Fog

October 3 - Took a day trip to the Marin Headlands, not only in hopes of 'fog' (and the many curious things it can do) but also just to get out of my apt., and away from this blasted computer screen. I don't do it often enough. My hunch, for some good fog, paid off. It was well worth the 12$ bus fare!
Fog is definitely a very curious and inscrutable thing, here's a start, if you want to learn more...

The thesaurus that comes w/ my Mac OSX defines 'fog' as:
"A thick cloud of tiny water droplets suspended in the atmosphere at or near the earth's surface that obscures or restricts visibility"
"an opaque mass of something in the atmosphere"
It continues, to cover the more figurative uses of the word:
Phrases - 'in a fog' - in a state of perplexity, unable to think clearly or understand anything.
That kind of fog is well beyond anything I can comment on! - if you are experiencing it? you need to consult someone much more professional than me, a photographer!
How 'bout 'webmd.com'... or if there is such a thing: 'web-shrink.com'.

(Of course they would have to mention photographic fog, but we won't have any of that will we??
I sure hope not!)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fog

"Fog can form suddenly, and can dissipate just as rapidly, depending what side of the dew point the temperature is on. This phenomenon is known as flash fog."
It's no surprise to me that a number of the photos on this wiki page are of San Francisco, or California.
I have seen fog form in less than a minute - you can go from miles of visibility.. to zero... and vice versa, in no time flat. (And if you ever have to drive in CA's central valley when there is tule fog? Can you please drive at less than 80 mph??)

So I did little google searchin'....

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/wfog.htm
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/jkl/?n=fog_types
(http://starryskies.com/try_this/fog.html)
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_is_fog_formed
http://www.windows2universe.org/earth/Atmosphere/clouds/fog.html
http://www.aviationweather.ws/067_Fog.php

And that's just an edited selection from the first 4 pages.. after which *I* was feeling a bit foggy.
So here's a bit of my 'foggy day' in small size.





For larger images, and a bit more commentary, as usual, a page on my website:
www.bobbennettphoto.net/LscapeDigital/MH_Sept10/index.html
'Heads up' if you are on a slow connection - It's a long page of full size images.

Other/Older fog pages:

www.bobbennettphoto.net/LscapeDigital/BLOG_MH_9_07.html
www.bobbennettphoto.net/LscapeDigital/05_07MH_Fog/index.html
www.bobbennettphoto.net/lscape6_2006/index.html
www.bobbennettphoto.net/LscapeDigital/7_09_06_MH_FOG/index.html

A few days ago I noticed an article in the LA Times - the linked image to the article was a *sweet* picture of Yosemite valley... with some fog drifting through:

Yosemite: My special place, a photographer's journal
By Mark Boster Los Angeles Times staff photographer
October 17, 2010
http://www.latimes.com/travel/destinations/yosemite/la-tr-yosemite-boster-20101017,0,7226286.story

And there's this one, just recently, probably more important than ALL the above:
http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/10/23/widespread-impact-from-an-afghan-mine/?hp

------------------------------------------
Last but not least, a musical suggestion (or three) :-)

Jethro Tull - 'Nothing's easy' - 1969
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoSOuYNNXjU
Nothing's easy in 2010 either...
The more things change? the more they stay the same!
Thank you, Ian Anderson!
------------------------------
'Come rain or come shine'
Ray Charles :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVMYs3enTF8&feature=related
Billie Holiday:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqECFy_qzkM&feature=related

View from a desert shadow

First from the 'whatever catches my eye file':
A whole lot, this time round.
Still playing with toy cameras

Posted By: Bryan Chan
Posted On: 11:05 a.m. | September 23, 2010

http://framework.latimes.com/2010/09/23/still-playing-with-toy-cameras/#/0

If this catches your attention, a place to shop these cameras is:

http://www.freestylephoto.biz/

'Lee Friedlander - America by Car'

If you don't know of Friedlander's work, it's about time you did.
http://www.whitney.org/
http://www.whitney.org/Exhibitions/LeeFriedlander
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/photobooth/2010/09/lee-friedlander-american-icon.html

While we're on the topic of photographic road trips, this one is very nicely done:
http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/in-pictures-the-great-american-road-trip/

http://jenniferokeeffe.com/

Now Showing | The Graceful Dead
By Andrew Belonsky
September 9, 2010, 6:35 pm
http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/09/now-showing-the-graceful-dead/


“People dealt with death differently in the 19th century,” says Eva Ulz, the curator of “Memento Mori: The Birth and Resurrection of Postmortem Photography” at the Merchants House Museum. “People looked forward to a reunion in heaven. Creating portraits was considered a precursor to that heavenly reunion. They shouldn’t be thought of as creepy.”

On to some 'darkroom'!!!

The second print from my most recent darkroom session was this one - 'View from a shadow'.
I'm not happy with the title, but haven't been able to come up with anything better...yet.
Got any suggestions?
The key neg. ( the view from a shadow, under a huge rock, looking out over the desert) was made in Joshua Tree. What a great place, I never get tired of it. Someday maybe I'll bump into the ghost of John Keys (one of the first guys to try and stake a claim here), or Gram Parsons.
(If you don't know who Gram Parsons was, google the name. You've probably been listening to his musical influence for many, many years.
Here's a stunning, chilling track, especially considering Gram's unfortunate demise:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reGtZnzDfek&feature=related)

If you walk out to the 'Wall St. Mill'?..

..you will definitely feel like a ghost could appear at any time!
Or maybe a mountain lion. I'd much rather see a ghost!
If you'd like to see the Wall Street Mill images larger, and more of Joshua Tree:

www.californialandscapephoto.com/2009/TN_Page_JT.html

The starting point for this print? - I (re)discovered a 'sketch' I had made quite some time ago.

When I searched my contact sheets, I couldn't find the interior shot at the right. No way, no how. Best conclusion I could come to was that it was definitely something I swiped from elsewhere to do this sketch, as some sort of placeholder, 'remember this thought'.
When I sifted thru my contacts sheets, this one got the thumbs up:

It's is a shot of the captain's dining room on the 'Balclutha' ship harbored at the Hyde St. Pier/Maritime Museum in SF. Perhaps it came bubbling to the surface, so to speak, 'cause I made the trip into SF recently, to take this in again, after many years. A very interesting place.
If you are wondering something like 'this is a bit underexposed, isn't it? there's very little shadow detail!'... well, yes, you're right, and it IS intentional. All I wanted was the sky light, and if the shadow detail 'dies', fine.
I shoot for hi-lites, and let shadows fade into clear film base for a good reason - it makes it a lot easier to blend into another image if there is little shadow detail - there won't be conflicting things going on in the shadows.

Lots of interesting things happen in shadows (or darkness!), don't they?
(I don't care, nor should anyone else, what you do in the dark(ness) - hopefully that is protected by the constitution: "life, liberty and pursuit of happiness', whatever version of it you make up!)

I saw the bottom rt. corner as being a vortex of sorts, and worked with that. So I sandwiched the neg of the dining room skylight... w/ a sky.
Since this was the second print of the day, and the first one worked out so well, I felt obliged to... 'just fucking wing it'. Glad I did. So I did a couple of prints like the one above
..and for the third one? I added 'something else'....
As usual, click on the link to see much larger images, a bit more talk, and the visual conclusion - the print with 'something else'.
http://www.bobbennettphoto.net/BeachBlog_2010/FromADesertShadow/index.html
Need a musical interlude?
Check out this guitar playing,Totally awesome:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2BOApUvFpw&feature=related
Next entry?.... Hey! some marin headlands fog, shot last weekend!