BBC Photography Series--The Genius of Photography (incl. international broadcasts)

unhinged · Nov 5, 2007

I don't think, if the book's anything to go by, that you'll get much Capa. The book by the way is excellent. I've "learned" more about photographic history and philosophy from that book than from anywhere else (though to be fair I've never gone looking for that sort of thing previously). Capa gets a mention in the book and there's a double page spread of his falling soldier but not a lot more. I've not watched telly for a couple of months so I can't compare the series to the book so far so I could be wrong.

Andy K · Nov 5, 2007

Another terrific installment.

What is REALLY beginning to piss me off though, is when I want to read the credits at the end of the programme, they bloody reduce them to a tiny, unreadable box in the corner of the screen so they can advertise other programmes. This is now common on most channels and is seriously annoying.

TheFlyingCamera · Nov 5, 2007

Steve Roberts said:
When the first programme ended with talk of WW1 it looked as if prog 2 would take up the story from there but disappointingly for me, it didn't. There was the inevitable ration of over-indulgence and up-own-backside stuff (just who was that bloke who turns photographs upside down to see what the photographer "must have been seeing"???) but the highlight of the hour for me was Walker Evans. I recall from somewhere that the migrant mother as usually seen is actually cleverly retouched for added effect. (Was the woman's left hand touched out? I'm sure someone here will know).

I'm hoping for some more war photography - surely Capa will warrant a sizeable section - but in four hours they're never going to cover everything in depth.

Steve

Actually, the migrant mother is Dorothea Lange, not Walker Evans. And yes, her hand is retouched out in the prints. I saw something about that a year or two ago, I think in a PBS documentary about photography, and the hand is still there in the negative - I think they showed a print made with the hand still in for comparison.

walter23 · Nov 5, 2007

markbb said:
I doubt if any yanks will watch this, the idea of 60 minutes of uninterrupted TV will too much to handle.

What, no commercials you mean?

That sucks. I only watch TV for my favorite commercials and find the program to be an unnecessary distraction. In fact I'd pay good money for a sexy-commercials-only TV station.

pentaxuser · Nov 5, 2007

TheFlyingCamera said:
Actually, the migrant mother is Dorothea Lange, not Walker Evans. .

Thanks. It just goes to show how easy it is to pick things up wrongly. Very little was said about Dorothea Lange but a lot about Walker Evans and his disillusionment with what the Farm Security Administration wanted him to do. It seems that he felt that he was required to sacrifice truth for the sake of promotion and marketing. They then show the famous shot and I had linked the two.

pentaxuser

Bob F. · Nov 5, 2007

They discussed Evans' Allie Mae Burroughs photo and some others taken at the time at some length as well as Lange's "Migrant Mother" somewhat more briefly.

Cheers, Bob.

Andy K · Nov 10, 2007

This week's was excellent once again. WW2 soldier/photographer Tony Vaccaro describing how he developed rolls of 35mm, using chemicals scavenged from a bombed out photography store, in four soldier's helmets, was priceless!

Allen Friday · Nov 11, 2007

Genius of Photography--US Broadcast

I was surfing in Tivo land and notice that the six part series will be broad cast in the US starting 11/19 on Ovation TV. The first three episodes will be broadcast starting at 7:00 pm CST on
Ovation. The second three follow on 11/20. Mulitiple rebroadcasts follow through 11/23.

Ovation will also broadcast 1. "Close Up: Photographers at work" starting on 11/18 ("Four photographers discuss the impact their work has had on their lives and culture"). 2. "Portrait of a Photographer, David LaChapelle" starting 11/18. 3. "Nobody here but me: Cindy Sherman", starting 11/18.

JHannon · Nov 11, 2007

Allen, thanks for the information. I have been reading about this series in the other thread and will be watching.

--John

Drew B. · Nov 11, 2007

what the heck is Ovation? Isn't that a guitar?? Anyway, I spoke with my local PBS station a week or so ago and they said they will look into running it.

JHannon · Nov 11, 2007

Drew B. said:
what the heck is Ovation? Isn't that a guitar?? Anyway, I spoke with my local PBS station a week or so ago and they said they will look into running it.

If you have cable TV, Ovation is carried by Verizon Fios. It may also be on Comcast.

JHannon · Nov 12, 2007

Here is the schedule on Ovation TV.
http://www.ovationtv.com/film/ProgramDetail.aspx?id=471&genre=3&subgenre=3

I will have to watch this channel more often, lots of Photography stuff.

Steve Roberts · Nov 12, 2007

Andy K said:
This week's was excellent once again. WW2 soldier/photographer Tony Vaccaro describing how he developed rolls of 35mm, using chemicals scavenged from a bombed out photography store, in four soldier's helmets, was priceless!

I found it the best one yet by a long way. In the section you mention, Vaccaro described how he did the film processing by see-sawing it (correct me if I'm wrong here) outdoors on a moonless night. Now even a moonless night gets to look quite bright to the human eye after a while, so I wonder what effective ASA was the film? Must have been pretty slow not to have been fogged during, say, ten minutes processing time. Clearly it worked well, though. Loved his story about the "official" army photographers like him being expected to use large format cameras (which he cheerfully ignored).

Steve

Andy K · Nov 12, 2007

Don't forget he was in bombed out Europe. No street lights, no light pollution. I have experienced similar in central rural Wales (between Lampeter and Tregaron). On a moonless night it's pitch black and you really cannot see anything. Your eyes don't acclimatise either.

Steve Roberts · Nov 13, 2007

Andy K said:
Don't forget he was in bombed out Europe. No street lights, no light pollution. I have experienced similar in central rural Wales (between Lampeter and Tregaron). On a moonless night it's pitch black and you really cannot see anything. Your eyes don't acclimatise either.

That's probably it, Andy, and what lights hadn't been bombed were probably switched off for blackout restrictions. (Thoughts of ARP Warden Hodges:"Put that bloody light out!")

Steve

pentaxuser · Nov 13, 2007

Spot on Andy. Nearly all of us have forgotten how dark, dark nights once were due to light pollution almost everywhere nowadays. Tony Vaccaro's experience and success puts some of our worries about absolute processing accuracy into context.

I thought he had aged remarkably well for someone who must now be 80 at least. It made no mention of how long he subsequently spent in darkrooms with chemicals after the war but if it was most of his working life then I think we can cease to worry about darkroom chemical effects.

pentaxuser

hal9000 · Nov 13, 2007

copy of this?

I would love to get a copy of this as it has not been broadcast in Germany. I scoured the BBC site but alas to no avail. Does anyone have any hints as to where I might obtain/order/download these broadcasts?

RIchardn · Nov 16, 2007

I thought this weeks episode concentrating on street photography was god but not quite up to the standard of the previous ones (maybe it's just me not being as interested in the subject matter) However what was good was the short 30 min programme that followed about James Ravillious and his wonderful photographs of North Devon.

Steve Roberts · Nov 16, 2007

RIchardn said:
I thought this weeks episode concentrating on street photography was god but not quite up to the standard of the previous ones (maybe it's just me not being as interested in the subject matter) However what was good was the short 30 min programme that followed about James Ravillious and his wonderful photographs of North Devon.

Perhaps it's partly that, like you, street photography doesn't particularly inspire me, but I will admit to having fallen asleep for about twenty minutes of this one, so couldn't comment on a large chunk of it. It was a surprise to me to learn that it's a six-parter, as I'm sure I heard it advertised as being only four.
As you say, the following programme more than made up for it, as per my other post.

Steve

Andy K · Nov 16, 2007

hal9000 said:
I would love to get a copy of this as it has not been broadcast in Germany. I scoured the BBC site but alas to no avail. Does anyone have any hints as to where I might obtain/order/download these broadcasts?

There is a book to accompany the series, but as yet there is no DVD.

Removed Account · Nov 20, 2007

In part IV they show a photograph of a street scene where the only people you see are a man and a shoeshine boy, because the others are moving too fast. They claimed that the photo was made by Louis Daguerre, but I have always been under the impression that it was a photograph by Nicephore Niepce. Does anybody know for certain?

- Justin

Bob F. · Nov 20, 2007

cafeharrar said:
In part IV they show a photograph of a street scene where the only people you see are a man and a shoeshine boy, because the others are moving too fast. They claimed that the photo was made by Louis Daguerre, but I have always been under the impression that it was a photograph by Nicephore Niepce. Does anybody know for certain?

- Justin

This one? http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Boulevard_du_Temple.jpg

Removed Account · Nov 20, 2007

That's the one! It also is credited to Louis Daguerre... maybe the book I was reading was wrong.

- Justin

Allen Friday · Nov 21, 2007

Nicephore Niepce died in 1833, the photo was supposedly taken in 1838 or 1839.

celluloidpropaganda · Nov 22, 2007

Probably too late for many Americans to see this post, but OvationTV (cable/satellite channel - 274 on DirecTV) is running the entire series tonight, up until 2am

Don't know if they'll be spreading the episodes out and re-airing.

BBC Photography Series--The Genius of Photography (incl. international broadcasts)

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