Swiss Miss

Found a new inspiration and a great place for chuckles.(swissmiss)

Living Young

This could be me.  I think my fascination of photographing children, particularly little towheaded girls, is my desire to recapture my youth.  Or is it my refusal to grow up? Or is it evidence of the dysfunctional family and my lost childhood?  Whatever it is, I am forever Living Young.

Living Old

As I work on the computer I watch different things via the internet. One show I entertain myself by are episodes of Frontline on PBS.  The "Living Old" I just finished and why I watched it for a second time is puzzling to me.  It is as if thinking hard enough and long enough I will change the outcome of  the inevitable-growing old.  The experience I had with Mom yesterday has got me suffering again with her aging.  I am so sad that there is nothing I can do to fix this part of her life.  I can't do this for her and it is not just a passing faze.  I can't carrying it; I can't take her away from it; we can't throw it away; we can't ignore it; the weather won't make it better.  It is the hard final agonizing lap; it is death coming;  it is the deterioration, pain, isolation, boredom.  Mom is going out slowly.  And somedays I just hate it.  Somedays I loose hope.  My biggest fear is she has lost hope too.

D-Day

Normandy 1944.  My father was a war hero from the WWII.  Each June 6th I like to spend some part of my day honoring his bravery and his simple acceptance of duty.  He hated the war and/but he loved it.  I grew up listening to his war stories.  So WWII photos, movies and stories are romantic to me.  Here is a link to Life Magazine Great War Photography in honor of one of the greatest plans, collaborations and duty of our countrymen.

I've recently discovered this photographer through Hey Hot Shot 2009 First Edition Announcements.  I thought Patrick Lyn's war reenactors would be appropriate for the day.

And tonight on CBS news with Katie I am so happy to learn that we have Witness to War.

The Concept

Amazingly I've been busy this past month.  Now I find myself without work for, well I guess as it is in the freelance world, the rest of my life.  I was across the board on all genres of photography this month from editorial, to private portraiture, to advertising.  It is the advertising work that seems so weird to me still.  After doing it for several years I am still stunned with the ending.  Depending on the job, there is so much of the work done before the actual photographing comes into play-the thing I went to school to learn, the thing I apprenticed for under countless photographers.  And then the thing I love to do is over in a matter of an hour or two.  

While discussing this very thing with my rep she shares comments from her other photographer who believes while in the estimating period of the job (mind you he hasn't even been awarded the job) he has shot the job in his mind over and over.  That is true;  you have to shoot it in your head to estimate it appropriately.  I get caught up though.   I have big ideas mostly that never seem to make it to film/file.  Art Directors are kind enough to let me have my pipe dream but in the end the concept from the illustration, focus group tested mock up, the agreed upon/client approved idea is what goes.  And if you have the time, the budget, the skilled talent,  the patient crew,  the willing AD,  the relaxed AE, and the stamina to carry forth that extra mile  you can get those wonderful, creative surprises and the reason for the excitement of the job.  Not that the concepts are uninspiring for me.  I just have a hard time feeling like the photo is mine when I'm not involved in the concept.  It seems to me I become a technician.  I know that is a lie I tell myself being the struggling optimist that I am.  Its just I have such big ideas and an ego to satisfy.  And maybe I'm not seeing what I do bring to the concept.  I am part of the concept.  Yes, yes....that's it.

burn magazine

David Alan Harvey is now showing the finalist of the Emerging Photographers Fund over at burn magazine.  What is so great is the artist statement is available.  Today there are five posted.  Look for the other five to be posted periodically.  

I love this blog because David is so open in sharing his feeling, fears and hopes.  It is educational as well as comforting in seeing the humanism of a great photographer.