Author: Nicolai Grossman

Arca Swiss Monoball Z1 ballhead review at The Digital Picture

Nicolai Grossman 2 Comments

Unique to the Arca-Swiss Monoball Z1 Ballhead is the aspherical ball. As the load on the head is moved away from center, the effects of gravity increase. To offset the higher gravitational effect, more ball tension is needed. Conventional ballheads require correcting tension control adjustments to be made. The Arca-Swiss Monoball Z1 Ballhead, because of its elliptical ball, automatically adjusts to handle the off-center load. In other words, the tension automatically gets tighter as you move the load off-center. And it works as advertised. Very nice.

Continue reading at The Digital Picture

I personally don’t like ball heads that much. In theory, they seem faster, but in practise, they’re much slower for me than a 3-way tilt head. If you nail the camera position the first time, it’s faster, but how often does that happen in real life? For me, never. With a 3-way, I can get one axis right, lock it down, and move on to the next withouth screwing up the others. With a ball head, if you don’t get it perfect the first time, you have to start all over on all the axes.

Am I missing something? (Really, if there’s some way of using them that I’m not aware of, I’d like to learn it, because 3-ways are heavy and stick out.)

Faking your own art?

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This story is related by Robert Anton Wilson in Ishtar Rising:

An art dealer once went to Pablo Picasso and said, "I have a bunch of ‘Picasso’ canvasses that I was thinking of buying. Would you look them over and tell me which are real and which are forgeries?” Picasso obligingly began sorting the paintings into two piles. Then, as the Great Man added one particular picture to the fake pile, the dealer cried, "Wait a minute, Pablo. That’s no forgery. I was visiting you the weekend you painted it." Picasso replied imperturbably, "No matter. I can fake a Picasso as well as any thief in Europe."

[Source, via Chris Rywalt]

Funny, yes, but is it really a larger question? Every try to take something you made that doesn’t speak to you and try to tart it up to make it look like it does? What would that mean, anyway: faking, or working to bring out the "you" in your own work? Useful/not useful?

I have a bunch of photos in a holding bin that do nothing for me, but I can’t quite write off, either. Every once in a while, I go back and revisit them. Sometimes I start fiddling with it, radical cropping, monochrome vs colour, toning, viewing it at different sizes… although I don’t think that’s trying to fake my work—sometimes you have to shovel a little shit before you find the pony—it sometimes feels like it in the moment.

By the way, this doesn’t work most of the time. But sometimes it does: I’ll come back after a few months and see something in a completely different way, and it ends up becoming one of my favourite pieces.

Which leads me to another question: are some of these questions really worth examining this deeply? Most of the artmaking process doesn’t make intellectual sense to me. Yeah, you can say that artmaking trajectory X generally has a set of properties and perils, but at some point, I have to just play it as it lies. I’ve accepted that the above is part of the editing process. It simply is. Why put it under a microscope?

That said, sorting out what the perils are really is important, I think, because once you have a map, you are usefully disabused of the notion that you’re alone in this game. It’s pretty much the same for everybody. You are not a unique and special snowflake on the path of artmaking. While this goes against the grain of the Artist Mystique, I think it’s great, because there are nuts and bolts problems that can be overcome, and how to do so doesn’t have to be a mystery.

Art vs. Business: social contracts & disowning your work

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Gallery owner Edward Winkleman has a characteristically thoughtful and thought-provoking post on his blog about artists disowning early "non-representative" works and the implied social contract of selling art:

What’s emerged in conversations lately (due mostly to Richard Prince’s refusal to permit reproduction of his much earlier work for a catalog accompanying an exhibition of it) is a question about authorship, specifically whether an artist can essentially rescind authorship because the earlier work no longer represents their current vision. Can Richard Prince declare that for all intents and purposes an earlier work he created is not "a Richard Prince"?

Continue reading, don’t skip the comments!

I really recommend Winkleman’s blog as a whole: his writing explores interesting territories within art and art business while provoking intelligent discussion in the comments. A+ all the way.

Shutter Stories Web zine launched

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Shutter Stories Magazine has just gone live, featuring interviews with photographers Yasuhiro Ogawa, Jim Zuckerman, Martin Bailey, and Noah Grey. The interviewing is solid, with a good balance of technique, process, and art in general.

As an added bonus, I was pleased to discover that I really like a lot of Jim Zuckerman‘s work. While I usually have a hard time connecting with high fidelity landscape photography, he seem to really know how to work it, turning digital’s shiny smoothness to his advantage.

New Ilford Professional brand and products

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I don’t know exactly what "translucent, reverse print, vinyl and pop-up films" means in terms of tangible products or how you use them, but they, uh, sound cool? Maybe this makes more sense to you than it does to me.

ILFORD press release:

Enhanced image performance and premium graphic quality – some of the numerous benefits to the new ILFORD range of professional film products

Marly, Switzerland – ILFORD, a major player in the development and manufacture of photo quality media for inkjet printing and photographic processes, announces today the launch of its new ILFORD Professional Brand aimed at helping professional photographers attain maximum image quality through a range of premium products.

In keeping with the ILFORD commitment to providing professional photographers with the tools to achieve constant, superior results, ILFORD has created and manufactured a new range of paper, film and vinyl products.

Developed to fill a niche market, the new ILFORD Professional Brand enables photographers to diversify their services and produce images on translucent, reverse print, vinyl and pop-up films which they can purchase in small quantities rather than committing to buying in bulk. The new product range is also compatible with the ILFORD STUDIO software.

"The intrinsic artistic value of a photograph is as important to professional photographers as its investment value", said Andrew Stewart, Sales and Marketing Director of ILFORD. "With the new ILFORD Professional Brand, photographers can now work with a host of new applications, without sacrificing quality or image stability. Where the professional photographer may once have been hindered by the lack of such quality products in small quantities, the new additions emphasize the ability of ILFORD to expand and cater for new markets", he concluded.

The new professional range will go on sale in April 2007 and will be available in 17" – 44" rolls with a single roll minimum order quantity. This product range, as well as other ILFORD products, will be distributed in the USA through WYNIT.

Erotic art show, TOMORROW, Catskill, NY, US

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Photographer Anne Dunn writes:

Hey all you porn fans,

There’s an erotic art show in Catskill [NY, US] next Saturday at Wilder Gallery (395 Main Street) from 5-9PM. I will be showing some racy photos amongst some other people’s kinky art.

So come on by and get cho’self a piece.

(DJ to spin until wine is done…)

Work from over 30 artists will be on display covering a wide variety of media from photography to oil, acrylics, quilting, and installation. Must be 18 or older.

ZINK inkless printing

Nicolai Grossman 4 Comments

A company called ZINK have just introduced a photo printing system that doesn’t use ink or ribbons. It’s basically a colour thermal printer that activates heat-reactive crystals in their paper.

ZINK Imaging Press Release:

Enabling Printing Where It Has Never Before Been Possible

ZINK Imaging has unveiled a new way for consumers to print and experience full color digital images without the need for ink cartridges or ribbons. ZINK Imaging’s patented technology, being shown for the first time at the DEMO 07 conference, shifts the printing paradigm from an ink cartridge or ink ribbon, to a totally inkless system. Images magically appear on the ZINK paper without a drop of ink.

The key to the ZINK process is the ZINK paper, which is protected by more than 100 patents and patents pending. Dye crystals are embedded in the ZINK paper and are activated by heat from a ZINK printer. The crystals then colorize, producing high quality, long-lasting, durable, and affordable images.

"At ZINK Imaging, we are insisting on the impossible to deliver a revolutionary digital printing experience to the world. ZINK technology does not require ink to print, provides a magical user experience, can transform any device into a printer, is good to the environment and most importantly, makes people smile," said Wendy Caswell, president and CEO, ZINK Imaging.

"Our unveiling at DEMO marks the completion of a long and intense road of research and development that has resulted in a patented, innovative printing technology that we are quite proud to deliver this year."

ZINK Enables a New Mobile Printing Market
The ZINK printing technology will enable a new mobile printing market. Later this year, ZINK Imaging’s partners will launch the first products using ZINK technology. These products are designed to take printing where it has never before been possible – into the pocket of every camera phone and digital camera user. With ZINK, printing in the moment becomes possible.

"Each year, millions of pictures are taken by camera phones and other devices but are never printed because consumers just don’t know how or the process is too difficult. ZINK Imaging has invented a whole new way of printing digital images through the simple process of just adding paper. With this new inkless technology, consumers can print anywhere they take a picture," said Chris Shipley, executive producer, DEMO. "DEMO has made its reputation by introducing disruptive technology to the marketplace and ZINK is definitely one of the most exciting new technologies we have ever had at DEMO."

ZINK Imaging is the technology inventor and the manufacturer of the ZINK paper. It is creating the future of digital printing with a network of the world’s most innovative companies and global brands to commercialize ZINK enabled products. ZINK Imaging will be announcing several partnerships in the coming months.

To learn more about ZINK Imaging, please visit www.ZINK.com. Or visit them at the DEMO Pavilion, #61.

While I’m not familiar with any of the specifics beyond this press release, the patents thing kind of gets me. I’m sure there are new and cool techniques involved here, but monochromatic thermal printing has been around for quite some time—most non-laser faxes and many shop and credit card receipts are printed thermally. Hell, you can make your own: coat a piece of paper with milk or lemon juice, let it dry, and write on it with something hot.

Via PhotographyBLOG