Up, Up and Away
As part of the Fourth of July Festivities down in Utah County, they have a large hot air balloon festival. D and I dragged oursevles out of bed at 5:30 so we could be down in Provo by 6:30 when the Balloon Festival starts. They'll be having demonstrations and competitions Monday and Tuesday as well.
It was actually pretty cool to see so many balloons in such a small space. Here is a handful of photos for you.
Less can be more.
We've all heard it: "Less is more." Sometimes. Most of this time, though, "Less" is just boring, and is often inclined to intellectual snobbery. A more accurate statement comes from one of my favorite movies ever, "Sabrina" (the new one. I have yet to see the original): "More isn't always better, Linus. Sometimes it's just more."
What I love about this photo is how understated it is while still managing to convey the vastness of Nature. No purple mountains majesty. No raging cascades. It's simple and unassuming in its grandeur. You really need to see the larger version to get the right impression.
Anthropomorphism
Gilad Benari, an Israeli photographer, recently gave me permission to display some of his work in my blog. He does so much nice work it's hard to pick one image to start with. I settled on this one.
This image resonates with a lot of people. The most immediate response is, "That poor monkey! Look how he yearns to be free!" I don't think that's the power of this image though. For all we know, the monkey likes not having to hunt for fruit or scrape beetles out of the bark of a tree or likes not having to worry about jaguars or other predators.
I think the power in this image comes from what we bring to it. Each and every one of us can relate to feeling trapped. Whether or not our freedom has ever been physically restricted, we know what it's like to be caught in a situation from which we see no escape. Whether its a relationship gone sour or a dead end job or the confines of a culture we don't fit, we have all been there. Therein lies the power. Our little monkey has become a symbol for powerful experiences and emotions shared by all of us.
Cinco de Mayo
Midvale had a small Cinco de Mayo parade this morning. Very small, which sort of surprised me. The metro area of Salt Lake City has no shortage of Latinos, though I don't know how many of them are from Mexico. D participated with some Mexican friends of his who run a skate shop. There were probably half a dozen of them zipping about on racing roller blades.
I doubt I would have gone to the parade had it not been for D. Indeed being with D has made the immigration debate just a bit more personal for me. D is one of those who has immigrated legally, so that's not it. He is nevertheless an immigrant and Mexican. I have thus been reading a lot trying to form a coherent position on the immigration debate. I don't know that I've found one yet, but here are a few thoughts.
Undocumented workers - I've never been a fan of politically correct speech. Even "illigal immigrant" isnt' accurate, since I think an immigrant is someone who has become a U.S. citizen. D has a green card. His official status? Resident alien. You have to be a resident alien for five years before you can apply for citizenship. What does that make the rest then? Illegal aliens.
The Wall - A 1,951 mile wall. What a great idea! The most conservative estimate of length of the Great Wall of China is 1,500 miles. Some say it could have been up to 4,500 miles. National Geographic describes the effectiveness of this enormous physical barrier as "spotty."1 But it sure makes a statement!
The expense isn't finished once the wall is built either. Unless you build guard towers, have enough of them so that at least their rifle ranges over lap, and then man them, a wall isn't going to stop anyone who is even moderately determined. What made the Berlin Wall effective was the guards with machine guns. I suppose we could create some no man's land and put land mines down. Of course, they'd have to be sensitive enough that they'd go off if someone tried to dig a tunnel under them.
Felony - The only idea more stupid than the wall is the idea of making it a felony to be in the country without proper documentation. Hello! It's already against the law to be here without proper documentation. That's why they are called illegal aliens. We don't enforce the laws now. How is making it a felony going to make it easier, cheaper, or more practical to enforce? Where are we going to put them? Are more prisons included in this program? Idiots.
Amnesty-The conservative side of me rankles at the idea of people breaking the law and "getting away with it." On the other hand, if government didn't turn a blind eye to agribusiness and the service industry hiring illegal aliens, then the job market for them wouldn't exist and they probably wouldn't be coming in the numbers we are currently dealing with. Who's really to blame then? Even if I thought rounding up and deporting all illegal aliens was a good idea (which is right up there with felony laws and the wall), the logistics and expense are prohibitive. I say grant amnesty to anyone who doesn't have a criminal record and who can show gainful employment.
Nuestro Himno - As I sat waiting for the parade to start, pondering the question of immigration and nationalism, I had to come to the conclusion that nationalism is just one more thing people use to exclude others. You were not born on the right side of the border/tracks. Your English isn't good enough. You're not white enough. You're not smart enough. You're not rich enough. You're not straight enough. Identifying with a group isn't necessarily a bad thing except that humans seem to enjoy giving in to their baser tendency to demonize and persecute their out groups.
What does it mean to be American (or Mexican or Canadian) anyway? D's friend, E, who owns the skate shop is native born Mexican, but, being of Dutch descent, he's more blond and more fair than this American of Irish descent. It was interesting to watch a Dutch broadcast of a speed skating competition where E skated first and D skated second. When D went to the line the Dutch commentator said, "Ah, here's the real Mexican." (I speak German. I can understand some Dutch words and phrases.)
So what makes D the "real" Mexican? His dark skin? That can't be it. That would be racist. Is it the fact that D's family has been in Mexico longer than E's? My grandfather immigrated from Ireland. I'm not sure when the other side of my family first came to America, but it was several generations ago. Which line do we use to determine if I'm a "real" American? Back to my grandpa. We can find no record of his entry into the country (current speculation is he came in through Canada via Wales), so the odds that he entered the country legally are pretty low. It's quite likely that my grandfather isn't the only Irishman to enter the country illegally. Why isn't anyone bitching about St. Patrick's Day parades? (If you think people aren't bitching about Cinco de Mayo, I'll get to that.)
Immigration Reform - Is it necessary? Yeah. What should it look like? I have absolutely no idea. Will it happen? I don't think so, and I'll tell you why. The U.S. is slipping below the fertility rate necessary to sustain the population. That rate is about 2.1 children per woman. The U.S. is hovering around 2.0. What this means is we aren't creating enough of our own workers to keep society rolling. As the population declines, so to does the standard of living. Let me give you an example. In a shrinking work force, managing Dillards becomes less important than garbage collection. You could probably survive without the latest in fashion trends, but things will get ugly and smelly really quick if there is no one to pick up your garbage.
There are two solutions to this problem, raise your fertility rate or immigration. Since I don't see the fertility rate going up (in fact it's more likely to go down), let's reform immigration. Which jobs do you think these new immigrants will get? Gee, might it be the jobs Americans don't want to do? What have we created but an underclass to serve the upper class?
You might be saying, "But that's what we have now, dummy!" Yes, that, however, brings me to...
American Jobs - Here is where the rubber really hits the road. Frankly, I think this argument is pretty much horse shit. If Americans really wanted those jobs, they could have them, but they probably get more from welfare than they would working at the wages sans benefits illegal aliens get. Maybe the problem is our welfare programs then. Take that away and there would be Americans desperate enough to work for next to nothing.
You can bitch and moan about depressed wages all you want, but wanting something to be true, doesn't make it so. The job market is something like collectible. An antique is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. So to with a job. It doesn't matter if I think I'm worth $50/hour. If no one is willing to pay me $50/hour, what I think means nothing.
It seems to me if we actually prosecuted employers for hiring illegal aliens, heavy fines and jail time ought to do it, it would go a long way to stemming the tide of illegal aliens. However, do you think corporate America is really going to give up it's cheap labor? Yeah, right. Immigration reform, while solidifying the current class structure, would also legitimize the lower class and give them rights and legal recourse. How much of what you have heard from Capitol Hill is more than grandstanding and hot air? Until you get government and big business out of each other's pants, I don't see that much is going to change.
No matter what solution is decided upon, it's not going to be cheap. I don't think that anybody really gives consideration to the expense of any program, whether it's hiring more border patrol guards or more bureaucrats to administer some guest worker program. Are U.S. citizens willing to accept a tax hike to pay for any of this? I doubt it.
Now, back to my comment about people protesting Cinco de Mayo. There was, of course, a fair set up in a city park after the parade with ethnic foods and music. Just outside the boundaries of the event was a lone display with four or five people dressed as pioneers touting American heritage. I found it offensive. There was no need for them to be there other than to make a statement about their political beliefs. Jerks.
Spring has sprung.
Despite the jokes Mother Nature likes to play—like the 1" of snow we got on Monday—Spring is well underway. I'm amazed by these guys growing in a dirt patch the builder left ibetween my and my neighbor's garages. I planted a couple single plants a few years ago. They died in pretty short order. It gets extremely hot in that spot in the summer time, getting full sun as it does for well over 8 hours a day. I'd have to soak the ground every single day to keep whatever is trying to grow there alive, and I'm just not conscientious enough to do that.
Oddly enough, these guys keep coming back. Last year I pulled up what came up and moved them to the flower bed in the back yard. It's a little more sheltered back there, but I still neglected to water them enough and they didn't last. I have no idea how these guys propagate, but image my surprise when they popped here again. Last year they didn't get any bigger than the bunch in the middle. Look at them now. Oddly enough nothing came up in the back yard. I'm sure there's some horticulturalist out there who can probably tell me what's going on. It will be interesting to see what happens next Spring. In the meantime, here's hoping I can keep them alive at least into July.
Surf’s Up
I continue to be swamped with work and have little time to do much here. It doesn't help that I am tired a lot these days and just don't have the emotional wherewithal to blog about everything that is going on right now. So instead, I'm going to post this fantastic photograph by a man who goes by Avie.
Apparently Avie has had problems with people stealing his work and pawning it off as their own. My thanks to him for allowing me to post this here.
Enjoy.
Thou shalt not have fun.
Some of you may have noticed the brief appearance of thumbnails down the right edge of the blog. I've taken them down because they've become unreliable and have started slowing down the loading of the page. There are things I like about Deviant Art, but they have been plagued by performance problems from the start. I suppose that's what happens when a good idea has to be implemented on a shoe string budget. I'm sure they didn't expect to be as popular as they have become. Hopefully one of these days they'll get on top of it. Yes, I know. The rest of the world uses Flickr. Mabye one of these days, I'll have time to look into it.
Michael does some very fine work. I am absolutely jealous of the amazing skies that are in 95% of his photos. That's what I get for living in a desert, I guess. I hope he appreciates them.
This one struck me today. I don't think you'd ever see these two symbols juxtaposed like this in America. Church is not supposed to be fun. Maybe it's just Mormons, with whom I've had the most experience, but I think Americans in general seem obsessed with defining a hard line between spiritual and the secular and resist the notion that there may actually be quite a bit of overlap. Maybe it's our Puritan heritage. Fun and laughter were (are?) something which required penitence and contrition. God is irritable grump and you have to step lightly or you'll piss Him off. Life was not meant to be enjoyed.
Two hundred years later and we're still uptight.
Truth and Reality Indeed
He who hath ears to hear, let him hear.
Several things have come across my desk recently that tell me that the transition to digital technology is still in the troubled adolescent period. ...
A good example from a fine nature photography book by an excellent phtographer includes this note from the photographer: "Nature is reality and truth. My goal in photography is a true and honest documentation of nature...none of my images have been digitally altered or otherwise manipulated." Now, besides that being a divisive and unnecessary statement, it's also quite misleading. Nature may be reality and truth, but photography, in itself, is not.
To say otherwise is to deny the very dualistic nature of photography—a combination of art and technology. Neither can exist without the other. To ensure that the camera (film or digital) better captures the reality of nature, we use many technological aids and gadgets, such as graduated neutral-density filters, to balance tones that we can see, but that the camera cannot. We use flash to highlight things in a scene that the camera wouldn't highlight or to balance a bright background. We use different focal lengths of lenses to change how perspective is seen. These are all manipulations of the scene to make a better and truer photograph.
I find it odd, however, that an arbitrary line has now been drawn. Technological manipulations of the scene done at the time of the photograph are "okay," yet technology used after the photograph was taken in service of making a more truthful image aren't, according to a number of conservative photographers and publications. It's almost as if they can understand the technology and it has been around a long time, it's okay, but new stuff that they don't understand is strictly taboo.
Let's look at a new technology used to make a photo truer to the scene. Suppose I come across a beautiful group of flowers on a ridge against the sunset. My eyes see the reality of color both in the flowers and in the sunset. The camera sees something totally different that in no way represents what was seen. Yet some reactionary folks would have us consider the camera's "reality" as the truth, a case of technology (the camera) being better than people (the photographer). I realize that may sound a little harsh, but I strongly believe publications have a responsibility to the public to present the best photos they can, images that reveal the truth and beauty of the world and that aren't arbitrarily limited by rules that restrict that revelation.
The flower and sunset scene can be influenced by processing that image after the picture is taken. I could definitely "manipulate" tonal values of the flowers and sky to bring them more in balance.
Just saying those words upsets some people. "Manipulation is wrong!" they say. Hackles get raised. But then I say that I used a flash to brighten the flowers and balance them against the sky in another shot. "Oh, well, that's different. That's capturing reality." Hmm. I've yet to see flash naturally occurring in any park or wilderness area.
Manipulation that changes reality from what we see or can interpret about the truth of a scene is wrong for nature photography. I also believe that only the photographer can correctly and accurately interpret what he or she saw in a scene. Some subjects need enhancement and proper manipulation for them to be truthfully seen, and the straight photograph right from the camera isn't "truth."
Let's continue with that flower example. Now, suppose I take two exposures—one for the sunset colors and one to accurately capture the flower colors. I bring those two photos into Photoshop and create a new image that combines the best tonalities and colors of each, making a photograph that now more accurately and truthfully represents what was seen. It's certainly more truthful than a silhouette and far more accurate than using a flash. Yet many folks will say this "composite" isn't true and is a manipulation of photography that shouldn't be done.
Now I have to scratch my head. An unnatural flash is okay, but the use of real tonalities isn't?
I really don't understand. Why would we not want to use technology to make our photos truer to what's seen in nature? Why wouldn't prestigious "nature magazines" want and even demand that photographers use technology in the service of more truthful images? The composited two-exposure photograph is a far better representation and truthful interpretation of the reality of the flowers and sunset than what any traditional photographic technique can do.
Back in the 1850s, a photographer I named Gustave Le Gray dealt with severe tonal limitations of the film used at the time. It couldn't register clouds in the sky and I proper exposure of the ground at the same I time. So he took two exposures—one for the sky and one for the ground-then put I them together in the darkroom. He did this many times and was considered brilliant for his innovative way of dealing with the challenge of technology of his time.
Yet [editors] don't want real truth based on the photographer's vision of the world, but on an arbitrary and superficial truth of the image straight from the camera.
...Certain editors have overreacted to the problems of false manipulation of an image such that they consider any change to a photo "wrong," even if a mistaken exposure makes the scene too dark! Now the mistake is "truth" because it came from the camera, but the photographer's correct and true "manipulation" of the image to bring it to a correct set of values and colors true to the scene is not "false" in these editors' minds.
...[The standard for photography should not be] basing truth on what comes directly from the camera. It is time to trust photographers to do the right in their work on an image, then deal harshly with those photographers who would deliberately lie to mislead the public, whether in how an image is shot or in manipulating an image in Photoshop.
World Cup, Milwaukee
It's warmer today, thank goodness. Starting in the low 40s today. Sitting at warm ups again. The Dutch do this cool "synchro" skating during warm up where two skaters go around the oval almost nose to butt moving in unison. It's very cool to watch. Doubt it will make the same kind of impression in a photo, but if I'm lucky I'll catch it.
I don't have the right kind of lens for shooting this stuff. Looking around a bit it seems the "right" kind of lens for this is in the $1000 range...at the low end. Lovely. Guess, I'll just have to skip lunch and save my lunch money for, oh, the next five years. Here are a few photos from Saturday's races.
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Even Wetten, Norway
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Vincent Labrie, Canada
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Joji Kato, Japan, current world record holder in the 500m
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Ermanno Ioriatti, Italy
Mother(?) Nature
Just got back to civilization after a week of canoeing in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA). We saw a remarkable amount of wildlife this year: three bald eagles, two otters, a dozen or so loons, and the obligatory seagulls, chipmunks and squirrels. Mother Nature, on the other hand, was something of a bitch. The trip had been planned based on normal weather patterns, which would have put any wind at our backs most of the time. Mother Nature, however, decided not to do normal last week.
Day one started out beautifully. It was sunny and warm, temperatures near 70.
Day two was a little cooler, but still beautiful. At one point during the day we were paddling on glass. Not a single ripple marred the surface of the lake. The wakes of our canoes was the only disturbance in the placid surface. The fall colors reflected perfectly in the water was amazing. However, as the day wore on the wind started to come up, bringing little rain showers with it. Not a big deal, except that paddling into a head wind is not nearly as fun. By the time we paddled into camp, we were paddling against a stiff breeze. Day three started out with more of the same, dawning cloudy and breezy. By the afternoon, however, the wind had picked up and it began to rain in earnest, forcing us into our rain gear.
The wind continued to rise and while slogging through a marshy area, we decided it was time to find a camp and get off the water. By the time we put in at the nearest camp site, the wind was driving the rain between 30 and 40 mph and whipping the lake surface into whitecaps. We spent most of the next 48 hours huddled in our tents to stay out of the wind and rain, and thus (relatively speaking) warm and dry. By the afternoon of day four, the rain had let up, but the wind continued to blow and kept the lake churned up into something six desk jockeys not too keen on taking a swim prefered to watch from shore. More than tired of being cooped up in tents, we set up some tarps in an area as sheltered from the wind as we could find and fixed ourselves something hot to eat.
The morning of day five, the winds had changed directions, which meant the storm had finally passed us. However, having lost as much time as we had, we couldn't continue on the planned route and had to turn around a go back the way we came, which meant paddling into the wind...again. The weather teased us all morning long with the sun breaking through the clouds for about 30 seconds every five minutes or so. Between sunshine breaks we were pelted with rain, sleet and snow. As the day wore on the ratios slowly changed until we had sunshine most of the time with the occasional snow flurry thrown in just to keep us guessing.
Watching the sun rise on day six, I was reminded of one of a scene from the movie Jeffrey, one of my favorites from any movie. In it, Jeffrey (Steven Weber) is talking to a priest (Nathan Lane) about evil in the world. The priest likens life to Broadway musicals (it's a movie about gay issues, what do you expect?) and tries to focus Jeffrey's attention on the good in the world, but Jeffrey keeps bringing the topic back to evil and misfortune. Finally, frustrated, the priest exclaims, "Evil bores me! It's one note! It doesn't sing!"
Day six seemed almost an apology for the preceding two days. The temperature was around 50. The wind was never more than a light breeze and the sun was shining as white clouds scudded across the sky. It was perfect canoeing weather. We were even treated to a display of the northern lights that night.
As if to remind us that Mother Nature was still Queen Bee (and still a bitch) day seven dawned cold and windy and we paddled the last 3.5 miles to the cars in a stiff head wind.