Nick Brandt does NOT add animals

cdowell · Jan 13, 2010

nickbran said:
Hi Shaggysk8, cdowell
Re the reason for my workflow : ... For the first time, I saw details in the shadows on the digital prints that I could never have gotten otherwise....

I saw a show in 2004 celebrating the 100 anniversary of the birth of Walker Evans. Scans of negatives had allowed new interpretations of familiar images with shadow detail never seen before. (Dead Link Removed)

Some people loved seeing these large prints and seeing things and people in the shadows that were never visible before. Others, I'm sure, thought it was a sacrilege.

Here's what the curator of the Evans estate said:

"Evans was intrigued by any technology that might expand his vision. This exhibition is a digital translation of his work, made with respect and consideration for his own rendering of these images. Coupling digital files with ink jet printing opens the door to both brilliance and mischief. In the proper hands, it is a medium that gives greater clarity and subtlety to familiar pictures."

Thanks again, Nick, for the information. It's very welcome. --Clifton

Richard Wasserman · Jan 13, 2010

Nick,

Any chance your platinum prints will be traveling to Chicago (or reasonably close) in the near future? I would love to see them. I have seen large platinum prints done by Salto and they were breathtaking.

nickbran · Jan 13, 2010

Richard Wasserman said:
Nick,

Any chance your platinum prints will be traveling to Chicago (or reasonably close) in the near future? I would love to see them. I have seen large platinum prints done by Salto and they were breathtaking.

I think photo-eye are going to Art Chicago. If they are, I'll try and remember to ask them to take a couple of the platinums with them.

Tom Kershaw · Jan 13, 2010

haris said:
But, in general, photographers don't reveal how they get particular look of their photographs.
.

Not so sure about this; one immediate example that springs to mind in addition to the canonical example of Ansel Adams would be Bruce Barnbaum's 'Art of Photography' book, which very much details his particular approach to photography from both a theoretical perspective and the mechanics of particular techniques.

Tom

PVia · Jan 13, 2010

keithwms said:
Funny you mention that

If an artist doesn't fess up about his/her methods then inevitably some geek will figure it out and post it on the web :rolleyes:

The thing is even if Nick or any artist did reveal their secrets, no one would be able to come up with the same feel to their photographs. It resides in the artist, period.

A technique does not equal vision.

haris · Jan 13, 2010

Tom Kershaw said:
Not so sure about this; one immediate example that springs to mind in addition to the canonical example of Ansel Adams would be Bruce Barnbaum's 'Art of Photography' book, which very much details his particular approach to photography from both a theoretical perspective and the mechanics of particular techniques.

Tom

That is why "in general" and not "absolutely" or "virtually"

doughowk · Jan 13, 2010

One of the early apostles of the Internet community now says:

that the mantras of open culture and information wants to be free have produced a destructive new social contract.
The basic idea of this contract, he writes, is that authors, journalists, musicians and artists are encouraged to treat the fruits of their intellects and imaginations as fragments to be given without pay to the hive mind. Reciprocity takes the form of self-promotion. Culture is to become precisely nothing but advertising.

see NT times Book Review for source
Buy a book or pay for a workshop if you want to know how someone does something; but don't expect all information, etc. to be free. Just my 2 cents.

phritz phantom · Jan 13, 2010

incidentally i just saw an announcement for the (new?- sorry, i missed the title. but i was from Knesebeck verlag) book on german tv. in the art news show "kulturzeit".
pictures are looking great!

keithwms · Jan 13, 2010

PVia said:
The thing is even if Nick or any artist did reveal their secrets, no one would be able to come up with the same feel to their photographs. It resides in the artist, period.

A technique does not equal vision.

Oh, I agree.

I do not think anyone is obligated to reveal his/her methods. However, as a teacher I keep no secrets: if somebody asks me something I tell the whole story, and I am always happy to show people firsthand. At the same time I do not flaw anyone for not adhering to that principle! For one thing it would be financially detrimental for some people.

We have to bear in mind that the A in APUG does limit the current discussion though: obviously if part of the workflow is a non-analogue method, then many will feel that it is a topic for another site e.g. hybridphoto. Just as matter of principle I will restate, for what it's worth, I flaw no-one for their methods. One has to do whatever the artistic vision asks you to do, period. It's just that we emphasize the analogue here

Marco B · Jan 13, 2010

Is Drukkerij Salto still alive?

nickbran said:
The platinums are made at Salto in Belgium - who are brilliant. They create three giant contact negs on an Imagesetter- one for highlights, one for mids, one for shadows - and that's what gets used for the printing.

Eh, Nick. Your remarks about Salto just made me curious because I hadn't ever heard of them before. Trying to look it up on the internet, turned up not a lot to say the least. They don't seem to have a website (anymore?), and I could only find a reference to their former location being sold in 2006:

http://www.reckheim.com/projecten/verkocht/fase-1--salto/

So, are they still alive and where to contact them?

Marco

Marco B · Jan 13, 2010

OK, just found another reference to Salto and his founder Georges Charlier here in a note dated from 2008, but that still makes me wonder where the company is located now, and why they don't even seem to have a simple website up with contact info...:

http://www.rolanddg.be/Applications/Testimonial/Georges Charlier/

Richard Wasserman · Jan 13, 2010

nickbran said:
I think photo-eye are going to Art Chicago. If they are, I'll try and remember to ask them to take a couple of the platinums with them.

Thank you, I'll be there!

nickbran · Jan 13, 2010

Marco B said:
OK, just found another reference to Salto and his founder Georges Charlier here in a note dated from 2008, but that still makes me wonder where the company is located now, and why they don't even seem to have a simple website up with contact info...:

http://www.rolanddg.be/Applications/Testimonial/Georges Charlier/

Hi Marco
Georges is very stubborn and doesn't like the idea of self-promotion, to the degree that he took down his website a while back.
They also do all of George Tice's Platinums, and have been responsible for the best printed book I've ever seen - lodima press' Edward Weston's Lifework.
I tried some of the best platinum printers in America and I thought that salto's work outdid them.

cdowell · Jan 13, 2010

Well, I'll risk going off topic as far as the technical discussion is concerned to say that I just enjoyed an hour and a lovely glass of wine while flipping through my new copy of "On This Earth." It's a beautiful book, very moving and a complete pleasure to view. That's about as much as I dare ask from a photography book, really. I'll look more closely at what I can learn from the photos next time through, but taking the book on its own terms right out of the gate, it's excellent.

nick mulder · Jan 13, 2010

nickbran said:
The effect you get with tilt/shift lenses cannot be simulated in any kind of post-work - not in the darkroom, not in Photoshop.... I really don't want to elaborate more than that - it's just one method I want to keep to myself.

Good good about keeping it to yourself - I'd probably do the same, I can always ask huh

But I disagree about the tilt/shift effects, sure they wont be exactly the same as doing it on the camera - but there are ways to to trick tilt effects both in darkroom and photoshop ... In the darkroom you just tilt the paper or the lens - as for PS just search google for 'tilt effect' or similar (as sad as it is to say it is effective, for the moment at least until we 'the public' dissociate low DOF/tilt trickery with macro and correspondingly lose that ooh-ahh factor)...

Anyways, unsure why it didn't occur to me earlier but this is one way to get the appearance of multiple planes of focus - which is not the reality of it, probably done would have to be done with split diopters and/or the film itself being non-planar.

As for shift that is just a redistribution of the data across the frame which can be done easily in PS, you just have to shoot a bit wider, crop and expect a resolution drop. As for the darkroom never done it but reckon by the same methods as you would in the field it can be achieved, visualize that the paper is now the film and the neg is the subject and away you go (?)

uh huh, yes, I think I've just answered my own question - so you might be asking why I'm chirping in in the first place - I guess, sometimes you gotta open your mouth in order to hear :rolleyes:

nickbran · Jan 13, 2010

Hi Nick M.
No, a tilt/shift effect done in the darkroom or in photoshop can never simulate the effect in camera because at that stage you are limited by a pre-recorded two dimensional image all on the same plane. If nothing else, you'll be knocking all your grain out of focus, and you'll be limited by what you can do with the tilt of the paper. And as for doing it in Photoshop, all the versions I've seen look awful, to be honest.
Go to my website, and into A Shadow Falls 2005-2007 folder, and look at Lion Before Storm II - Sitting Profile and Baboons in Profile. I defy you to create that effect to satisfaction without doing it in camera. (You need to see the prints large to see how complex the shifting focus is through the focal planes.)

Hi Clifton
Glad you liked the visuals accompanying the wine. Please do buy A Shadow Falls when it's out again in May- it really is superior. In my opinion of course....

nick mulder · Jan 14, 2010

nickbran said:
Hi Nick M.
No, a tilt/shift effect done in the darkroom or in photoshop can never simulate the effect in camera because at that stage you are limited by a pre-recorded two dimensional image all on the same plane. If nothing else, you'll be knocking all your grain out of focus, and you'll be limited by what you can do with the tilt of the paper. And as for doing it in Photoshop, all the versions I've seen look awful, to be honest.

I'm aware of the limitations with tilt in the darkroom (but not shift) but I'm talking about appearances, most of the people buying your book have not the faintest idea about what we're talking about. The sad part is and is a part of my point, is that an amount of them might just assume it was done by a computer and probably see that as a 'buying' point anyway :rolleyes:

Anyway, small digression - so: agreed and agreed (especially with respect to PS)

I used a helpful amount of disclaimer and italics in my post in an attempt to make it clear that this was understood

The images you mention - in camera - ok, I have noted that you mention 'focal planes' plural - ok, so something like a combo including at least one or more of: split diopters, vaseline type carry-on, broken lenses/filters, homebuilt lensbaby type constructions and the rest of the myriad ways to degrade an image into dreamscape and wonderblunder. However, I don't understand how I'm meant to go about being defied or not - its your image, you're not spilling your technique so er... yeh !

(but they certainly are profound, if not simply in terms of technicality but in mood and what not)

Chestnut alert: "There's no accounting for taste"

nickbran · Jan 14, 2010

Hi Nick M.
yes, you did use many disclaimers and italics to qualify. Duly noted! Re me mentioning "focal planes" plural, take no heed of that in terms of any significance/consequence - I merely mean, say, a focal plane of 6 inches, 12 inches, etc etc. PS I don't use vaseline or any smear-on substance/ingredient. The lenses/filters are clean.

nick mulder · Jan 14, 2010

er... looks like we have a different understanding of focal plane.

Anyways, I'll stop with the pedantics and get down to some photography, seems to be the thing to do in becoming a successful photographer - off to Liberia in March with a 4x5, not much time for photography but I mentally framed up some stuff last time I was there so hopefully the shots will still be intact and I'll be able to get it. Not animals, not landscape - so I wont be able to step up to your challenge, another day though !

thanks for replying personally - APUG, I'm learning every day

nickbran · Jan 14, 2010

nick mulder said:
looks like we have a different understanding of focal plane.

Your use was correct. I was using it in the context of planes of focal distance from the camera - probably something I made up, but I know what I meant even if no-one else did....

nick mulder · Jan 14, 2010

Its occurred to me just now that pictorialism and obscurantism(in pyjamas) are close cousins

sdivot · Jan 14, 2010

You guys are giving me a headache.
Excellent work, Nick

Steve

Sobriquet · Jan 31, 2011

Platinum prints vs emulation

Marco B said:
Eh, Nick. Your remarks about Salto just made me curious because I hadn't ever heard of them before. Trying to look it up on the internet, turned up not a lot to say the least. They don't seem to have a website (anymore?), and I could only find a reference to their former location being sold in 2006:

So, are they still alive and where to contact them?

Marco

To the best of my knowledge Salto Drukkereij was using offset printing to emulate platinum prints. To enhance the tonal range of bw/ sepia images, printers often use additional colours to enhance contrast and tonal range. If done properly, offset can deliver results that can look even more spectacular than continuous tone images. This is why many mistake such output for large format platinum prints.

ann · Jan 31, 2011

this is an old thread

mpylkko · May 20, 2015

I'm sorry of digging this old thread up, and that being said I admire the work Nick has done and look forward for seeing the whole trilogy in Fotografiska in Stockholm this summer.

Not sure if Nick reads this forum anymore, but if there'd be anyone else to answer my question I'd be happy. Nick has stated many times that he can get better tones with Photoshop from the negatives. For what I've understood he uses ND-filters and exposes for the sky. Then he digs the underexposed tones in Photoshop. I've read he uses Nikon Scan 9000. I have a Epson V700 and I bet it's nothing as close to the Nikon, but I still can't think I could get anything useful out of the scans if I had to Photoshop them and print in large. My question is, what kind of files are the raw files from the scanner from where this kind of method can be used for high-end prints?

Nick Brandt does NOT add animals

haris

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