Little rays of sunshine?
Plainly things have been a little dark and depressing lately. With weather, work and the general state of UK and World affairs. In all that gloom there are little rays of sunshine that, if you allow them, can warm your soul a fraction.
- Sean Tucker released a thoughtful video on the perennial problem of getting meaningful critiques of you art. Platitudes from friends and acquaintances are nice but not overly constructive as means of making progress, improving and creating focus. Give it a watch.
That video has prompted me to reach out to a fellow photographer to see if they would like to try a virtual travel partnership. Let's see if that works out.
- The distinct lack of interest after having set up print sales on this site, linking to FB/IG, running some ads and figuring out all the printing requirements was rather a blow. It creates doubt about what you trying to do, but I have managed to now sell a few prints so that's a little light let in. 🙌
- As a terrible introvert and imposter syndrome sufferer I find it really hard to reach out and communicate with people. Anyway I've made myself do that. I reached out to a local gallery about my work and workshops/presentations. They are struggling in these Covid times so that was a dead end for now, but will revisit next year. Small steps.
- On the subject of focus I've been spending some time on that. I've been "wanting" something more portable that the 7x17" and have been contemplating a medium format camera or a 35mm panoramic like a Widelux. I think however I will concentrate on my Harman Titan 4x5 pinhole for the next little while and work on my alternative process printing techniques. This combination makes a reasonably unique combination and far enough away from the "mainstream" to satisfy my need to not conform... 😉
I now just need to find the cheapest way possible to create good enough digital negatives so I can "enlarge" those tiny 4x5" pinholes... 🙄
- Another ray of light is that I might have a method of using colour filters for the Harman Titan that isn't just waving them in front of the camera, risking knocking it or letting non filtered light in during longer exposure. Yay!
As I said, they are all only little rays of sunshine but they add up to help lift the general mood of doom and gloom. Getting outside and away from all the bad news also helps!
Happing image making.