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PDNONLINE.COM
THE ADVENTURE & SPORTS
PHOTOGRAPHY ISSUE
HOW TO LAND
ADVENTURE
SPONSORSHIPS
®
JOSEF KOUDELKA
Looks Back
7 CAMERA DRONES
Lift Your View Aloft
THE SHOT
Winners’ Gallery
5 ROUTES
TO SUCCESS
IN SPORTS PHOTOGRAPHY
FEBRUARY 2015
© MIKE ARZT
SHOOTING BETTER
VIDEO WITH
ACTION
CAMERAS
THE NUMBER ONE PHOTO COMPETITION OF THE YEAR!
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PDN PHOTO ANNUAL | 2015
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› Recognition in the June issue of PDN,
our largest issue of the year, with an
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Award and a one-page
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DEADLINE
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Visit pdnphotoannual.com/2015 for
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Brought to
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You wait for clients who are “just a little” late.
Watch the best light slip away.
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VOLUME XXXV ISSUE 2 FEBRUARY 2015
CONTENTS
COVER STORIES
5 ROUTES TO
SUCCESS IN SPORTS
PHOTOGRAPHY
PAGE 34
HOW TO LAND
ADVENTURE
SPONSORSHIPS
PAGE 44
SHOOTING BETTER
VIDEO WITH ACTION
CAMERAS PAGE 48
JOSEF KOUDELKA
LOOKS BACK PAGE 52
© JOSEF KOUDELKA/MAGNUM PHOTOS
THE SHOT WINNERS’
GALLERY PAGE 56
7 CAMERA DRONES
LIFT YOUR VIEW
ALOFT PAGE 78
An image by Josef Koudelka, taken in Prague in August, 1968. A 1990 print of this image is included in the exhibition,
“Josef Koudelka: Nationality Doubtful” at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles. To read a Q&A with Koudelka, see page 52.
ABOVE:
PDNEWS
12 Picture Story: Home, Troubled Home
An image
taken by Mike Arzt,
for both Warren Miller
Entertainment’s annual
ski movie and the apparel
company Spyder Active.
Arzt explains the evolution
of his photography and his
work with outdoor sports
brands in “5 Routes to
Success in Sports and
Adventure Photography,”
page 34.
COVER IMAGE:
Kurdish photographer Hawre Khalid is documenting daily
life in his hometown of Kirkuk to show outsiders there is
much more to the city than oil and war. BY DAVID WALKER
18 What’s in You Bag?: Mark Peckmezian,
Film Shooter, Camera Lover
THE SPORTS & ADVENTURE
PHOTOGRAPHY ISSUE
34 5 Routes to Success in Sports
and Adventure Photography
Sports photographers who have successfully carved
out niches in the market share how they forged distinctive
styles, built connections, and seized opportunities to learn
new techniques. BY PDN STAFF
Editorial and fine-art photographer Mark Peckmezian
explains why he carries diverse tools and how they inform
his work. INTERVIEW BY MATTHEW ISMAEL RUIZ
44 Getting In On the Action
20 Career Advice: Julian Richards on
What Makes a Good Photo Rep
48 Lights, Action Camera
How photographers land assignments shooting sponsored
expeditions. BY SARAH COLEMAN
How cinematographers make video from action cams play
Julian Richards, who recently stopped repping after 20 years, well with other footage. BY GREG SCOBLETE
talks honestly about what it really takes to suceed as a rep.
INTERVIEW BY AMY WOLFF
23 U.K. Orphan Works Law Takes Effect;
Similar U.S. Law Is Increasingly Unlikely
It is now legal in the United Kingdom to use photos whose
copyright owners can’t be located. Efforts to pass a similar
U.S. law are at an impasse. BY DAVID WALKER
PDN, PHOTO DISTRICT NEWS, VOLUME XXXV, ISSUE 2 (USPS): 549-030 (ISSN): 1045-8158 IS PUBLISHED MONTHLY FOR $65 PER YEAR BY
EMERALD EXPOSITIONS, 85 BROAD ST., 11TH FL., NEW YORK, NY 10004. © 2014 EMERALD EXPOSITIONS. PERIODICALS POSTAGE PAID AT
NEW YORK, NY, AND ADDITIONAL MAILING OFFICES. POSTMASTER: PLEASE SEND ADDRESS CHANGES TO PDN, PHOTO DISTRICT NEWS, P.O.
BOX 3601, NORTHBROOK, IL 60065-3595. CANADIAN POST PUBLICATIONS MAIL AGREEMENT NUMBER 40798037. RETURN UNDELIVERABLE
CANADIAN ADDRESSES TO: EMERALD EXPOSITIONS, C/O P.O. BOX 2601, 915 DIXIE RD., MISSISSAUGA, ON L4TOA9.
FEATURE
52 Josef Koudelka on Motivation, Humanity
and What Makes a Good Photograph
On the eve of his retrospective exhibition at the
Getty Museum, the master photographer sat down
for an interview about his work.
INTERVIEW BY LAURA HUBBER AND ANNELISA STEPHAN
The winners’ gallery for The Shot contest
begins on page 56.
F EBRUA RY 20 15
p d n on l i n e .com
3
VOLUME XXXV ISSUE 2 FEBRUARY 2015
CONTENTS
CREATE
EXPOSURES
64 Client Meeting:
84 What A View
Going to California
Cinematic photography with a strong
sense of place helps form the visual style
of The California Sunday Magazine, a new
publication with a West Coast feel.
BY CONOR RISCH
GEAR & TECHNIQUES
70 How I Got That Shot:
Still-Life with Fleeing Cat
Justin Fantl turns a large-scale product
shot into a colorful, graphic composition.
BY HOLLY STUART HUGHES
72 Product Reviews
Leica X, Panasonic HC-X1000, Sigma dp2
Quattro. BY GREG SCOBLETE
76 Frames Per Second:
Seeing Sounds
In her book Window Seat, Jennilee
Marigomen utilizes light, shadow and
color to reveal the beauty and wonder in
small, fleeting details. BY CONOR RISCH
88 A Garden Grown
Artist Eric Gottesman collaborated
with an Ethiopian children’s collective,
empowering them to create a longterm project about their lives as AIDS
orphans that avoids stereotypes.
BY DZANA TSOMONDO
DEPARTMENTS
8 Letter from the Editor
10 Letter from the Publisher
26 Our Picks
94 Reader Comments/
In their music video Cymatics, musician
Nigel Stanford and director Shahir Daud
use science to make music, and vice versa.
Advertiser Index
BY MATTHEW ISMAEL RUIZ
BY CONOR RISCH
78 7 Drones To Let Your
Photography Take Flight
96 End Frame: Pace and Place
This Month on PDNONLINE.COM
HOW AP CHOOSES PHOTOGRAPHERS
AP Deputy DOP Denis Paquin on what it takes to get repeat
assignments.
PDN VIDEO: JAY MAISEL ON MAKING
GREAT STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
The master photographer explains the importance of gesture.
ACCESSORIES EVERY DRONE PHOTOGRAPHER NEEDS Gimbals, flight controllers, carrying cases, remotes.
WHO INSTAGRAM FEATURES
Editorial director Pamela Chen on selecting photographers
to feature on the platform’s blog.
PDN SUBSCRIBERS
Visit PDNOnline to access your free Digital Edition and read all of
our subscriber-only online articles.
WHO’S SHOOTING WHAT
Creatives and photographers behind new work for Marc by
Marc Jacobs, Dish Latino, Hyatt, Cadillac, Crate & Barrel and
more. www.pdnonline.com/wsw.
PEOPLE ON THE MOVE
Creative directors, photo editors, art directors and designers:
Where they are now. www.pdnonline.com/potm.
4
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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
© PETER HURLEY
SHOOT WHAT you love, hone your skills,
deliver something your audience can’t
find elsewhere. The photographers we
interview in “5 Routes to Success in Sports
and Adventure Photography” exemplify
these familiar maxims about how to build a
successful career in photography. But they
have also developed some keen perceptions
of what their clients and their clients’ customers want, and these
lessons informed the decisions they made about how to evolve
their careers. I was interested, for example, in how Mike Arzt’s
collaborations with a number of outdoor sports brands led him to
co-found a company that offers production and marketing services,
first for sports and adventure brands, and then for other types of
companies. Outdoor adventure photographer Chris Burkard is
active on social media, but like many photographers, he had to
make the decision about how much of his work to share for free
and how much to hold back in the hopes of landing assignments
or licensing deals. His explanation for the decision he reached
makes sense in the context of the kind of work he wanted to do,
and it’s proved successful, helping him get the attention not only of
outdoor companies but other brands that want his skills. It’s taken
a long time for each of the sports and adventure photographers we
interviewed to achieve their success, and I think the lessons they’ve
learned can be informative for anyone, even if your idea of “outdoor
adventure” is running to the corner bodega without a coat.
This month we publish the second part of photo editor
Amy Wolff ’s interview with former photography agent Julian
Richards, who recently left the business after 20 years. When
we published his candid, often hilarious tale of what’s changed
in commercial photography and why he decided to leave the
business abruptly, it was wildly popular and widely shared. One
reader called it “a helluva read,” and I suspect its popularity was
due not only to Richards’ wit, but his often-poignant honesty
about the frustrating parts of this business. What resonates with
me is that, amidst his raucous humor and vivid metaphors, there
is also a moral conscience guiding his decision: “The message
that a person should persist because it pays for houses, colleges,
holidays is a pernicious one,” he says. In this month’s interview
about repping, he makes a plea for treating colleagues with
honesty and empathy, rather than suspicion and cynicism, and for
maintaining faith in your own talents.
For a look at a how a truly independent spirit works, I
recommend the interview with Josef Koudelka. For 45 years
he’s refused all assignments, persistently following his curiosity
wherever it leads. This master photographer’s most memorable
and beautiful images are the products of his experience—
witnessing revolution, his years of rootlessness and exile—and his
moral outlook. In the interview, his magnanimity and trust in the
goodness of people comes through forcefully, and illuminates the
empathy that informs the best of his images.
EDITOR Holly Stuart Hughes
®
MANAGING EDITOR Matthew Ismael Ruiz
PHOTO DISTRICT NEWS
PHOTO EDITOR Amy Wolff
PDNONLINE.COM
SENIOR TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Greg Scoblete
VOLUME XXXV
ISSUE 2
FEBRUARY 2015
PHOTO DISTRICT NEWS
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LETTER FROM THE PUBLISHER
THIS MONTH I have decided
to focus my letter on the value
of photo contests, and there is
no better way to do it than to let
one of our readers speak for me.
I met Edwin Remsberg at Palm
Springs Photo Festival, where
he discussed his skepticism
about contests, and I countered
that they provide tangible
benefits: getting your work in
ABOVE: 2014 Arnold Newman Prize winner Ilona
front of creatives who can hire
Szwarc (second from right) at the PDN Photo Annual
you, cash prizes and coverage
party with Elizabeth Greenberg of Maine Media (left),
both in print and online. I heard
former ASMP executive director Gene Mopsik and
Lauren Wendle.
from Edwin a year later:
“While I still feel there are
too many photo contest offers filling my inbox, I have adjusted my outlook
on how they can be put to work for me based on the conversation we had
a year or so ago. Basically, we shifted from seeing these contests as an end
unto themselves to viewing them as a tool for our larger marketing effort.
[W]e won something in the PDN Photo Annual this year as a result.
One of the best ways we are using contests is to enter projects on behalf of our
clients. If you want to be celebrated, celebrate others…
Our PDN win is a great example. It was shot on an international study trip to
Chile that a local foundation sponsors. The timing of our recognition was perfect
because it came at the same time the foundation was planning the budget for a
similar trip in South Africa. If there was any question about including me in the
PDN_FlashlightPhotoRentalAd.indd 1
10
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
budget it was erased by the news…
I feel like the contests are not going to do much for us on their own but it is
a great tool as part of a larger self promotion, marketing, and client relationship
strategy that works well if used correctly. When buyers see the image [in PDN]
and on our promo card or email, then we have a chance getting that website visit.”
I heard from Edwin again after our PDN Photo Annual party, where he ran
into a photo editor he had previously worked with.
“I had not talked to her in 15 years and almost did not recognize her, save for
the name tag. Anyway, we stayed in touch and today I confirmed a very nice shoot
I booked through her in her new position. The return on investment actually has
a number behind it now. All because I bothered to enter (and won something).”
I’ve found that Edwin’s experience is not unusual for contest winners. By
marketing your recognition, the reward goes beyond any prizes that the contest
itself offers and gives your award longevity.
The early deadline for the 2015 PDN Photo Annual is February 3. You can
enter by going to pdnphotoannual.com.
In the meantime I hope to see everyone at our next trade show, WPPI in Las
Vegas, from February 26–March 4.
Lauren Wendle, Vice President, Publisher, PHOTO+
[email protected]
Phone: 646-668-3762 Cell: 646-592-2882
3/11/14 11:00 AM
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12 PICTURE STORY 18 WHAT’S IN YOUR BAG? 20 CAREER ADVICE 23 COPYRIGHT WATCH 24 NEWS DIGEST
PDNEWS
ALL PHOTOS © HAWRE KHALID/METROGRAPHY
E D ITE D BY DAV ID WA LK E R
HOME, TROUBLED HOME
Kurdish photographer Hawre Khalid is
documenting daily life in his war-torn
hometown of Kirkuk to show outsiders there
is much more to the city than oil and war.
BY DAVID WALKER
ABOVE: A game of pool in the Ahmed Agha Bazaar.
Photographer Hawre Khalid wandered the streets
of his hometown, photographing people trying to
live normal lives amid hardship and violence.
INSET: Photo of Hawre Khalid.
12
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
TO U.S. AND EUROPEAN media audiences, Kirkuk is an oilrich, war-torn city, previously occupied by the U.S. military and
now a tense, violent hot spot in the war between the Kurdish
security forces and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). But to
photojournalist Hawre Khalid, Kirkuk is home, and a place where
most people are just trying to go about their daily lives in peace
with their neighbors, despite its complicated history and politics.
“It is difficult to understand if you are not part of it, if you
are not inside it,” Khalid explained in an email interview. To
help provide outsiders with a better understanding, Khalid returned in 2014 after four
years in Europe to work on a project called “My Kirkuk,” which was published in late
October by Roads & Kingdoms, the online magazine of travel and culture.
Pauline Eiferman, the magazine’s associate editor and photo director, came across the
project after a summer meeting at Visa Pour l’Image Perpignan 2014 with Stefano Carini,
editor-in-chief of the Iraqi photo agency Metrography. Eiferman ended up doing a story
© COURTESY HAWRE KHALID
PICTURE STORY
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“It takes a village to raise a photographer.
Joining ASMP is definitely one of the smartest
things I’ve done since going free-lance.”
k i m b e r l y d a v i s m e m b e r s i n c e 2011
www.kimberlydavisphotography.com
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about the agency, which represents Khalid.
His work in particular caught her eye, and she
contacted him about doing a separate story for
Roads & Kingdoms featuring his Kirkuk work.
“I came up with the name ‘My Kirkuk’
for the story because that’s what I liked most
about Hawre’s work: the fact that it was so
personal,” Eiferman told PDN via email.
She’d seen work about Kurdistan by other
photographers. “But the fact that Hawre
was photographing his hometown gave his
work incredible depth…I believe it’s also
extremely important to get the story from
local journalists and photographers.”
Khalid had covered Kirkuk as a freelance
news photographer from 2007 until 2010,
when he was forced to leave in a hurry. He
had written a newspaper column about
attitudes toward sex in Kurdistan, and
Kurdish mullahs responded by making death
PDNEWS
ABOVE: A boy sells birds at the Kirkuk Bazaar in
Kirkuk, Iraq. Merchants struggle to stay afloat in
the war-torn city.
threats against him during Friday prayers,
Khalid says. He fled to the Netherlands, and
stayed for four years.
Although he was glad for the opportunity
to experience another culture, he frequently
felt the pull of home, and he wanted for
Kirkuk what surprised him most in the
Netherlands: people living in peace in a
beautiful country.
“I wanted to be with my people, and I
wanted to make a change [there],” he says.
“The people of Kirkuk want to live their
lives. Many don’t care about religion or
[ethnicity] or politics.”
His intent was to hold up a mirror for
the people of Kirkuk. “I feel that they are
too close to the situation to see it properly,”
he says. But he also wanted to help outside
audiences understand the aspirations,
culture and history of the people of Kirkuk,
and see beyond the region’s oil resources.
“I want to say to [outsiders], ‘If you can’t
help the people of Kirkuk, then leave them
alone,’” Khalid says. “If you do care, invest
in education. Don’t just bring your oil rigs.
Bring liberal, modern ideas and invest in
the people.”
When he returned from the Netherlands,
Khalid found Kirkuk “even worse than
before” he had left. The city’s infrastructure
is crumbling. Unemployment is high, and
many people struggle to get enough to eat.
Making the situation even worse is the
Kurdish war against ISIS. Random terrorist
bombings are frequent, and Kirkuk residents
risk their lives by leaving their houses to buy
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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PDNEWS
ABOVE:
An Iraqi Arab refugee from Mosul and her daughter on a Kirkuk street. A number of Arab Sunnis fled Mosul to escape bombings by the Iraqi air force.
food or visit friends.
The story he had in mind before returning
“got bigger and got a different angle” because of
the hardship and conflict, he says. It became a
story about how people in a war zone hold onto
a sense of normalcy while trying to survive.
Khalid’s approach was to walk the city streets,
and talk to people he met “about their life,
about their families,” he explains. “Everywhere
I go there is something interesting, sad or
beautiful” to explore and photograph.
His subjects are predominantly men in
public places: smoking and drinking tea at
a cafe, playing pool at a bazaar, watching a
World Cup soccer match (Germany vs. Brazil)
at a cafe in a Kirkuk park.
“Everybody was totally engaged in the
game,” Khalid says of the image of the soccer
fans in the cafe. “In Kirkuk there are many
explosions, especially at busy places, like this
16
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
cafe. But people were not afraid. They live
their life without thinking what can happen
to them. They are tired of thinking about that,
of having their lives surrounded by violence.”
Another image shows a refugee family
from Mosul, taking shelter from the midday
sun under a billboard advertising food.
“They left everything behind,” Khalid says.
“When I asked them how they get money
to buy food, the father told us they only eat
once every two days.”
Yet another subject, a 22-year-old
soccer player and actress, allowed Khalid
to photograph her in public as well as at
home. She stands out as a liberated, Westernleaning, middle-class woman making a life
for herself amid the privation and maledominated culture of Kirkuk.
Khalid says it was a challenge getting
his subjects to open up because of a general
mistrust of journalists. “Many journalists in
the Iraqi media lie to the people” in order
to get stories, Khalid says. People also fear
repercussions from the authorities for
anything they might say to journalists.
Khalid also had difficulty working around
local authorities, who are often in conflict
with one another. “For example, police and
Asaish (Kurdish security forces): When you
get permission from one of them to work the
city, the other will refuse to recognize the
permission,” he says.
Through contacts in both organizations,
Khalid was eventually able to resolve those
bureaucratic conflicts. And by explaining that
he was a freelancer working for international
media, and telling potential subjects that he
was interested not in politics, but how they
lived their daily lives, wary subjects were
willing to give him a chance. “After spending
some time with them I gain their trust,” Khalid says.
He shot with minimal gear: two Canon camera bodies (a EOS 60D and 5D Mark II) and
two lenses (a 24-105mm f/4L zoom and a 50mm prime). He had help editing his work from
Carini, the Metrography editor-in-chief. Carini sent 25 images to Roads & Kingdoms, from
which Eiferman selected 15.
“Hawre and I then worked together on an introduction to the piece. It was crucial for me
to get his voice in the writing as much as it was in his photographs,” Eiferman says.
Khalid says he plans to continue working on the Kirkuk project, documenting the city as it
changes. “I will focus more on street photography and I will try to be much closer to people. I
have a plan to show the difference between the rich and poor people,” he says. Eventually, he’d
like to publish a book, and exhibit the work in the U.S., because Americans know Kirkuk only
through the lens of a decade-long war, he says. “They haven’t seen the real Kirkuk.”
What are some tips for
shooting sunsets?
How do I make great
photos of my kids?
What is the best way to
get a self portrait?
Where can I
see great
photography?
How can I share my
photos?
Which camera should
I buy?
What
makes a good
photograph?
What lens
do I need?
How can I
make photo books?
Where can I buy
photography for
my home?
What is a
histogram?
Where can I learn
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Which printer is best
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IS HERE. SPREAD THE WORD
Answers to the photography questions your
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SHUTTERLOVEONLINE.COM
Hewar Faris, a 23-year-old soccer player and actress, cleans her living room. One of Khalid’s
challenges was to win subjects’ trust in a city where people mistrust the media. TOP: Residents of the
Turkman Qoria area of Kirkuk.
ABOVE:
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12/11/14 3:01 PM
PDNEWS
COURTESY MARK PECKMEZIAN
WHAT’S IN YOUR BAG?
MARK PECKMEZIAN,
FILM SHOOTER,
CAMERA LOVER
Editorial and fine-art photographer
Mark Peckmezian, who shoots for
The New Yorker, The FADER, Dazed
and Confused and other clients,
moves comfortably between various esthetics using
a diversity of tools. In an email interview with PDN, he
explains what gear he carries and how it informs his work.
INTERVIEW BY MATTHEW ISMAEL RUIZ
PDN: What equipment do you carry on a typical job?
MP: I generally get away with shooting film. For those jobs, on
location, I’ll usually take my Hasselblad 500C/M with four film backs
and a set of lenses, a Voigtländer Bessa with a Leica Summicron lens,
and sometimes my Rolleiflex TLR and Graflex 4x5. Generally, the
Hasselblad is my camera of choice.
I also bring Nikon and Metz flashes, and usually my Profoto
lighting kit: An Acute 2400 pack, three heads, beauty dish, black foil,
umbrellas and soft boxes, gels, etc. For film, in black-and-white I
shoot Kodak Tri-X 400 and sometimes, Ilford Pan-F. But Tri-X is the
best. In color, I mainly use Kodak Portra, but sometimes I’ll use Ektar.
I only wish they still made Tri-X 400 in 4x5! Ugh! I lust for that.
Digitally, I generally use a Nikon D800 with 35mm, 50mm, and 85mm
Zeiss lenses.
The desired esthetic determines most such choices, although that
is often hemmed in by practical factors. On location, like a recent
shoot with [rap artist] Tyler, The Creator for the FADER, I used a
simple portable kit with my Hasselblad. On a recent job in South
America, I had to use digital because of the risk of airport workers
refusing to hand-check film, and it being x-rayed.
PDN: Why so many different cameras?
MP: For a recent story I did for Muse magazine, I used everything:
my Voigtländer, Hasselblad, Rolleiflex and 4x5. Each camera has
an entirely different feel and I chose the camera according to the
concept for each photo. This was particularly appropriate for this
story because it was part of the concept for the story to play between
a variety of different fashion/historical esthetics.
For natural-light shots where I wanted flare and soft tones, I
used my early-model Zeiss 150mm for the Hasselblad or my 1930s
Rolleiflex. Each has inferior lens coatings that make them especially
prone to flare.
PDN: Why do you choose to stick with film?
MP: There are a lot of reasons. I like the personality of film—or,
rather, the different personalities of different film types and cameras.
For celebrity portraits, film has the huge advantage of precluding
publicists and handlers from interfering with the shoot. There are a
few notable occasions where I probably couldn’t have gotten away
with what I shot but for the fact I shot film—like the Bill Gates shoot
for Bloomberg Businessweek.
For my artwork, film has a conceptual import that is often critical
to what I’m going for. Namely, I often want to create images that are
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p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
timeless—from no readily identifiable place or era—and film has been the
common form for the entire history of photography until 20 years ago.
PDN: How does the gear affect your aesthetic? Does each piece of
gear contribute to your overall style, or do you get different things
from different cameras?
MP: The lenses determine much of the quality, I think. The Zeiss lenses
for the Hasselblad have such a particular personality, you can spot it a
mile away. It generally trends towards sharp, defined and contrasty, with
a very particular coloring. For all these reasons, the lenses work well
for any poppy or hard-flash esthetic, like the bodybuilding convention
I shot for Sportsnet. I have a Hasselblad Softar soft-focus filter that I’ve
become obsessed with and use very often.
The Rolleiflex lens has a totally different personality: sharp, but
low-contrast and prone to flaring beautifully. I use it a lot with blackand-white. I also love the slightly wide 75mm perspective. I shoot in
many different styles. I choose cameras, lenses and film accordingly.
PDN: How do you choose between, say, the Hasselblad and Rolleiflex
when you’re on assignment?
MP: For a recent fashion story I shot for The Happy Reader (a new
magazine by the creators of Fantastic Man), I decided to do it all
on Rolleiflex. I find that the Rolleiflex loves Tri-X and hard flash—
for some reason it’s just perfect for that camera. If I shot it on the
Hasselblad, the contrast would be too harsh. The Zeiss lenses for that
Image from Peckmezian’s story for The Happy Reader. LEFT: Peckmezian’s
camera bag. OPPOSITE PAGE, INSET: Mark Peckmezian.
ABOVE:
are great, but can often have too much contrast and definition. The
Rollei gives a softer rendering.
Sometimes it’s determined by budget or turn-around time, but it’s
mostly decided well in advance, and is based on my concept for the
shoot. The right pairing of the style with subject is critical in my mind.
I might decide on a low-key and classical esthetic, in which case I’ll
bring my 4x5 and Pan-F film. And so on.
BOTH PHOTOS © MARK PECKMEZIAN
PDN: How often do you use portable flashes? Will it differ from studio
to location shoots?
MP: I bring my portable flashes with me all the time, on everything, even
if only for inconspicuous fill lighting. I also bring the aforementioned
Profoto kit. I love hard flash, and even on shoots where the key shot
is with other lighting, I’ll try a few options with the flash. To me, hard
flash is not merely an esthetic, it’s an entire mode of shooting.
For a shoot in my own studio, like the recent one with Laverne Cox
for Dazed and Confused, I obviously use any and everything I have. For
shoots at rented studios—which is to say, for bigger budget shoots—I
usually switch up my lighting quite a bit. I’ll get Profoto Pro packs,
twin heads, octoboxes, and other gear I like, but don’t own.
PDN: Will what you bring to a shoot differ on an editorial job, as
opposed to your your personal work?
MP: The distinction is shrinking more and more—I feel lucky to be
doing my commissioned work in a way that is more and more like my
personal work. This is a freedom I didn’t always have.
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PDNEWS
CAREER ADVICE
© GENTL AND HYERS
JULIAN RICHARDS ON WHAT MAKES
A GOOD PHOTO REP
Julian Richards, who represented A-list photographers for 20 years, recently
explained with brutal honesty and sharp wit why he quit the business
(see bit.ly/1vkLMvx), eliciting a wave of positive comments from readers about
his assessment of changes in the industry, as well as praise for Richards’ work
as an agent over the years. Here he offers advice about how to be a rep people
want to do business with. INTERVIEW BY AMY WOLFF
allergic to agents. Because I’ve had to trudge through the whole
“Phaedra’s rate begins at…” Marrakech souk routine. It’s ghastly. It
doesn’t make you a better agent to be demanding teams of Nubians
to ferry your stylist ’round the studio in a sedan chair. It just gets
everything off to a miserable start.
Perspective. We’re facilitators, not obstacles. We don’t do it; we help
it get done. There are few things more squirm-inducing than somebody
burnishing their status with other people’s accomplishments. It’s the
epitome of vulgarity. The fact that you have 100 photographers petitioning
you every five minutes doesn’t make you the Pope. It just means there are
far too many photographers and not enough trailers to put ’em in.
What makes a good agent? Same as makes a good anything.
Intelligence, empathy, wit, kindness, honesty, vision, poise, appetite. It’s
not about having sharp teeth. Over-evolved piranha skills are a bummer
for the poor soul charged with furtively sticking his toe in the river.
View the narrative as an epic poem, not a haiku. Each job isn’t
necessarily the last; your boats don’t always have to put to sea replete
with gold and virgins. Who knows, if you’re fair, people might come
back for more. If it’s about anything, it’s relationships. Always pays
to understand the other person’s position; that it isn’t by definition in
conflict with your own. Basic empathy. The idea that everybody has
more under the table they’re not admitting to (and that you should
be on your hands and knees like a demented beagle sniffing it out) is
tawdry, cynical and ultimately counterproductive. Again, empathy. If
you’re encouraged to perceive everybody as an adversary you’re going
to end up an asshole, no matter how shit-eating your grin. And if the
photographers you represent think it’s your job to bamboozle, deceive
and pillage on their behalf, stop representing them.
© GREG MILLER/COURTESY JULIAN RICHARDS
PDN: What makes a good agent?
Julian Richards: Oddly, I start from the invidious position of being
getting cold or wet? Uncertain of your own currency in the market,
thinking of trading somebody else’s? At a loose end, sick of your other
job? Is that job on the other side of the fence? Understanding your
germinal motivation brings clarity when you’re sat in the office and
people aren’t returning your calls. Because it’s demeaning to be needy
all the time, to be liking clients’ Facebook posts about kittens, creative
directors’ Instagram art or any other creed of public sycophancy. So if
it’s all about a perceived outcome, rather than exciting, engaged process,
you’re likely to be unhappy. Because there’s no escaping it: no matter
how cool your trousers, you’re the guy at the door with the dentistry
TOP RIGHT: Image by Greg Miller shot for the Village Voice. BOTTOM RIGHT: Image by
Henrik Knudsen shot for Osmos magazine. TOP LEFT: Julian Richards.
20
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
© HENRICK KNUDSEN/COURTESY JULIAN RICHARDS
PDN: What advice would you give someone who is currently a rep, or
wants to be one?
JR: Be honest. Are you looking for a paying gig that doesn’t involve
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PDNEWS
ABOVE:
Billy Joel photographed by Chris Buck at the St. Regis Hotel in New York City in 2001 for Blender magazine.
who always seems to want something.
Who are you representing and why? Who’s doing something original?
Who’s saying anything other people don’t already say better? What
are you hoping for, bits of stuff the other people can’t do? And even if
you’re okay shilling for a poor man’s somebody else, why would they
be? Doesn’t that mean something? What kind of person wants to ride a
tandem-geared to come fourth? Let alone be a cheerleader for one.
Do you like your photographers? Not just their pictures, their billing,
their potential in the marketplace. But them. Their personalities,
values, the way they communicate. It’s hard to get vicariously excited
about the success of people you don’t like: Money isn’t enough. Despite
protestations to the contrary, most photographers believe you work for
them. Consequently you’ll be the repository for blame in the likely event
22
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
of perceived underachievement (always easier to shoot the messenger
than examine the shortcomings of the message). Add disagreeability to
guilt and recrimination and you’ve got shit soup.
Stop trying to look like other people. The job isn’t to blend in so
you accidentally catch an arrow meant for the person standing next
to you. Trust your voice. If you don’t have one, don’t do it, stop now.
Don’t try to invent one; it’s completely embarrassing. You look like
my Auntie Dorothy trying to pogo. Stop selling, stop waving your
arms about, stop lionizing mediocrity. Don’t badger. Let Melissa’s
studies of artisanal quiche speak for themselves. Treat people the
way you’d want to be treated. Trust the work. If you don’t have the
work, or if it doesn’t stand up without a battery of scaffolding, do
something else. Honestly, you’ll be happier.
COPYRIGHT WATCH
U.K. ORPHAN WORKS LAW
TAKES EFFECT; SIMILAR U.S.
LAW IS INCREASINGLY UNLIKELY
Under certain conditions, it is now legal in the United
Kingdom to use creative works belonging to copyright
owners who can’t be located. But efforts to pass a
similar U.S. law are at an impasse. BY DAVID WALKER
A CONTROVERSIAL “orphan works” law, making it legal under
certain conditions to use photos and other creative works belonging
to copyright owners who cannot be located, took effect took effect on
October 29 in the United Kingdom. Efforts to enact a similar law in the
U.S. continue to languish.
Orphan works laws reduce the legal risk for publishers, filmmakers,
museums, libraries, universities and private citizens who want to use
copyrighted works, but cannot locate the copyright owners of those
works. The laws are intended to make works of unreachable owners
available for public benefit, provided users conduct a “diligent search”
for the owners before using the works.
But photographers, artists, and their trade groups have resisted the
laws, fearing they will end up protecting infringers who don’t search
diligently for copyright owners. Some opponents fear that orphan
works laws may even give infringers incentive to turn traceable works
into orphan works by stripping away credits and other metadata.
But so far, the new U.K. law is causing little worry. “I don’t think
it’s going to be a problem for photographers,” says David Hoffman of
Editorial Photographers U.K. (EPUK).
The American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) and other
U.S. photo trade groups that issued dire warnings two years ago that
the U.K. law would bring about “a firestorm of international litigation”
are mostly quiet now. “I think the law they’ve come out with [in
the U.K.] is pretty reasonable,” says Eugene Mopsik, the outgoing
executive director of the ASMP.
He adds, “Personally, I’d be shocked if my sister associations
weren’t agreeable to [a U.S. law like the one] fashioned in the U.K.,
with a proviso that some means be put in place for reasonable
compensation” when an owner of what was thought to be an orphan
work steps forward.
The ASMP, Professional Photographers of America (PPA),
American Photographic Artists (APA), Picture Archive Council of
America (PACA), National Press Photographers Association (NPPA)
and other U.S. trade groups have staunchly resisted passage of an
orphan works law in the U.S. in any form that would be acceptable
to libraries, museums, and others that have pushed for such a law.
Orphan works bills have so far failed twice in Congress—in 2006 and
2008. An effort initiated by the U.S. Copyright Office to try again has
stalled. (More on that shortly.)
Hoffman says the U.K. law addresses the concerns of copyright
owners with extensive guidelines for determining whether a work
is “orphaned.” The law requires applicants to submit evidence that
they satisfied the “diligent search” requirements. (The guidelines
are published at bit.ly/1DiFlef, a website of the British Intellectual
Property Office (IPO), which is the U.K. equivalent of the U.S.
Copyright Office.)
The guidelines, drafted by Hoffman and others representing the
interests of copyright holders, are onerous enough to discourage most
people from applying to the IPO for an orphan work usage license.
“The important part of orphan works law are diligent search
guidelines,” Hoffman says. “If you want to use pictures for something
small”—say, on a flyer to advertise the activities of a local club, for
instance—you can do a fairly superficial search and get away with it.
“But if you want to use an orphan work for an ad campaign,
or a book cover, you have to go through a serious, diligent search
procedure. [The law requires] you to jump through a lot of hoops to
find out who the copyright owner is. It would be much easier to go
to a photo agency to license something else, unless there’s a specific
picture you really, really want.”
Hoffman says a diligent search that satisfies the law could take
days. Moreover, commercial users cannot use orphan works freeof-charge: They will have to pay license fees to the Intellectual
Property Office. The fees would be paid to the copyright holder,
should he or she step forward and claim ownership of the orphan
work at a later date.
Hoffman says there is some question whether the fees, which he
compares to stock photo usage fees, will be high enough to satisfy
rights holders who step forward. But he predicts that there will be few
instances of orphaned works being used commercially. He adds, “For
trivial uses, it doesn’t matter, and there may be many of those.”
Here in the U.S., the orphan works bills that died in Congress were
similar to the U.K. law, but had important differences. The U.S. laws
also would have required would-be users of orphan works to conduct
“diligent searches,” with the details of the procedures and guidelines
for such searches left for the U.S. Copyright Office to figure out.
But unlike the U.K. law, which gives the Intellectual Property
Office power to set fees for use of orphan works, the U.S. laws would
have left it up to users and owners of orphan works—in cases where
owners eventually stepped forward—to negotiate a “reasonable” fee
for the use. If the parties disagreed, the copyright owner could sue in
court for a “reasonable” fee, but not for damages.
Both U.S. bills ran into resistance from copyright owners and their
representatives, who considered the proposed laws too complicated
and too unfair to creators.
The U.S. Copyright Office has tried in the past two years to revisit
the issue, with hopes of reviving orphan works legislation in Congress.
That effort appears to be going nowhere. (The Copyright Office did
not respond to PDN’s calls or emails.)
One reason the effort has stalled is because the Library Copyright
Alliance, which had been one of the biggest advocates in the past for
an orphan works law, has stopped pushing for it. The reason is because
the LCA believes that federal courts have expanded fair use protections
to the point where most uses of orphan works by libraries would now
qualify as fair use. (Details of LCA’s position are at: 1.usa.gov/1FnxpbF)
The LCA has recently declared that another orphan works bill “is
bound to fail” because “there is less agreement now than six years ago
both on the existence of a problem and the best approach to solve it”
and that “the divisions between different communities may be even
deeper now than before.” (See 1.usa.gov/1vJxuFx)
Organizations representing copyright holders have recently
told the U.S. Copyright Office they would support an orphan works
law, provided it includes caveats. But some of those caveats are
unacceptable to many advocates for an orphan works law (See public
comments about orphan works legislation at 1.usa.gov/1yc85D0).
For instance, APA wants the law to specify the steps that
constitute a diligent search, and the organization outlines a series of
steps that are likely to be cost-prohibitive for most would-be users of
orphan works.
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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PDNEWS
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ONLINE NEWS DIGEST
© LEWIS BALTZ/COURTESY GALERIE THOMAS ZANDER, COLOGNE
The following are excerpted from news stories posted on PDNOnline and PDNPulse.
Visit www.pdnonline.com/digest to read the complete articles.
ABOVE:
“Model Home, Shadow Mountain,” 1977 (Elemant from Nevada) by Lewis Baltz.
Obituary: Lewis Baltz, Age 69
Lewis Baltz, a star of the New Topographics movement of the late 1960s and 70s, died at home in Paris
on November 22 of complications related to cancer and emphysema. Baltz was known for stark suburban
landscapes devoid of human presence. His seminal book, The New Industrial Parks Near Irvine, California,
appeared in 1974.
COURTESY STOECKLEIN PHOTOGRAPHY
Moreover, APA doesn’t want a
law that limits the liability of users
of orphan works to “reasonable”
compensation in cases where
copyright owners step forward.
APA wants to make users subject
to actual damages, statutory
damages, and attorneys’ fees for
infringement, too. With no threat of
damages, the APA argues, infringers
can strip images of identifying
information, call them “orphan
works,” and avoid penalty. (ASMP
has also called for a law that doesn’t
limit liability of commercial users of
orphan works.)
For advocates of an orphan
works law, however, the whole
point is to shield good-faith users
of orphan works from costly
damage awards for infringement.
In addition, APA and ASMP
both want a law that gives to
copyright owners who step
forward to claim orphan works the
power to decide what constitutes
“reasonable” compensation.
And ASMP and NPPA are both
calling for a law that provides
creators with a “small claims
process” where they can enforce
their rights in cases where they
have disagreements with users of
orphan works.
A “small claims process”
would make it easier and less
costly for photographers to press
infringement claims against
users of orphan works. But
setting up copyright small claims
courts would require a separate,
significant change in copyright
law that raises constitutional
issues about legal due process
for infringers. And advocates of
orphan works laws are highly
unlikely to agree to adjudicate
disagreements in special courts
that give legal advantages to
copyright holders.
Mopsik says the call for a
small-claims copyright court “is
something we’d love to see,” but
wouldn’t be a deal killer. He
emphasizes that he will soon be
stepping down as ASMP executive
director, and doesn’t know what
stance his successor or the ASMP
board will take on the issue in the
future.
Obituary: Arthur Leipzig, age 96
Arthur Leipzig, a documentary photographer who
captured daily life in New York City, died on Friday,
December 5, at his home in Sea Cliff, N.Y. He was
96. A high-school dropout, Leipzig studied under
Sid Grossman at the Photo League, enrolling in
1941 after injuring his hand in an accident.
Obituary: David Stoecklein
Stoecklein, who built a small
publishing empire on his
photographs of cowboys,
horses, and western lifestyle
and landscapes, died
November 10 in Idaho at the
age of 65.
Shortlist for Deutsche Börse $47,000
Prize Announced
The finalists include Nikolai Bakharev, Viviane
Sassen, Zanele Muholi, and Mikhael Subotzky and
Patrick Waterhouse. The winner will be announced
in May 2015.
Nicoló Degiorgis Wins $10k Paris Photo-Aperture
First PhotoBook Award
Degiorgis received the prize for Hidden Islam
(Rorhof, 2014), which depicts semi-permanent and
makeshift Muslim places of worship in Italy and
elsewhere in Europe. In other categories, Oliver
Sieber won PhotoBook of the Year for Imaginary
Club, a collection of work depicting the places
and people that define various music subcultures.
Christopher Williams won Photography Catalogue
of the Year honors for two exhibition catalogues.
Photographer Zwelethu Mthethwa’s
Murder Trial Delayed Again
The trial of photographer Zwelethu Mthethwa,
who has been charged with the brutal 2013
murder of a 23-year-old sex worker in a suburb of
Cape Town, South Africa, has been postponed six
months because no judge was available to try the
case in November. It was the third time the trial
has been delayed. A new trial date has been set:
June 1, 2015.
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OUR PICKS
PDN SELECTS OUR FAVORITE BOOKS, EXHIBITIONS, FILMS, GADGETS AND PRODUCTS FOR FEBRUARY 2015
EXHIBITION
At the age of 74, photographer Nobuyoshi Araki continues to inspire, amaze and, at
times, shock. His latest exhibition, now on view at Foam Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam,
“ARAKI Ojo Shashu-Photography for the After Life: Alluring Hell,” is no exception. The
show includes “PARADISE,” the photographer’s new series of images of flowers and
plastic toys, and also his rarely seen 2008 series “Alluring Hell,” a collection of black-andwhite erotic photos that he’s painted on. Combined with images made earlier in Araki’s
career, the exhibition offers a broad perspective on this celebrated artist. The show is also
the inspiration for the winter issue of Foam magazine, which looks at Araki’s influence on
contemporary photography around the world.
Among the most famous—or notorious—series included in the show is Araki’s series of
photos on Kinbaku [rope bondage]. But in his career he’s published more than 450 photo
books, encompassing street photos of Tokyo and his life with his late wife, Yoko, and their
cat. The title of the Foam exhibition, which was
shown in a slightly different form in Tokyo last year,
“ARAKI OJO SHASHUcomes from the Japanese-Buddhist book Ojoyoshu,
PHOTOGRAPHY FOR THE
AFTER LIFE: ALLURING HELL” which depicts both heaven and hell. The polarities
of the mundane and the transcendent, the banal
Through March 11
and the spiritual, light and dark, and life and decay
Foam
run throughout the show. The accompanying text
Keizersgracht 609
suggests that Araki’s growing fascination with the
1017 DS Amsterdam,
afterlife, as expressed in his recent series, may
The Netherlands
represent the preoccupations of “an artist in the dusk
www.foam.org
of his life.” Luckily for us, Araki’s creativity shows no
signs of slowing down.
FOAM MAGAZINE
—HOLLY STUART HUGHES
www.foam.org/magazine
© NOBUYOSHI ARAKI IN COLLABORATION WITH GALERIE ALEX DANIËLS/REFLEX AMSTERDAM
ARAKI ON SEX, DEATH AND
WHAT COMES AFTER
ABOVE: ”Alluring Hell, 2008” by Nobuyoshi Araki in collaboration with
Galerie Alex Daniëls.
Brikk Lux Nikon Df
Your photos may be pure gold, but what about your camera?
Luxury goods maker Brikk is allowing a select few to make the
metaphor a reality with its gold-plated Nikon Df. They’ve taken
of
apart Nikon’s retro-styled DSLR and slathered it in a 4- to
DESIRE
5-micron-thick coating of 24K gold. The camera body, a Nikkor
14–24mm f/2.8 lens, lens cap and lens hood are all awash in the
glittery stuff. Anything not coated in gold—such as the focus rings and grip—is
covered in stingray leather, which is evidently prized for its durability and
textured finish (who knew?). The entire luxurious package is housed in a—wait
for it—gold-plated Zero Halliburton hard case luxurious enough to carry the
camera—or Marsellus Wallace’s soul. There are only 77 units of the Brikk Df on
the market, so hurry up and submit that second mortgage application before
it’s too late. Before you write this off as unseemly or irredeemably decadent,
we should add that Brikk is donating an unspecified portion of its gold Df
profits to charities and NGOs around the world. Ok, it’s still decadent.
—GREG SCOBLETE
OBJECT
PRICE: $41,395
INFO: www.brikk.com
26
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
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Creating 360-degree photos used to
involve a considerable amount of time
and effort composing and editing. Now,
of
Ricoh’s Theta can stitch them in a snap.
DESIRE
Now in its second generation, the Theta
brings a few new tricks to the table. First, it
can now record 360-degree videos, with audio, for up to
3 minutes. (You’ll need to process the 360-degree videos
on your desktop first before you can view them.) The
new Theta also gets a speed boost with Wi-Fi transfers
up to 2X faster than in the original version, so you can
view your immersive stills on your iOS or Android device
in record time. Using the Theta mobile app, you can also
trigger the camera’s shutter, or set shutter speed, white
balance and ISO. Like its predecessor, the Theta boasts
a pair of fish-eye lenses, one on either side of its slender
vertical body, that each snap a 180-degree image. The
snapshots are then stitched together in the camera to
create a single 360-degree photo which you can navigate
around using the app or free desktop software from
Ricoh. The updated Theta is also more colorful, in your
choice of blue, yellow, white or pink. —GREG SCOBLETE
© JACK MITCHELL/COURTESY SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
Ricoh Theta
OBJECT
PRICE: $300
INFO: theta360.com
Rokinon 12mm T3.1 Cine Fisheye
The name of Rokinon’s newest cinema lens—the 12mm T3.1 ED AS IF
NCS UMC Cine DS—may be a mouthful, but it comes at a price that’s
a lot easier to swallow. This prime fish-eye lens is part of a refreshed
of
series of specialty cinema lenses that have earned the moniker “DS”
DESIRE
for their dual-sided markings for aperture and depth of field. This way,
assistants can operate on either side of the lens during a shoot. The
focus and aperture rings are geared so follow-focus accessories can
be easily attached to the lens and the manual aperture
is de-clicked for smooth and silent adjustment. The
aperture of the 12mm fisheye is T3.1–22, and is
calibrated in T-stops to ensure consistency
across the entire line. The lens offers a
180-degree angle of view on full-frame
cameras and is available in Canon,
Nikon, and Sony (A and E) mounts.
It’s composed of 12 lens elements
in 8 groups with 3 extra-low
dispersion elements and
two aspherical elements.
The lens elements
feature Nano crystal
coating to reduce
ghosting and flaring.
—GREG SCOBLETE
OBJECT
PRICE: $699
INFO: rokinon.com
28
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
ABOVE: “Revelations – Opening Section of “Pilgrim of Sorrow”
danced to “I Been ‘Buked,’” 1961, printed ca. 1992 by Jack Micthell
from Double Exposure: Through the African American Lens.
BOOKS
AFRICAN AMERICAN
NARRATIVES
This month sees the launch
DOUBLE EXPOSURE:
of Double Exposure, a
THROUGH THE AFRICAN
significant new series of
AMERICAN LENS
books from the Smithsonian
GILES in association with
National Museum of African
the Smithsonian National
American History and Culture
Museum of African American
(NMAAHC), produced in
History and Culture
partnership with London
80 pages, 60 images
publisher GILES. The three
$16.95
books in the series draw from
the growing photography collection of the museum’s sevenyear-old Center For African American Media Arts, and include
images that span the history of photography, from pre-Civil
War daguerreotypes to digital images.
The first volume, Through the African Lens, presents an
overview of the collection and “illuminates photography’s
significance in interpreting and documenting African American
art, culture, and history,” writes scholar Deborah Willis in her
essay for the book. Through the African Lens includes the work
of early black photographers—like renowned daguerreotypist
Augustus Washington—and several historically significant images.
One example is McPherson & Oliver’s “Gordon under Medical
Inspection, 1863,” which showed the terrible scars on the back
of an escaped slave. It was published in newspapers and sold to
raise money and awareness for the antislavery cause. Portraits of
black soldiers, writers, artists, political leaders and other notable
figures by photographers such as Leonard Freed, Lewis Hine and
Ernest C. Withers are interspersed with depictions of families and
daily life. In her introduction to the series, curator Rhea L. Combs
notes how figures such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Sojourner Truth and
Frederick Douglass, all of whom are depicted in the book, “realized
their photographic image could create a counter-narrative to
mainstream understandings of African Americans.”
Two other books, Civil Rights and the Promise of Equality
and African American Women, are due out this July.
—CONOR RISCH
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LG 31MU97-B
The 4K era has dawned, but what good is a 4K
camera without a display capable of showing
off all those pixels? LG’s new display, the
of
31MU97-B, may be just what you need to
DESIRE
kick-start your 4K workflow. This 31-inch
monitor has a resolution of 4096x2160, so
there are enough pixels to display true 4K and UHD sources in
all their resolution-soaked glory—provided your graphics card
is up for it. The 31MU97-B uses in-plane switching technology
for a wide viewing angle and with a color depth of 10-bit, it’s
capable of displaying 1 billion colors. In more concrete terms,
it can display more than 99.5 percent of the Adobe RGB color
space and 97 percent of the DCP-P3 color standard, so both
stills and cinema editors can be confident they’re working
in a color accurate environment. You can also carve up the
display’s generous real estate so that one half of the screen
displays the sRGB color space while the other shows Adobe
RGB. The monitor’s 17:9 aspect ratio gives you just a bit more
horizontal working space than typical 16:9 monitors offer.
The 31MU97-B also packs a decent audio punch via a pair of
5W speakers. There are two HDMI ports, a DisplayPort, Mini
DisplayPort and four USB 3.0 ports on hand for connecting
PCs and other devices.
—GREG SCOBLETE
OBJECT
PRICE: $1,400
INFO: www.lg.com/us
EXHIBITION
© JANE O’NEAL/COURTESY LOS ANGELES COUNTY MUSEUM OF ART
LIGHT ON NOIR
ABOVE:
“Red Shoe,” 1981 by Jane O’Neal.
30
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
Classic film noir
“THE NOIR EFFECT”
movies gave us more
Through March 1
than memorable hardThe Skirball Cultural Center
boiled detectives and
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sexy femme fatales.
Los Angeles, CA 90049
The visual style of film
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noir—gritty shadows,
www.skirball.org
low-key lighting, tilted
horizon lines—has
influenced many visual arts, from television and video
games to advertising. To celebrate this influence, The
Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles has teamed up
with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
to present “The Noir Effect,” an exhibition examining
the influence of film noir on contemporary photography
and other media.
The show includes work by Cindy Sherman,
who mimics stills from film noir in some of her selfportraits, and Bill Armstrong, whose “Film Noir” series
is characterized by deeply saturated colors and abstract
shapes, yet manages to capture the ominous mood of
film noir. Ronald Corbin captures black-and-white
scenes of rain-soaked sidewalks and neon lights that
look like they came right out of the movies of the 1940s,
but were shot in the 1990s. Other artists in the show
include Ed Ruscha, Jane O’Neal and Helen Gardner.
—HOLLY STUART HUGHES
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PEDEN + MUNK SERVE UP
A DOUBLE ORDER
All photos © Peden + Munk
There is delight in unexpected
food pairings, and for food photography duo Peden + Munk,
their dynamic brings similar surprises. “We often joke that we are
like Coke and Pepsi, Canon and
Nikon,” Jen Munkvold says. She
and partner Taylor Peden met eight years ago at the
Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, and they’ve been shooting together since. “In
some ways, we are polar opposites and this is what
makes our creative bond so unique and strong.”
The photographers’ strengths lie not only in their
ability to create authentic-looking food imagery, but
in the way they evoke a sense of place. In one of
their favorite projects to date, a Memphis BBQ road
trip for Garden & Gun, they did not opt for polished
images of food preparation, but emphasized texture
and a varied color palette instead—black-and-white
or muted tones capture the humble eateries, and
rich tones are brought out in the embers, ingredi-
ents and final presentation of the food.
Peden + Munk were honored for their knack for
atmosphere with two wins in PDN’s food photography contest TASTE—a Bon Appétit feature on The
Restaurant at Meadowood was recognized in the
Editorial category, while their Destination story for
Condé Nast Traveler on Copenhagen restaurants
won the overall professional grand prize (the full
gallery can be viewed at www.pdntaste.com). “The
food scene in Copenhagen is beyond incredible,”
Munkvold says. The two worked with chefs Rasmus Kofoed, Matt Orlando. Christian Puglisi and
René Redzepi for the shoot, keeping the imagery
clean, precise and vibrant to match the high-end
feel of each dish.
The pair has recently launched a full body of video work, and Munkvold says they are excited to
focus on more motion commissions. A recent still
and video project took them to Martha’s Vineyard
to work with chef Chris Fischer. “We didn’t get any
sleep but we still had the best three creative and
A DVERTISEMEN T
Above:
Copenhagen restaurant still lifes shot for the
November 2013 issue of Condé Nast Traveler.
collaborative days of our career,” she says.
Peden + Munk’s dedication to food is clear in the
caliber of their work, and Munkvold says that they
are committed to learning more about ingredients,
farming and cooking with each shoot: “We are on a
personal quest to keep expanding our knowledge.”
See more of Peden + Munk’s work at
www.pedenmunk.com
PEDEN + MUNK FAVORITES
Camera: Canon 5D III
Lights: Profoto B1
Software: Lightroom 5 and Capture One
Storage: WiebeTech CRU devices
Food: Japanese and Korean cuisine
THE SPORTS & ADVENTURE
PHOTOGRAPHY ISSUE
34 5 ROUTES TO SUCCESS IN
SPORTS AND ADVENTURE
PHOTOGRAPHY
44 GETTING IN ON THE ACTION
© GARRETT GROVE
48 LIGHTS, ACTION CAMERA
Photographer Garrett Grove spent three days backpacking in the Mulvey
Basin area in the Valhallas, British Columbia, on a shoot for Mountain
Safety Research. Grove and other photographers explain how they land
sponsorships for outdoor expeditions in the story that begins on page 44.
F EBRUA RY 20 14
p d n on l i n e .com
33
THE SPORTS & ADVENTURE PHOTOGRAPHY ISSUE
5 Routes to Success
IN SPORTS AND ADVENTURE PHOTOGRAPHY
Photographers who shoot sports and outdoor adventure face intense competition. PDN
interviewed sports photographers who’ve blazed career paths to learn how they successfully
carved out their niches in the market. They built their reputations among commercial and
editorial clients by forging distinctive styles, building connections, and capitalizing on
opportunities to learn new techniques and skills.
COURTESY DYLAN COULTER
DYLAN COULTER’S SPORTS PORTRAITS IN MOTION
Photographer Dylan Coulter’s success and reputation are due in part to his ingenuity
in finding distinctive ways to capture familiar subjects. Last year, for example, his
technique for creating multiple-exposure images of an athlete’s form, which he first
developed on assignments for ESPN The Magazine, landed him a job shooting a still
and video package on World Cup soccer stars for The New York Times Magazine. He
parlayed that experience—and his skills at creating polished, stylized portraits of
athletes—into assignments for entertainment and advertising clients. Looking back on
the assignments he shot in 2014, he says, “This has been a rewarding and successful
year for me, and a lot of doors have been opened.”
Coulter first explored new ways of creating images of athletes more than a dozen
BELOW: One of Dylan
Coulter’s first assignments
for Nike—photographing
Olympic speed skaters—
brought attention to his
stylized images of athletes.
INSET, LEFT: Dylan Coulter.
VIEW
SLIDE SHOW
34
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
© DYLAN COULTER
>
BOTH PHOTOS © DYLAN COULTER
Neymar da Silva Santos Júnior, who plays for Brazil’s national football team, photographed for The New York Times Magazine. ABOVE, RIGHT: Pitcher Brad
Ziegler’s submarine delivery, captured for a story on pitchers’ form for ESPN the Magazine.
ABOVE, LEFT:
years ago, while he was working as an art director for Adidas in
Portland, Oregon. Though he had studied photography and shot
frequently for himself, he had decided to pursue a career in graphic
design, and landed a job with Adidas as the sports apparel company
was rebranding itself. “I was interested in pushing the kind of sports
photography they did,” he recalls. At the time, most sports photography
had a “photojournalistic” look. His own photography, he says, was
inspired by portraiture and fashion work. “I was interested in taking
lighting from those genres and applying it to sports work.”
He began making studio portraits, “taking the athlete off the field
of play, [which] you wouldn’t be able to do if you were on the sidelines
covering action.” His experiments inspired him to leave his job and
pursue freelance photography assignments. At the time, he says,
photographers such as John Huet and other commercial shooters were
beginning to redefine sports photography. From his base in Portland,
Coulter was able to land shoots for several outdoor and sports clients—
including his old employer, Adidas.
It took a while for Adidas’s rival, Nike, to take a chance on him.
On one of his first jobs for the company, he was hired to photograph
runners in Nike running shoes, showing them from the waist down, and
in motion. Based on the success of those shots, Nike hired him again for
what started out as a small job: making portraits of speed skaters who
would be competing in the Olympic Games in Salt Lake City. “They
were evenly lit, with no dramatic shadow. They were crisp, frozen
moments of them on the ice,” explains Coulter. The campaign was
featured in the PDN Photo Annual and won other advertising awards,
bringing wider attention to Coulter’s sports work.
Though he had several enviable commercial clients, Coulter
was only landing a few editorial assignments, primarily from
magazines that hired him when they needed a portrait of someone
in the Portland area. “By certain magazines, I was perceived as too
commercial,” he says. His decision to move to New York City in
2006 was inspired by many factors, including a desire to be closer
to magazine editors. “It took a while to get to know the world of
editorial and form relationships,” he says, but he gradually landed
assignments, shooting both sports and non-sports stories, for Slam,
Vibe, Men’s Health and Men’s Fitness.
When ESPN the Magazine launched a section devoted to analyzing
an athlete’s form, they contacted Coulter. He photographed a tennis
player’s forehand, capturing multiple frames to show each element of
her form. While traditional multiple-exposure technique captures a
series of frames—with each frame given the same weight—Coulter had
a different idea. He wanted to create “a visual hierarchy, where parts of
the images are more opaque and some more transparent, so you know
where to go with your eye.” He developed a post-production retouching
technique to make the preliminary stages of the swing more transparent,
leading towards the final step.
Last year he used the technique on an assignment for ESPN to
photograph the form of nine pitchers for the Arizona Diamondbacks.
His images reveal startling differences. “Every pitcher wants to get
the ball in the same place—the strike zone—but the way that pitchers
do that is so different,” he says. “Some have a crazy windup, some no
windup, one had scrapes on his knuckles from grazing the ground.”
The pitching story elicited a positive response from Kathy Ryan,
the director of photography at The New York Times Magazine. Coulter
had been sending his work to Ryan for years. “She’s someone I’d
always aspired to work with,” he explains. “She’s been very supportive
in recent years.” Before the World Cup in 2014, Clinton Cargill, then
associate photo editor at The New York Times Magazine (and now
photography director at Bloomberg Businessweek) contacted him
about doing multiple-exposure images of some leading soccer players.
Coulter had only a few minutes with each player, but managed to
capture enough frames for his multiple-exposure technique, and some
video. The results were published as a package both in print and on
The New York Times website.
The multiple-exposure work he’s done with athletes lead directly
to a recent assignment from Entertainment Weekly to photograph the
cast of The Walking Dead (doing zombie walks). That story, in turn, has
landed Coulter work for other entertainment clients. Editorial work,
Coulter notes, remains his best promotion, demonstrating to clients
both his skills and his interests. “I’ve always felt that there are building
blocks, and one thing leads to another,” he says.
Last fall he also got to photograph former president Bill
Clinton for The Atlantic. The assignment—photographing multiple
portraits in less than 10 minutes—was tricky, but Coulter says all
his years photographing sports stars prepared him well. Coulter
says professional athletes are among the most difficult subjects to
shoot. Like many celebrities, they come to shoots with handlers and
publicists who have thoughts about their clients’ public personae. Yet
unlike actors, Coulter notes, “They’re not real comfortable in front
of the camera.” And because he only has a few minutes with a busy
athlete, Coulter says, “It’s taught me to elicit something from them
quickly.” Shooting athletes, he notes, “has been a great training ground
for all kinds of portraiture.”
—HOLLY STUART HUGHES
F EBRUA RY 20 15
p d n on l i n e .com
35
COURTESY CHRIS BURKARD
5 Routes to Success in Sports and Adventure Photography
ALL THREE PHOTOS © CHRIS BURKARD
CHRIS BURKARD: FROM SURF
PHOTOGRAPHY TO
COMMERCIAL ASSIGNMENTS
36
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
A huge part of the appeal of outdoor sports is the
experience of being in inspiring landscapes. Whether
they’re into surfing, rock climbing or backcountry
snowboarding, athletes revel in the chance to
experience beautiful, rugged and remote locales.
Photographer Chris Burkard says his personal style
is inspired equally by his love of outdoor sports and their
setting. His landscape imagery is in high demand among
editorial and commercial clients with the action sports
industry and beyond—leading to assignments for companies
like American Airlines, Toyota, Apple and Microsoft.
“I learned early on that if you can’t bring back a
photograph that tells the story of where you are, then it
could be anywhere,” Burkard tells PDN from his home
in Central California. “That doesn’t really do much for
the viewer. If you really want to create something that’s
timeless, something that allows the viewer to be in that
moment, you have to show the landscape.”
Drawn to art in high school, Burkard saw
photography as a way to live a creative life without
“being stuck” in a studio. “Photography was that
medium where I could be out in the water with my
friends surfing, or be in the mountains, or be kayaking,
or whatever it was,” he explains.
Burkard grew up surfing, and the sport gave him his
first professional experience as a photographer. But
from the beginning, he was focused on the landscapes
that surround the sport. “Surfing is super fun and I love
it, but it was more the experience of being out in the
waves and shooting the things that you see when you’re
out there,” he recalls. “I was drawn to empty waves and
the locations,” Burkard recalls.
Burkard made his first image sale to Channel Islands
Surfboards, then Transworld Surf magazine published
his work. For the next few years he concentrated on
editorial work, trying to get on surf trips funded by
magazines and to sell individual images to publications.
He also occasionally sold images of athletes to the
brands that sponsored them. Honing his editorial
skills was important, he says, because it allowed him
For the outdoor clothing and gear company Fjällräven’s North
American campaign, Chris Burkard photographed the landscapes
of the Pacific Northwest and the float planes that tend to be the
only way to reach remote locations. MIDDLE: Dane Gudauskas,
photographed for Surfer magazine taken in the Lofoten Islands,
Norway. BOTTOM: A view of Half Dome and the valley during a
sunrise hike in Yosemite. TOP, INSET: Chris Burkard.
TOP:
© MIKE ARZT
to develop his storytelling abilities. As he gained
notoriety, he got to know “like-minded” athletes
and journalists who were interested in traveling to
remote locations in Alaska and Iceland. “It was cool
to get in touch with folks that had the same value
for traveling, for obscurity, for the places I liked to
go. Ultimately that was how I was able to do a lot of
editorial work.”
Burkard also interned at Transworld Surf after he
began selling images to the magazine, which gave
him insight into the editorial process. “It allowed
me to understand how to pitch to an editor, and I
think that’s something a lot of people miss out on.
They blindly submit photographs. They don’t have
a concept of the schedule of the magazine and what
they’re looking for…I found that working closer
with [editors], communicating and trying to find
out what they need helps to align the objectives
even if you’re shooting on spec.”
While he was getting his name out through
editorial work, he was also sharing his images on
social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook
and 500px. Burkard began working for commercial
clients, doing jobs that drew on his editorial style.
Now, 90 percent of his work is commercial, and he
also maintains a senior staff photographer position
with Surfer magazine.
Burkard says careful editing of his portfolio and
the work he posts to social channels have been key
to growing his business and to getting the types of
jobs he wants. “I’ve aimed to really be a specialist
and tailor my portfolio to what I wanted to do,”
he says. “Obviously, down the line of my career,
I’ve shot a lot of things that aren’t necessarily my
personal style. I would shoot anything to pay the
bills, don’t get me wrong. But what I’ve done is
really try to curate what I put out into the world,
so what people see of my work are things I want to
shoot.” Burkard says a lot of his commercial clients
found him on social media. For this reason, instead
of trying to license a great image, he’ll often publish
it on his social channels. “Photos that I could
potentially sell somewhere, I’d rather seed them
out online and allow that to bring work back for
me,” he explains.
Contributing ideas to his clients’ creative
process is another factor in Burkard’s growth as a
commercial photographer, he notes. “We’ve been
able to bring [creative input] to a lot of the work
we’ve done.”
In the past couple of years, Burkard says, he’s
concentrated on making images that are timeless
but also relatable. “I’ve tried not to have ‘Everest
Syndrome’ in my work, which means photos of
people high fiving on the top of Mount Everest.
That appeals to one percent of the world. I want to
shoot stuff that feels relatable, attainable; that has
an element of ‘I could do that or I could be there.’
That’s really an important aspect of my work.”
—CONOR RISCH
ABOVE: A photo shot for Red Bull at Guanella Pass, Colorado, by Mike Arzt. Arzt’s work has
evolved from photography to numerous other services offered through The Public Works,
the company he co-founded.
MIKE ARZT: FROM SNOWBOARD
PHOTOGRAPHER TO BRAND STORYTELLER
For Mike Arzt, photography is one piece of a career that seems limited only by
his imagination and by the capabilities of the company he co-founded, The Public
Works. Arzt has a big-picture understanding of how photography works with
and complements filmmaking, design, marketing, sales, brand development and
even fabrication. In a given week, he and his colleagues might be photographing
Formula 1 races in Montreal or the U.S. Ski Team in Austria, or producing a
multimedia shoot for Airstream in the Aspen, Colorado, backcountry.
Arzt took a deep interest in photography early on—he built a darkroom in high
school and “kept shooting” as he got older, he says. As someone who “shaped
my life around snowboarding,” Arzt would read snowboarding magazines and
pay attention to the photographers, not the athletes. Early influences included
photographers like Kevin Zacher, Mark Gallup and Vincent Skoglund.
Arzt started working at Burton Snowboards as a student at the University of
Vermont. During his tenure there, he did sales and marketing, and then traveled
with Burton’s sponsored athletes. While he was helping produce one of the
last photo shoots he worked on at Burton, Arzt made some images that drew
compliments and encouragement from pro photographers who worked for Burton.
“That motivated me to leave Burton and go to work in a multimedia role,” he says.
After a stint at a sports multimedia startup that went boom and bust during
the dot-com bubble of the late ’90s, he moved to Airwalk Snowboards as global
snow marketing manager. At Airwalk, he and the other staffers shot much of
the photography and video the company used in its marketing, which was part
of the appeal of the work. As part of his hiring bonus, Arzt got a new camera
setup. His work has “always been a mix of marketing but also executing”
creative concepts, he says.
In 2006, Arzt partnered with Frank Phillips, who was head of the engineering
department at Burton while Arzt was there. The pair founded The Public Works,
a “brand storytelling company,” in Denver, Colorado. “We were motivated by
trying to combine the worlds of product design with marketing,” Arzt recalls.
Initially they thought they would develop products, but they also “wanted to be
able to offer up the full range of [creative] services, so that if we came up with
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5 Routes to Success in Sports and Adventure Photography
COURTESY MATT SLOCUM
a good product idea we [would] be able to put the entire business and marketing
plan together.”
Eventually they did get around to creating products, including a furniture line,
but early on they worked for clients including Red Bull, Helly Hansen and Aspen
Ski Company. For Red Bull, they did custom fabrication and photographed skiing,
snowboarding and other sports and events. For Helly Hansen, they managed global
snow-sports marketing—signing athletes, producing photo shoots and hiring
photographers—but also created visual assets for the brand themselves. For Aspen
Ski Company, they produced photography and video work.
Arzt says The Public Works team spends most of its time “trying to keep up
with everything on our plate”—their new work comes mostly through word-ofmouth, although they occasionally pursue clients they want to work for. “If an
opportunity presents itself, then we go after it really hard,” he says. After repeated
requests from clients for brand projects that included customized Airstream
trailers, Arzt decided to cold call Airstream to introduce them to The Public
Works. Three years later, “we have a really good partnership and some big plans
for the future,” Arzt says. (They also have a 28-foot trailer they are customizing
into a mobile production studio.)
Though snow sports were a big part of their work early on, Arzt says they’ve
been able to expand into doing work for a variety of clients interested in reaching
active people. “Snowboard or action sports stuff leads to other companies, whether
it’s Whole Foods or Subaru,” Arzt notes.
Clients also appreciate their lean approach, which is often light on production
and heavy on results. “We can get in with a tight team and we can execute on a lot
of stuff,” Arzt says. “We don’t go in thinking that we need 40 people to create a
30-second [TV] spot, and that’s all [a client is] going to get.” Currently The Public
Works employs 10 full-time staffers with a variety of expertise, from photography
and filmmaking to fabrication and Web development.
While snowboard and action-sports photography remains a part of Arzt’s career
and work, he and his colleagues at The Public Works have used those industries as a
foundation for expansion into a variety of creative work for clients in fields as diverse
as the beverage, automotive, resort and cigar industries. “We sum ourselves up as
brand storytellers,” Arzt says. “Whether we do that with a mobile champagne bar,
like we built for Veuve Clicquot, or a custom video project, which we’ve also done for
Veuve Clicquot, they’re really just creative marketing tools to help tell a story.”
—CONOR RISCH
© MIKE ARZT
MATT SLOCUM’S CLIMB
VIA THE NEWS WIRES
ABOVE:
Arzt photographed at the Retreat by Skatelite in the San Juan Islands, Washington.
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AP photographer Matt Slocum’s rise to the top
echelons of sports photography is the result of
his passion, hard work and taking advantage of
opportunities. “I kept hopping up the food chain,”
starting with his high school newspaper, says the
33-year-old photographer. He adds, “It wasn’t quick.”
From the start, Slocum was fascinated with
the gear and craft of photography. He read every
photography book and magazine he could get his
hands on. “I was completely obsessed. I was always
pushing, always thinking,” he says.
He gravitated to sports photography, for the
thrill of its constant action. He also liked that he
could get good results by following basic rules—
narrow depth of field, high shutter speed, subject
in focus, the rule of thirds. And once he mastered
the basics, he had fun figuring out how to break the
rules—shoot into backlight, for instance, or use fisheye lenses—to get something different.
And he missed no opportunity to practice. The
high school he attended in Duncanville, Texas
had a strong sports program and a good school
newspaper. There were games to shoot all year long.
Even better for Slocum, it was the late ’90s,
when the Dallas Morning News and the Fort Worth
Star-Telegram were having an old-fashioned
newspaper war. Slocum shot high school games
shoulder-to-shoulder with photographers from
those papers. “I was able to pick their brains,”
he says. Before long, he was contributing to
both papers as a freelancer, and learning from
professional photo editors.
“You look at what you messed up, what made the
papers the next day, what didn’t make the papers,
what you thought was really nice that nobody
cared about,” he says. “You learn that everyone runs
the storytelling pictures, as opposed to the pretty
pictures.”
After high school, he attended the University
of Texas at Arlington, home of The Shorthorn, one
of the best college papers in the state. “You would
shoot and shoot and shoot,” he says.
By his junior year he started landing
internships, first at the Corpus Christi Caller-
Times, then the Star-Telegram, and finally
at The Arizona Republic. “I did two or
three assignments a day. They treated
me like a staffer,” he says of the Arizona
Republic internship. On his free time, he
went to shoot Arizona Diamondbacks
baseball games for practice—“just to do it
over and over,” he says.
Slocum reels off a list of newspaper
photographers who taught him how
to shoot not just sports, but news and
features, too. In particular he remembers
the late Randy Reid, an Arizona Republic
photographer “who burst my bubble. I’m sure I was in there with
a big head, acting like I knew everything. He was threatening to
come to a game with a Nikon F3 and a roll of black-and-white film
and whip my ass.”
Reid never made good on his threat, but Slocum says the important
lesson he learned was “not to be an asshole. Be humble. Do your job. You
don’t need drama. Just do it, and do it good.”
Nearing graduation, Slocum started sending clips from his
internships and freelance assignments to Tony Gutierrez, a UTArlington graduate who had parlayed an AP internship into a staff job.
Gutierrez began asking Slocum, a leisurely college student, when he
was going to graduate. “In hindsight, he was keeping an eye on me,
pushing me. Finally he said, ‘You need to apply [for an AP internship]
when you graduate.’”
That gave Slocum incentive to finish college, and he landed an
internship in AP’s Dallas bureau in 2005. He looked at the internship as
another opportunity to improve his skills. And Gutierrez continued to
push him—and push for him. “He’d try get [me] better gigs,” Slocum says.
The internship led to a series of three-month contracts with
AP, beginning with a temporary job, filling in for a Dallas-based AP
photographer who spent weeks in New Orleans covering Hurricane
Katrina. “If they like you, they find a way to keep you around,”
Slocum says.
In 2007, he ended up in a job-sharing arrangement with another AP
photographer who needed a more flexible schedule. Meanwhile, he
had his eye on AP’s job board for full-time job openings in cities where
he’d have a chance to shoot a lot of sports. In 2009, an opening came up
in Philadelphia, which has four pro sports franchises. Slocum has now
held that job for five years.
“He’s the type of photographer [AP] is looking for,” says Denis
Paquin, AP’s deputy director of photography, who explains that AP
photographers have to be able to shoot all types of assignments, not just
a single specialty, like sports. They also have to be able to look critically
at their own work and strive constantly to improve.
Slocum says that starting at the bottom and working your way up isn’t
the only way to establish a career in sports photography. “It’s just how I
got here, slow and steady,” he says. His advice to others on that path is to
embrace it as a learning process, not resent it as a dues-paying exercise.
He also warns against the misperception “that you’re nobody if
you’re not shooting professional sports.” The lighting conditions, the
freedom to move around the field, and opportunities to experiment are
often far better at high school and college games, which aren’t stagemanaged for TV audiences, he explains.
Slocum is nostalgic for his formative experience, but says, “The
appeal of the big leagues, to me, is the chance to see [through a camera]
something great…professional photographers are trying to capture those
storytelling moments and a little history, too.”
—DAVID WALKER
San Francisco Giants
Madison Bumgarner and
Buster Posey celebrate a
win over the Kansas City
Royals. MIDDLE: Florida
Gulf Coast’s Chase Fieler,
top, dunks over San Diego
State’s Deshawn Stephens.
BOTTOM: The Russian
women’s ice hockey team
before a game at the 2014
Winter Olympics. OPPOSITE
PAGE, INSET: Matt Slocum.
© AP/PHOTOS BY MATT SLOCUM
TOP:
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5 Routes to Success in Sports and Adventure Photography
JIM FRYER AND IRI GRECO
“BRAKE” INTO WORLD TOUR CYCLING
Fryer and Greco capture the grit and dirt at Cyclocross,
Hoogerheide, the Netherlands, 2014. BOTTOM, RIGHT: A rider in Vuelta a España,
Angliru, Spain, 2013. ABOVE, INSET, LEFT: Jim Fryer. INSET, RIGHT: Iri Greco.
BOTTOM, LEFT:
ALL FOUR PHOTOS © BRAKET HROUGH MEDIA
Jim Fryer and Iri Greco spend most of the year touring Europe,
capturing the sights and sounds of the Union Cycliste Internationale
World Tour. The couple, who maintain homes in New York and San
Francisco, make photos and videos of the sport’s premier athletes,
events and locales for clients such as Specialized Bicycle Components
and SRAM. And while their personal and professional relationships
may have begun at a bike race, their paths to that meeting couldn’t
have started more differently.
Jim Fryer is a cycling lifer. He raced competitively as a child
growing up in Los Angeles, competing in events on the juniors
circuit and eventually going pro. After an early retirement in 1997 at
the age of 24, he stayed close to the industry, starting a company that
used a new inkjet process to make custom short-run cycling apparel.
While the stress and frustration of being an early adopter of the new
technology led him to sell the business—and spend a few years at
The GAP trading on his product development experience—he always
found a way back to cycling.
“[I] always…kind of kept a foot in the door, if you will,” Fryer says,
“One thing about cycling, even though it is across the globe…you just
see the same people over and over.”
In 2008, he launched cyclistvillage.com—a social-media website
dedicated to cycling—with venture-capital backing. The site got
American cycling legend Frankie Andreu to review products oncamera to drive traffic, sampling gear provided by bike manufacturers
such as Specialized, Trek, Look and Fuji, among others. While the site
never took off, event producers in the cycling industry took note of
the quality of Fryer’s videos, and he was able to get work producing
promotional reels and commercials for the companies whose goods
cyclistvillage.com had been reviewing.
In 2009 Fryer re-branded his operation as BrakeThrough
Media. Heading into the season he had one client: Specialized. His
relationship with Specialized—which stretches back to when it
sponsored him as a pro—would prove strong. The company sent him to
shoot at the Tour of California, where he met Iri Greco.
At the time, Greco was a field producer for a documentary
film following a cycling team, but she was no bike enthusiast.
Disillusioned after a decade working with food—both in the kitchen
and as a stylist—she was up for something new. “I didn’t really care
about the cycling part,” she says. “It was a breath of fresh air...and
then I met that guy.”
A New Yorker, Greco was an art school kid who worked in
Manhattan’s garment district as a teenager. When she went off to
college in Wisconsin, she worked in restaurants to pay for school,
and decided she wanted to be a chef. After moving to San Francisco
to work in “progressively more serious kitchens” throughout her 20s,
Greco found herself doing freelance food styling for magazines, such
as Martha Stewart Living.
She broke into video production after parlaying a friendship with
a Food Network employee into a tryout with the network. She found
work on PBS shows such as Lidia’s Family Table, doing demos at
Macy’s and cooking segments on morning shows like Today and Good
Morning America.
Successful but unfulfilled, Greco was having dinner with a
producer friend when he asked her to describe what her ideal job
would be like. When she described the tasks she liked to do, his
response was, “You want to be a producer.” So she started her own
one-woman visual media company, Panforte Productions. By the
time she met Fryer, she had been informally auditioning partners for
Panforte, and he had just gone solo with Brake Through Media.
“When he and I met, we were both thirsting for a new partnership,”
Greco says. “We saw it in each other and said: Let’s work together. Our
first project was in Belgium, shooting commercials for the Federation
of American Cycling.”
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© JJ MILLER
The gregarious Greco quickly made friends in the
notoriously insular cycling community, and as she and
Fryer hit it off, they began to develop their own style.
“Coming from food, where everything is really sensual
and textural, there’s a lot of extreme close-ups,” Greco says.
“I applied this approach…to sport.”
They taught themselves how to shoot and edit. They
developed a unique perspective: with lots of low angles,
close-ups of sweat, skin, dirt and other details, they
emphasized the visceral qualities of cycling, much like one
would a gourmet meal. “We shoot mud like it’s chocolate
cake,” Greco says. “We shoot sweat like it’s the beads of
condensation on a glass of cold milk. That’s the way I see
the world. And he began to see it that way.”
But by 2011, their clients’ budgets (and thus, crews)
were shrinking, so they transitioned from Panasonic
camcorders to DSLRs. New tools in hand, they started
taking high-quality behind-the-scenes photos at work
throughout the cycling season to promote their business.
HTC, the main corporate sponsor of the Specialized team
they were shadowing, took notice. When HTC hired
them to shoot video and photos for the rest of the tour,
they made the rare transition from videographers to
photographers. They spent the next year hustling photo
and video work.
Erick Marcheschi, Specialized’s content creation
manager, says Fryer and Greco’s unique perspective stands
out. The company hires other photographers for standard
race fare, but they bring something else to the table.
“What Jim and Iri were doing was a little bit different,
more behind-the-scenes,” Marcheschi says. “A day-inthe-life, embedding with the teams themselves, building
relationships with the teams and the riders.”
These days Brake Through Media prefers to shoot
stills rather than video. By paying their own way to
follow the 2013 World Tour, Greco and Fryer were able
to make their own schedule, then convinced Marcheschi
and other clients such as SRAM, VeloNews.com and the
cycling team Omega Pharma-Quick Step to pay them on
retainer. Rather than rely on one huge sponsor to pay
for all their expenses, they can spread the costs among
several. They know which races their clients will want
covered, their turnaround times are fast and they strive to
get shots the other guys don’t.
“They understand cycling, they get it,” Marcheschi
says. “They know instinctively what to get, and always
give us surprises.”
Empowered by their clients’ trust with the freedom
to choose what they want to cover, Brake Through is
looking to branch out and make more travel and foodand-wine work. Gastro tours of Italy, restaurant bike
treks in New York City: These are the kind of projects
that suit both Greco and Fryer. With their expenses
already covered by their cycling work, they hope to
fill the down times in their race schedule with travel
assignments that might be tougher for an editor or buyer
to justify funding themselves.
“Travel makes the most sense, because….” Greco starts.
“That’s what we’re doing anyway,” finishes Fryer.
—MATTHEW ISMAEL RUIZ
ABOVE: A portrait of Mike Trout, photographed by JJ Miller for Zepp Baseball in Anaheim,
CA 2014.
5 Tips for Getting a Winning
Portrait of a Sports Star
Photographing top athletes comes with a unique set of challenges. The
subjects typically bring all of the trappings of celebrity — publicists,
entourages, tight schedules — but unlike famous actors, have no training
in performing in front of a camera. A portrait shoot with a busy sports star
requires the ability to work fast, as well as the directing skills to elicit a spark
of personality from the subject quickly.
We asked three photographers — Randi Berez, JJ Miller and John Huet —
for tips on how you can get the nuanced and interesting shots you want from
a professional athlete.
1.
Be Prepared
Berez, Miller and Huet all noted that you need to be ready to shoot
the moment the subject walks on set. Miller estimates that he
usually gets between five and ten minutes to capture 25 shots,
as well as to create video footage. Increasingly, he also needs shots for social
media and viral content. As a result, he makes sure he has drawn up not only
lighting set-ups, but also sketches of poses he’d like the athletes to try. “If you
plan well in advance, ten minutes actually seems like a lot of time,” he notes.
On a recent cover shoot for Sports Illustrated with P.K. Subban, a
defenseman for the National Hockey League’s Montreal Canadiens, Huet
encountered some resistance from Subban’s publicist regarding timing. He was
scheduled to shoot at the same time as another publication that dropped out at
the last minute. When he asked for the 15 extra minutes the cancellation freed
up, the publicist told him he could have five. “Their schedules are so busy that
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5 Routes to Success in Sports and Adventure Photography
every minute counts,” he says.
Whether Berez is shooting for advertising or editorial
clients, she makes sure that a blueprint for the shoot is
created and distributed so that everyone knows what to
expect on the day of the shoot. “I usually show up with
something in hand I can show my subjects as a starting
point,” she says.
As a photographer, Berez is always looking for
an iconic image. However, she is acutely aware
that an athlete’s body is their job. As a result, she is mindful
not only of the poses that she asks them to take, but also
of the fact that she often shoots them in between workouts, or on a day when they’re supposed to be resting.
In essence, that she’s asking them to work when they’re
supposed to be recuperating.
On a recent trip to photograph soccer player Graham Zusi
for Men’s Fitness, she received an email notifying her that
Zusi had been injured in practice. “Nobody wanted to cancel
the shoot, but we needed dynamic shots,” she explains.
She considered a number of options, including having a
teammate do the action while Zusi posed for a portrait. In the
end, she had her assistant buy a crash pad. Although Zusi
was not at 100-percent capability when he showed up for
the shoot the next day, after seeing the crash pad, he was
more than willing to give a few high-energy action shots.
3.
Get Familiar With the
Language
Before he became a professional photographer,
Miller played baseball in college. As a result,
he’s familiar with the language that professional athletes,
and especially baseball players, use when being coached.
He is able to utilize this lingo when he’s asking them to
assume poses in front of the camera. “I explain it to them
in terms they understand,” he says. He doesn’t believe it’s
© JOHN HUET
2.
Be Aware That Their Bodies
Are Their Equipment
ABOVE: Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce from “The Celtic Threebound,” shot for TIME
magazine by John Huet. BELOW: Randi Berez photographed professional beach volleyball player
Kerri Walsh Jennings for Oakley.
necessary for a sports photographer to have been an athlete, however. “You just have
to understand how the body moves,” he says.
Berez notes that professional athletes have an uncommon degree of physical
self-awareness. “Once you break down an action and determine which part of that
action you want to capture, [your subjects] are able to make minor adjustments in
body position that make a huge difference on camera,” she says.
4.
Do Your Research
Professional athletes are not particularly known for their ability
to emote. While music can create a more relaxed atmosphere, it’s
sometimes not enough. In order to prevent any awkwardness — which
ultimately leads to time wasted — Huet does his research. “I try to find out a little bit
about that person. If I need a little juice, I try to use something he or she’s familiar with,
or something they’ll react to.”
On a shoot with Michael Phelps for a Mazda commercial, for
example, Huet relaxed the athlete by giving him playful crap
about the Baltimore Ravens. “He’s a big Ravens fan, and I’m from
Pittsburgh, so I like the Steelers,” he explains. The challenge soon
became keeping Phelps focused once he was riled up.
Researching an athlete in advance helps Miller determine
whom he should have on his crew, to make sure there is
someone on the set the subject can relate to. Sometimes when
Miller is shooting a female athlete, for example, he’ll have a
female camera assistant on set.
5.
© RANDI BEREZ
It’s No Time to Be Starstruck
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Being talented is no longer enough for a professional
athlete to be successful. They need to approach their
profession, their public image and their relationship
with their fans with gravitas. “A lot of these people are at the
tops of their fields,” notes Huet. “They are professionals, and they
want to feel that the people around them are the same way.” He
adds, “Just understand it’s another person you’re directing. It’s no
different than the portrait of the computer engineer you’ve done
the day before, even if that person is a sports legend.”
—BRIENNE WALSH
THE SPORTS & ADVENTURE PHOTOGRAPHY ISSUE
GETTING IN ON
THE ACTION
How photographers land assignments shooting sponsored expeditions, and balance a
branding message with the need for thrilling shots and images. BY SARAH COLEMAN
RUGGED MOUNTAINS, sapphire lakes; athletes climbing, jumping and pushing themselves to the
limit. The best action-sports imagery captures the thrill and spontaneity of outdoor adventure. For
companies like Patagonia, Eddie Bauer and Smith Optics, images like these are an essential part of a
brand marketing strategy. Companies need photographs that stir excitement around outdoor sports,
even if the images don’t explicitly sell the brands’ products.
If you’re a photographer of outdoor adventure—especially if you enjoy participating in these
pursuits— this need presents a great opportunity. But how do you break into the industry? What are
BELOW: Andrew McLean, photographed on
a trip sponsored by Black Diamond and
Powder magazine. Photographer Garrett
Grove was commissioned to capture
images of ski mountaineering.
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© GARRETT GROVE
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© SMITH OPTICS/PHOTOS BY MARK WELSH
art directors looking for? Most important, how do you get invited to
document the best trips?
Defining a Need
“To me, authentic storytelling is the best brand marketing,” says
Jane Sievert, director of photography at Patagonia. “We’re far more
interested in the spirit of the photo than if the person is wearing our
latest style or the logo is apparent.”
“We use photographs to connect all our touch points,” says
Chatham Baker, creative director at Smith Optics, which makes highperformance sunglasses, goggles and helmets. “We want world-class,
authentic imagery in print and digital ads, point-of-sale, catalogues,
websites and social media.”
The key to attracting attention on all these platforms is keeping the
images real.
Caley George, who manages expedition photography for Eddie
Bauer, says he takes notice of “how a photographer is using landscapes,
light and shadow, and whether a product is featured well.” However,
he says, all these elements must be held together by a natural-looking,
editorial style.
Likewise, Smith Optics’ Baker says he’s looking for photographs
“that are almost journalistic—[that] capture genuine, amazing
moments.” Tal Roberts, who has shot a variety of sports for Smith
Optics, says assignments following sponsored athletes in the outdoors
require him to document “the whole experience of what they’re doing.
A lot of the stuff that Smith runs is in-the-moment stuff, where you get
the feeling of being there in the situation.”
Breaking In
For the most part, photographers who work with top outdoor brands
love outdoor sports—and for many, this led them into photographing
professionally.
“I’m a snowboarder, skateboarder and mountain biker,” says
Roberts, who shoots all three. Initially, Roberts started photographing
because he wanted to capture peak moments in skateboarding. “I’d
say to people, ‘Hey, that trick you just did was awesome, do you want
to get a photo of it?’” Eventually he had a portfolio of images that
appealed to Smith Optics, which gave him his first big break.
Similarly, Garrett Grove started taking photographs to document
his own skiing and climbing trips, afterward
posting images online for friends and family.
In 2007, he caught a lucky break when the
marketing director of Necky Kayaks saw his
blog and asked Grove to do a shoot. He now
shoots for Patagonia, Black Diamond and
Eddie Bauer, among others.
Mark Welsh, an avid snowboarder, got
to know his fellow snowboarders, and
through them met sponsors. He now travels
internationally with top athletes, and is
praised as “a photographic badass” by Baker, with whom he often
works. “My best friends are snowboarders and surfers,” Welsh says.
“When I leave to go on a job, it’s more like I’m going on vacation.”
All three photographers say it’s crucial to know the sport you’re
photographing, for safety reasons and in order to position yourself
correctly. “That’s 100-percent crucial,” says Roberts. “This is not
something you just walk into.”
Photographers shooting sponsored trips have to be able to switch
between covering the action and looking out for images that present the
sponsor’s brand well. While a catalogue shoot is typically art directed,
with a defined shot list, most of the work Grove does for sponsors has to
be shot like “editorial stories,” he says. “I guess about 70 to 80 percent
of the time you’re just going with the flow, shooting from the hip; 20 to
30 percent of the time you’ll see a moment that fits with [the clients’]
branding, then you’ll set it up [again] and make sure it works.”
Welsh says, “My approach is to shoot as much as I can and always
have my camera out shooting, so I can get everything.” That includes
both environmental shots and close-ups on interactions between the
athletes, and everything in between. He explains, “On a five-day trip,
I’ll shoot 15,000 to 18,000 photos.”
ABOVE, LEFT AND RIGHT:
Images from a trip
sponsored by Smith
Optics, photographed
by Mark Welsh. Welsh
says on sponsored trips
he shoots constantly,
capturing both the
environment and inbetween moments with
the athletes.
Know Your Athletes
Photographers and sponsors suggest that anyone who wants to get
into the field should befriend athletes. Leading athletes are “sponsored
from head-to-toe,” Grove says, and sponsors often underwrite their
expeditions. If a photographer teams up with an athlete (or group of
athletes), chances are the sponsor will hire a photographer based on
the athlete’s recommendation.
“I ask athletes if they have a preferred photographer or videographer;
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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45
GETTING IN ON THE ACTION
about half of them do,” says Eddie Bauer’s George, who fields around 70
trip proposals from athletes a year, and funds ten. “I’m always eager to
hear what they think, because they know as much as I do.”
At Patagonia, Sievert says she almost always lets athletes select
the photographers they feel safe working with. “I never want to
micro-manage who’s included on an expedition, both for safety
reasons and in order to help create the best vibe for our athletes
when they’re out in the field.”
Grove says that at least 60 percent of his work comes from planning
trips with athletes, and then pitching his ideas to sponsors. He first
assignment, I’ll be sending the image around to companies who
sponsor Chase, such as Capita Snowboards and Smith Optics, as well
as snowboarding magazines,” says Roberts.
Marketing Your Work
© SMITH OPTICS/PHOTO BY TAL ROBERTS
Because of the importance of word-of-mouth, promotional materials
from photographers tend to be less valuable than in other types of
advertising. Roberts, Welsh and Grove say they almost never send out
printed promos, though they may assemble digital portfolios when
they pitch an idea to a
particular client.
EDDIE BAUER’S CALEY GEORGE: “If you’re new, try to get someone
Sievert and Baker
say they actively dislike
to say, ‘I know this guy, his work is great and he’s looking for a break.’
receiving promo materials
No one wants to [send] a shoot out the door on a bit of a gamble.”
from photographers.
“Maybe it works for
other people, but I prefer
word of mouth, friends
of friends, phone calls or
even chance meetings,”
says Baker. Sievert adds, “It
pains me to receive slick
promotional materials on
non-recycled paper that
simply get tossed into the
recycle bin.”
George differs a
little, estimating that he
hires 60 percent of his
photographers based on
existing connections,
and 40 percent based
on photographers’
marketing efforts. He
attends major trade
shows each year in Salt
Lake City and Denver,
where he’ll set up
meetings; he also looks at
social media. “You meet
people or see their work,”
he says. “You may not
use them for a couple of
years, then suddenly it’s
the right time.”
Though adventure
ABOVE: Desiree Melancon does a hand plant at the Brundage Basin resort, photographed by Tal Roberts on the last day of a trip to
sports is a competitive
McCall, Idaho, for Smith Optics.
field, there’s still room for
met professional athletes while skiing Mount Baker in Washington,
emerging photographers, say Sievert and George. “If you’re new, try to
and was able to self-fund trips and sell images afterward, each trip
get someone to say, ‘I know this guy, his work is great and he’s looking
paying for the next, until his portfolio and reputation were strong
for a break,’” says George. “No one wants to [send] a shoot out the door
enough to get him commissions.
on a bit of a gamble.”
Roberts and Welsh have similar stories. Welsh has worked with
“Produce good work; Have athletes that want to work with you,”
professional snowboarders Bryan Fox, Austin Smith and Shaun
advises Roberts. “See if you can step your technique up a bit in order
McKay. Roberts often works with professional snowboarder Chase
to stand out.”
Josey, and the two might go out on a shoot with or without advance
But—bottom line—love what you do, says Welsh. “Bear in mind that
funding. When PDN spoke to Roberts, he was in the mountains in
you won’t make the kind of money you could make in fashion
Stanley, Idaho, building a snow ramp to a colorful jungle gym that
photography—you’re doing it because you love the sport,” he says.
Josey was about to board off. “Since this wasn’t shot while on an
“Know that first, and stick with it.”
46
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
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THE SPORTS & ADVENTURE PHOTOGRAPHY ISSUE
Lights,
Action
Camera
ALL PHOTOS © TETON GRAVITY RESEARCH
How cinematographers make wide-angle video shot on
action cams play well with other footage. BY GREG SCOBLETE
IF YOU WERE wondering why GoPro’s
stock price skyrocketed after its IPO,
listen to cinematographers like Shane
Hurlbut or Toby Oliver as they recount
with barely disguised glee what they’ve
put these action cameras through.
They’ve plowed them into asphalt and
rock, sent cars and trucks barreling into
them at high speeds and—for the coup de
grâce—melted them down in firestorms
while still retrieving usable memory
cards from the charred husks.
That most users of GoPros and other
action cameras put their gear on a path
of destruction has kept production lines
humming. It’s also created a whole new
era of point-of-view filmmaking, in which
action cams are being increasingly pressed
into service as the “disposable” camera of
choice for productions large and small.
ABOVE: Teton Gravity Research, an action-camera early adopter, prizes them for their ability to go where cinema cameras fear to tread. Teton trains its athletes, such as
Tim Durtschi (top center, bottom) and Angel Collinson (top right), to use action cams to get point-of-view footage that can comprise up to 20 percent of a feature film.
48
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
COURTESY DREAMWORKS PICTURES
ABOVE: In Need for Speed, cinematographer Shane Hurlbut and director Scott Waugh equipped cars with GoPros using mounts bought at a chain electronics store
to capture unique angles that couldn’t be risked with more expensive cinema cameras. Working with GoPro, Hurlbut was able to increase the dynamic range of the
cameras so they would blend well with footage from an Alexa, a Canon EOS C500 and a Canon EOS-1D C.
At the same time, action camera footage
has made a leap from small screens to silver
screens.
Todd Jones, co-founder of the action sports
media company Teton Gravity Research, was
an early adopter of action cameras. He prizes
them for the ease with which he could mount
them to goggles, helmets and high-flying
athletes to capture point-of-view images that
the production team simply couldn’t engineer,
even with a helicopter and RED Epics. Back
when action cameras produced standarddefinition video and the quality “was so
noticeably awful,” they were used sparingly, he
says. Today, in films like Jeremy Jones’ Higher,
action-camera footage can comprise almost 20
percent of the movie.
For all the gains that action cameras have
made in the past several years, it’s still a
challenge to integrate them into productions
that use other cameras. Relative to cinema
cameras or DSLRs, action cameras have
miniscule image sensors and very limited
control over exposure settings. Their
wide-angle, often fish-eye lenses provide a
noticeably different field-of-view that can be
all the more jarring when blended with footage
from more traditional cinema focal lengths.
But according to the cinematographers we
spoke with, there are several ways to mitigate
these deficiencies and exploit action cameras
to their fullest potential.
Planning Makes Perfect
For Jones, the first step in securing usable
action-camera footage is ensuring that the
athletes they work with are fully trained on
the cameras they’ll be wearing. Teton Gravity
Research uses Sony action cams—which
Jones chose for their audio quality, sleek
physical profile and contoured fit when
mounted to goggles or helmets—and the
company’s daredevils know they have an
important role to play in securing great pointof-view footage. “We encourage them to think
like camera [operators],” he says. “They know
if we’re not around and they see something
cool unfolding in front of them, that they have
a camera… and can get the shot.” The athletes,
he adds, have really embraced this dual role.
In instances where there’s no human
operator or chance of human intervention,
such as when Oliver and Hurlbut mounted
GoPros to cars fated for fiery crash scenes,
redundancy is the watchword. Mounting
multiple action cameras ups the odds that
some useable footage can be salvaged from
the wreckage. It also ensures a wider range
of camera angles. In Need for Speed, Hurlbut
outfitted a replica of a Koenigsegg Agera race
car with multiple GoPros and one was able
to capture the view from the bottom of the
car as it flipped over in the air above another
vehicle. All the GoPro hardware and mounts
Hurlbut used in Need for Speed, he says, were
purchased at a chain electronics store.
And while action cameras are treated as
“disposable” in the context of Hollywood
budgets, they’re remarkably hard to dispose
of. “We put GoPros in situations where I
thought they would have a 30 percent survival
rate, but it turned out to be closer to 80
percent,” Hurlbut says.
To film a truck crash in Wolf Creek 2,
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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49
© MARK ROGERS
© MARK ROGERS
© TOBY OLIVER
Lights, Action Camera
In Wolf Creek 2, cinematographer Toby Oliver used 11 GoPros mounted to a truck and in the crash zone to record a head-on collision and explosion.
An Arri Alexa films the carnage from Wolf Creek 2. BOTTOM RIGHT: Three GoPros, and this magic arm mount, were destroyed in the process of filming
Wolf Creek 2’s epic truck crash.
ABOVE:
TOP RIGHT:
Oliver outfitted the plunging truck with six
GoPros while deploying five on the ground to
record the impact head-on. As Oliver recalls,
eight emerged from the carnage, including the
aforementioned GoPro that melted in the heat
while still preserving its memory card. “But
we captured a truly extraordinary shot that
was used in the trailer, of the truck landing on
top of the camera and blowing up.”
Set and Forget
Whether the action cam is on a suicide mission
or bound to an athlete attempting a deathdefying stunt, there’s no chance for a do-over
or mid-course corrections. Action cameras
typically offer minimal control over exposure,
so you have to put your faith in the camera’s
Auto mode, Hurlbut says, and hope for the best.
Beyond blind faith, both Hurlbut and
Oliver had some GoPro-specific approaches
that helped them in their respective films.
Both used the Hero3+ Black Edition camera
and took advantage of GoPro’s Protune
controls, which lets you adjust white
balance, ISO limit, sharpness and exposure
compensation before filming. The only
significant adjustment they made was to
Protune’s color profile, setting it to flat, which
is a neutral color profile that captures more
details in shadows and highlights and can be
50
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
color-corrected to better blend with footage
from other cameras.
Both Hurlbut and Oliver set their GoPros
to record at 2.7K resolution at 24 fps to better
match the main camera’s resolution. “We
looked at recording at 1080p and 48 fps but
at that resolution it didn’t hold up as well,”
Oliver says, though they were able to use
some 1080p footage at 60 fps.
Another simple tweak Oliver employed was
the use of ND filters. “The way GoPro controls
exposure is with shutter speed and if you’re in
bright sunlight, it will respond by speeding up
the shutter which can give you a staccato look.”
In digital cinema, Oliver noted, you tend to set
a shutter speed for the whole movie, but the
GoPro’s shutter is “all over the place.”
ND filters hit the brakes on this rapid
shutter movement while the crew filmed Wolf
Creek 2 on the sun-drenched plains of the
Australian Outback.
Post Patch Up
Critical to any smooth integration of action
camera footage is effective postprocessing.
In Need for Speed, Hurlbut worked with
GoPro to expand the dynamic range of the
Hero3 so while he was recording in 2.7K at
24 fps, he had a RAW file with more dynamic
range than the Hero3 typically produces.
To reduce the noise and blend the GoPro
scenes with those shot on the other cameras
used in the film, the footage was run through
Cinnafilm’s Dark Energy, a $199 plug-in for
Adobe After Effects. The plug-in not only
reduces noise and film grain in individual
clips, but also works to ensure noise and
film grain consistency across multiple video
sources. Need for Speed blended files from
a total of four cameras in Dark Energy: The
Arri Alexa, a Canon EOS C500, a Canon
EOS-1D C and GoPros.
Oliver also sees the new Hero4’s faster 4K
frame rates as providing another opportunity
to work around the GoPro’s limitations in
postproduction—the distortions at the edge of
the frame due to the camera’s wide angle lens.
“If you have a 4K file in post you can zoom in
to find a tighter frame and lose the fish-eye
feel” without sacrificing resolution, he says.
Even the best edit may not camouflage the
action cam, and for some scenes, the solution
is to keep the cuts short. “It’s not ideal,”
Oliver admits, but it’s often a choice of that
“GoPro look” or nothing at all.
Besides, Hurlbut says, people shouldn’t get
too caught up with quality concerns. Using
action cameras isn’t about pristine image
quality but about immersing the audience in
thrilling experiences. “That emotion,” Hurlbut
says, “you can’t get with any other camera.”
T P KNOTS
WWW.TOPKNOTSCONTEST.COM
Categories
• ENGAGEMENT SESSION
• COMMERCIAL
• PRE-WEDDING
• EDITORIAL
• WEDDING DAY
• MOTION
Prizes
O N E GR AN D-PR IZE WI N N ER
WILL RECEIVE:
A
$2,500
cash prize
Round-trip airfare, four-night hotel
accommodations, and a Full Platform Pass for the
Wedding and Portrait Photography Conference +
Expo at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas
A one-page profile in PDN's May and
Rangefinder's April issue
$500 gift card from Adorama
A Photo+ Basic Membership
E A C H F I R S T- P L A C E W I N N E R
WILL RECEIVE:
$100 gift card from Adorama
A PHOTO+ Basic Membership
Winning images will be printed in the May 2015
issue of PDN and in the Top Knots gallery on
PDNOnline. All featured photographers will
receive the offi cial winners' seal.
Judges
L I N D S AY C R O S S
K R IST I D R AGO-P R I CE
C R E S S I D A P AYAV I S
Wedding
Photographer
Consultant
Editor's Edge
Senior Art Director
MODCo Creative
S H I R A S AVA D A
Art Director
Southern Brides
Producer
BHLDN
Entry Fee
$35 per image or
series of six
Real Wedding Editor
Martha Stewart
Weddings
Extended Deadline
January 29, 2015
SPONSORED BY:
PHOTO © BEN SASSO
TA N I A P I R O Z Z I
BROUGHT TO YOU BY:
JOSEF
KOUDELKA
ON MOTIVATION, HUMANITY AND WHAT
MAKES A GOOD PHOTOGRAPH
F
© MAGNUM COLLECTION/
MAGNUM PHOTOS
or nearly six decades, Josef Koudelka has
focused an empathetic eye on the human
condition. An exhibition at the J. Paul Getty
Museum in Los Angeles, “Josef Koudelka:
Nationality Doubtful,” presents a sweeping
overview of his work, including poignant photographs
of Roma (Gypsies), electrifying documents of the
52
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, and massive
panoramas of conflict-altered landscapes, most
recently from his book Wall, on the barrier separating
Israel and the West Bank.
BELOW:
“Al ‘Eizariya (Bethany),” negative 2010; print 2014.
Josef Koudelka in 2007.
INSET, LEFT:
Laura Hubber: You’re famous for not taking
assignments. How do you choose your
subjects?
Josef Koudelka: I know what I want to do
and I do it. And I’ve created conditions so
I can do it—I’ve been doing it for 45 years.
People who do assignments are being paid
and they are supposed to do something. I
want to keep the freedom not to do anything,
the freedom to change everything.
LH: What’s the main motivation for you to
choose a subject?
JK: I’m an intuitive person.
LH: If it speaks to you, you go.
JK: You know, people ask all the time why I
photographed gypsies. I’ve never known. I’m
not particularly interested to know.
LH: Is it possible that you were drawn to the
way Roma are free from the state?
JK: No, not at all [pause]. You know, I didn’t
JK: When you look at something and think,
this is right.
AS: So it’s a feeling?
JK: Sure.
LH: How important is composition in your
photographs?
JK: It’s not a good photograph without good
grow up with American cinema like many
photographers. I was from a little village. I
was never fascinated by the United States.
But I remember seeing photographs from
the Farm Security Administration and they
moved me very much. It wasn’t because of
the style of the photography—it was because
of the subject. Maybe you’ll find something
similar with Gypsies too.
composition. Originally I’m an aeronautical
engineer. Why do airplanes fly? Because there
is balance.
A good photograph speaks to many
different people for different reasons. It
depends on what people have been through
and how they react.
The other sign of good photography for
me is to ask, “What am I going to remember?”
It happens very, very rarely that you see
something that you can’t forget, and this is the
good photograph.
Annelisa Stephan: You’ve talked about
having “the eye.” What does that mean?
LH: Tell us about photographing the Sovietled invasion of Prague.
© JOSEF KOUDELKA/MAGNUM PHOTOS
As the exhibition title suggests, statelessness,
perpetual travel and exile have characterized
Koudelka’s life and work. One of his most
famous projects focuses on nomadic people—
the Roma—and he produced his book Exiles
during his own years of rootless wandering in
the United States and Europe, before he was
granted French citizenship in 1987.
He spoke in November to the the Getty
Museum’s Laura Hubber and Annelisa
Stephan, during the final moments of
preparation for the exhibition, which runs
through March 22, 2015.
F EBRUA RY 20 15
p d n on l i n e .com
53
JOSEF KOUDELKA
JK: I’d just gotten back from
Romania, where for months I was
photographing Gypsies, and my
friend called me and said, “The
Russians are here.” I picked up the
camera, went out on the street, and
I photographed just for myself. I’d
never photographed events before.
These pictures weren’t meant to
be published. Finally they were
published one year later, which is
interesting, because they weren’t
news anymore.
AS: The exhibition includes several
panoramas. What attracts you to
this format?
JK: I love landscape. But I was
© JOSEF KOUDELKA/MAGNUM PHOTOS
never happy photographing the
landscape with a standard camera. In
1986 I was asked to participate in a
government project in France. They
invited me to the office and I saw a
panoramic camera lying on the desk.
I said, “Can I borrow this camera for
one week?”
I ran around Paris; I had to
photograph everything. I realized
that with this camera I could do
something I’d never done before.
The panoramic camera helped me
go to another stage in my career, in
my work. It helped me to remain
interested in photography, to be
fascinated with photography.
I’m going to be 77. When I met
[Henri] Cartier-Bresson, he was
62. I’m 15 years older than CartierBresson was then. And at that time
Cartier-Bresson was stopping his
work with photography.
It’s not normal to feel that you
have to do something, that you love
to do something. If that’s happening
you have to pay attention so you
don’t lose it.
54
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
AS: In an interview at the Art
Institute of Chicago you said you’ve
“never met a bad person.” I see
much empathy and love in your
photographs.
JK: That’s up to you [laughs].
AS: Are people fundamentally good?
JK: I’ve been traveling 45 years
without stopping, so of course
things have happened to me that
LEFT:
Prague, 1968.
ON MOTIVATION, HUMANITY AND WHAT MAKES A GOOD PHOTOGRAPH
© JOSEF KOUDELKA/MAGNUM PHOTOS
© JOSEF KOUDELKA/MAGNUM PHOTOS/COURTESY PACE/MACGILL GALLERY, NEW YORK
KOUDELKA: “I think it’s wonderful that everybody can take photographs,
just like I think it’s wonderful everybody can write. But there are very few
writers and there are very few photographers.”
ABOVE, LEFT:
Still Life (Newspaper), France, 1976.
ABOVE, RIGHT: Ireland, negative 1972; print 1986-1988.
weren’t right. But even “bad” people behave
a certain way because you don’t give them
the opportunity to behave well. When you
start to communicate with somebody, things
go a different way.
AS: Can you give an example?
JK: Have a look at the Russian soldiers [in
my photographs of the Soviet-led invasion of
Prague]. Okay, they were invaders. But at the
same time, they were guys like me. They were
maybe five years younger. As much as it might
sound strange, I didn’t feel any hatred toward
them. I knew they didn’t want to be there. They
behaved a certain way because their officers
ordered them to. I become friendly with some
of them. In a normal situation, I’d have invited
these guys to have a drink with me.
I can’t say I met one bad person [while
photographing] in Israel either. Once I was in
East Jerusalem with a photographer friend
who went with me. We were planning to
eat sandwiches under the trees. Suddenly,
soldiers ran over with guns. One of them hit
and broke my camera. But when I looked
in his face, he had the same fear as the
Russian soldiers in ’68. I’m sure if I’d had the
opportunity to talk to this guy, he would never
have done that.
LH: To be a wonderful photographer, you have
to have empathy for the human condition.
JK: We are all the same. And we are
composed from the bad and the good.
LH: May we ask you to comment on a few of
your photographs?
JK: I wouldn’t talk about the photographs.
No, I try to separate myself completely from
what I do. I try to step back to look at them as
somebody who has nothing to do with them.
When I travel, I show my pictures to
everybody—to see what they like, what
they don’t like. A good photograph speaks
to many different people for different sorts
of reasons. And it depends what sort of
lives these people have. What they’ve gone
through. It happens very rarely that you see
something you can’t forget. That is a good
photograph.
LH: What’s the role of the professional
photographer today, when everyone is
empowered to take photographs?
JK: I think it’s wonderful that everybody
can take photographs, just like I think it’s
wonderful everybody can write. But there
are very few writers and there are very few
photographers.
Everybody has a camera, everybody can
press the button. Everybody has a pencil,
everybody can make a signature. But that
doesn’t mean there are many great writers
and it doesn’t mean there are many great
photographers.
AS: What do you see as the difference
between photography and art?
JK: I never use the expressions “art” or “artist.”
In Israel we were stopped every day, sometimes
five times a day, when we were photographing.
Once my friend turned to the soldiers and he
said, “He’s not a reporter, he’s an artist!”
I’ve only said I’m am artist once—when I
nearly got into trouble in Algeria [laughs]. If
I said I’m a photographer, I would really get
into trouble. If you’re artist, you’re all right.
AS: Why don’t you call yourself an artist?
JK: I’m a photographer, that’s all. Like
anything else, not all paintings are art. Not all
photographs are art. They might be, but it’s
not up to me to say.
This interview originally appeared on The
Getty Iris, the online magazine of the J. Paul
Getty Trust. “Josef Koudelka: Nationality
Doubtful” was co-organized by the J. Paul
Getty Museum and the Art Institute of
Chicago. Laura Hubber is a writer and
editor for the Getty Museum’s Collection
Information and Access Department. Annelisa
Stephan is Head of Digital Engagement for the
J. Paul Getty Trust.
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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55
presents
THE SHOT
SPORTS & ACTION PHOTOGRPAHY
ZE
I
R
P
D
N
A
GR
STEPHEN MCCARTHY/SPORTSFILE
A scrum of Leinster and Glasgow Warriors rugby players
during the Celtic League rugby clash at Scotstoun Stadium
in Glasgow on November 23, 2012.
56 THE SHOT
WELCOME TO THE ADRENALINE-PACKED GALLERY FOR PDN'S THE SHOT 2015!
In the following pages, you'll see some of the most talented professional and amateur sports
and action photographers of today, as selected by the panel of judges below. Congratulations to
grand-prize winners Stephen McCarthy and Claudio Abella, who will receive cash awards of $2,000
and $1,000, respectively, a $500 gift card to Adorama and a one-year PHOTO+ Basic Membership.
To view the extended online gallery, featuring more winning work in each category,
visit www.pdntheshot.com.
Headshot © Will Wilson
THE JUDGES
AMY SILVERMAN
is the photo editor
of Outside. She has
served as a portfolio
reviewer for the
Palm Springs Photo
Festival and the Santa
Fe Photographic
Workshops, and has
served on the jury of
photo competitions
for PDN, The Georgia
O'Keefe Museum,
Mountainfilm Telluride
and the Santa
Fe Photographic
Workshops.
BRAD SMITH
is the director of
photography for Sports
Illustrated and oversees
all sports photo content
for Time Inc. He has
attended nine Olympic
Games, 17 Super
Bowls and numerous
Final Fours and World
Series. His former gigs
include a stint as the
sports photo editor at
The New York Times
and assistant director
of photography at the
White House under
President Clinton. Smith
is a proud Florida Gator.
CHELSEA POMALES
received her
photojournalism degree
from Ohio University
and has since acted as
the photo director at
several publications at
Bonnier Corporation,
including Garden
Design, American
Photo, SAVEUR, and
mostly recently, Sport
Diver. As the photo
director at SAVEUR,
the magazine's August/
September issue won
the 2013 ASME Single
Topic award.
CHRIS STACKHOUSE
is the art director at
the National Football
League. His work
branding NFL clubs like
the Carolina Panthers
and global events like
the Super Bowl has
garnered awards from
HOW and PromaxBDA,
among others. He built
his creative playbook
upon his studies at
Temple University’s
Tyler School of
Art. After years in
Philadelphia, he now
lives outside New York
City with his wife and
daughter, both rabid
Steelers fans.
Thank You
To the judges and sponsors of PDN’s The Shot, and a special thank
you to all the entrants of this competition.
SPONSORED BY
THE SHOT 57
PROFESSIONAL
On the Court & In the Water
FIRST PLACE
ON THE COURT
MATT PALMER
Muay Thai fighter Elliot
Compton strikes his
opponent Jun Lee in the
head, revealing Lee's
fanged mouth guard.
FIRST PLACE
IN THE WATER
MARJAN RADOVIĆ
Shot for a story on Croatian
freediver Lidija Lijić as she
trained to break a Guinness
O2 diving record.
58 THE SHOT
PROFESSIONAL
On the Mountain & On the Road
FIRST PLACE
ON THE MOUNTAIN
CHRISTIAN PONDELLA
WIll Gadd ice climbing on
Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania,
on October 31, 2014.
FIRST PLACE
ON THE ROAD
MATTHEW BRUSH
Racers from around the
globe compete for cash
and glory at North America's
largest gravity sports
festival, the Maryhill Festival
of Speed, in south central
Washington.
THE SHOT 59
PROFESSIONAL
In the Sky & In the Studio
FIRST PLACE
IN THE SKY
JODY MACDONALD
A paraglider flies along the
dry mountain side of the
Sierra Mountains during
a paragliding expedition.
MacDonald says, "The goal
was to fly the length of
the Sierra Mountain range
in Nevada, California and
Oregon. In the end, we
made it 435 miles."
FIRST PLACE
IN THE STUDIO
STEVE BOYLE
Part of a series depicting sports
scenes reimagined with powder.
60 THE SHOT
AMATEUR
On the Road
E
Z
I
R
P
D
N
GRA
CLAUDIO ABELLA
Longboarder Manuela Bayugar at maximum speed in Esquel, Argentina.
THE SHOT 61
AMATEUR
On the Field, On the Court & In the Water
FIRST PLACE
ON THE FIELD
VALENTINA
VARESANO
In Italy, a growing
number of practitioners
are taking up MMA
fighting due to the
international success
of UFC.
FIRST PLACE
FIRST PLACE
ON THE COURT
IN THE WATER
HALI HELFGOTT
ONE OCEAN ONE BREATH
Playing handball on the courts of Venice Beach, California.
Swimming underwater over a field of posidonius in Ibiza,
Spain. The sport of freediving allows husband-and-wife team
One Ocean One Breath to experience the ocean with true
liberation and fantasy.
62 THE SHOT
AMATEUR
On the Mountain, In the Sky & In the Studio
FIRST PLACE
ON THE MOUNTAIN
LUKE HUMPHREY
Cecil Groetken reaching the summit
of Denali, Alaska, during the worst
weather and summit success
season in 30 years.
FIRST PLACE
FIRST PLACE
IN THE SKY
IN THE STUDIO
JOSH HOTZ
JOSEPH B. BORNILLA
A skateboarder airs over the hip at the Ride It Sculpture Park in
Detroit. Power House Productions, along with a grant from the
Tony Hawk Foundation, created this park as part of its movement to create an influx of arts and positive energy in the area.
Bornilla says, "No matter slippery life is, never let go of
reaching and living your dreams."
THE SHOT 63
CREATE CLIENT MEETING
GOING TO
CALIFORNIA
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTO BY HOLLY ANDRES
© JAKE STANGEL
© TO BE ANNOUNCED
Cinematic photography with a strong sense of place helps form the visual style of
The California Sunday Magazine, a new publication with a West Coast feel. BY CONOR RISCH
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p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
IN THE LETTER introducing the first
issue of The California Sunday Magazine,
founding editor Douglas McGray notes that
“most media gets made in New York.” This
new monthly magazine, on the other hand,
draws on California and the West for its
perspective and sense of place. “The West
is huge and fascinating and influential,”
McGray writes. “We’re surrounded by
great stories.”
California and the West also have
specific vibes and esthetics, which
are reflected in The California Sunday
Magazine’s subtle design and the primacy
and space it gives to photography. As
editorial clients go, California Sunday
should excite a lot of photographers.
“We want to surprise readers with every
issue,” says Jacqueline Bates, the magazine’s
photography director. “California Sunday
imagery feels cinematic, it’s bright; when we
photograph people, we want to represent
them in an authentic way, with an emphasis
on place and setting. You won’t see a lot
LEFT: A Holly Andres photograph commissioned
for a cover story on virtual reality, which
appeared in the inaugural October 2014 issue
of The California Sunday Magazine. ABOVE, INSET:
Photography director Jacqueline Bates and
creative director Leo Jung.
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTOS BY RICHARD MISRACH
ABOVE AND RIGHT:
of stylized studio
From a photo essay
photography in the
by Richard Misrach
magazine.”
about the U.S.-Mexico
“Cinematic” is a
border, published in the
buzzword the staff
November 2014 issue
are using to describe
of the magazine.
the magazine’s
photography. Creative
director Leo Jung says that means they want
to create a “sense of a narrative through a
sequence of images” that accompany a story.
To do this, they “give a lot of real estate
to the photography,” Jung notes, and pay
particular attention to the settings where
the stories take place. “When we’re shooting
subjects and portraits, it’s really important to
see them in their own spaces or in the place
where the story takes place,” Jung explains.
Another way the magazine achieves a
cinematic feel is with a “two-beat cover,”
meaning utilizing both a standard cover
image and the inside front cover spread of
the magazine. For instance, the magazine’s
November issue, its second, featured a
graphic, close-up Richard Misrach image
of a woman standing behind a border
fence that separates San Diego County
and Tijuana, Mexico. The fencing forms
a tight, square grid, through which the
woman’s face and upper body are barely
visible. On the inside front cover spread,
readers saw a pulled-back photograph of
the same fence, this one revealing its scale,
the rusting steel posts that give it structure,
and, in the foreground, what appears to be
a blood stain on the stonework on the U.S.
side of the border. “As soon as you turn the
cover, there’s space for us to use the page to
continue the story that we’re introducing on
the cover,” Jung notes. “Instead of having
words tell you what the story is about, we’re
hoping…we can introduce the story through
a sequence of images.”
In the case of the November issue, the
cover story is about Misrach’s collaborative
project with sound artist Guillermo Galindo,
“Border Signs.” Since 2009, the pair have
collaborated to create a body of work about
the U.S.-Mexico border. The full exhibition
and Aperture-published book won’t appear
until 2016, but Misrach and Galindo chose
to debut the work in The California Sunday
Magazine. “The opportunity to work
with the CSM people, as well as recent
developments and pressure for political
action regarding immigration, made us feel
it was time to contribute to the dialogue,”
Misrach told PDN via email.
The artists’ decision to debut the work
in the magazine was appropriate—their
collaboration began when they met at one
of McGray’s Pop-Up Magazine gatherings,
at which writers, photographers and others
share stories with a live audience. It was from
these popular events in San Francisco that
The California Sunday Magazine emerged.
While it’s sold in select bookstores in
the Bay Area, L.A., Portland and Seattle, the
magazine is primarily distributed in Sunday
editions of the San Francisco Chronicle, Los
Angeles Times and Sacramento Bee. (The first
three issues were also distributed to select
New York Times subscribers in California.)
In designing the magazine, Jung considered
the wide, diverse audience, as well as
California’s laid-back attitude. An East Coast
native who worked previously at The New
York Times Magazine and WIRED, Jung says
he “wanted to be able to capture what I felt
like was a different vibe and essence on the
West Coast.”
For the “Shorts” section of the magazine—
short articles that appear in the front of the
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CREATE CLIENT MEETING
66
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTOS BY DANIEL SHEA
JACQUELINE BATES: “We’re looking for stories that
are beautiful and arresting. It can be fully formed
or a work in progress...we want all the photography
to be unseen and unpublished.”
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTO BY OMAR LUCAS
book—Jung uses color gradation in the headlines
as a “reflection of the different type of light” on
the West Coast. He also chose a rounded slab
serif for the magazine’s main typeface, which
had “the serious qualities of the serif,” but could
also feel lighthearted when he used the bolder
versions of the typeface, which conveys “that sort
of casualness of California.” Despite these subtle
nods to region, Jung says he aims to keep the
design “secondary” to the reader experience of the
magazine and digital products. “The important
thing,” he says, is to “enhance the experience
whenever possible, but be a lot more subtle.”
“Leo’s design, and the simplicity and the
elegance of it, really elevates the photography,”
Bates notes. “He lets it breathe, whereas in many
other magazines, you don’t always have the luxury
of having all of these big, beautiful images.”
Misrach says he “loved” working with Jung,
Bates and writer Kit Rachlis on the piece. “They
came to my studio where they found a huge
project (I have made over 12,000 photos thus far)
and they were able to hone it down to a poignant
essay. This was an amazing feat,” he enthuses,
adding that Jung’s print layout “knocked my
socks off.” In print, a panoramic image of a beach
bisected by steel fencing was given a gatefold
spread in the center of the magazine. The design
for California Sunday’s digital editions, which they
publish on their site and in smartphone and tablet
apps, “was even better,” says Misrach.
The first issue of the magazine featured a Holly
Andres photograph on its cover, which introduced a
story about virtual reality. And Brian Finke’s portrait
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTO BY JIM MANGAN
RIGHT: A Jim Mangan photograph from a story about
a family clashing with Mormon Fundamentalists that
appeared in the December 2014 issue of the magazine.
BOTTOM LEFT: An Omar Lucas image in an October-issue
story on a woman who won a game show in Peru.
BOTTOM RIGHT: Images by Daniel Shea accompanied a story
on the Los Angeles art scene for the October 2014 issue.
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTO BY STEPHANIE GONOT/ ILLUSTRATIONS BY GUY WOLEK
© THE CALIFORNIA SUNDAY MAGAZINE/PHOTO BY GIULIO DI STURCO/
ILLUSTRATIONS BY GUY WOLEK
RIGHT AND BELOW: From the story
of chef Roy Choi ran on the
“Dunkin’ and the Doughnut
cover of the December issue.
King,” which appeard in the
“We’re trying to make these
November 2014 issue of the
deliberate decisions to make
magazine, with photography
each cover feel like it’s very
by Giulio Di Sturco (right) and
different from the previous
Stephanie Gonot (below).
ones. And that’s part of being a
really effective general interest
magazine,” Jung notes.
Andres was the only photographer Bates thought of for
the cover story about virtual reality, she says. Bates and
Andres met in 2009 at the Photolucida portfolio reviews in
Portland, OR. “Her images create such fantastical narratives
that she was the perfect fit for what we were trying to
achieve,” Bates explains.
While she plans to build a small roster of
photographers she will regularly work with, Bates says
she’s “very interested in also working with artists that
haven’t shot for a magazine like ours before, from upand-comers to established photographers.” Through the
first three issues, Bates notes, they’ve worked with many
female photographers, something she is “thrilled” about.
Previously a photo editor for W and Elle magazines, Bates
says she looks for photographers by paying attention to
gallery shows, photo blogs and arts journals as well as
Instagram and Tumblr. The magazine also features stories
on Latin America and Asia, so her needs go beyond the
region. She also relies on word of mouth from friends and
photographers. The photography community on the West
Coast feels “slightly less competitive,” she notes. “I meet a
photographer and it’s like, ‘Oh, you have to meet all of my
photographer friends here.’”
For a December story about a family clashing with a
community of Mormon fundamentalists on the Utah/
Arizona border, Bates hired Jim Mangan. “I was looking
for an opportunity to have him shoot something along the
lines of his otherworldly series of aerial photographs of
Utah,” she recalls. Mangan was a fit for this story because
it was “so much about the awe-inspiring landscape—
which, when viewed from the outside, concealed a drama
unfolding in the community,” Bates explains.
The California Sunday Magazine also welcomes pitches
from photographers, and from photographers and writers
who’d like to work together on a story. “We’re really
looking for stories that are beautiful and arresting,” Bates
explains. “It can be a fully formed project or a work in
progress, but we want it to be super special…we want all
the photography to be unseen and unpublished.”
Creative freedom is one of the biggest advantages of
working on a new magazine, Bates says. “Some photo
editors can get stuck hiring the same photographers,
because you know they can deliver, and there are such
tight budgets and deadlines nowadays that you can’t afford
to re-shoot if the edit comes back and doesn’t work. We
don’t have the same pressure to fit into the tight
constraints of an already established brand. We’re creating
a visual language with each issue, from scratch. There is a
sense of freedom in that. We can take chances. The best
part of my job is commissioning photographers to
experiment and challenge themselves.”
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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67
deadline:
March 26
www.pdncuratorawards.com
presents
T HE S E A R CH F O R O U T S TA N D I N G A N D U N D I S COV E R E D FI N E-A R T P H OTO G R A P HY
SIX Winning photographers will gain
exposure beyond measure through a group fine-art
photography exhibition and opening reception in New
York City sponsored by PDN.
ONE GRAND-PRIZE
WINNER
Photo © Patricia Voulgaris
will receive:
A $3,500
Cash Prize
The six selected artists will also have their work published in a winners’ gallery in the July Issue of PDN, in
addition to an extended gallery on PDNonline.
WINNERS WILL RECEIVE:
CATEGORIES
$200 gift card from B&H
Portraits
Still Lifes
Abstract/Mixed Media
Landscapes
Urban Scenes
Student Work
VIP Expo Pass to PDN PhotoPlus
Expo Oct 22–24, 2015
$250 gift card from MoabPaper.com
A PHOTO+ Premium Portfolio
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Sponsored by:
GEAR & TECHNIQUES
70 HOW I GOT THAT SHOT
72 PRODUCT REVIEWS
76 FRAMES PER SECOND
78 7 DRONES THAT LET YOUR
PHOTOGRAPHY TAKE FLIGHT
The Leica X sports a large image sensor and fast lens,
ideal for street photography and photojournalism.
Our review starts on the next page.
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GEAR & TECHNIQUES HOW I GOT THAT SHOT
BY HOLLY STUART HUGHES
STILL-LIFE WITH
© MAX FANTL
FLEEING CAT
Photographer Justin Fantl turns a large-scale product shot into a
colorful, graphic composition.
CLIENT: WIRED
PHOTO EDITORS: Paloma Shutes and Julia Sabot
IN HIS PERSONAL work, photographer Justin Fantl often constructs
studies of shapes and colors. The editorial and commercial clients who
hire him to shoot still lifes of everything from clothes to sleek, high-tech
gadgets have described his style as “clean,” “graphic,” “playful,” “cheeky”
and “surreal,” he says. On a recent assignment for the 2014 WIRED:
Design Life special issue, Fantl applied his crisp lighting and eye for color
to a series of complicated product shots, photographed on a grand scale.
WIRED photo editor Paloma Shutes told Fantl they needed eight spreads
that would serve as openers to each feature article, plus a cover. Fantl
had previously shot smaller assignments for WIRED, but this assignment
would stretch over the course of four days, giving him “more time and
luxury to play around,” he says.
Working at Blast Studio in San Francisco, he had space to lay out a
wide selection of props, showing their use in the course of an ordinary
day—from exercise to work to dining at home.
“I have quite a bit of experience with lay-downs,” Fantl says.
What made this shoot difference was the scale of the arrangements
of objects he would be shooting. His image of a dinner table laden
with food, glassware, plates and silverware, for example, was shot on
seamless measuring roughly 9 x 20 feet.
“It was a very hands-on collaborative process. We had a food stylist,
a stylist, myself, my assistant, a designer and two photo editors all
working to put the table together,” Fantl explains.
Fantl says he likes the crisp shadows he creates with continuous
lights—and his clients do, too. To maintain a consistent look in all the
photos for WIRED, he set up the key light and fill lights for his first
photo, then made only small adjustments for all the other photos.
To show that these were objects that people live with and interact
with, the photo editors wanted to add an element of life to some of
the photos. In one shot, WIRED photo editor Julia Sabot served as
a model, striking a yoga pose on a yoga mat along with weights, a
balance ball, gym bag and other props. A well-behaved dog belonging
to WIRED editor Scott Dadich made an appearance in another shot.
For the shot of the dinner table, the photo editors suggested placing
a cat in the scene. To capture the cat as it dashed through the set, the
photographer had to bring in an additional light in order to freeze the
motion of the skittish creature.
LOGISTICS
Before the shoot began, Fantl and Shutes came up with a plan for
shooting a maximum number of props and a schedule for capturing
each scenario, so that during the shoot they would be able to focus
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p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
on arranging the objects. “We knew that we wanted to be clear about
what we were going after and what we wanted to do,” he says. Art
director Claudia de Almeida had designed numbers that would be
incorporated into each image, to indicate the time of day that the
props would be used: The layouts called for the numbers to appear
under the lay-downs, and the team discussed making the numbers
out of cardboard or wood and placing them on the floor. Fantl says
that while he prefers capturing every element of a composition
in camera, he proposed adding the numbers in postproduction,
“because I knew it would give us more flexibility” to create
interesting arrangements.
While shooting each scenario, they overlaid the number on
the monitor using Phocus software, so that as they arranged each
composition, they could see how the props worked with the colors
and shapes of the numbers. “The process felt like live graphic design
in a way,” Fantl says.
LIGHTING
Fantl says he began using Mole Richardson 1K and 2K tungsten lights
while working in a variety of rental studios. “In many studios there is
usually a deep, dark closet and on a shelf in the abyss. You can often
find a worn and battered stage light,” he explains. He gave them a
try, “and began using them more and more.” He says when he shows
clients tests shot with the tungsten lights and with strobes, they
often choose the tungsten. “I find that the shadows are a bit crisper
and the quality of light is somehow different from strobes,” he notes.
On the WIRED shoot, he says: “We had a half day to figure out the
lighting and we used it.” Once he set up his lights for the first shot, he
would use a nearly identical setup for each of the shots.
He first put his primary key light, a Mole Richardson 2K tungsten
on a boom hanging over the center of the set. Next, he set up walls
of V-flats around the set. Inside the V-flats, he set up four 2K Mole
Richardsons on light stands. “The lights were pointed away from the
subject and bouncing light into the V-flats,” Fantl says. “So a more
even, soft light was bouncing back onto the set.”
This bounced light worked, he says, “to create fill as well as
highlights.” Depending on where he wanted the shadows to fall in
each scenario, he could adjust the light stands and V-flats.
Once the table was in place, but before it was set, Fantl needed
to capture a shot of the cat, which could later be composited into
the final shot. “One problem with continuous light [is that] you can’t
freeze motion all that well,” the photographer notes. “We had to rig
up a strobe next to the continuous key light in order to capture the cat
without motion blur.” He had a Profoto head with a Magnum reflector
placed near the key light on the boom.
>
VIEW
SLIDE SHOW
© JUSTIN FANTL
ABOVE: For each spread he shot, Fantl used a Mole Richardson on a megaboom,
and then bounced more tungsten lights into V-flats around the set for fill.
To capture the skittish cat, he also brought in a strobe. As he composed and
previewed the shot, he had the pink number “8:00,” referring to the dinner hour,
displayed on the monitor. INSET, ABOVE: Justin Fantl.
He notes, “The cat was a little freaked out by being in the studio, so
basically as soon as we put him down, he took off like a rocket to hide.
We didn’t want to stress him out so we only put him down a few times
and got one or two options.” After the cat was back in his crate and
on his way home, the stylists began setting the table with placemats,
glasses, tableware and food for the final shot.
CAMERA
Fantl fixed a Hasselblad H5D-50c to a scissor lift, then hoisted it to
about 30 feet above the floor. He used a 35mm lens at f/16. The relatively
wide lens served two purposes, Fantl says. “In order to get the whole
area, we needed the wider focal length, and with the wider lens, you
start to see the sides of objects,” even with the camera pointed straight
down. “If you could only see the tops of the objects, it would be harder
to tell what they are.” Fantl says he shot most of the images at 1/4 to 1/3
sec, but to capture the image of the running cat, he shot at 1/500 sec.
Though he shot tethered, Fantl climbed up the scissor lift to look
over the set as the compositions came together. “There was a lot of
going up and down,” he recalls. “It was fun for me to go up there, and
ponder the game plan.”
POSTPRODUCTION
Fantl estimates that setting up and shooting the tabletop image took
about four hours from start to finish. He and the photo editors
previewed each image, tweaking the arrangement of objects and lights
as they went. Fantl did some color correction and made some
sharpening adjustments to the selected images on the spot. Then he
saved the native Hasselblad RAW files as high-res TIFF files and
JPEGs to a hard drive. The team at WIRED handled the compositing
of the numbers and the final shots. “It can be hard to just turn your
images over to someone else to work on,” Fantl says, “but I am
fortunate that most of my esthetic comes from my lighting.”
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GEAR & TECHNIQUES PRODUCT REVIEWS
BY G R E G S CO B L E T E
LEICA X
For superior image quality, X truly
marks the spot.
We’re several years into the trend of advanced
compact cameras blending large image sensors
with fast, fixed focal-length lenses and a nostalgic affection for analogue-era knobs and dials.
The Leica X (Typ 113)—an update to the Leica
X2—checks off all these boxes, but unlike other
popular cameras in the category, the $2,295 X
carries a much steeper premium. Is it warranted? We teamed up with our frequent co-tester,
photographer and director David Patiño (www.
davidpatino.com) to find out.
FEATURES
The X packs a 16.5-megapixel APS-C-sized
CMOS image sensor and a 23mm Summilux
lens, equivalent to 35mm on a full-frame
sensor. The lens has an aperture range of
f/1.7–16, and a minimum focusing distance
of 7.87 inches. You’ll enjoy both manual
focusing and 11-point autofocus, plus spot
AF and face-detection options.
The camera has a native sensitivity
range of ISO 100–12,500 and shutter speeds
ranging from 30–1/2000 sec. Unlike its
predecessor, the X does have HD video
recording—you can choose between
1920x1080p or 1280x720p at 30 fps. The X
uses Adobe’s DNG format for RAW files and
includes a free copy of Adobe Photoshop
Lightroom with each purchase.
DESIGN
The X forgoes any hint of ergonomic
contours or grips in favor of a box-like body.
At 17.1 ounces (with battery), it’s not terribly
heavy, but with its stout 23mm lens, it isn’t
pocketable, either. It’s mostly comfortable to
shoot with, but we found the metal hooks for
the camera straps to be awkwardly placed.
They’re exactly where your hands will be
when you shoot, and we found our fingers
were constantly colliding with them.
There’s a small built-in pop-up flash,
but no viewfinder—you’ll have to buy one
separately. Aperture and shutter speed are set
using a pair of dials at the top of the camera
while exposure compensation can be adjusted
via a scroll wheel on the back of the camera.
As you’d expect, the build quality on the X
is first rate. It’s a sturdy, well-built camera.
IMAGE QUALITY
We could begin and end our discussion of the
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p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
ABOVE:
The Leica X hits all the right retro notes with its design.
X’s image quality with a single word: superb.
Patiño brought the camera to the beach
where he was roped into an impromptu
wedding portrait session that was unfolding
on the sand. He shot from bright daylight
well into the night, relying mostly on natural
light, and he was extremely pleased with
the results. The colors were richly saturated
and details, like the crystal beads on a bride’s
gown, popped off his monitor. The X held up
well in low light, with images that were still
useable up to ISO 1600. “The skin tones hold
up nice, even at ISO 3200,” Patiño told us.
“The image quality on this camera is stellar.”
The X is well-served by its lens, which
produced very little flare despite the
abundance of angled sunlight on the shore.
Patiño took photos of a cloud-free sky to see if
the lens showed any fringing, but found none.
Video quality was similarly impressive. In
fact, it was just good enough to make us wish
Leica had put just a bit more effort into the
X’s video capabilities. You do get a dedicated
record button to initiate video recording, and
you can manually focus while filming, but
that’s about the extent of your control. Like
Henry Ford’s auto paint options, the X offers
your choice of frame rates, so long as it’s 30
fps. Cameras retailing for a fraction of the X’s
sticker price provide a wider selection of frame
rates, greater control over exposure during
video recording and even 4K resolution.
What really struck Patiño was not just
the quality of the moving picture but the
sound. He used the X to record a woman
singing over an acoustic guitar. When we
played it back on his Yamaha HS8 studio
monitors, we were struck with how rich
the sound was. Given how modest the video
feature set is on the X, such sound quality
seemed discordant. But we’ll take it.
PERFORMANCE
The X starts quickly and offers brisk shotto-shot performance when you disable the
auto-review function. As far as continuous
shooting goes, the X isn’t much of a speed
demon, clocking in at between 3–5 fps
for up to seven frames when shooting in
RAW+JPEG mode. The camera offers a
countdown for bursts that tips
you off to how many new frames
it’s able to capture. It takes about
a second per frame to completely
clear the buffer. The wait isn’t
intolerable, and this won’t really
be your camera of choice at a
sporting event.
Patiño found the autofocus to
be sluggish at times as it hunted
for focus. You can manually focus
the lens and there’s a helpful focus
preview function that magnifies
a portion of the frame to help you
dial in your subject. But there’s
no manual-focus override when
you’re in autofocus mode.
Leica rates the battery as good
for 350 shots, and we enjoyed
two full days of shooting (without
flash) before needing a recharge.
BOTTOM LINE
The Leica X takes beautiful
photographs. We wish there
were more video features, that
the autofocus was a bit more
responsive and the pesky strap
handles were relocated, but these
vices don’t overwhelm the X’s
virtues. Price is another matter. As
is usually the case, Leica is asking
its devotees to dig deep into their
wallets for a camera that, despite
its impressive image quality, isn’t as
versatile as others on the market.
Those that take the plunge should
be more than satisfied with the
quality of their images, but we can’t
fault those who choose to invest
their compact-camera dollars into
something more versatile.
Leica X
www.us.leica-camera.com
PROS: Outstanding image
quality; surprisingly good
audio; excellent build
quality; terrific lens.
CONS: Expensive relative
to other large-sensor
compacts; limited video
feature set; occasionally
sluggish autofocus.
PRICE: $2,295
PANASONIC HC-X1000
A feature-rich entrée to 4K.
Panasonic has been among the more aggressive manufacturers when it comes to promoting 4K video
(those pricey TVs aren’t going to sell themselves, you know) and the HC-X1000 is the company’s
latest attempt to bring 4K recording to a wider audience of video professionals.
The HC-X1000 stakes its claim to increasingly contested turf. It’s a small-sensor video camera
challenged from below by cameras like Panasonic’s own GH4, which boast larger sensors,
interchangeable lenses and smaller form factors—not to mention lower price tags. From above,
cinema cameras from the likes of Blackmagic and Canon are coming down in price. In tandem
with co-tester David Patiño (www.davidpatino.com) we put the X1000 through its paces to see if it
could hold its ground.
FEATURES
The X1000 uses a 1/2.3-inch MOS image sensor with a total pixel count of 18.5-megapixels, though
only 8-megapixels are effective during filming (or 8.9-megapixels if you’re filming in the 17:9 aspect
ratio). The X1000 captures 3840x2160 video in the MP4 format with a maximum bitrate of 150Mbps.
It can also record true or “cinema” 4K—4096x2160 pixels—at 100Mbps, also in the MP4 format. You
have the option to record 4K at 24 fps for the cinematic feel or drop down to 3840x2160 to enjoy
faster frame rates of between 30 and 60 fps.
1920x1080p and 1280x720p video can be recorded in MP4, AVCHD or MOV formats, with bitrates
ranging from 200Mbps all the way down to 5Mbps.
It uses a built-in Leica Dicomar lens with 20X optical zoom and a 35mm full-frame equivalent
focal length of 30.8–626mm. The lens has an aperture range of f/1.6–3.6 and takes 49mm filters.
There’s a four-stop manual ND filter built-in, as well as a manual lens cover that’s integrated into the
lens hood, which is itself fixed to the camera.
On the audio front, the X100 sports a stereo microphone plus pair of XLR inputs with phantom
power and independent controls for each input. There’s a mic input for audio monitoring plus A/V
and HDMI outputs—but no HD-SDI output. Wi-Fi and NFC are also on hand for wirelessly pairing
with mobile devices.
DESIGN
The X1000 has very little exterior real estate that isn’t festooned with buttons and dials. Almost
every critical recording function can be accessed via buttons on the camcorder. A few, like audio
controls, are behind plastic doors, but there’s relatively little need to go digging through on-screen
menus, which Patiño definitely
appreciated.
The record button and zoom
toggle are duplicated
in two locations on
the camera body to
accommodate both
hand-held and tripod
recording. We found zooming to be
very smooth, sensitive and responsive
to gentle pressure. There
are three rings around
the lens for manually
pulling focus, zoom
and iris control with
just the right amount
of tension for smooth
operation.
RIGHT: In an era of DSLR
video, the X1000 looks to
bring inexpensive 4K capture
to a wider range of video pros.
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GEAR & TECHNIQUES PRODUCT REVIEWS
At 3.4 pounds (without a battery or
SD card), the X1000 is lighter than most
cameras in this category—often by a
full pound, which is quite impressive.
Combined with the well-contoured
handgrip, we had no trouble holding
this camera for half-hour stretches.
While we were definitely pleased with
the weight, the trade-off is a lesssturdy, mostly plastic body with a few
components (like the articulating LCD)
that feel worryingly flimsy.
IMAGE QUALITY
For our co-tester Patiño, who owns
a RED Scarlet, a Blackmagic Cinema
camera and a Canon EOS 5D Mark II,
the small chip “look” produced by the
X1000 wasn’t his cup of tea. When set
to iAuto, the X1000 kept some darkened portions of the frame out of reach,
even in postprocessing. We had more
luck with the DRS (for Dynamic Range
Stretching) setting, which gives you
more dynamic range to play with. Noise
cropped up indoors, but with the iris
wide open, you can avoid the worst of it.
Still, small sensors do have their
virtues. It’s considerably easier to focus
the X1000 when shooting—and have
it stay focused even as subjects are
darting about—than it is to lock onto
moving targets when filming with a
DSLR. Moreover, color reproduction
was consistently accurate. The built-in
lens and 5-axis image stabilization—
which kicks in when shooting at HD
resolutions—also impressed Patiño. Even
handheld at full telephoto, we were able
to keep the scene mostly steady.
Esthetics aside, Patiño was satisfied
with the 1080p clips, and our review
of 4K footage showed the expected
incredible abundance of detail, despite
a fair amount of highlight clipping
in both HD and 4K. For electronic
newsgathering, weddings and corporate
videos, Patiño could see the X1000
being a valuable tool, even though he
personally wasn’t converted into the
small-sensor camp.
PERFORMANCE
There’s much to like in how the X1000
handles. It starts relatively quickly,
zooms smoothly and has a pretty long
battery life—about six hours worth of
HD capture. A button on the back of
the battery (which is exposed) lets you
conveniently monitor its remaining life
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if you don’t want to peek at the menu or
turn on the camera.
There’s a 3.5-inch, 1.2-million dot
LCD display that slides out from the
top handle and swivels into a variety
of angles. Despite being unnervingly
flimsy, we found the image to be
super crisp. The touchscreen menu
is easy to read in bright sunlight, and
responsive when navigating through
menu options. You also have the option
of navigating through menu functions
using buttons and a scroll wheel on
the bottom of the camera, though
we found this to be less efficient.
Patiño, however, liked that the menu
was viewable/adjustable through the
.45-inch, high-resolution electronic
viewfinder.
With two SD card slots on hand, the
X1000 gives you the option to backup your recordings or use both cards
to maximize your memory capacity.
One odd tick we noticed was that the
camcorder would repeatedly warn us
that our high-speed memory cards were
incompatible (i.e. too slow) despite the
fact that they were speed-rated for HD.
We routinely ignored the warning and
recorded the scene just fine.
BOTTOM LINE
The X1000 has great value, bundling
an awful lot of functionality beyond
4K video recording at a very attractive
price. What’s more, it has very few
direct competitors outside of Sony’s
AX1, which costs $1,000 more than the
X1000 despite a roughly comparable
feature set. As of this writing, JVC
has announced—but not shipped—a
line of 4K camcorders that will square
off with the X1000, and we expect
more competition to follow. If you’re
willing to live with the constraints and
esthetics of a smaller image sensor and
a fixed zoom lens, the X1000 won’t
disappoint.
Panasonic HC-X1000
www.panasonic.com
PROS: Feature-rich; great value
for your money; true 4K resolution.
CONS: Plastic build; some noise
visible indoors.
PRICE: $3,500
SIGMA DP2 QUATTRO
A unique camera with caveats.
Every camera needs something to hang its lens cap
on. For Sigma’s dp Quattro series, it’s the Foveon X3
Quattro image sensor.
The Foveon X3 Quattro is not your typical image
sensor. Where traditional Bayer sensor designs split
up pixels along a single surface to capture color
data, the APS-C-sized X3 uses a stacked threelayered design. One layer captures red chrominance
information, the other green chrominance data
and the top layer captures blue chrominance plus
luminance information. The X3 sensor has no
optical low-pass filter, either, so it’s providing as
much resolution as possible.
Because of its unique design, the dp2’s megapixel
math gets a little convoluted. Sigma claims that
the three individual sensors collectively have an
effective resolution of 29-megapixels—the blue
sensor accounts for 19.5-megapixels, the other two
for 4.5-megapixels—but that these 29-megapixels
have the resolving power of the 39-megapixel
traditional Bayer sensor found on most digital
cameras. However, the resulting JPEG images
coming out of the camera in Super-High measure
7608x3296 pixels (about 25 megapixels), and
the RAW image EXIF data reveals the resolution
coming from each sensor (for a total of about
29-megapixels). No matter how you parse it, the
X3 does produce very large image files, with RAW
images weighing in close to 53MB, and JPEGs at
12MB and above.
The X3 sensor is making its way into a total
of three revamped dp series cameras from Sigma
that differ only in the focal length of the lens. We
spent some time with the dp2 in conjunction with
frequent co-tester, photographer and director David
Patiño (www.davidpatino.com) to see whether this
unique camera deserves a place in your gear bag.
FEATURES
Beyond the unique sensor, the dp2 boasts a fairly
Spartan feature set. There’s a 30mm, f/2.8 fixed focallength lens (45mm full-frame equivalent) with a ninepoint AF system and a minimum focusing distance of
28 centimeters. It features a sensitivity range of ISO
100–6,400, 11 color modes, and shutter speeds from
30–1/2000 sec. Alas, there is no video mode.
DESIGN
The dp2 is not only distinguished by its sensor; its
design is also strikingly unique. At 6.4 inches, it’s
extremely long, but relatively thin, and the frame
takes a sharp turn and bulges into a prominent
handgrip at one end. Together with the bulbous lens,
the dp2’s length makes it impossible to slip into even
deep coat pockets. Still, Patiño found that the large
grip made the dp2 relatively comfortable to carry, if
ABOVE: Sigma’s dp2 Quattro packs a redesigned Foveon X3 image
sensor that uses a three-layered design for recording color data.
less so to shoot with. We would have liked to
have the lens and display a bit more centered—
given the overall length of the camera, your left
hand runs out of room quickly and the camera
can be a bit awkward to hold.
Nevertheless, the camera’s build quality
is excellent. It feels sturdy and wellconstructed.
IMAGE QUALITY
We found the dp2 to be something of a Jekyll
and Hyde when it came to image quality. In
some scenarios, it produced gorgeous, richly
detailed images. The sensor really shone
in full daylight and did an excellent job in
capturing fine details. In an image we took
of a scattering of leaves, we could zoom up
close to observe the skeletal capillaries in
great detail. The dp2 is well-served by its lens,
which showed few signs of optical aberrations
and did an excellent job at resolving details.
In other scenarios, the dp2 did not fare
as well.
Patiño found skin tones to be a bit flat. He
shot a series of RAW+JPEGs indoors at the
National Air and Space Museum and found
that JPEGs showed a noticeable color shift
at ISO 400 and above. Noise was also quick
to rear its splotchy head at ISO 400. In an era
when cameras routinely push the boundaries
of low-light performance, Patiño was hardpressed to recommend shooting the dp2
above ISO 400. Devotees of film-style grain
may enjoy the look, but if you don’t want it
baked into your digital negative, you’ll need
to be mindful when using the dp2 in poorly lit
environments.
The RAW files, fortunately, showed little of
the color shift that marred the JPEGs, though
the grain was still there. While photographers
don’t need to be reminded to shoot in RAW,
with the dp2 it’s a necessity—and therein lies
the rub. Third-party processors like Adobe
Lightroom don’t support Sigma’s unique RAW
file format, so you’re left with the company’s
own free Photo Pro RAW utility. The software
proved sluggish on both Patiño’s 2013
MacBook Pro (2.6GHz Intel Core i5 with 8GB
of RAM) and our Mac Mini (2.6GHz Core i7,
16GB of RAM). Even simple operations, like
scrolling through images in the editing menu,
produced delays. Patiño encountered several
bottlenecks as well.
You can coax some very beautiful images
from the dp2’s RAW files in Photo Pro, but
it takes a considerable investment in time to
do so.
PERFORMANCE
You won’t mistake the dp2 Quattro for a
thoroughbred. It’s not all that quick to start
up, and autofocus and shot-to-shot times
were somewhat pokey compared to compact
cameras. You can catch some motion with
the dp2, but this isn’t the camera to bring to
the sidelines.
The included battery is rated for a meager
200 shots and, not surprisingly, Sigma
packages two batteries with the dp2. We
quickly became accustomed to keeping that
spare with us at all times.
The dp2’s 3-inch display proved difficult
to view in bright sunlight and while its
resolution is a very respectable 920,000
pixels, it didn’t look as crisp as the highresolution displays we’ve become accustomed
to on other high-end compacts. There’s no
viewfinder on the dp2, though Sigma sells an
optical viewfinder—for a cool $245—that you
can slide into the hot-shoe.
BOTTOM LINE
They say patience is a virtue. If you opt for
the dp2, it will be a necessity.
From its shooting performance to its
post-processing software, the dp2 is not
going to be first across the finish line. In
some cases, it’s worth the wait. There are
shooting conditions in which the dp2 will
unequivocally delight owners—outdoors
with mostly still subjects. Set-piece nature
photos, architecture and outdoor portraits
are among its killer apps. The images bristle
with resolution and the X3’s claim to filmlike fidelity is definitely vindicated in these
environments.
Outside of its comfort zone, however, the
dp2 struggles to compete with comparably
priced compacts. Sigma’s RAW utility, while
generously functional for a freebie, is often
slow. It makes little sense to shoot JPEGs
using this camera but Photo Pro proved to
be a serious bottleneck, making us wish that
third party editors supported the camera’s
unique RAW file.
Sigma dp2 Quattro
www.sigmaphoto.com
PROS: Film-like image reproduction;
excellent color reproduction; great lens;
sturdy build.
CONS: Poor low-light performance at
ISO 400 and above; sluggish; limited
battery life; slow post-processing
software; awkward design.
PRICE: $999
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75
GEAR & TECHNIQUES FRAMES PER SECOND
SEEING SOUNDS
>
VIEW
VIDEO
PHOTO COURTESY SHAHIR DAUD
ABOVE:
A still from the end of Cymatics, with seven copies of Stanford using all seven experiments to visualize the song. BOTTOM, INSET: Shahir Daud and Timur Civan.
FROM THE first time he heard
about synesthesia, Nigel Stanford
was fascinated with seeing
sounds. Stanford, a musician from
Wellington, New Zealand, had seen a
documentary on the phenomenon—in
which people’s sensory and cognitive
pathways in the brain get crossed—
and was amazed by people who
are overwhelmed by auditory response to the bright lights of Times
Square, or children who see colored auras around their parents’ faces
as they speak. He would learn that synesthete musicians like Pharrell
and Devonte Hynes claim to see music represented as colors.
The fascination inspired Stanford (nigelstanford.com) to make
Cymatics, a music video that uses a pair of high-tech cameras to capture
classic science experiments engineered to visualize an original song he
had written. Stanford had just done the soundtrack for Tom Lowe’s film
Timescapes, a time-lapse film featuring the night skies of the American
Southwest. While he was frustrated by his lack of control over the
visuals, he saw the potential in the way the film was marketed.
“Seeing how you could put something on Vimeo, get a trailer out,
and a couple of million people will watch it…it was cool,” Stanford
admits. “And I wanted to get something more for myself.”
Stanford was working on a new album, and had been fascinated
by watching videos of experiments in cymatics—the study of visible
sound vibration—online. Plenty of people had filmed experiments,
but the videos were typically artless and featured one experiment at a
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p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
time. Stanford wanted to combine multiple scientific phenomena into
a single narrative paired with his music. He knew he would need help
with the visuals, so he recruited his old friend Shahir Daud (www.
shahirdaud.com), a director and editor at MTV Networks. But while
he had a concept and a director, he still didn’t have the song.
“We did all these experiments and found the notes that would work
for the visuals,” Daud says, “and then Nigel would go away and write
a piece of music that would work for those visuals.” In the video, each
experiment is triggered in some way by Stanford’s music: magnetic
pulses triggered when his synthesizer activated ferrofluid, the liquid
in a petri dish affixed to his speaker rippling in time to the music,
Tesla coils activated by an audio signal shooting bolts of electricity.
Because different sounds would create different displays, Stanford had
to write music that would induce esthetically pleasing visuals.
Some of the equipment for the experiments could be rented, but
much of it was custom-built, and each one had its own quirks that
required consideration. They discovered, for example, that the Chladni
plate (a vibrating plate that makes patterns with sand, see Fig. 7,
opposite) they had hooked up to Stanford’s synthesizer requires long,
sustained tones to create the visual patterns. They collected seven
experiments, including Nikola Tesla’s famous coils and a plasma ball,
incorporating them into the video—and therefore, the song—in ascending
order, starting with the experiments that used the smallest equipment,
and moving to those that made the biggest visual impact. Each part
builds upon the other’s into a crescendo until they are all being played
simultaneously during the song’s climax. Since Stanford plays all the
parts of the song on record, he and Daud cast body doubles. When the
ALL STILLS © SHAHIR DAUD/TIMUR CIVAN
In their music video Cymatics, musician Nigel Stanford and director Shahir Daud
use science to make music, and vice versa. BY MATTHEW ISMAEL RUIZ
shot called for close-ups of his face, they composited
multiple images of Stanford with the frame, making
for an ironically more “honest” depiction of how the
music is made. They perfected the experiments as
Stanford finished writing the song, made storyboards
for every shot and assembled a team for a two-day
shoot at The 1896, a studio in Brooklyn, NY.
On the recommendation of photographer/
director Vincent Laforet, Daud hired
cinematographer Timur Civan (timurcivan.com),
who used a combination of vintage glass and hightech sensors to define the video’s visual esthetic.
Almost everything had to be done in-camera,
because other than the few composites of Nigel,
there were no computer-generated images—
everything you see in the video happened in the
studio. Civan would prove helpful in solving the
technical challenges of capturing the experiments’
fleeting moments of beauty.
“Some of the things are spectacular, but
they’re over in a fraction of a second,” Civan
explains. “Mainly the ferrofluid, and the electrical
components of the Tesla coils. The lightning bolt in
the air, to your brain it’s a few seconds, but to the
camera it’s really only up for 1/100,000 of a second
or something. So you have to shoot really high
frame rates to try and get it spread over two frames,
so you can cut all the air out.”
Civan and his crew took an entire day to prep
the lights at the massive studio. They blanketed the
warehouse space with light so the camera could
move freely throughout with minimal adjustment
of the equipment. He shot with a RED camera
sporting the new 6.5K Dragon sensor, and a set of
Russian Lomo square-front anamorphic lenses.
The ancient coatings on the Russian lenses added
dramatic flares, and the anamorphic ratio let them
pack multiple Nigels into the frame.
To capture the fast-moving experiments, they
worked in footage from the high-speed PhantomFlex
camera, capable of capturing 1280x720p video at
1000 frames per second. For example, the bolts of
electricity from the Tesla coil moved so fast that
Civan would have to assemble key frames from the
high-speed footage on set to make them sync with
the music. Daud and Stanford mostly stuck to their
original storyboards when they edited the video, and
they finished and graded the video in 4K, with the
720p footage from the PhantomFlex scaled up.
When Cymatics was released, it quickly went
viral, earning a Vimeo Staff Pick (bit.ly/1DoSk0i)
and racking up more than two million views across
platforms on the Web. Stanford says he’s received
offers to perform the music and the experiments
live, and the pair hope to build on the momentum
and make another music video, but it may prove
difficult—Cymatics took almost year to assemble,
edit and grade after the shoot in December 2013.
Daud, for his part, is already starting to think about
scaling back his day job in TV.
Stills from Cymatics, made in collaboration with director of photography Timur Civan, who
used both a RED and a PhantomFlex camera. ➊ HOSE PIPE This experiment uses the
vibrations from a speaker cone to move liquid, but uses air rather than direct contact. In
real-time, the stream of water seems to vibrate randomly, but shot on the PhantomFlex at
1000 fps and slowed down, a perfect swirl emerges. ➋ SPEAKER DISH A small petri dish
is secured to the outside of a speaker cone. The liquid in the dish ripples according to the
frequency of the tones emitted by the speaker. ➌ RUBENS TUBE An antique physics
device for visualizing acoustic standing waves, the Rubens tube uses gas and flame to graph
sound waves and sound pressure. Gas fills the tube, with holes along the top for flames to
emerge from. When hooked up to Stanford’s synth, the sound waves of different tones put
different pressure on each hole, creating a graph of the sound wave with the flames.
➍ PLASMA BALL A clear glass orb with a high-voltage electrode in the center, plasma globes
are filled with a mixture of noble gases. When the electrode is powered on, plasma filaments
extend from the electrode to the glass. When a charged element (like a human hand) comes
into contact with the glass, the filaments connect to the contact point. ➎ TESLA COIL
One of Nikola Tesla’s most famous inventions, the Tesla coil is essentially a high-frequency
transformer that steps up output to extremely high voltage. When switched on at the set for
Stanford and Daud’s video, the air was so high-charged that unplugged fluorescent bulbs
would glow with light. ➏ FERROFLUID A portmanteau for ferromagnetic and fluid, ferrofluid
becomes magnetized in the presence of a magnetic field. Stanford and Daud implemented
a simple rig with several magnets that were switched on by certain notes played on a
synthesizer. Using high-speed cameras, they were able to capture movements in the fluid that
last only a fraction of a second. ➐ CHLADNI PLATE Sand or metal filings are shaken onto a
square metal plate, and the vibrations from tones at different frequencies create patterns,
as some parts of the plate vibrate and others do not. Stanford’s plate was connected to his
synthesizer, whose tones emanated from a bolt in the center of the plate.
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77
GEAR & TECHNIQUES
7 DRONES THAT LET
YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
TAKE FLIGHT
Whether you use a GoPro or a RED, there’s a flying machine that can take it to new heights.
BY GREG SCOBLETE
THE FAA MAY have clipped the wings of commercial drone
photography in the United States—for now—but that hasn’t stopped
companies in the States and abroad from forging ahead with new
and innovative flying cameras. Whatever your piloting skill level,
or the type of camera you need to carry aloft, chances are there’s a
drone for you.
LEHMANN AVIATION LA200
The Lehmann Aviation LA200 is one of the more unusual aerial
imaging systems around. While most aerial photography platforms
take the helicopter approach, Lehmann has built a drone that looks
more like a stealth bomber. What’s more, you launch the 2-pound
LA200 by throwing it, paper airplane-style, toward the heavens.
Don’t worry, you won’t have to catch it when it returns: The LA200
lands on the ground. And where other drones require you to navigate
your flying machine using joystick-based remotes, the LA200 is fully
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automatic. Using their Windows 8-based OperationCenter app, you
can literally draw your flight plan on a map using your finger. The
app will interpret your finger swipe to generate a path and send it
to the drone via Wi-Fi. Then the LA200 flies off while the GoPro
attached to the top records all the footage en route. While you won’t
have access to a live camera feed during the flight, you’re not totally
in the dark. The OperationCenter app provides info on the flight,
such as battery life and any alerts and also lets you send commands,
such as flight cancellation, to the drone. Lehmann claims it takes
roughly three minutes to prep the LA200 for takeoff. It has a total
flight time of 30 minutes—making it the longest flier on our list—and
can travel a total of 1.9 miles. It’s rated to tackle challenging weather,
with winds up to 21.7 mph and temperature ranges from -13 to 140
degrees Fahrenheit.
PRICE: $3,101
INFO: www.lehmannaviation.com
DJI INSPIRE 1
Billed as a step-up from the company’s popular Phantom Vision
2, the Inspire 1 quadcopter will have more lift and stability
thanks to its 13-inch propellers. It also sports something no
other drone in its class currently does: an integrated 4K camera.
The new camera uses a 12-megapixel Sony sensor and is capable
of 4K (4096x2160 pixels) video recording at 24 frames per
second or UHD (3840x2160) recording at 30 fps alongside RAW
still photo capture. In addition to 4K, the Inspire 1’s camera can record
1920x1080p HD video with varying frame rates between 24–60 fps in
either the MOV or MP4 format. It’s capable of burst shooting up to 7
fps. There’s a fixed-focus lens that’s threaded, so you can screw in ND
filters before you take flight. The camera rests on a 3-axis gimbal to
maintain stability while airborne.
The new drone features a design that transforms into a V-shape as it
takes flight, allowing the camera to drop
down below the landing gear, giving it an
unobstructed 360-degree field-of-view.
The Inspire 1 is stabilized using an optical
flow package with a dedicated camera
and ultrasonic sensors that helps orient
the drone in the air for flying indoors
or without GPS, a first for UAVs in this
category. DJI has also built in Lightbridge,
its technology for wirelessly transmitting
1080p video to mobile devices up to 1.7
kilometers away, to aid in composition
while the drone is in flight. The on-board
battery can keep the Inspire 1 aloft for up
to 18 minutes, and you can monitor the
battery’s life throughout your flight. The
total platform (including battery, gimbal
and camera) weighs roughly 6.5 pounds.
PRICE: $2,899 (one controller);
$3,399 (two controllers)
INFO: www.dji.com
AERONAVICS SKYJIB-X4 XL
This heavy-duty drone is highly customizable, and can be configured with
propellers as long as 18 inches. The Skyjib X4 XL uses eight
motors in a coaxial configuration, which
Aeronavics says delivers better
stability in windy conditions.
You can have this drone built
with either fixed or retractable
landing gear, as well as your own
branding splashed on the hull (which could
be incriminating, were you to say, crash it
into a building). Depending on payload, you
can get up to 20 minutes of flight time on the X4 XL,
and can fly as high and as far as line-of-sight persists—just keep
in mind that the drone’s flying capabilities may exceed regulatory
boundaries. The total payload can top out at 7.7 pounds worth of
camera. A “ready to fly” package includes a fully assembled and
flight-tested SkyJib, a radio controller, batteries, charging station
and handheld controller. Gimbals, such as the Zenmuse, are sold
separately or can be packaged with the “ready to fly” kit to make
a “ready to operate” kit that also adds a wireless video downlink
system and a more functional Mission Control remote controller.
PRICE: $2,841 (ready to fly kit)
INFO: www.aeronavics.com
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GEAR & TECHNIQUES 7 DRONES THAT LET YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY TAKE FLIGHT
STEADIDRONE FLARE
The Flare will take a GoPro or other compact camera into the air
for up to 20 minutes of flight time, thanks to its 12-inch props. The
airframe, minus camera payload and battery, weighs just 3.7 pounds,
so the Flare is a lightweight travel companion. It uses a rapid-deploy
design with arms and landing gear that click—rather than screw—into
place so you’re not wrestling with wrenches before flight time. The
top dome shields the flight controller while still providing you with
direct access to the USB interface and safety switch without having
to remove or unscrew anything. It also ships with a brushless gimbal
system powered by a 32-bit AlexMos controller. You can clip a gimbal
up to 0.6 pounds along with cameras up to 1.8 pounds onto the Flare. The
camera gimbal can point 90 degrees up or down, for a variety of framing
angles. The Flare’s rails are adjustable so you can use a variety of batteries
that mount to either the top or bottom of the unit. Its included 3DR Pixhawk
GPS flight controller displays telemetry data and offers return-to-home and
loiter capabilities plus a “follow me” mode for tracking a subject around as
they move (but in a non-creepy way, please).
PRICE: $2,499
INFO: www.steadidrone.com
DRAGANFLYER X4-P
The X4-P is packed with 11 sensors to help orient the drone and keep it steady during filming. Its brushless
motors stay quiet while the drone is airborne and feature quick-release carbon fiber propellers that can be
swiftly popped off when it’s time to pack up. The standard X4-P is outfitted with a Sony RX100 camera,
but you can also opt for a version carrying a Sony QX100 or a FLIR Thermal Imager instead. Once you’ve
selected your camera, it’s mounted onto the drone using a gyro-stabilized housing with vibration isolation
so the camera should be shake-free in the skies. A high-resolution
wireless digital video link will send a camera feed to a
mobile device. The total package—including
camera—weighs 5 pounds and can stay
airborne for roughly 20–25 minutes before needing a
recharge. Each system includes replacement props, battery
and charger and a hard case. The X4-P’s controller provides
real-time telemetry, camera control and a digital video downlink to Android
devices. If you want to split duties between a pilot and camera operator, you can
add a second wireless controller to the system. Semi-autonomous flight modes
provide altitude hold, GPS position hold and return-to-home flying features while
an onboard microSD card logs all your flight data for future reference (try not
to think of it as a black box). The company also offers a two-day factory flighttraining course in its Canadian facilities to get you fully up to speed with
piloting your aircraft. Training costs $1,995 for up to two people.
PRICE: $15,995
INFO: www.draganfly.com
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FREEFLY SYSTEMS CINESTAR 8
Freefly Systems’ Cinestar 8 octocopter isn’t simply
for the GoPro set. It’s designed to hoist
cinema cameras from the likes of RED and
Canon into the sky with a total payload
capacity of 12 pounds—though, yes, you
can strap a GoPro or another small action
camera to it if you want. The drone is
customizable, so you can swap out booms,
propellers and batteries, depending on
your camera payload. The Cinestar 8 can accept
boom arms up to 21.7 inches in size. The top-mounted battery helps
keep the sensitive flight control electronics protected while ensuring an
ideal center of gravity for the Cinestar when airborne. The octocopter is
assembled and disassembled using a single tool, so you can set it up and
break it down quickly. Beyond its lift, the Cinestar is optimized to work
with Freefly Systems’ MoVi electronic gimbal system (sold separately)
but can also mount third-party gimbals such as the Zenmuse. The
gimbal mount is quickly detachable, so you can change out cameras
relatively easily between shoots. A vibration-isolation system is
also on hand to ensure your stills and videos stay steady in flight.
PRICE: $7,850
INFO: www.freeflysystems.com
PARROT BEBOP
If aerial systems like the Cinestar and Inspire 1 are a bit too
intimidating, Parrot’s approachable Bebop provides an easier and
considerably less expensive onramp to droneography. This diminutive
drone can be flown indoors thanks to removable hulls (included)
that shield the propeller. It offers an integrated 14-megapixel camera
capable of recording 1920x1080p video at 30 fps. It can also snap RAW
stills in the DNG format. The f/2.2 fisheye lens captures a 180-degree
angle of view, and images are stored to the drone’s 8GB of internal
memory (there’s no card slot). Images and videos are accessible
through a mobile device. You can direct the camera and pilot the drone
all from a single smartphone app.
The Bebop keeps itself stable via a series of sensors, including
a 3-axis accelerometer, a gyroscope, a
magnetometer, an ultrasound sensor with
an 8-meter reach, one pressure sensor and
a vertical camera (to track the unit’s speed).
The lightweight Bebop weighs just 0.9 pounds
with hull attached, and it has a flight time of
roughly 12 minutes. Parrot will also sell an
optional Skycontroller that lets you mount a
mobile device and use physical joysticks to
navigate the Bebop. The Skycontroller also
has a more powerful Wi-Fi radio that will let
you fly the Bebop further (up to 2 kilometers)
from the pilot and higher than you would
by simply using your mobile device. If you
want a really different drone experience, you
can connect the Skycontroller to optional
video glasses via HDMI and get a “drone’seye view” of the world. As of this writing,
the Bebop supports Sony’s FPV and Zeiss
Cinemizer spectacles, but Parrot says more
video glasses will be added to the list soon.
PRICE: $500; $900 (with Skycontroller)
INFO: www.parrot.com
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THIS MONTH: Jennilee Marigomen finds wonder in the everyday; Eric Gottesman’s 15-year collaboration with Ethiopian AIDS orphans.
EXPOSURES
E D I T E D BY CO N O R R I S CH
© ERIC GOTTESMAN/SUDDEN FLOWERS
Banded passport pictures, from the
book Sudden Flowers, Eric Gottesman’s
long-term collaborative project with a
group of Ethiopian AIDS orphans.
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EXPOSURES
EXPLORATION
What A View
In her book Window Seat, Jennilee Marigomen utilizes light,
shadow and color to reveal the beauty and wonder in everyday
scenes and small, fleeting details. BY CONOR RISCH
ALL PHOTOS © JENNILEE MARIGOMEN
IN DISCUSSING his seminal series “American Surfaces,” the photographer
Stephen Shore has described thinking of “photography as a technical means of
communicating what the world looks like if you see it in a state of heightened
awareness.” As he traveled through the United States, Shore was making
photographs of landscapes and details that most would overlook, using the
camera to assign them significance.
A similar state of heightened awareness is evident in the work of Jennilee
Marigomen, a Vancouver-based photographer new second book, Window
Seat, was published last year by New Documents. Marigomen, who won the
Magenta Foundation’s Flash Forward Emerging Photographer award in 2011,
is part of the lineage of photographers who create art from everyday scenes. In
Window Seat, Marigomen combines careful use of light, shadow and color with
sensitive—at times playful—observation to show viewers a world flush with
beauty and wonder, for those who care to open themselves to it. She created
this particular body of work during a trip to Mexico, but it is less about a
ABOVE:
From Jennilee Marigomen’s book, Window Seat. “Every photo that I take reflects something that I feel or that I felt,” Marigomen says.
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p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
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EXPOSURES
What A View
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specific place than about a way of seeing
and appreciating the world.
Emotion plays an important role in
Marigomen’s process. “Every photo that I
take reflects something that I feel or that
I felt,” she says. “A lonely waste bin or a folded up umbrella leaning
on the wall after it’s been used in the market—I can sympathize
with these objects.”
While emotional awareness influences how she sees, Marigomen
tries to maintain her distance. Her work is “about quietly observing
things around me and trying not to disturb what is there,” she says. The
book’s title references the metaphor of photography as a window, but
windows are also barriers that imply separateness and remove—when
we look through windows we see the world, but are not necessarily in it.
In one of Marigomen’s images, cracks in a sidewalk caused by
growing tree roots play with dappled sunlight and strewn magenta
flower petals. A pair of images shows masses of potted plants
decorating doorsteps. A bushy, black dog sleeps in a shadow under
the rear bumper of a parked car. A small house with a thatched roof,
which looks like it was built and added to in several stages, sits at the
end of a dirt driveway, surrounded by green hills.
ABOVE: Marigomen made
the images in Window Seat
with an old Nikon S90X
and Kodak Portra Film.
MARIGOMEN: “I am chasing the ephemeral:
reflections, shadows, rainbows, nature
arranged strangely. I don’t take them for
granted, and think of them as gifts.”
Throughout the book, light and shadow contribute to the graphic
beauty of the images, which she made using an old Nikon S90X
and Kodak Portra film. The changing light in Marigomen’s native
Vancouver, and the rain there, which “is always washing things away,”
influence her work. “In some ways, I am chasing the ephemeral:
reflections, shadows, rainbows, nature arranged strangely. I don’t take
them for granted, and think of them as gifts,” she says.
People play a subtle role in Marigomen’s book. They are
represented primarily by the environments they’ve created, which,
Marigomen notes, have a do-it-yourself quality—a stack of cinder
blocks holding an umbrella steady, or plastic chairs hung creatively
from a hot dog stand for easy transport. When people do appear in
the images, they are seen at a distance, or their faces are obscured,
which makes them “replaceable with anyone,” Marigomen
notes. The photographs aren’t about individuals, they are about
“everything around them.”
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ABOVE: Marigomen says her work is “about quietly observing things around me
and trying not to disturb what is there.”
F EBRUA RY 20 15
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87
EXPOSURES
What A View
ALLL PHOTOS © ERIC GOTTESMAN/SUDDEN FLOWERS
Marigomen edited the work with New Documents publisher Jeff
Khonsary, whom she met at an artist talk he organized a few years
ago. The pair stayed in touch, and he approached her about creating
a book in 2013. Khonsary’s input and the passage of time helped
Marigomen edit the work, which she had made in 2011. It “took away
my emotional attachment to the moment or the photo,” she says.
“Forgetting exactly what happened in that moment, or what made
that special to me when I took it,” helped her focus on the formal
qualities of the images and the sequence.
In editing the book, Marigomen
says, she “wanted people to see how
BELOW: Marigomen made the
the awareness of the smallest, everyday
images in Window Seat in
gestures in the smallest detail can be
Mexico, but the book is less
just as fulfilling as something with a
about a specific place than
direct study or commentary.”
about a way of seeing the world.
ABOVE: “Radait wants to dance,” a photo from Sudden Flowers, a new book
by Eric Gottesman, published by Fishbar.
PARTNERSHIP
A Garden Grown
© JENNILEE MARIGOMEN
Artist Eric Gottesman collaborated with an Ethiopian
children’s collective, empowering them to create a
long-term project about their lives as AIDS orphans
that avoids stereotypes. BY DZANA TSOMONDO
88
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
SUDDEN FLOWERS, a new book that offers a unique look
at the lives of AIDS orphans in Africa, is the result of a 15year collaboration between the Massachusetts-based artist
Eric Gottesman and a collective of children in Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia. Gottesman worked with the children to create
photographs, writing and recorded testimonies that reveal
their personal experiences of losing parents to AIDS, and of
overcoming homelessness, ostracism and depression. The
collective gave themselves the name Sudden Flowers because,
as one of them put it, “if given just a bit of light and water and
care, we will suddenly blossom.”
The Horn of Africa has often been at the center of limited
and frequently stereotypical depictions of Africa by western
photographers—malnourished children beset by flies is a
familiar trope. Ethiopia’s peculiar history with the camera,
whereupon photography was banned or restricted for decades
under authoritarian rule, weighed heavily in how Gottesman
approached the Sudden Flowers collaboration.
Gottesman didn’t study photography in college, but he did
take a course at Duke University’s Center for Documentary
Studies—taught by the acclaimed photographer Alex Harris.
Gottesman graduated and, intending to go to law school, took
a research position at the Supreme Court. He was working
and living in Washington, D.C. when Harris encouraged
him to apply for a new photography-related public policy
fellowship. Intrigued by the possibilities, Gottesman
considered the list of places the fellowship would be willing
to send him and applied to work in Ethiopia because it
was the one place that he knew the least about. He was
A FOOD PHOTOGRAPHER
IN THE MAKING:
ISABELLA CASSINI
She studied part-time at Santa Monica
College, balancing her schedule with
a job at AtEdge, a publishing group
that showcases the work of selected
commercial and editorial photographers
in beautiful photo books. It was at AtEdge
that Cassini first discovered her affinity for
“I love to spill, smash and crash things,”
commercial work, and set out to start her
food photographer Isabella Cassini says.
own portfolio.
So much so, in fact, that she has dedicated
As Cassini continues to build her
a portfolio on her website to vivid, fun and
oeuvre, she has sharpened her focus
deconstructed food imagery, aptly named
on creating high-caliber work through
“Splashes / Crashes / Smashes.”
experimentation, collaborating with stylist
Cassini has only been shooting food
Jason Schrieber to perfect her aesthetic.
for the past two years, but she’s already
And as for her personal relationship with
developing her client list—she’s currently
food, she says: “I love food, but I don’t
shooting an online menu for over 100
consider myself a foodie, even though
vendors across New York City—and
it’s what I love to shoot.” She adds, “I’m a
winning awards, snagging the amateur
photographer first and foremost, but I do
grand prize in PDN’s food photography
make a mean tomato sauce.”
contest, TASTE (www.pdntaste.com).
Her winning image, a promotional shot
See more from Isabella Cassini at www.
isabellacassini.com
of the stacked, individual ingredients
of a burger, caught the eye of judges
from Bon Appetit, SAVEUR, Kinfolk
HOW SHE GOT THE SHOT:
Magazine, Modern Farmer and the Food
Cassini and Schrieber shot the layers
Network Magazine—no small feat for a
separately, placing each ingredient on
photographer with only a couple of years
circular Plexiglas and balancing it on
under her belt in the food world.
two thin wires. The wires were held
But Cassini’s background in
taut between a tower of stackable
photography stretches further back; she
items on either side of the burger, and
has been shooting since the age of 14,
each ingredient was raised slightly
and decided to make a commitment
higher than the last to keep the
to the medium during her college
perspective looking accurate. “It was
years. “We’ve been in a monogamous
definitely a poor-man’s setup,” Cassini
relationship ever since,” she jokes.
says, “scrappy, but effective.”
Photo © Isabella Cassini
A DVERTISEMEN T
EXPOSURES
A Garden Grown
selected, and arrived in Addis Ababa in 1999.
Gottesman estimates he spent at least five of
the next 15 years in the country.
His fellowship was initially connected
to Save the Children, an NGO that, at the
time, was trying to raise awareness of
impending famine in Ethiopia’s Ogaden
region. Gottesman was paired with a team
of Ethiopian doctors who traveled about
the desert evaluating nutrition levels in
pastoralist communities. Gottesman’s job was
simple: to take pictures that illustrated the
direness of the situation.
“I was faced with this conundrum of
having to point my camera at people who
were desperate and starving [as part] of
this whole process that would eventually
benefit them,” he explains. “But that moment,
standing in front of people with some of the
least agency and power on earth and pointing
my camera...it was very troubling.”
The fact that those images would
eventually help convince USAID to provide
RIGHT: “My name is Tenanesh Kifyalew. If I had my own
house, I would give shelter to children like me who have
lost their parents.”
Photo © Lou Mora
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90
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
early funding for relief efforts in the Ogaden
was small comfort for Gottesman. In his
mind, if that was how the system was meant
to work, there was something fundamentally
wrong with the system. Once the assignment
finished, Gottesman spent much of that
first trip “hanging out”—meeting people
and learning about the country. One of the
people he met was Yawoinshet Masresha,
an Ethiopian writer and youth activist who
introduced him to the children who would
become his “sudden flowers.” When he told
Masresha of his interest in Ethiopia’s AIDS
epidemic, she took him to a home she was
renting for six orphans.
“The question for me [coming into this
project] was, how do you get at the root
of the problem with photography rather
than using photography to visualize the
symptoms,” he explains. In order to facilitate
a truly collaborative effort, Gottesman
decided that he needed to work with the
same people over an extended period of time.
LEFT: “I want to be a teacher and educate the
uneducated.” One of the children acts out a life goal
in this image.
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EXPOSURES
A Garden Grown
ABOVE: “The worst day of my life was the day my father died.” Gottesman used a variety of methods in the project. In some images, like this one above by Bereket
Muluneh, children were encouraged to reenact moments from their lives. Gottesman also changed camera formats throughout the project. Polaroid slowed the process
down, while also providing instant gratification.
Gottesman explained his ideas to the children, outlining how he
thought they could use photography to investigate their experiences.
They listened politely, conferred amongst themselves and told him
they would get back to him. A few days later they agreed to work
with him, on the condition that the pictures be used to help other
“children on the street.” The democratic spirit of the formation
of the Sudden Flowers collective has remained a key part of the
collaboration, with all of the children having a say in the process of
creating and sharing the work.
“[At first] the images were just snapshots and kids mugging for
the camera but eventually there was one picture that was about a
dream one of them had about the house burning down with her and
her mother inside of it,” Gottesman says. “It was a double exposure
where they took a picture of everyone running out of the house, then
92
p d n o n l i ne. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
took a picture of the flames, and it created this really striking image.
That’s when I realized that these kids understood the mechanics of
the camera and the way that photographs can tell a story.”
Over the course of 15 years, working with a group of children that
expanded well beyond the initial six, Gottesman used a variety of
methods in the project. Some images are reenactments of moments in
the children’s lives inspired by thought experiments the photographer
posed to the group. At one point Gottesman provided the Sudden
Flowers collective with tape recorders and encouraged them to
record themselves talking in private about their parents. Another
assignment was for the children to write letters to the parents they
had lost. “They missed their parents hugging them or buying them ice
cream. It wasn’t about the kinds of things that NGOs, on their behalf,
thought they needed, like food and shelter,” Gottesman remembers.
The Future of Fashion
ABOVE: A letter to Gottesman from one of the children
in the Sudden Flowers collective.
The letters and transcripts are a vital part
of Sudden Flowers, the text facilitating a
dialogue between the words and images,
the past and present, and at times, between
the children and Gottesman himself. The
media also changed; film turned to digital,
black-and-white to color, still images to
video. Polaroids proved especially effective,
their cost forcing everyone to slow down
and carefully consider every shot, while also
providing instant gratification in the form of
an object the children could hold.
The initial aims of the Sudden Flowers
collective were focused on building awareness
inside Ethiopia through traveling public
exhibits. But Gottesman had long harbored
ideas of producing a photobook as well.
During years of making mixed-media
exhibitions, the children edited the work as
they went along, and provided a template for
incorporating text. “In 2008 I started working
with a designer who helped me put some stuff
together, and that was incredibly helpful in
starting to conceptualize what the final object
might look like,” Gottesman explains. He took
drafts of the book to the children in Ethiopia
and came back home with all their notes, then
returned again to Addis Ababa with a new
draft. As a final touch, the children created a
thousand handcrafted letters, one for each
copy of the book. A fitting addendum to a
project that sought to give voice and agency to
those who are traditionally subject to the
Western lens.
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93
ADVERTISER DIRECTORY
READER COMMENTS
WHEN SHOOTING “SPEC” WORK WORKS
Our series of articles on “Shooting on Spec to Land Advertising Assignments”
looked at how commercial photographers had shot work for their portfolios
with specific clients in mind, and successfully landed work from the clients. Our
article on the spec work that Aaron Greene created on the advice of a designer at
Confluence Outdoor (who later hired Greene) drew a lot of reaction on Facebook.
The PDN Advertiser Directory is provided as a courtesy to
Photo District News advertisers. The publisher assumes
no responsibility for errors or omissions.
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This is the correct definition of spec. You do the work. You keep the
work. You show the work. You do not give the work away hoping a
dollar floats your way.
—MICHAEL J. GLENN
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“Spec” has to mean “speculation,” as in the photographer produced the
material with the intent of using it to sell the work to fill a need or to sell
himself to land an assignment, much like a land speculator buys land with
the intent of selling or developing it. I would think that if a photographer
had work already in his/her portfolio that impressed the client, which
this guy was lacking, then they wouldn’t need to shoot speculatively. I
can see why it would be wise to avoid this practice if you have established
yourself...but it seems like a good plan in some cases...like this one.
—LEE HAWKINS
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PALM SPRINGS PHOTO FESTIVAL ....................................................................82
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PDN’S THE GREAT OUTDOORS CALL FOR ENTRIES.......................6, 7
CORRECTION
PDN’S TASTE WINNERS’ PROFILES .......................................................32, 89
In “Innovative Gear That Will Shape 2015,” we referred to a Tamron
lens as the “Tamron SP 15-30mm f/2.8 DI VC USB.” It’s USD, not USB.
Our apologies for the error.
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COMING IN MARCH
the
CO L L A B O R AT I O N
issue
94
•
CALLING ON EXPERTS
•
STRENGTH IN NUMBERS
•
VIDEO COLLABORATION
Photographers teaming with programmers, writers, stylists
to take their work to a new level.
Creating inspiring group projects, with photographers
acting as contributors, curators, producers.
New online platforms promise to connect editors and directors.
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
P LU S
HOW I GOT THAT SHOT
Lighting and directing
a group portrait.
GEAR ROUNDUP:
ACTION CAMERAS
Taking photos to new places.
© GEORGE KAMPER
© ANN CUTTING
A Visual Database of the World’s Best Photographers
PDN connects photographers with 5,000 Art Buyers, Photo Editors and Creatives
ANN CUTTING
GEORGE KAMPER
Advertising lifestyle, travel, resorts and hospitality photographer
George Kamper worked closely with the Miami Biltmore Hotel to
produce a fun series of images for their new interactive and print
campaigns highlighting the Biltmore’s fabulous features
and activities.
www.georgekamper.com
Ann Cutting works out of her studio in Old Town Pasadena,
specializing in conceptual, editorial and advertising photography.
This image was created for the cover of Time Magazine for a story
about Healthcare Reform. The map of the USA was created with
medical props and a gradient of color from left to right going
from warmer to cooler areas. Other fun items correspond to the
different regions.
www.cutting.com
RUSS
QUACKENBUSH
Advertising,
portrait and lifestyle
photographer Russ
Quackenbush’s “The
Kiss” is one in a series
of photos inspired by
© SCOTT WITTER
intimate moments
© RUSS QUACKENBUSH
he witnessed while
driving in Los Angeles.
Quackenbush’s work
has a spontaneous and
emotional intimacy
that creates an immediate connection with his subjects and
the audience
www.russquackenbush.com
SCOTT WITTER
Los Angeles-based advertising and editorial entertainment, portrait,
fashion and motion photographer Scott Witter photographed the
one and only James Goldstein, multi-millionaire and NBA super
fan, for Quote Magazine.
www.scottwitter.com
FIND A DIFFERENT POINT-OF-VIEW WITH PHOTOSERVE.COM
© FATALI, THE LIGHT HUNTER
END FRAME
Pace and Place
PHOTOGRAPHER Chris Burkard, whom we profile in “5 Routes to
Success in Sports and Adventure Photography” on page 34, established
his personal style by focusing on the landscapes that surround sports
like surfing and snowboarding. Working early in his career as an
editorial photographer, he says he learned that, “If you really want to
create something that’s timeless, something that allows the viewer to
be in that moment, you have to show the landscape.”
Burkard’s attention to capturing a sense of place was influenced
in part by Michael Fatali, a photographer who works with an
8x10 camera to create fine-art images of remote locations. As a
young photographer, Burkard studied with Fatali for a couple of
months, and learned key lessons from the large-format landscape
photographer’s process.
“His work and the patience it takes to get his work really made an
impression on me,” Burkard says. Fatali would spend hours hiking
into remote canyons or other locations with his 8x10, Burkard says,
and would make only a small number of exposures once there. “His
96
p d n o n l i n e. c om F EBRUA RY 2 0 1 5
ABOVE: ”Wings of Angels,” 2014,
approach was always, when you come
by Michael Fatali. Chris Burkard
to a place, the last thing you want to
learned from Fatali to have
do is just grab your camera,” Burkard
patience and get to know a
explains. Instead, “you absorb the
place before photographing it.
experience. You look at every angle.
You get down on your belly and you go
up high and you just look at everything—you try to educate yourself
on [the place], and then you wait for the right light and when that
moment comes, you know.”
While Burkard appears to work in a vastly different field of
photography, he’s adapted Fatali’s approach to his work. “Traveling, I
don’t aim to go to places and pull out my camera and just start blasting
away sequences,” he says. “I want to know a place and remember what
it felt like, and all those attributes that make traveling so great. For me,
it’s been a really fine mixture of being educated on a location before I
go, but also leaving myself open to new experiences as they arise so I
can capture stuff that’s in the moment.”
—CONOR RISCH
© Lenny Kravitz portrait by Mark Seliger
LIGHT SHAPING BY MARK SELIGER
“I use lighting as a tool to enhance. In my opinion, once the lighting
starts to feel tricky, then that becomes the photograph, and you’re
taking away from what I consider to be great portraiture.”
– Mark Seliger
Learn from one of the masters of portrait photography
at www.profoto.com/us/markseliger
Profoto US | 220 Park Avenue, Florham Park NJ 07932 | PHONE (973) 822-1300, profoto.com/us