3 November 2009, late evening
The 4th class in my Figurative Photography Class was the first class where we photographed the nude body. I found the experience quite surreal. Normally the people you interact with are clothed. Having a conversation with a naked person is odd. Asking them to pose this way or that way is all the more strange.
The models were regulars at the AGO. It seemed like most of my class members had taken other gallery courses at the AGO, so they had already worked with nude models before. (A few even knew the models in question.) We were supposed to have a male and female model to work with, but the sculpture class lost their model so our female mode left to help them out. The male model called up his friend, another AGO regular, and so a half hour or so into the class we had two male models to work with, Ab and Flip. Being regulars, they were quite comfortable getting naked and contorting their body. They were probably far more comfortable with the situation than the people in my class.
I found that I would get wrapped up in the way the models were posed and forget where the shadows are falling on their bodies. Another issue is that the schlong is a very awkward appendage: it’s hard to place in a photograph. More so, I think it’s hard to photograph a dude’s junk and not have it be vulgar. I’m not sure what I can say about nude photography. I found it hard to take a meaningful photo. There are a few shots I thought were standout, but for the most part I felt like I was just taking pictures of naked people. Hopefully the next time we take pictures i’ll have a better idea of what I want to photograph.
A few NSFW images from the night are up on Flickr.
[6] Photography | Advanced Figurative Photography Class
2 November 2009, early morning
This is pretty neat: the city of Toronto is releasing a bunch of the data and information they collect online, via the portal toronto.ca/open. There is a companion site, dataTO.org They look to be following the lead of the US government, who recently created DATA.gov not too long ago. This stuff is all generated using tax payer money, so I think it makes sense that the data be available to the public. You can grab the entire TTC schedule as a series of text files now. There is a real time XML feed of events and festivals taking place in the city. This address validator web service looks like it could be used to do a lot of interesting things. I’ll be curious to see what sorts of things people start creating with the data released so far, and what other datasets the city plans to release. There isn’t much online right now, but it seems like a good start.
[3] Toronto | Technology
29 October 2009, mid-morning
Flickr is often looked on disparagingly by the more established photographic community. This is understandable. There are 4 billion photographs on Flickr, and for the most part they are pretty shitty. If you browse the Explore feature of Flickr, you’ll see photo after photo of HDR scenes, flowers, stupid shots with lots of “bokeh”, and other stupidness. I wasn’t sure what you would call this aesthetic till I read the following: the main thing that makes Flickr unattractive is that it is dominated by ad-educated aesthetic, by which I mean, sleek, surface-based, and impressionable with little beyond that point. In case you get the wrong idea, hyperallergic labs is a fan of Flickr. He goes on to say, “I am an art critic in NY and I use Flickr ALL THE TIME, if I find something interesting, I write about it.”
I’ve seen Flickr come up in two discussions on other photography sites recently. Burn Magazine published a photo essay edited by Rafal Pruszynski featuring photographs came from the Flickr group La Familia Abrazada. The group consists of family and vernacular photography. The photographs are usually pretty damn good. Some of the contributors to Burn Magazine and the regulars who comment at the site were offended a set of images from Flickr were featured on Burn. Flickr is for your mom and douche-bags with 5Ds, while Burn is for serious-ass photographers pursuing their art! Things were fairly obnoxious and heated in one of Burn’s forum threads. The discussion is a bit disappointing because it seems to focus on where the photographs came from rather than the photographs themselves.
A few days later Jorg Colberg wrote a follow up to a piece by Jin from Shooting Wife Open. Colberg’s article, particularly its conclusion, offended Bryan Formhals of La Pura Vida, who responded himself. This sparks some discussion on Flickr itself at HCSP. Colberg posts yet again, complaining that people on the Internet don’t know how to debate, and are jerk-asses. Perhaps. I think the thing that riles people up with Colberg’s initial post is that it’s incredibly dismissive. He seems to argue that Flickr is useful for finding photos you can use to make real art out of. And that’s it. He completely glosses over the fact there is real talent on Flickr itself. I would argue that not appreciating the Behemoth that is Flickr suggests you’re a bit out of touch.
So as I said at the start of this post, there are 4 billion fucking photos on Flickr. It is the height of arrogance to suggest in that mess of images there aren’t a substantial number of incredible photos. It’s probably not unreasonable at all to argue there are more absolutely incredible photos on Flickr than there are anywhere else on the Internet. I’m not going to argue that though, I wouldn’t know where to start.
[7] Photography
25 October 2009, evening time
he third figurative photography class I attended was split, more or less, into three sections. We started the class with an overview of nude photography. As with the class on portraiture, we more or less covered the history of nude photography from the advent of photography to the 70s or so. (I believe we are covering more contemporary nude photography in an another class.) As with the previous class, there were a few names I recognized, and plenty I did not.
I haven’t really sat down and looked at a lot of nude photography, so it’s interesting to see how different people approach the subject, and how it has changed over time. The very early nudes seem to have a lot in common with classic sculptures of the body, or paintings. This is to be expected to some extent. This is also probably due to the nature of cameras at the time. They were large and cumbersome, and the exposures were quite long. Most of the photographs we saw from the early part of the century were of full body nudes. As cameras get smaller, and film more straightforward to process and develop, you start to see more interesting takes on the subject. Surrealists like Man Ray were doing pretty interesting things with the nude body. Other photographers whose work I thought was quite good include Peter Hujar,
Lee Friedlander, and Bill Brandt.
The second part of the class was reviewing each others work. Everyone presented 3 photos from the previous week’s class (Stacey, Dave), 2 portraits they took outside of class (Shima), and one self portrait. It was interesting seeing what everyone decided to photograph, and how they lit their subjects.
Finally we went up to the fifth floor of the AGO to check out the Beautiful Fictions exhibit currently taking place. I ended up going to the AGO again today to check it out once more. It’s a really cool collection of contemporary photography. There is a lot to see, and a good variety of images, so it’s well worth the trip to the gallery.
Next week we are working with nude models. That should be an experience.
Photography | Advanced Figurative Photography Class
20 October 2009, lunch time
For some reason Apple launched a whole lot of products today, and is doing so fairly quietly as far as Apple goes. Of note is their new mouse, the Magic Mouse. It’s a mouse that supports multi-touch input. It looks pretty slick, but I’ve been burned by Apple and their shockingly shitty mice before. Apple also released new iMacs, a new unibody plastic Macbook with a rubber bottom, and new Mac Minis. (The Mac Mini Snow Leopard Server seems particularly cool.) I sort of want the giant iMac, but it doesn’t seem like something I can justify buying. Also, they are still selling them with a glossy screen, which I can’t stand.
Update: There are also new Airport Extreme routers, and a new remote control. I guess they are getting geared up for Christmas.
[1] Apple Computers
19 October 2009, mid-morning
I’ve been using (playing?) Foursquare for a few days now. It’s a simple enough idea, and it’s well executed: users can use the site (or mobile application) to let their friends know where they are, and what they are up to. The idea is that your friends could discover you’re nearby and come meet up. Similarly, you could learn your friends are out and join them. You don’t need to publish all your check-ins, so you can use the site privately. You can also push your check-ins out on to twitter, so people who aren’t using Foursquare can still see where you are.
There are other applications and services that do this. (BrightKite is the first that comes to mind, and you can certainly put this information out there using Twitter.) What makes Foursquare interesting is that to encourage people to use the service by setting itself up like a game. You get points for: telling your friends where you are; going to multiple places in a night; going to new places; going to the same place several times; etc. You are also awarded boyscout-like badges for completing various tasks. Finally, if you go to the same place enough times, you will be declared the mayor of that place. These points and titles are more or less meaningless, but if you’ve spent any amount of time online you’ll know that people still love to collect meaningless things. (Karma on Reddit and Slashdot is the first thing that comes to mind.) Some people have labelled this sort of thing prescriptive social software. Foursquare is encouraging a certain sort of behaviour from its users.
The NYT recently ran an article on the service, which touches on some of the ways it encourages people to get out and see the city, meet up with friends, etc. It also looks at possible ways the service could make money. Businesses might want to encourage people fight for their mayorship since it encourages more people to visit them. Similarly, businesses might want to add badges to the game that encourage users to come visit them. There seem to be plenty of ways to monetize something like this.
As with most things on the Internet, the site is probably more useful when you know a bunch of people using it.
Technology
16 October 2009, mid-morning
I attended my second Figurative Photography class yesterday. This class was focused on portraiture. The first hour or so was spent on a brief overview of portraiture from the last 100 years or so, looking at some important or interesting figures. Some names I recognized, like Yousuf Karsh or Richard Avedon. Others were new to me, like Mike Disfarmer. We looked at all sorts of photographs, from Karen Finley covered in chocolate to Anne Noggle’s self portraits. My favourite shot of the night was a photograph of Arthur Miller by Bresson.
The rest of the class was spent taking portraits. The class was split in two, with each group working independently. We each took turns modelling for the other members in our group. One person was supposed to be in charge lighting and direction, with this role alternating as we cycled through models. In practice I felt we were all cool with deciding what to do together. This was the first time I had taken photos so formally, using tungsten lights and other junk to light a subject. I regret not trying this stuff out sooner. You have so much control over the image when you can control all the lighting. I was shooting with my Rebel, and with my Leica. You can see some photos from the night on Flickr.
In the next class we are supposed to review each others work, and then begin a look at nude photography. The following week we photograph nudes.
[2] Photography | Advanced Figurative Photography Class
15 October 2009, early morning
I was interviewed yesterday about this blog and Blansdowne by Redmond Entwistle for a video installation project he is doing for Gallery TPW. It was a strange experience being interviewed about the area, since I don’t think my website or my opinion are particularly important. I also haven’t lived here that long. I suppose the total dearth of people blogging about the area is what elevates this blog to a position of authority it probably doesn’t deserve. The video he was working on sounds like it’ll be interesting, so if you’re in the city you should go check it out. The opening is this Saturday.
Life | Bloor and Lansdowne
8 October 2009, late at night
Today was my first class of Advanced Figurative Photography. The AGO offers studio courses, and this one sounded interesting. I like photographing people.
Today’s class was a light introduction to things. We looked at work from past students. We looked at some of the teachers own work. We looked at a slide show on how the human body has been portrayed in the past: how we might classify different sorts of images. Finally we ended the class with a brief discussion on lighting.
The take away from all this, which I didn’t really pick up on when I read the course description, is that a big part of Figurative Photography is taking pictures of naked people. The course description made it sound like this was one aspect of the course, but it’s clear from the first class that this is probably the primary focus of the course, and this topic in general. I suppose I should have known that. We looked at a lot of really great nudes during the class. (And the work our teacher showed were his own nude self portraits.)
I think this course will be an interesting experience. I quite enjoyed the first class.
[3] Photography | Advanced Figurative Photography Class
5 October 2009, early morning
Nuit Blanche was a bit of a bust this year. In previous years my friends and I have usually checked out the area around Yorkville, U of T and the AGO. There is usually a pretty big concentration of exhibits to see. The problem is that those areas are usually jammed full of people. This year we decided to check out Queen West, which is the 3rd zone for art. It’s a bit out of the way, so I thought it would be less packed. This was foolish on my part. Queen West was also shockingly boring. There really wasn’t much happening. We saw them put the ants back on the Cameron House. We saw some nude life drawing class thing at Coupe Bizarre. There was a lite brite installation in Trinity Bellwoods. We saw the hydrophone, again. I had a drink with Matt and my brother at the Gladstone, which was nice. Though the areas closer to the core are more packed, that’s really where you want to go for Nuit Blanche. I think the only way to enjoy the festival now that it’s clearly popular is to start your night at 2:00AM. You should also go through the listings and figure out what you want to see. I think had I seen how little there really was to do on Queen West, I might have suggested a different route for the night. It’s a shame there wasn’t more happening in my neighbourhood this year. Funktion Gallery was open, and across the street was some sort of pole dancing photobooth thing, which was kind of sexy-cool. Now, if only the Run for the Cure wasn’t the next day.
[What L thought of the night. On the other hand, my friend Matt quite enjoyed himself. It’s clear looking at the Torontoist coverage that there was a lot of cool stuff to be seen, if you were well prepared.]
Life | Toronto
1 October 2009, mid-afternoon
I am on Google Wave. As they were with GMail, Google is being fairly tight with how they are rolling out the service. Twitter is full of “can I get an invite” messages. (My invite came from my friend Ryan, who works at Google now. By coincidence, he’s the same guy who invited me to GMail way back in the day.) Unlike GMail, invites aren’t sent out immediately. You nominate someone for an account and at some point they’ll be sent an invite. For a service like Google Wave this is a stupid way to get things going. GMail was actually usable even if you didn’t know anyone else using GMail — it’s just an email client. Wave is something new and fancy. As such, I can only “wave” to one other person with the service, my friend who invited me. Awesome? He hasn’t replied to my first wave yet. Maybe it’ll be more exciting by the end of the week, but I have my doubts.
[5] Technology
30 September 2009, mid-morning
I managed to catch a cold. I think I get them whenever the weather starts to shift. So i’m sitting at home, alternating between sleeping and thinking about eating.
[2] Life
25 September 2009, late morning
Over the last couple days, during lunch, my coworkers and I watched Never Back Down. Imagine The Karate Kid, but with people doing mixed-martial-arts. Jake Tyler plays the troubled kid who gets into fights and needs some guidance. (The dude looks like Tom Cruise, but younger; it’s kind of crazy.) The always awesome Djimon Hounsou plays the Mr. Miyagi character, a fellow from Senegal who grew up in Brazill and teaches Jujitsu in a gym he lives in. There is a bunch of fighting, chicks in bikinis since the film is set in Orlando, and more fighting. It’s more than a bit cliche, but it’s definitely better than I had thought it would be. It’s definitely no Flash Point.
Reviews of Never Back Down on Rotten Tomatoes.
Movies
24 September 2009, early morning
Yesterday I decided to grab the McSweeney’s iPhone application. The quarterly they put out is held in very high regard, and the content they put online is hilarious, more often than not. (For example: Iran or Star Wars.) The application is $6, and is subscription based. Buying the application signs you up for 6 months of content from what they are calling the Small Chair. This content is pulled from sources that aren’t available online, and is updated weekly. You can subscribe for another 180 days of content for an additional $5. This is done using the newly added in-app purchase features introduced with iPhone OS 3.0. They also pull free content from their Internet Tendencies website, though I suppose this isn’t what you’re paying for.
This seems like a pretty smart idea to me. It’s an easily digestible version of a magazine, which seems well suited for an on-the-go device like the iPhone. The application lets you bookmark spots in the story/article you are reading, and has a fairly nice interface. I’ll be curious to see if anyone else copies the approach McSweeney’s is taking with this application. I could see Harper’s doing something like this since they already have so much content online, but behind a subscription wall.
The first ‘issue’ of the Small Chair is a story by Wells Tower. It’s good so far.
[2] iPhone
21 September 2009, mid-morning
The final film I watched at the film festival was Between Two Worlds, a Sri Lankan film. I had watched the directors previous film, The Forsaken Land, a few years back at TIFF as well. I knew the film would be overly symbolic and art-house. I had underestimated just how art-house this movie would be. While The Forsaken Land was challenging to watch, and incredibly slow and meandering, it was well ultimately an interesting and compelling movie. Between Two Worlds was too obtuse. A man falls from the sky, wanders the Sri Lankan country side, and ultimately makes his way back home. His journey is probably some sort of allegory for the war in Sri Lanka, but I think you’d need to be watching the film with the director to figure out what’s what. The film is shot incredibly well. Sadly, that isn’t enough to make for a good film.
Between Two Worlds at the Auteurs website.
Movies
18 September 2009, mid-morning
The Ape
Mez and I watched the Ape on Wednesday evening. It’s a story of unease and panic. There is really only one character of note in the film, and basically every shot in the movie features him in the frame. Most of the film is shot following him, giving the audience the sense we are chasing after him. There is almost no dialogue in the movie. For the first 3rd of the film you aren’t really sure what’s wrong, though you know something definitely is. (If you’re reasonably astute, you can probably guess much earlier what has happened.) The film was interesting, but I don’t think it was good. It’s filmed well, and I think it was well put together. The acting is great. The problem is the story just isn’t that compelling.
The Ape on the Auteurs website.
[2] Movies
17 September 2009, early morning
My friends and I went to the Ryerson theatre Tuesday night to watch Johnie To’s latest film, Vengeance. In a nice change of pace, the film wasn’t playing at midnight, but at a much more reasonable 9:15. Colin Geddes influence looks to have extended out of the Midnight Madness program. Vengeance was an entertaining film. A French man arrives in Macau after his daughter and her family are killed by hit men. He then proceeds to find another set of hit men to help him exact his revenge. Well, there is a bit more to it than that. It’s very much a To film. There are a some really great shoot outs, interesting characters, and some moody atmosphere. During the Q&A the audience learned the original star of the film was to be Alain Delon, the lead in Le Samourai. For whatever reason this didn’t end up working out, but the producers found French rock-god Johnny Hallyday to play the role. He was pretty awesome, if only because he looks so strange. Also, he has a great jacket in the movie. The film also stars some great HK actors: Anthony Wong is as usual excellent playing one of the hit men; and you can’t make a film in HK without casting Simon Yam. The film was quite enjoyable.
The official Vengeance website.
[2] Movies
15 September 2009, lunch time
Shima and I watched Cairo Time together Sunday night. The film was premiering at TIFF. Cairo Time is probably going to get a wide release, so it’s exactly the sort of film I don’t normally go see at TIFF. However, Shima is totally in love with Alexander Siddig, so I made an exception for her. I wanted to see the film as well: it had a fair amount of hype around it.
In the film, Patricia Clarkson plays a married women who arrives in Cairo to meet her husband, who works for the UN, only to find his friend, played by Alexander Siddig, waiting for her at the airport; her husband has been delayed, so she ends up exploring the city and spending time with her husband’s friend. As the film progresses the characters grow closer together. The film is technically a romance, though this title seems a is a bit disingenuous. It’s a very slow and subtle film. Both actors do an amazing job. I think Siddig’s very last scene in the film is an example of some seriously superlative acting. I liked the movie a lot.
The official Cairo Time website.
[5]
15 September 2009, terribly early in the morning
The second film I watched at the film festival was Women Without Men. The film is set in Iran, based on a book with the same name, but is a French production. I believe it was filmed in Morocco. The movie chronicles the lives of 4 women living in Iran, circa 1953, just before the American & British backed coup. Each women encounters some sort of hardship, and ends up wandering to this mysterious orchard. The film was a little bit too surreal at times: I find with films that are for the most part realistic depictions of life, introducing fantastic elements rarely works well. I find it hard to connect to the characters, since it’s unclear what’s ‘real’. The actress who plays the prostitute does an excellent job. The scene with her in the bathhouse is really well done. It’s a very pretty film, and the story is interesting enough, but on the whole I thought the film was lacking. There is certainly a lot of buzz around the film, so I might just be an idiot.
Woman Without Men at the Auteurs website.
Movies
14 September 2009, early morning
My first film of the festival was City of Life and Death, which was absolutely stunning. Shot in black and white, the film looks gorgeous. Each shot could be a photograph. This is all in great contrast to the films subject matter, which is about the Rape of Nanking. The movie is relentless. The film opens with the Japanese army advancing on the city. There is a pretty exciting battle, which the few Chinese soldiers who remain in the city ultimately lose. And then come mass executions. And all sorts of other atrocities. We are introduced to characters, develop a rapport with them, only to have them die. There are lots of close up shots of peoples faces. These sorts of shots show up again and again in the film. People we are never introduced to, and who never show up in the film again, will be featured in this way on the screen for a few seconds. An attempt to humanize an event that has become a list of statistics? I think so. The two lead Japanese actors in the film both incredible to watch. The film ends, more or less, with a victory dance through the city. That whole sequence is one of the best things i’ve seen shot on film. I can’t praise this film enough.
Apparently there was some controversy in China over the films release: people thought the Japanese soldiers were too sympathetic. The lead in the film is a conflicted soldier. He’s the only constant through out the film. The audience is probably supposed to identify with him. Soldiers are seen playing with Chinese children and giving them candy. They sing and dance with one another. They joke around. This certainly does humanize them, but does it make them sympathetic? I don’t think so, because it doesn’t justify any of their actions. They are still raping and killing people. They are behaving like beasts, but they aren’t beasts they are people. This is actually what makes these sorts of events all the more horrific. Lu Chuan should be commended for not making the Japanese soldiers into caricatures.
City of Life and Death at the Autheurs website. I watched the film with my friends, and L has written about the movie as well.
[3] Movies
11 September 2009, early morning
Late Wednesday night Vinnie, Mezan, and I watched Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino’s latest film. The commercials might make the film look like its focus is on a group of Jewish-American soldiers who spend their time killing and maiming Nazis, but there is quite a bit more to it than that. The film is actually very dialog heavy — not uncommon in his films — with scenes that are drawn out just enough to build tension, and which more often than not end with some sort of violence. Brad Pitt is hilarious. Christoph Waltz who plays the lead villain is brilliant. The entire cast does an amazing job. The film is probably one of Tarantino’s more accessible films, as the story unfolds sequentially — you don’t jump back and forth in time as with his other films. The movie was great. You should watch it.
The official Inglourious Basterds website.
Movies
9 September 2009, mid-afternoon
The entire Beatles catalogue has been re-released today. You can buy box sets of their catalogue remastered in stereo or in mono; well, in theory, anyway. As far as I can tell, the mono box set is sold out, and the stereo box set looks to be as well. You might be wondering why anyone would want the mono recordings. It turns out the Beatles would produce the mono mixes for their albums first. The stereo mixes were done second, and, by the sounds of things, without any real input from the Beatles themselves. Many people consider the mono mixes to be how the Beatles’ songs were meant to be heard. (This changes with the last two albums, which were mixed in stereo from the start.) Both box sets sound pretty awesome. These are apparently incredibly well done re-issues. I’m quite conflicted as to which box set to buy. I definitely want to get one.
Don’t know who the Beatles are? Chuck Klosterman explains.
[5] Music
8 September 2009, early evening
I watched X-Men Origins: Wolverine on the plane trip to Edmonton. I had been told the film was bad. I wasn’t expecting much. Even then, I have to say the film didn’t really deliver at all. Well, I suppose the title credits were kind of cool. For the most part though, the film was incredibly cheesy. I was reminded of bad 80s action flicks. There is a shot of Wolverine walking away, lighting a cigar, while a helicopter blows up behind him. There are (multiple!) shots of him screaming, “Nooooo!” while the camera pulls away from above. This film should have been way better than it was. I mean, the source material is great, and it’s not like Hugh Jackman can’t act. What the bloodclot?
The official X-Men Origins: Wolverine website.:
[6] Movies
8 September 2009, early morning
One day I’ll have to experiment with letting other people post to the site while I’m away. It seems strange that the site goes quiet for a week or so when I decide to take a vacation. Edmonton was fun. My mini-cousins are cute. The Rockies are pretty majestic. That about sums up my trip. It was awesome.
Life
31 August 2009, late morning
I’m in Edmonton with Shima. It’s been two days of awesome so far. So, don’t expect too much on this site for the next few days.
Life
