Outside of your comfort zone - what would you like to try!

hoffy

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OK, we have the comfort zone thread…..so what is outside your comfort zone that you would really like to try?

For me, its models, in particular ‘Pin Up’ style photography. Of late, I have found myself seeking out the ‘Kustom Kulture’ and Hot Rod scene – maybe it’s a bit of a thing at the moment, but I really like the ‘look’.

Yes, I have done people photography in the past, but its been people I know and in their own environment. I would really like to be able to try working with a model in the styles above – my thing is I get a cold shiver thinking about having to talk and deal with someone in that scenario….

Oh well, maybe one day I’ll get the courage.
 

brian d

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Actually I would like to try Pin Up's too 1940's-50's style stuff but, people photography is not something that I feel I'm good at. Also like you I wouldn't evven begin to know how to approach someone about modeling for such photo's.
 

brian d

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brian d said:
Actually I would like to try Pin Up's too 1940's-50's style stuff but, people photography is not something that I feel I'm good at. Also like you I wouldn't evven begin to know how to approach someone about modeling for such photo's.
Click to expand...

See I got flustered just trying to type about it
 

ChristopherCoy

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Believe it or not, I'm trying to do 'artsy' stuff. Portraits are over rated and I'm SO tired of doing them.
 

removed account4

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sounds like fun christophercoy!
my fingers are crossed, but i am hoping to do it with
large format camera ( maybe a graflex slr ? maybe something bigger ) ..
 

waynecrider

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I think I'd like to try flying an ultralight plane and shooting from above.
 

robbalbrecht

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I'd love to do one of those 100 Strangers projects. Walking up to a random person on the street and asking them if I can take their picture terrifies me for some reason. I've done it before but I don't know what my deal with it is.
 
OP
OP

hoffy

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robbalbrecht said:
I'd love to do one of those 100 Strangers projects. Walking up to a random person on the street and asking them if I can take their picture terrifies me for some reason. I've done it before but I don't know what my deal with it is.
Click to expand...

I actually started doing it in Sept/Oct last year - I got 3 photos in and haven't gotten any further.
 

RalphLambrecht

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hi hoffy. i would gt startedby joining a workshop or a photographer wh o does this kind of thing, as far as finding models, just ask. the worst you can get is a 'no and a black eye. i got neither in 20 years of nude photography, just met great people.
 
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OP

hoffy

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Thanks Ralph. I have hinted very much to my wife that a perfect birthday present for me is a 2 day workshop with a local photographer - I hope she has heeded my request!
 

markbarendt

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stavrosk said:
What is so amazing about his portraits other than the people he photographed?
Click to expand...

His subjects expressions and poses for two.
 

TheTrailTog

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robbalbrecht said:
I'd love to do one of those 100 Strangers projects. Walking up to a random person on the street and asking them if I can take their picture terrifies me for some reason. I've done it before but I don't know what my deal with it is.
Click to expand...

+1... I've been wanting to do this for a while. I just moved to the city too, but haven't mustered up the cojones yet to start asking people
 

Thomas Bertilsson

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I'm challenged by photographing strangers. It's really hard for me to walk up to someone and ask to take their picture. I don't even know what I'm afraid of, as I'm not normally a very shy person.

That's a boundary I'm looking to push through.

To get really out of my comfort zone, perhaps go to Sturgis for one of the biker meetings there, and do a documentary. On film. That would be challenging to me. The hardest thing I know is to capture fleeting moments. Landscape, aerial, architecture, etc takes mostly time, dedication, and enough money to pull off. A fleeting moment never returns, so it becomes an exercise of reacting quickly and making very fast decisions. That, to me, is a lot more difficult, and to do that with a stranger even more so.
 

darkosaric

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What I would you like to try and what I am trying almost always lately: complex geometry in harmony together with people in the frame.

Safe zone is to make photo of one object, one person, one flower, one grave stone... but to combine many objects in harmony and in geometry - this is hard for me, many times I end up with 36 bad frames on film.
 

removed account4

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robbalbrecht said:
I'd love to do one of those 100 Strangers projects. Walking up to a random person on the street and asking them if I can take their picture terrifies me for some reason. I've done it before but I don't know what my deal with it is.
Click to expand...

it used to terrify me too, but after a while i used all that nervous energy to make better portraits.
eventually it lead to me making portraits for a newspaper, photographing everyone from supreme court chief justices
to chief sachems ...

stavrosk said:
What is so amazing about his portraits other than the people he photographed?
Click to expand...

hi stavrosk ..
my take on karsh might be a little different than others but ...
he transformed portrait photography from lots of light
to theatrical lighting ( rembrandt style lighting ) ..
he in some ways merged dutch painting and modern photography
because technically it wasn't possible before he was around.
films ( and plates ) were slow there had to be lots of light &c ...
his portraits really show more of personality/character of his subjects
than a deadpan-portrait, or a bathtub filled with milk.

but all that said, i can see why someone would look at them and not be impressed ...
( i only know the effort of what goes into portraits like that because i apprenticed with someone who did similar work
and for her it was nearly effortless work, probably like karsh )

john
 

jp498

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stavrosk said:
What is so amazing about his portraits other than the people he photographed?
Click to expand...

If you have the opportunity, see for yourself sometime. I knew of him, but was not a fan, till there was a karsh exhibit nearby last year, and my affinity for B&W photography drew me.

In all aspects, Karsh "had it together" to produce exceedingly masterful portraits on silver gelatin paper. He was stupid expensive in his day, but we've sort of lost appreciation for his aesthetic in the past two generations.

His work is far different than the pop-celebrity-fashion-photo culture that someone growing up in the 1980's or 1990's would imagine. More museum quality dutch painting inspired than rolling stone inspired.


Back to the original topic. I'm always up for challenges. And I like to excel at what I'm working on at that time. I'm still working on things that have lots of potential left to develop. I like to go beyond what other people have done, rather than strictly emulate something that's already been done, [before moving on to emulate again]. When I get done with those projects, I'd be up for trying some people photography with people I don't know quite so well.

What hasn't been mentioned, and is challenging, is trying techniques or processes outside of your comfort zone. If you've never done alt process variations, that's a good skill to develop that can expand what you see when you photograph; thinking about how the image will translate to various final mediums. Some photos that are kinda dull on silver can make a really special van dyke or cyanotype, and the inverse is true as well. The soft focus and/or old lens aesthetic is another good challenge. Going from crisp "safe" sharp realistic images such as in architecture or grand landscape, to blobs of light and dark and lenses that actually change focus when you stop down is getting outside of your comfort zone; sort of changing of religion from mainstream ansel adams to something more obscure and misunderstood.
 

Thomas Bertilsson

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stavrosk said:
What is so amazing about his portraits other than the people he photographed?
Click to expand...

What about his portraiture is not amazing?

Like Ralph, I'll keep trying too...
 

coigach

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Thomas Bertilsson said:
Landscape...takes mostly time, dedication, and enough money to pull off.
Click to expand...

3 good reasons why my own landscape photographs are not better...!

And, back to the thread. Polymer photogravure - I've always wanted to try this, and have just taken a brave pill, ignored the under-confident voice in my head and completed a course. Daunting but worth it. Am currently trying to master the basics, and really enjoying it. Have discovered that intaglio ink is a real b*gger to remove from hands though - think you must need the pee from a nervous beagle...
 
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stavrosk

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Yes, someone had to make the things that today seem simple, and I totaly respect that.

I said that however because someone said that he thinks that you are a good portrait photographer today if you reach this type of photoghraphy.
That is where I disagree.
 
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