MASTER PHOTOGRAPHER SERIES: Jerry Uelsmann

At first glance some might think Photoshop!  But it is not so.

Jerry Uelsmann has been a master print maker since the early 1960s. He creates composite photographs with multiple negatives and extensive darkroom work. He uses up to a dozen enlargers at a time to produce his final surrealist images.

Many of my students struggle with the idea that manipulating images using Photoshop extensively  somehow degrades the image or renders it fake. I remind them that photographers have been manipulating their photos since the beginning of the art and that it is one's intended vision that should dictate how much manipulation should be done. Photoshop is a tool just as printing with multiple negatives is for Uelsmann. However, like in any medium, expertise makes the difference between a classic image and a shoddy one.

Jerry Uelsmann began doing multiple printing early in his career. He received a Guggenheim fellowship in 1967 and a National Endowment for the Arts grant in 1972.

Photographer Chris Jordan explores American consumerism

Chris Jordan's 60" photographs of human consumptions are beyond belief. Partly because of sheer 'wow' factor, and because the innovative use of Photoshop. With his Portraits of Mass Consumption and Running by the Numbers he appears to photograph items individually or in small groups and then layers them together to create a massive composition that is very realistic to view. "Gyre, 2009" is a 8 X 11 foot image that depicts 2.4 million pieces of plastic that enter the ocean every hour. Viewing "Gyre" from a distance presents the famous Japanese woodblock print, The Great Wave off Kanagawa. You can see all the plastic pieces as you examine the image closer.

"Exploring around our country’s shipping ports and industrial yards, where the accumulated detritus of our consumption is exposed to view like eroded layers in the Grand Canyon, I find evidence of a slow-motion apocalypse in progress. I am appalled by these scenes, and yet also drawn into them with awe and fascination. The immense scale of our consumption can appear desolate, macabre, oddly comical and ironic, and even darkly beautiful; for me its consistent feature is a staggering complexity." Chris Jordan

Woodblock by Katsushika Hokusai 1832

Photographs by Chris Jordan

Edward Weston's last wife and famous model, Charis Wilson dies at 95

Shooting over the San Fernando Valley

Yesterday a friend and I drove up in the San Gabriel Mountains in the howling wind to shoot a few photos.



Photographs by Keith Skelton

An hour in the Los Angeles Arts District

Photos from a short walk through the LA Artist District with my Panasonic LX3.





Photos by Keith Skelton

National Geographic photographer Paul Nicklen and the leopard seal

Two spaces open for Death Valley Photo Workshop Dec 3-6

Link here for information CHIAROSCURO PHOTO WORKSHOPS

'The Americans' Revisited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Robert Frank Photograph

2009 Leonid meteor shower

Last night at the last minute I decided to head out to the Pinon Hills to try and photograph the Leonid meteor shower. The Pinon Hills are off Highway 138 near Wrightwood, CA. on the opposite side (north) of the San Gabriel Mts. from L.A. This is apparently one of the darker areas near L.A. without driving for 3-4 hours. I left the Pasadena area about 10pm and got out there by midnight. I got home at 5 am.


I drove off 138 onto a dirt road where there were as few lights as possible and used the Joshua Trees in the foreground. There was still quite a lot of light coming from Victorville and Palmdale as well as the massive glow from LA to the Southwest. It was kind of creepy out there since I'd never been there in the daylight. I know there is some interesting folks that live out there so I began imagining crack dealers with mean dogs discovering me. I also began think about tarantulas and scorpions crawling up my legs in the dark.


No such luck.


I was lucky to get this one frame with a few comets in it. Dozens of other frames had only Joshua trees and sky. So it was really a matter of luck whether the camera was pointed where the meteor was. I knew the general area but even with a wide lens it was hard to capture enough of the sky in the frame. I saw a few good ones, but it really wasn't as good as I thought it might be.


Next time I will drive to a darker place and use 2-3 cameras pointed in various directions. Also, I'll bring my heavier coat. It was freezing last night.

Photo copyright by Keith Skelton


This exposure was about 60 sec. at f4, ISO 800. Nikon D300 - 12-24mm at 12mm. (18mm equivalent) The Nikon isn't as good as some of the Canons for shooting long exposures. You can see some of the blotchy look.

Fantastic Monocle Magazine Video From 2009 Prix Pictet

Monocle Magazine reports on the world's premier award for achievement in environmental photography with first prize awarded to London-based photographer Nadav Kander.

The Digital Journalist suffers from the recession as Canon drops its sponsorship.

From Dirck Halstead:

I am afraid that the December issue of The Digital Journalist may be our final issue, at least for a while.

As many of you on our mailing list know, The Digital Journalist has been online producing our monthly magazine, about visual journalism, for 12 years. During that time we have presented the memorable work of some of the greatest photojournalists in the world, while offering opportunities for publication to many new photographers. Our columns and reviews have taken a 360-degree look at the industry, and predicted much of the upheaval that has taken place as the media around us have been buffeted by the shifting winds of technology, and now, a crippling economic downturn.

We have also sponsored over 37 Platypus Workshops around the world, which have taught photojournalists how to cope with and adapt to these industry changes.

Unfortunately, our principal sponsor, Canon, whose market has also been impacted by these turbulent times, has decided they can no longer afford to provide their financial backing to The Digital Journalist. We are very grateful for the generous support they have given us over the years.

Even before Canon's decision we were planning to reorganize. We are aware of how seriously a lot of our readers, who make their living from photojournalism, have been hit by the recession through the failures and cutbacks of countless publications, magazines and newspapers, as well as TV and cable. Our reorganization goal is not only to continue publishing The Digital Journalist, but to provide funding in order to send photographers out into the world to do their work, documenting the important stories that shape our lives and history.

Such an ambitious undertaking requires serious fundraising efforts on our part.

So we are asking you, our loyal readers, numbering more than 10,000, to help us raise these funds. Effective immediately, we have set up a PayPal link on The Digital Journalist ( http://digitaljournalist.org/pledge.html ) and urgently ask for your pledges so that we can continue the work which will help us all. We have never solicited paid subscriptions, but these dire times call for dire measures.

If you value The Digital Journalist, this is the time to step up and make a pledge. If enough people do, we may be able to keep The Digital Journalist -- and video journalism -- alive. Consider it as an investment in yourself, and the future.

Thank you all for your loyalty over the past years. We appreciate your continued support, and look forward to seeing you on the Web.
Sincerely,

Dirck Halstead
Editor and Publisher

Portland photographer throws own wake: 'Why bother when I'm dead"

November in Los Angeles

Photo by Keith Skelton

South Georgia

Over Halloween I was in Southern Georgia for a few days and shot these photos with the Panasonic LX3 and the Canon G10.

Boreal Forest Photo Project

A group of Canadian photographers have photographed The Boreal "Boreal Forest Photo Project" all across Canada. There are some fasinating images in this set.

David Burnett asks, "When the budgets that have been cut a dozen times already finally trim off the photography altogether, what in the hell do we do?"

I ask the same questions. David Burnett says, "This week there are said to be yet another round of cuts at the Time Inc. magazines, cuts numbering in the hundreds. Part of the ongoing bloodletting that the press as a whole has endured over the past five years". Read The Digital Journalist and see Peter Turnley's photos of the fall of The Berlin Wall.

Photo by Peter Turnley

Voice of the Photographer from The Annenberg Space for Photography

Here are some fascinating interviews with photographers from the Annenberg Pictures of the Year exhibit in Los Angeles.

Photo by Nikki Kahn
The Washington Post 

Audio slide show: Frozen land, forgotten people -- latimes.com

Here is a well done photo essay by Barbara Davidson of The Los Angeles Times.

Audio slide show: Frozen land, forgotten people -- latimes.com

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