Fox Talbot Appreciation

Sirius Glass

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pentaxuser said:
Nothing wrong with our trees that a few small cuddly bears sitting in them couldn't cure

pentaxuser
Click to expand...

Personally I like the cuddy bears in Australia much better.
 

pentaxuser

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awty said:
Rupert would be no match for our cute lizards.

Click to expand...

It was Koalas I had in mind when I said cuddly bears. Rupert is like Ted i.e. a complete figment of the imagination Only Koalas fit the bill as real animals You can pick them off a tree like Mangoes and Bananas in "South Pacific" If my granddaughter of a few years back had been in Oz on a holiday we'd have never got her back on the plane to the U.K. until she was at least a teenager

pentaxuser
 

shaunphoto

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I joined this forum only recently, and this sort of thing has probably been pointed out elsewhere, and is hinted at up above.
I don't want to stir things up, or I may end up having to leave... but here goes;

This is NOT a print by Fox Talbot. This is a digital representation of a print by Fox Talbot. I imagine it is a copy from a book -
a scan? a photograph? a copy from another website?
The originator of this digital file has likely seen the print, or the book's facsimile, of the print on paper.

Maybe it is, if we're lucky, a copy from the original print. Made with expertly exposed and colour balanced fidelity? Or not, perhaps.

But you are now looking at it on YOUR screen... in your room, on your continent, on a high end calibrated Pro monitor, an iPad or a smartphone etc...
with settings you have set, or factory settings, on your own screen...

I don't want to be difficult, but it is just to point out how we react to 'photographs' often unthinkingly.

The image above does LOOK like the original, but it is NOT the original.
For many this is sufficiently like the original, for others this is nothing like the original. Ever seen a real daguerrotype?

However, for myself, I am very impressed with the image I see, yes the one above, - even though I know it is in pixels, and not the original in chemicals on paper.
And I have seen thousands, if not, tens of thousands actual trees, in my lifetime.


Why is that?
 

Arthurwg

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Alan Johnson said:
It maybe that Fox Talbot was quite oblivious to any artistic effect but that one year or so after its introduction he just took this picture of a tree in his garden in his investigation of the calotype process......
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I'm sure that's true. But he didn't need to consider the "artistic effect" because that came to him naturally. He had the right stuff, whatever that is. Plenty of people strive to create an artistic effect and fail miserably.
 

Don_ih

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shaunphoto said:
This is NOT a print by Fox Talbot. This is a digital representation of a print by Fox Talbot.
Click to expand...

Well, truthfully, everyone is aware of that and there isn't much reason to point it out. The fact is, such a "representation" is all that's available to the majority of people - it's certainly what's available for us here to talk about. If it grossly misrepresents the original, that's beyond the ability of anyone who has not seen the original to know or meaningfully comment on.
 
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cliveh

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For me, this is one of the best photographs of a tree I have ever seen: -



Oak Tree in Winter by William Henry Fox Talbot

Buy Oak Tree in Winter by William Henry Fox Talbot as fine art print. ✓ High-quality museum grade. ✓ Perfect reproduction
www.meisterdrucke.uk
 

Sirius Glass

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Unfortunately the URL displays a blank screen.
 

CMoore

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awty said:
Boring. If you cant give a tree some life and personality, you should just stick to people.
Click to expand...

Carefuuullllll.

Remember Poland 1939.
THAT tree is massing an entire army of trees right behind it
 

Taylor Nankervis

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It strikes me as bland and stark, as a passing snapshot in time, rather than a subject given consideration in technique or aesthetics. But, one must note this is counterbalanced by the historical, very experimental first-steps in photography of which Henry Fox Talbot was but one of many in the craft's early epoch, and the photography of static subjects such as trees, buildings, roads and people steadily refined over the next century, as knowledge of the camera and technique was wedded to the critical gaze of the photographer's conceptual eye — that place where the photograph is first planned out and envisioned.

We have HFT and others to thank for the fact today we are following his early pioneering footsteps and photographing subjects just like this.
 

MTGseattle

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If we jump forward to a current working photographer, here is in my opinion some of the best tree photography.

Interview: A Photographer’s Quest to Document the Oldest Trees Around the World

For over a decade, photographer Beth Moon has made it her mission to document the biggest, oldest, and rarest trees around the world.
mymodernmet.com

It's nice to have the historical context of the W.H.F.T "Oak in Winter" in the conversation. I know some of you are more well versed in the history of photography than I. Did any other pioneers of the art form take humble "tree portraits?"

Arguably, Beth Moon's work is not what I would call "humble" tree portraits. There is a lot of travel involved, and she prints Platinum/Palladium.
 

koraks

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MTGseattle said:
here is in my opinion some of the best tree photography.
Click to expand...

Compositionally, I can see what you mean, but the digital reproductions on that page are so appallingly bad that I find it hard to appreciate the photography. Her own website is marginally better, but also a mixed bag. Impressive photography (I think!), but the online presentation doesn't quite convince. Well, goes to show - prints are just overall nicer to look at.
 
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cliveh

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The last time I visited Laycock, that tree was still there. I believe it can be seen from the window on which Talbot made his first experiments. For those photographers who live near that location, it would make a fine winter project to try and make a print in homage to that image.
 

MattKing

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Is there a bench nearby .
One of my many, many, many photographs where trees are featured:

Memorial Bench - October 2024

A newly installed memorial bench facing toward one of my favorite sites in the North 40 Lands...
 

awty

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Is it good because of who took it and where it was taken, that doesn't necessarily effect everyone else the same way.
It's very English.
The trick is to make them universal and have their own life.
 
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cliveh

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awty said:
Is it good because of who took it and where it was taken, that doesn't necessarily effect everyone else the same way.
It's very English.
The trick is to make them universal and have their own life.
Click to expand...

I take it you are referring to the Fox Talbot image, or do you mean Matts? Why do you say it is very English? Please define this Englishness of the image in question.
 

MattKing

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