Large format fine art figure or nude girls...

[djonesii]

Dear all;

I have finished processing my first full fine art shoot with the Speed Graphic and the Polaroid conversion.

It stands to reason, that these images are not work-safe, and that if naked females offend you, don't look, that's why it's password protected.

User = Guest;
pass = matrix.

http://www.jonesii.net/2009_07_18_LF_zoya/index.html

As usual, C&C welcome.

Another MF format shoot has been developed, but not PP, so keep your eyes open.

Dave

[Bobbie]

I liked the shots with the dark background.
It's a pity with small web shots that we can't see the quality of the large format, though I guess big prints would do the shots more justice.









Bobbie.

[Trius]

I only liked 6 & 7 ... All the others I found uninteresting and the poses awkward. The model seemed bored/not engaged in the session.

[excellent]

Looks like it was a nude shoot for the sake of getting a girl naked.
Lighting and composition on the dark background ones were good but as said before she doesn't look very engaged.

[johannielscom]

Well done first shoot!

It goes without reason these shoots are called 'fine arts' shoots not just for the art of photography, but also for lighting, posing and directing a model.

I sure wish I had as much experience as the other posters on the subject. Just getting ready to step up to the LF challenge.

I'm pretty sure it takes time to get to that gallery level, getting used to working together, the pace of the shoot, directing etc. Even 'getting a girl naked' isn't exactly as easy as the others make it sound and it doesn't get the job done by itself either. Maybe the model doesn't look involved, but she's not shy either, which is an accomplishment for the both of you already, I reckon.

Probably will take me at least 1.5 years to get anywhere close to this, since I have to manage LF first and find me a girl that'll do the honours

Thanks for posting!

[djonesii]

The shots with the Speed Graphic were all focused via ground glass and loupe. The Polaroid were all focused via the Rangefinder.

I would say the model was pretty engaged in the session, the high key shots were done at the end of the 2nd hour of shooting, and she had just finished a round of much more glamour oriented shots, and was very deliberately toning the vivacity down.

Dave

[Jamie123]

Looks like it was a nude shoot for the sake of getting a girl naked.
Lighting and composition on the dark background ones were good but as said before she doesn't look very engaged.

That's a bit harsh, don't you think? Like he said, it was his first try and while it may not be the best shoot ever one can see that he put some effort into it. Saying that it looks like he was just trying to get the girl naked is quite rude.

[Keith]

I quite liked the lighting in the black background shots but I found a lot of the poses didn't do justice to the female form.

I have somewhat limited experience shooting nudes personally ... I feel it's very hard to be original in this genre and I would have approached it very differently.

[Al Kaplan]

For a photographer to refer to his/her photography as "fine" art borders on arrogance. The intention might have been to shoot "just because" rather than to satisfy a client but how it rates on the arts scale depends on the critics, the collectors, the galleries, and the mood of the times.

What I see is a series of well done studio shots of a pleasant looking young woman. When the New York Times reviews your latest gallery show and you have prints in the collections of several universities and museums then using the term "fine art" to describe your work would change from arrogance to merely pretentious.

[Keith]

That's a bit harsh, don't you think? Like he said, it was his first try and while it may not be the best shoot ever one can see that he put some effort into it. Saying that it looks like he was just trying to get the girl naked is quite rude.


I think that remark was intended more as an abstract comment than a direct accusation.

[Mcary]

For a photographer to refer to his/her photography as "fine" art borders on arrogance. The intention might have been to shoot "just because" rather than to satisfy a client but how it rates on the arts scale depends on the critics, the collectors, the galleries, and the mood of the times.

.

Most photographer who shot this type of work use the term "Fine Art" in the same way other photographers use the term landscape or street photographers. In fact you'll find rather then being arrogant most people who shoot this type of work are quit humble.

[Al Kaplan]

I always just refered to my efforts as "nudes" and famous photographers like Weston made photographs of naked chicks that everybody refered to as "nudes". He also photographed peppers and called them peppers. I suppose it has advantages being able to say "I do fine art photography" at family gatherings or to your pastor, but it's still pretentious.

[sevo]

For a photographer to refer to his/her photography as "fine" art borders on arrogance. The intention might have been to shoot "just because" rather than to satisfy a client but how it rates on the arts scale depends on the critics, the collectors, the galleries, and the mood of the times.


And that from a well-read highbrow like you, Al...

Don't get heated up about the "fine" in there. It is a term, and has been around for longer than photography - ever since Europeans started creating art directly to be purchased as such (as opposed to art as a mere byproduct of room and church decorations or popular graphics). It is no quality designation, just like "passport portrait" isn't. There is bad and good, coarse and fine, successful and pathetically hopeless "fine art", but all of it was explicitly made to be sold on the art market.

Sevo

[Tuolumne]

Most photographer who shot this type of work use the term "Fine Art" in the same way other photographers use the term landscape or street photographers. In fact you'll find rather then being arrogant most people who shoot this type of work are quit humble.

Some excellent work on your blog. I really liked the photos. Both erotic, evocative, and beautiful.

/T

[djonesii]

My intent is not to be pretentsious by using "fine art", but more to distinguish what I'm trying -to do from "playboy nudes", " hustler nudes", galmour nudes", "editorial nudes" or any of the myriad of other ways to take photos of a model with her clothes off.

So, the "fine art" refers to a style rahter than the quality. I think some other posters have already made that comment.

Please keep in mind, that this set is very specifically limited to the 20 or so images that I took on large format film. In fact, it's most every image that I took, with almost none edited out. That is the nature of this forum, so the MF 35mm and digital are not in this set.

When I get around to post processing all the film images that I did with the Contax G1, and Fuji 645, I will post those links in the appropriate place. I have made an active choice to post some of the images on shot on the medium just because the are shot on the medium, rather than becasue they are the strongest images in the set.

The real world reality is some of the better images were captured with the D300 and the Tamron 28-75. Thus, they are not in the LF set. If anyone on the fourm cares to look, the URL and the logins are left as an exercise to the reader.

Dave

[excellent]

Should I have lied and sugar coated it. I said his lighting and composition was good. Yet everyone is focusing on the negative truth I said. He asked for a critique and we are all open to say what we feel.

[dfoo]

Saying what you feel doesn't mean you have to be an ass though.

[excellent]

Saying what you feel doesn't mean you have to be an ass though.

Being an ass like you have just said would mean that yes me being honest would be of the asshole caliber. Take it for what it is.
p.s. you still only took the negative out of what was said. overall my thoughts could be considered neutral if you didn't focus on the negative.

[JohnnyT]

Hmm... I think it's not all important to play on word here... But... I would say that some people acts like university kids... Behave yourself...

We have a person here who made his first studio nude photoshoot that was not that bad at all... A really good first try. Not perfect, but not bad...

I really like the last picture. Very odd... strange... I like to think about a monstrous beauty...

[pagpow]

Thanks for sharing --
I, too, like the black background better, in large part because the pose and lighting in many of those emphasize form. That said, I also like 7.
I found I preferred the B&W ones to the color ones.

[Al Kaplan]

I have no trouble with the photos themselves. I really like a couple of them. I just don't like the term "fine art" being used that way. A hundred years ago a lot of people would have considered them pornographic. Some might have seen the artistic aspects but they wouldn't get framed and hung on the living room wall.

Nobody ever says "fine art flowers" or "fine art landscapes" or "fine art street photos". This argument, and I guess that I started it, is about semantics more than anything.

[Tuolumne]

"Fine art nudes" - Let's just call it a euphemism and be done with it.

/T

[johannielscom]

I have finished processing my first full fine art shoot with the Speed Graphic and the Polaroid conversion.

I reckon shooting your first Speed Graphic shoot was quite different from the other shoot Fred found? Must be slower to work, a model needing more patience etc? Do you find the technical stuff takes more attention? Does that make it harder to direct the model and to manage the shoot?

Can you describe the difference, and if not, can you describe the general feel of this shoot?

I'm thinking psychology of the shoot here, both for you and for the model.

[Dunk]

They look too full of tension to my eyes and personally I do not like nude studies with the model staring at the camera. Some of the poses look very unnatural and with the exception of No. 11 which IMO is quite a good study, do not convey the femininity that I normally associate with nude art studies.

But thanks for sharing and hope you get some ideas from the total feedback and that you try again so we can see your second nude studio session.

Cheers

dunk

[Pablito]

. As a pure study of form I find them lacking, and as erotic, not enough.


Was going to stay out of it but nikonwebmaster stole my words exactly.

[jreid]

Photographing unclothed women always seems to provoke some kind of unfortunate response in many people -- anger, defensiveness, whatever. I think that's the biggest argument in favor of doing it.

As for the pictures that are the subject of this thread, I don't think they're terribly interesting. Using the Speed Graphic is a challenge and I commend you for that. But my question would be what are you trying to say with your nudes?

It's a question I struggle with but my answer boils down to this: I want people to feel the same awe I do when I see the naked human form. I also want to carry people beyond the negative emotional reaction many people often have to nudes.

[Al Kaplan]

Why does it almost always seem to be a naked female form? Doesn't the male form inspire the same awe?

Let's see some male nudes, or perhaps nude couples.

[djonesii]

Dear rangefinder forum guy/gals;

Thanks for all your input, it is indeed a lively thread. From all I have read, there was in no way shape or form, any offense given, and certainly none taken. Quite nice in a forum where most likely we will never meet face to face.

My motivation in taking these photos is that I like the way the female form and its associated curves interact with light and shadow. Even more so when I can capture that on film. I make an active choice to search out situations where I can take those photos in a "wife safe" environment. Just for me, if I take a photo, I have to be willing to show it to my wife. And as a rule, the models are indeed professional models, nothing more, nothing less. I would guess that this is close to my 20th nude model shoot, just to clarify. I shoot at a studio with the owner, and a group of 2-4 other photographers. Every one always shoots digital, one other person shoots film, sometimes in a Nikon F, and others in a Leica M6. No one else shoots medium format film, or large format film. I compile my favorites for my web site, and some specialized sets to share, like on this forum. At the end of the year, I print a vanity book. This year will be my third book. So much for the motivations.

In this setting, there is a fair bit of time pressure to get on with your turn at the lights, and get the model posed, and shoot. Most of the shoots that I really enjoy, I have eithier directed or set the lights my self. Given this setting, both directing the model, and getting the photograph with large format are interciate parts of the whole process. LF takes much work work. I shot near on 100 frames between the speed and the polaroid before I treid to use either at a "real" shoot. To say the least, there were quite a few mistakes in that first 100 or so. At this point in my photographic journey, I think I have a reasonable understaing of the fundamentals, aperature, speed, focus .... MF and LF images that are in focus and exposed correclty are the proof of that.

The LF process takes much more time and more rigor than the DSLR process, its a check list that I have in mind mentally, set speed, cock, Open up the lens, focus, veryif aperature, close lens, dark slide, fire, reverse dark slide, reverse film holder, repeat ..... This process takes in the order in minutes when you have a 7-10 minute slot of shooting time. I take a few digials first to check posing, then a few 35mm or 645 film, then if I'm lucky one or two LF. At this point, I'm still working on camera technique. Sadly, the thing that suffers most is the posing. But the only way to get better at it is to do it. Of the 20 shots that I attempted, I think I actually got about 14 that show technial profeciency with the camera, thats 70%, barely pasing.

As to if these shots are art, or porn, or something else, it's a free country, have your opinion. I sleep well at night, with a clear consence. I imagane that Hugh Hefner and some internet porn site owners do too.

As I have said in a previous post, most of the shots in the LF set are there because they were taken with a 4X5 range finder, not because they are my favorites. Of them, 2 will probably make the book, and of that, only one will be 8X10.

Having reviewed this set, I think I made an error, and one Contax photo slipped in, care to take a guess?

Dave

[djonesii]

A quick response to Al .... check my site, I have many sets that show a couple of female models ..... Although I don't think that's quite what you had in mind when you said couples.


Dave

[35mmdelux]

For a photographer to refer to his/her photography as "fine" art borders on arrogance. The intention might have been to shoot "just because" rather than to satisfy a client but how it rates on the arts scale depends on the critics, the collectors, the galleries, and the mood of the times.

What I see is a series of well done studio shots of a pleasant looking young woman. When the New York Times reviews your latest gallery show and you have prints in the collections of several universities and museums then using the term "fine art" to describe your work would change from arrogance to merely pretentious.

I agree with AL Kaplan. Fine art is Van Gogh, Vermeer, Matisse -- this was the title bestowed on them by the cogniscenti over the years. Fine art used to describe the recent photog of nude women seems an inappropriate use of the term. I dont believe Helmut Newton called himself a "fine artist."

[Bobbie]

You guys are just not getting the point, we need words to define some things we do in life. Fine art is a very clear occupational definition, which all those engaged in it know, but seldom find the need to explain. It has absolutely nothing to do with being pretentious, it is a definition of purpose, audience, and financial sources.



Totally agree with you Fred.

You others, just check out the wiki definition.







Bobbie.

[Al Kaplan]

I guess that all those kids with cell phone cameras are now Fine Artists sending naked pictures of themselves all over the place. With that amount of Fine Art out there it sure won't be worth much.

[Al Kaplan]

I have some quite valuable drawings and paintings by established artists that I've known over the years. Ask them what they do and you'll most likely get a response such as "I paint" or perhaps "I teach painting".

[35mmdelux]

I guess that all those kids with cell phone cameras are now Fine Artists sending naked pictures of themselves all over the place. With that amount of Fine Art out there it sure won't be worth much.

LOL. You're the man AL. I need to take out a membership in your Temple.

[35mmdelux]

This is not brain surgery.

Let's call brain surgeons, fine surgeons. The cook at Morton's a fine cook. Problem solved.

[back alley]

the ignorance and the arrogance...some of you folks are downright hilarious.

[Trius]

I can imagine that female nude sessions with LF is quite different from using a smaller, more mobile format camera. In my mind spontenaety would be compromised, and so I think that is what I saw there -- poses that, except for a couple, seemed more stiff or contrived as a result.

Achieving good nude studies with LF would require a lot of practice and experience, in my mind. So keep it up -- your technique is very good. I'm not sure exactly why you chose to do a session with LF, but I'm sure you have a good reason. It's a real challenge and I commend you.

[JohnnyT]

Where did you get the idea it was his first attempt???

Wow... It's really, but really what we can call hostile.

I'M SORRY if I've misunderstood if it was actually a first attempt or not. It really remind me my years at the university where people were arguing on such ... absolute subject. Now that I work in the "art" industry, it's fun to see that nobody cares about the words, the concepts or anything that could stop the creativity. God bless me.

The only fact that is absolute is that the guy made a good attempt on a nude shooting; not perfect nor bad. He asked for opinion and people began to argue on fine art or not. And, it's been a while since I've seen such adults playing as kid.

God dammit, it's photography. You can find plenty of texts about the fine art or not and a lot of good arguments within it. Go for it and go for a butt kicking contest into the philosophy tread. But I think that the person here just wanted to show something that he found interresting and wanted to share it to the world. Fine art or not.

Now the next tread that is really a total, absolute, and really fun intellectual masturbation :

"Photography is an art or not?"

How can we call it fine art now that the title "art" as been put into questionning ? :angel:

Wait me up you kids, I'll go get my diet pepsi and a bag of all dressed chips!

Ah....

I'll say it again, good job for your photos. I hunger to see the rest with or without the fine before the art. Is that fine?

[35mmdelux]

Wow... It's really, but really what we can call hostile.

I'M SORRY if I've misunderstood if it was actually a first attempt or not. It really remind me my years at the university where people were arguing on such ... absolute subject. Now that I work in the "art" industry, it's fun to see that nobody cares about the words, the concepts or anything that could stop the creativity. God bless me.

The only fact that is absolute is that the guy made a good attempt on a nude shooting; not perfect nor bad. He asked for opinion and people began to argue on fine art or not. And, it's been a while since I've seen such adults playing as kid.

God dammit, it's photography. You can find plenty of texts about the fine art or not and a lot of good arguments within it. Go for it and go for a butt kicking contest into the philosophy tread. But I think that the person here just wanted to show something that he found interresting and wanted to share it to the world. Fine art or not.

Now the next tread that is really a total, absolute, and really fun intellectual masturbation :

"Photography is an art or not?"

How can we call it fine art now that the title "art" as been put into questionning ? :angel:

Wait me up you kids, I'll go get my diet pepsi and a bag of all dressed chips!

Ah....

I'll say it again, good job for your photos. I hunger to see the rest with or without the fine before the art. Is that fine?


Wow. Is this over the top or what?! Chill out dude. Its not there's an exam at the end of the thread.

[Al Kaplan]

Wow, I'm getting the itch again. Any ladies in the south Florida area that would like to pose nude? You must be 18 but there are no age or other weight restrictons. If you're one of those that I photographed forty years ago it might be interesting to do a "then and now" shoot. http://thepriceofsilver.blogspot.com

[amateriat]

I agree with AL Kaplan. Fine art is Van Gogh, Vermeer, Matisse -- this was the title bestowed on them by the cogniscenti over the years. Fine art used to describe the recent photog of nude women seems an inappropriate use of the term. I dont believe Helmut Newton called himself a "fine artist."
Why the distinction?


- Barrett

[Tuolumne]

It was getting really boring around here. I love this thread.

/T

[djonesii]

Al;

I went out to your blog, too bad the baby speed is gone .....

With a little luck, you could find one at an estate sale for pennies on the dollar!

Seriously, I really think that my work is more of the arts and crafts variety than fine art. I don't take my self too seriously, don't find the models my self, and really don't organize the shoots, I just pay and show up. I do set the lights and poses. To me the fundamental inspiration is not that of an artist, but more of a tradesman. The craft is OK, and some of it might even be worth money, but to me, while the subject mater can be labeled fine art, the muse need to judge the quality as commission worthy is lacking.

Clearly, the term fine art has struck a nerve here, so let me pose the question, how would you signal to other forum members that you would be looking at nude young ladies, with very little chance of seeing what is shown in some medial text books and various web sites ... I choose the term fine art. Keep in mind, this is a short title block, and your typing at web speed ..

Dave

[Al Kaplan]

:rolleyes: Do nude photographs of Monkette count?

I don't think that I've ever asked a girl to pose nude. The young women in the sixties and seventies were really no different than the ones today, except that digital and cell phone cameras have now allowed them to bypass both the photographer and the photo lab.

[amateriat]

:rolleyes: Do nude photographs of Monkette count?
What? And give up politics? :D


- Barrett

[Al Kaplan]

Amateriat, Monkette assured me that she's not giving up politics, and when she becomes president we should expect to hear rumors of a steady stream of handsome young male monkeys and their big bananas parading through the oval office.

[amateriat]

Amateriat, Monkette assured me that she's not giving up politics, and when she becomes president we should expect to hear rumors of a steady stream of handsome young male monkeys and their big bananas parading through the oval office.
Hmm...

In that case..."Monkette 2012", anyone? ;)


- Barrett