Don’t compare him to Man Ray.
On a good day he was Man Ray from Wish.com.
I’m still looking for an example of an actual good Mortensen photo.
AA was a supreme darkroom worker and understood the technical aspects of photography better than anybody at this time; Wiliam Mortesen, on the other hand, was a true photographic artist. Everybody admires the skills of the former, but believes to really have the skills of the latter
Well, Greg, Ansel certainly wasn't any kind of real mountain climber like Sella or Washburn.
neither correct NOR correct..
Both had their own private techniques,, but both were using the newest techniques of the day... that 90% of the world CANNOT do without Photo Shop..
AA was using darkroom trickery to remove houses, power lines,, put the full moon over a national mountain that could never happen in real life..
Mortensen was using technique to turn photographs into art that LOOKED and tasted like drawings, sketches, and even etchings.. that wire mesh grid he devised,, was copied by AA.
AA is favored by those who think too much of themselves and have fear of the afterlife.
Mortensen is almost at the point of becoming a photographic version of heaven and hell, and why you dont want to be consorting with the devil.
Really now.....show us all how much you don't think of yourself and let us judge who we favor, it'll be entirely objective, I promise....a bold but ludicrous comment aimed at trying to shame anyone who favors AA over some other photographer, whoever that may be.AA is favored by those who think too much of themselves and have fear of the afterlife.
Got any examples of the removed houses?neither correct NOR correct..
Both had their own private techniques,, but both were using the newest techniques of the day... that 90% of the world CANNOT do without Photo Shop..
AA was using darkroom trickery to remove houses, power lines,, put the full moon over a national mountain that could never happen in real life..
Mortensen was using technique to turn photographs into art that LOOKED and tasted like drawings, sketches, and even etchings.. that wire mesh grid he devised,, was copied by AA.
AA is favored by those who think too much of themselves and have fear of the afterlife.
Mortensen is almost at the point of becoming a photographic version of heaven and hell, and why you dont want to be consorting with the devil.
neither correct NOR correct..
Both had their own private techniques,, but both were using the newest techniques of the day... that 90% of the world CANNOT do without Photo Shop..
AA was using darkroom trickery to remove houses, power lines,, put the full moon over a national mountain that could never happen in real life..
Mortensen was using technique to turn photographs into art that LOOKED and tasted like drawings, sketches, and even etchings.. that wire mesh grid he devised,, was copied by AA.
AA is favored by those who think too much of themselves and have fear of the afterlife.
Mortensen is almost at the point of becoming a photographic version of heaven and hell, and why you dont want to be consorting with the devil.
redbandit - AA wasn't even remotely up to speed with the "latest" and most sophisticated printing techniques. Heck, if you want Fauxtopshoppish tomfoolery, three little girls concocted an infamous composite print before the turn of the Century which fooled even Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of Sherlock Holmes detective series. Color press printing was around while AA was still in diapers, which was far more technically involved than anything he ever did. And as for creative liberty, look at Outerbridge, or the Surrealist movement before him, and how they printed. And then there's Stiegliz's mastery of multiple media, including gravure, all of it way more involved than anything Adams found personally necessary.
Why does everything on this forum need to gravitate towards ignorant extremes, one direction or another. AA was not the apogee of technique; but he did learn to master his own bookends of variables to obtain the best representation of his own sight and feeling with respect to what he saw. Relatively few of his Zonie clones did. It goes beyond mere technique; but technique was a critical tool in eloquently conveying it.
AA did post-blacken the sky in his famous Hernandez Moonrise shot not only for sake of a little more drama, but to disguise the many water-bath development streaks and blotches in the sky, which are more evident in those early prints prior to him selenium intensifying the negative. If there are now more houses and fences around Hernandez than in the original photo it just might be due to 70 years of difference in time, just like how any rural town is likely to enlarge. Ever think about that?
As far as his erase of LP on the hillside above Lone Pine in his famous sunrise shot there, it involved a literal eraser on the negative to reduce the density, and was for esthetic reasons. But the ruse is still evident if you look closely at the prints, and even in quality book reproduction. But that was hardly anything Photoshoppy. Even P.H. Emerson, who damned dodging and burning ("sundowning") as cheating, sometimes did the same kind of thing, removing annoying bright spots. But that's about the most egregious thing AA ever did. You want deceptive comps in famous documentary images? - study Eugene Smith instead.
redbandit - AA wasn't even remotely up to speed with the "latest" and most sophisticated printing techniques. Heck, if you want Fauxtopshoppish tomfoolery, three little girls concocted an infamous composite print before the turn of the Century which fooled even Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of Sherlock Holmes detective series. Color press printing was around while AA was still in diapers, which was far more technically involved than anything he ever did. And as for creative liberty, look at Outerbridge, or the Surrealist movement before him, and how they printed. And then there's Stiegliz's mastery of multiple media, including gravure, all of it way more involved than anything Adams found personally necessary.
Why does everything on this forum need to gravitate towards ignorant extremes, one direction or another. AA was not the apogee of technique; but he did learn to master his own bookends of variables to obtain the best representation of his own sight and feeling with respect to what he saw. Relatively few of his Zonie clones did. It goes beyond mere technique; but technique was a critical tool in eloquently conveying it.
AA did post-blacken the sky in his famous Hernandez Moonrise shot not only for sake of a little more drama, but to disguise the many water-bath development streaks and blotches in the sky, which are more evident in those early prints prior to him selenium intensifying the negative. If there are now more houses and fences around Hernandez than in the original photo it just might be due to 70 years of difference in time, just like how any rural town is likely to enlarge. Ever think about that?
As far as his erase of LP on the hillside above Lone Pine in his famous sunrise shot there, it involved a literal eraser on the negative to reduce the density, and was for esthetic reasons. But the ruse is still evident if you look closely at the prints, and even in quality book reproduction. But that was hardly anything Photoshoppy. Even P.H. Emerson, who damned dodging and burning ("sundowning") as cheating, sometimes did the same kind of thing, removing annoying bright spots. But that's about the most egregious thing AA ever did.
You want deceptive comps in famous documentary pictures? - study W. Eugene Smith instead. Or in famous landscapes? - look up how Vittoria sella dubbed in climbers on the Baltoro Glacier in Pakistan using a negative of climbers taken in the Alps, and did it so well and seamlessly, that nobody discovered that until the original Baltoro neg was found in recent years and studied up close. And all through the blue-sensitive film days of the 19th C, photographers would make separate exposures of clouds to dub into otherwise blank skies. I don't think Adams ever did that kind of thing. He would enhance clouds via contrast filters and pan film, just like nearly everyone now does.
I probably know that same mountain light better than anyone else on this forum, and understand how Adam's use of it, and of cloud formations, was never faked, in relation to my own impressions. If you had grown up there, and taken hundreds of backpack trips up in the high country with large format film gear yourself, just like I have, redbandit, I doubt you'd be making these silly allegations. Besides, there were often people with him, who could attest to his visual honesty, including the Moonrise shot at Hernandez. I've got my own spectacular moonrise from a different Western desert setting. So do many others. Get outside a little; it actually happens.
Why do you think Ansel Adams is better known than William Mortensen? Both have books on photographic aesthetics and techniques. Has “pure photography” won over Pictorialism?
... Only a fool tries to gild the lily.
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?