testing and carrying out measurements during the winter solstice, scholars in the field of archaeoastronomy determined that an indigenous culture arranged the megaliths into an astronomical observatory about 1,000 years ago, or five centuries before the European conquest of the Americas began.

Their findings, along with other archaeological discoveries in Brazil in recent years — including giant land carvings, remains of fortified settlements and even complex road networks — are upending earlier views of archaeologists who argued that the Amazon had been relatively untouched by humans except for small, nomadic tribes.

Instead, some scholars now assert that the world’s largest tropical rain forest was far less “Edenic” than previously imagined, and that the Amazon supported a population of as many as 10 million people before the epidemics and large-scale slaughter put into motion by European colonizers.

In what is now the sparsely populated state of Amapá in northern Brazil, the sun stones found by Mr. da Silva near a stream called the Rego Grande are yielding clues about how indigenous peoples in the Amazon may have been far more sophisticated than assumed by archaeologists in the 20th century.

“We’re starting to piece together the puzzle of the Amazon Basin’s human history, and what we’re finding in Amapá is absolutely fascinating,” said Mariana Cabral, an archaeologist at the Federal University of Minas Gerais, who together with her husband, João Saldanha, also an archaeologist, has studied the Rego Grande site for the last decade.

Calçoene pottery at the Amapá State Scientific and Technological Research Institute in Macapá, Brazil.

Back in the late 19th century, the Swiss zoologist Emílio Goeldi had spotted megaliths — large monumental stones — on an expedition through Brazil’s frontier with French Guiana. Other scholars, including the pioneering American archaeologist Betty Meggers, also came across such sites, but argued that the Amazon was inhospitable to complex human settlements.

It was not until Mr. da Silva, the former ranch foreman, came across the stones at Rego Grande while deforesting surrounding jungle in the 1990s that scholars focused greater attention on the findings. Mr. da Silva said he first stumbled on the site while hunting wild boar as a teenager in the 1960s, but had subsequently avoided the area.

“The place initially felt sacred, like we didn’t belong here,” said Mr. da Silva, who now guards the Rego Grande site as its custodian. “But it was impossible to miss it during the deforestation drive of the ’90s, when the priority was to burn down trees.”

About 10 years ago, after securing public funds to cordon off the stones, Brazilian archaeologists led by Ms. Cabral and Mr. Saldanha began excavating the site, which is shaped roughly like a circle. They soon identified a portion of a river about two miles away where the granite blocks may have been quarried.

They also found ceramic burial urns, suggesting that at least part of the Rego Grande site may have been a cemetery, while colleagues from Amapá’s Institute of Scientific and Technological Research discovered that one of the tall stones seemed to be aligned with the sun’s path during the winter solstice.

After identifying other points in the site where stones could be associated with the sun’s movement on the solstice, the researchers began piecing together a theory that Rego Grande could have served various ceremonial and astronomical functions connected to agricultural or hunting cycles.

Ms. Cabral said that Rego Grande and a series of other less elaborate megalithic sites found in Amapá may have also served as markers for hunters or fishermen on a landscape that was being transformed by Amazonian peoples a millennium ago.

Lailson Camelo da Silva, the caretaker of Amapá’s megalithic observatory. CreditDado Galdieri for The New York Times

Still, other scholars say that more information may be needed about Rego Grande to lift it into the realm of prehistoric places clearly conceived for astronomical observations.

“We’ve seen a lot of similar claims, but it takes more than a circle of standing stones to get to a Stonehenge,” said Jarita Holbrook, a scholar of physics and cultural astronomy at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa, citing the need for more findings about Rego Grande’s characteristics and how the site was used by the people who built it.

For now, Rego Grande, which local people already call the Amazonian Stonehenge, remains enigmatic. Pottery shards jut through the soil as if offering tantalizing clues around the place, which has the feel of a contemporary conceptual art piece. Researchers are still trying to determine how Rego Grande fits into the evolving views on the Amazon’s human history.

Representatives of the Palikur, an indigenous people living in Amapá and French Guiana, have recently stepped forward to say that their ancestors had frequented Rego Grande. Still, archaeologists express caution about establishing such links, emphasizing how much can change in human societies over the span of a thousand years.

Ms. Cabral, the archaeologist who has spent years studying Rego Grande, said that evidence of large settlements remains elusive, in contrast with other sites in the Amazon like Kuhikugu, at the headwaters of the Xingu River, where researchers have drawn parallels to the legends surrounding the mythical Lost City of Z, long an irresistible lure for explorers and adventurers.

Either way, John McKim Malville, a solar physicist at the University of Colorado who writes extensively on archaeoastronomy, emphasized how the field is moving away from focusing exclusively on astronomical functions to interpretations that are more holistic, by including the ceremonies and rituals of ancient cultures.

In that sense, the site in Calçoene offers a beguiling if cryptic glimpse into Amazonia’s past.

“The stones of Rego Grande are quite extraordinary and in their irregularity may have their own unique meaning, different from other megalithic sites around the world,” Mr. Malville said, raising the possibility that Rego Grande reflects the importance in Amazonian cultures of animism, the attribution of a soul to entities in nature and even inanimate objects.

He added, “We can only speculate what its stones mean.”

The 1940s school that turned photography into art – in pictures

December 09, 2016

Mentored by the likes of Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange and Edward Weston, photography students at the California School of Fine Arts explored everything from abstraction to documentary.

The Orient Express, 1952
Following mentorship at the California School of Fine Arts under Weston, Ira Latour travelled to Europe, taking photos as well as presenting a radio show on photography for foreign troops
Photograph: Ira Latour

Paris, France c.1945-50
Benjamen Chinn came to the school from a job as an aerial photographer in the air force. He also learned painting under Richard Diebenkorn, and was later taught sculpture by Alberto Giacometti in Paris
Photograph: Benjamen Chinn

Guy Bourdin - About Photography

December 08, 2016

Enter Guy Bourdin: a fashion photographer who revolutionized the field (alongside Helmut Newton). Bourdin was one of the first photographers to mix fashion, fine art, and commercial photography. His photos are full of suspense, mystery, tinged with sex, drama, and death.

I’d have to say — I am currently thoroughly enamored and inspired by his work. Most of his work is constructed through his mind (he drew a lot of his scenes, and was a perfectionist). He is known for throwing blue dye into the water to make the water more blue, for painting grass green, and obsessing over every detail.

What are some lessons I learned from Bourdin? I explore more below:

1. What’s outside of the frame is more important than what is inside the frame

What I love about the photos of Guy Bourdin is that the viewer becomes a part of the story. The photos of Bourdin are open-ended, which allow the viewer to make up his/her own story in the photo.

Which brings me to the idea that what is outside of the frame is more important than what is inside the frame.

The story doesn’t exist inside the frame, but what exists outside the frame.

The story exists in the mind of the viewer.

So when it comes to your photography, see how you can create mystery and suspense in your images. Whether you setup your scenes or not, try to deliberately leave out certain details in your photographs. The more open-ended your photos are, the more engaging they will be to your viewer.

2. Mix art and commerce

One of the most revolutionary things that Guy Bourdin did was to mix his photography with commerce.

For example, Bourdin is best known for his shoe campaign for Roland Jourdan. Traditionally, advertising photos focused solely on the product. However what Bourdin did was to create an alternate, hyper-realistic, surreal reality — in which the shoes were simply another actor of the scene.

The campaign was sensational, according to Gérard Tavenas (who ran Jourdan’s Paris office) said that people were appalled at first. They hated it. But as time went on, Tavenas said:

”It was as if we were publishing not advertisements but a paperback novel or a comic strip. People were hungry to see what was next.”

The famous portrait photographer Albert Watson also has mentioned that Guy Bourdin was one of the first revolutionaries who brought “fine art” into the field of commercial/advertising/fashion photography.

Don’t let convention put barriers on you. If you want to innovate with your photography and mix disparate fields, don’t let anyone stop your creative ideas.

3. Draw inspiration from outside arts

If you look at the work of Guy Bourdin, you can see an array of inspirations for him. His inspirations include Edward Weston (who made him realize that photography could be art), Man Ray (Bourdin’s mentor), and surrealist painters Magritte and Balthus, and Spanish surrealist filmmaker Luis Buñuel. Other inspirations include Alfred Hitchcock and Lewis Carol.

One thing I’ve been realizing about my photography is this: to truly innovate, create original art, and to evolve is to combine other forms of art into your work.

Don’t limit yourself to just photography. Draw inspiration from painting, film, or even novels.

By combining all the outside forms of art that inspire you, you will create a distinct style.

4. Take total control

One lesson I learned from Guy Bourdin is he was a perfectionist, who needed absolute control.

For example, whenever he would present his photos to French Vogue, instead of presenting the editors with an array of images to choose from, he only presented them one. Francine Crescent said: ”Guy brought us one picture-only the one.”

Bourdin was such a perfectionist that he destroyed photos he didn’t use by cutting them in half.

Furthermore, his photos showed his passion for meticulous compositions, and that he was a master of color and light. He built a lot of the sets for photos before, and would be extremely demanding from his models.

It is very rare that we have these kind of photographers or artists anymore — that don’t compromise, have a strong singular vision, and demand total control.

If you have a day job and shoot photography for a hobby, consider yourself blessed. You have absolute control and freedom over your photography. You dictate how you shoot, when to shoot, what photos to show, and what photos not to show.

Realize how blessed you are, because many wedding and commercial photographers don’t have this luxury. They are bound to their clients, and most of them don’t have the spine to demand total control (they often compromise their artistic vision).

So if you are an independent photographer (or even a commercial photographer) try your best to demand total control.

Going off the prior point, Guy Bourdin aimed for perfection in his photographs. For example, hear this story when he shot a photo called “Water Nymph” (it started as a simple shoot for British Vogue of a model swimming naked):

“‘But Bourdin decided the water wasn’t blue enough,” Grace Coddington says. ‘So he tried to dye the sea blue. But every time we got it blue enough a wave came in and washed out again. We were trying stronger and stronger dyes. So he decided to have the girl flying over the water. He built a trestle. But the tide came in, and it collapsed. We cancelled the shoot. It cost us a lot of money.’

If you look at his photos, most of them look “photoshopped.” But mind you, this is way before the days of photoshop.

Bourdin would often start off by drawing his photo shoots, and trying to execute the story he had in his mind. You can see how meticulously each element in his frame is in his photos, the contrasting and juxtaposing colors, as well as the expressions from the models.

I don’t think there is such a thing as “perfection” in a photograph. But I think what we should do is this: aim for perfection according to your own standards. Aim to make photos that please yourself, and try to make the best photographs you possibly can. Don’t settle for half-good.

6. Cultivate your own skills

Guy Bourdin’s main passion was painting— but early on he realized that his works were simply “mediocre derivatives” of paintings from his heroes such as Balthus, Francis Bacon, and Stanley Spencer. Feeling inadequate, he decided to pick up a camera after seeing an artistic photo of a pepper by Edward Weston. Bourdin also drew inspiration from Ansel Adams, and the aesthetic possibilities of photography.

Which made me realize— we all need idols and masters when we are starting off in any creative art. When I started my photography, I tried to copy my idols (Henri Cartier-Bresson, Bruce Gilden, Martin Parr, William Eggleston, Daido Moriyama, and Josef Koudelka). However realize that if you really want to create a name for yourself, you need to break off the shackles of your masters and pursue your own direction.

Conclusion

Guy Bourdin never exhibited his photos or produced a book in his lifetime. He refused to make prints for collectors, and hated any form of public attention. He even refused the Grand Prix National de la Photographie when it was offered to him, because he didn’t believe in their standards.

Furthermore, Bourdin had a tumultuous personal life. Many of his ex-girlfriends and wives either killed themselves (or attempted to kill themselves). A lot of people say that is what inspired a lot of his macabre, strange obsession with death and sexuality.

However for the models who worked with him, they often called him a kind man, who was just a bit strange and cuckoo.

Regardless, myself and many other photographers have gained tons of inspiration from him. He was a master of light, color, and the stage. He created this epic dramas from his own imagination, and would photograph relentlessly until he made the image which satisfied him.

And so the ultimate lesson is this: you are your own worst critic. Therefore work hard to please yourself, and aim for the closest thing to “perfection” (however you define that). Don’t settle. Don’t compromise. And do the work you were destined to create.

Mariell Amélie – Conceptual Photography

December 06, 2016

Conceptual self-portraits by London-based contemporary photographer Mariell Amélie.

Mariell Amélie is a Norwegian conceptual photographer currently based in London, UK. She grew up in Andøya, a small island above the Arctic Circle. Her photographic work often creates a connection between nature and man. Despite living in London, her rural hometown above the Arctic Circle is still a great source of inspiration. Over the years, Mariell Amélie has developed a unique conceptual style, which can be described as eerie and rich of emotions. In her body of work, she skillfully combines surreal and ordinary aspects of life. Please read more below the first image.

Her conceptual photography is characterized by subtle colors and strong lighting. She wants to visualize a variety of emotions such as fear, loneliness, insecurity, etc. In her self-portraits, she interacts in different ways with her environment. A few images can be found below.

For those who want to see more of Mariell Amélie’s conceptual self-portraits, please visit her website: www.mariellamelie.com