Finally, I update my own blog. On this Sunday August 15th coming I will be at 091 Labs holding a talk on photography entitled Writing Light. Writing Light is a recounting of the separate histories of the camera obscura, the precursors to photography, photography itself. I also explore the state of the modern photographic art and look ahead to what might be to come in the next few decades.
And afterwards, you get to build your own camera. We have craft scissors, pritt sticks, craft paper and masking tape.
This talk will be so good, that it (and I) were mentioned in the Galway Independent yesterday.
Admission and Pre-booking:
Admission:
Members: Free!
Unwaged/Student: €8
General Public: €10
You can find the full details of this and 091 Labs’ other Irish Hackerspace Week workshops on their public calendar. Any inquires or questions about the event should go straight to me at mark@bhalash.com.
Look at the groomed beard! Look at the neatly-cut hair! Look at the steady gaze and strong jaw!
Not that ho. The other ho. My hand to god.
My stunningly expensive 15 euro webcam turns out to be super-sensitive to infrared light. I popped an R72 infrared filter on the front and got some surprisingly clear and usable images/video.
I apologize for the quality of an image; I was trying to screencap the scene while holding an R72 lens filter over the front of the webcam, which in turn was wobbly. My next step is to look at the fun and creative things I can do with a webcam, beyond the webstream and time-lapse projects I blogged about on the other site.
Star trails and astronomy immediately come to mind.
Suggestions, please. :]
Kinda. I mean. It is a webcam still. Maybe more of videography?
Having two blogs and trying to keep their content separate and unique sometimes leaves me at a very strong risk of neglecting one or another blog (caveat: I maintain the capability to immediately and seamlessly merge one blog into another, should I see fit). While I’ve been active on other-and frequently related-geek fronts, I haven’t really felt and strong desire to pick up a camera since mid-May or so. I know that I’ve gone through such dry spells before. I also know that eventually I will come back to photography in a strong way.
Give it time.
Having starting working with 091 Labs (/plug), and having been shown how not-difficult it is to process basic film, I’ve come up with some embryonic ideas that I eventually would love to try:
- I have a big stock of photographic paper. I could use some of it for six-month exposures.
- A room-sized camera-obscura in order to dramatically demonstrate photographic principles.
- Papercraft pinhole cameras.
Over on the other site I have really gone into a good bit of detail on the technical side of the whole webcam/timelapse thing, but here on Misadventures I want to hold forth for a few minutes on the creative side of the matter: I am really excited to have a method for painlessly capturing timelapse video, so long as I can find somewhere to put my laptop. Maybe more of this?
I’m going to get yelled at for the first photograph. My mum has this almost-magical ability to flinch, scowl and project distaste when she comes into the field of a view of a camera. Doesn’t matter none if you’re using a fisheye or 50 metres down the down the road peeping through a long telephoto. She will know.
Last night I had my first hands-on experience with developing my own film at the surprisingly gentle hands of Sinead Williamson. Load roll, add developer, tumble, fix, rinse, and dry: That’s it.
Considering the arcane language used by regular film photographers on Internet forums and in guides I was expecting…expecting what, exactly? Bunsen burners, frightful expressions, chthonian black robes embroidered with eldritch glyphs, chanted incantations to the Exarchs of Ith. Maybe a touch of blood sacrifice too for the sake of form.
In the end, the only really cult-ish part of the night was the late hour involved. Sinead and I started on my film at 11pm (more on the night with Petra and Tommy on my other blog), wound it up at about two o’clock this morning. I crawled off to bed, while Sinead was up until past four developing her infrared film from the weekend gone.
Dedication, she has it.
Scanning at Rua Red in Tallaght was also painfully painless: €2.50 an hour for the use of a media room equipped with professional scanners and Mac Pros. Sinead gave me a good overview of the equipment and helped me to figure out what it was that I wanted (I settled on a high-resolution contact sheet with individual images suitable for web use).
Overall? I am disappointed with the quality of my output. I’m thrilled to have finally gone through the whole process of developing and scanning, don’t get me wrong. But when I look at the images produced I have to admit disappointment in the final contrast, grain and sharpness. I’m positive about this because I’m at a beginning: I can only but improve.
