The 8% Solution
November 12, 20133 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)How can photographers measure their success? Through simple mathematics, of course.
Archive for f/Egor (Leica Blog)
More Bartlett’s Rejects
January 6, 20135 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)MusingsLinguistic economy is most definitely not the hallmark of a typical ULTRAsomething article. But every once in a while, I do manage to articulate my thoughts in a pithier than normal manner. I did this a couple years ago with an article called "Bartlett's Rejects," which simply listed 14 of my own personal quotes about photography. This article is the sequel — cleverly titled "More Bartlett's Rejects," it contains another 14 photography quotes, ripe for copying and pasting into signatures, tweets and term papers.
A Fetishist’s Guide to the Monochrom (Part 3)
December 11, 201214 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)Photo GearIn this, the third and final installment in my three part discussion of the Leica M Monochrom, I wrap up my review of the camera's imaging characteristics, then dive deeply into the psychological aspects of the camera.
A Fetishist’s Guide to the Monochrom (Part 2)
December 11, 20121 commentf/Egor (Leica Blog)Photo GearIn this, the second of my three part discussion of the Leica M Monochrom, I take a good long look at the camera's various imaging characteristics, including tonality and "filmishness" — whatever that means.
A Fetishist’s Guide to the Monochrom (Part 1)
December 11, 20122 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)Photo Gear3 installments! 4 dozen images! 10,000 words! And enough photographic fetishes to qualify as camera porn! In this, part one of my three part discussion of the Leica M Monochrom, I discuss the kinkier mechanical aspects of the camera.
Terrible Parables
October 19, 20124 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)MusingsPhoto GearIn this article, I explore the idea of a "photographer's parable," and soon realize why there are so few of them out there.
Term Limits
June 27, 20121 commentf/Egor (Leica Blog)MusingsWe need to fit the term “photographer” with a pair of concrete shoes, and drop it in the nearest lake. Photography is no longer a unique ability — but the numerous tasks we can accomplish with photography ARE still unique. And this uniqueness is how each of us, moving forward, must define ourselves.
A Derelict Memory Lane
May 3, 20123 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)Musings"Memory Lane," as I define it, is "a long strip of acetate with a silver halide coating." I consider my film cameras to be miniature time capsules — my past self records a person, scene or event that it thinks my future self will find interesting. This article discusses one such trip down Memory Lane, and how it isn't quite the way I remembered it.
Shooting Through the Wormhole
January 18, 20122 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)For the last several years, various mid-20th century sources have exerted a profound influence on my own photography: golden age photojournalists of the 1930s and 1940s; post-war photo essays from the 1950s; and John Szarkowski’s New Documentarian leanings of the 1960s. I wasn’t always this anachronistic. Rather, I used to be even more so, and once drew inspiration from the pictorialists, surrealists and Czech avant-garde. Lately, I seem to be backsliding into my old, early-20th century "pictsurrealist" habits, and my tool of choice is the humble pinhole. Shooting through a pinhole is like shooting through a wormhole. It’s a shortcut through time. This article talks about the aesthetics and mechanics of looking through this wormhole, and illustrates what might be looking back.
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
December 19, 20111 commentf/Egor (Leica Blog)I make no money writing these articles for ULTRAsomething. So I moonlight by writing the f/Egor column for Leica Camera — a gig that pays me... umm... actually it pays absolutely nothing. Obviously I haven't completely grasped the meaning of "moonlighting," but I do understand the meaning of "respect." And so should anyone else who photographs on the streets.
The Leica 21mm Super-Elmar-M
November 23, 201110 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)Photo GearWhen Leica lent me their new Super-Elmar-M 21mm f/3.4 ASPH lens, I gave a figurative shrug. I already owned an excellent copy of an old 21mm f/2.8 Elmarit pre-ASPH, which I absolutely love. So it would be highly unlikely that Leica's new 21mm would actually inspire a case of gear lust… but gear lust I have. The Leica 21mm Super-Elmar-M is one of the most stunning lenses I've yet mounted on any camera. This article discusses the reasons why I feel this way.
The Geometry of Night
September 27, 20114 Commentsf/Egor (Leica Blog)Photo TechniquesThe requirements for photographing at night versus day are as different as... well... as night and day. This article proposes that night photography is best approached not as a challenge of light, but as a challenge of subject.