Corner Dust

Looking Straight Up....

2010-11-29T23:52:00.000-05:00

Black and white trees on sky. It's like ink on paper. I love what you can find sometimes. This one felt very Steadmanesque.

"Way up on the hill....

2010-11-21T23:07:00.002-05:00

Where they do...do the boogie." This is the beginning of an image dump. I have been going out and photographing on my lunch hour and collecting then. Things have conspired to keep me from uploading them until now. I do like the long shadows of fall and winter.

Sometimes The Light....

2010-10-25T23:17:00.001-04:00

...doesn't come from where you think it might. Maybe there's a double entendre in there and maybe there isn't.

Abbott and Costello meets....

2010-10-13T23:25:00.003-04:00

This is from a new iphone app called Fracture. Take a photo and "paint in" the "cubist" look. I took an image and "painted" this in less then five minuets. I call it "Sunset on the Hudson".
I read an article once about the history of horror films and the author postulated that at some point in the life cycle of any genre of film it becomes so "old hat" that parodies of it become more popular than the genre itself. I wonder if that sort of thing isn't happening with software like this?

This is a wierd one.....

2010-10-08T23:16:00.000-04:00

I was looking at my iPad sitting on a table close to a lamp and all the finger marks I had made in the last two hours showed up plain as day. The real challenge was getting it to photograph as I saw it. After about 20 min. of fussing , this is what I came up with. I don't know where this is going, but I think I might try shooting a series of these. I might call them "iPad Reactive Finger Paintings". Just a thought.

Monochrome with red again....

2010-10-01T22:29:00.002-04:00

I saw this on the window sill the other morning and and found myself taking an image of it. It was only afterward when I was going through that set of work that I noticed it was yet another one of those images.

First image from the Premo-GF1...

2010-09-27T22:38:00.002-04:00

I figured out how to set the GF1 so it would shoot without a connected lens. It took some digging in the menu structure and manual to find it.
This was a 4 second exposure on a tripod with the aperature on the Premo shut all the way down and set to T. I'll start working on reading my aberrations foibles soon.

Playing Dr. Frankenstein Again....

2010-09-20T22:20:00.002-04:00

Back view

Front view

I was going through some old camera equipment I had and found a portable bellows camera with the words "No. 2 Folding Cartridge Premo" on the handle. The entire bellows mechanism came away from the back of the camera. I sized it up to my GF1 digital and it fit almost perfectly.
Some adhesive insulation foam and a couple of wide rubber bands later and I had an intriguing new device to experiment with. I still need to find the settings to bypass the shooting without a lens problem.

Some Times Ya Just Don't See Them Coming....

2010-09-12T23:14:00.002-04:00

I sat down in my car the other day just after a rain and had forgotten that I had left the sun roof visor open, Glanced upward and saw this image.

A Quick Glance.....

2010-08-29T22:04:00.002-04:00

....from that window, a thousand years ago....
On a drive through the country, I spotted an old house that was rotting away and thought I should get some images. How a window becomes a silly brambled delineation between inside and out.

Camouflage....

2010-08-23T01:20:00.003-04:00

Alright, it's another empty chair, but somewhere in the clash between the upholstery and that sea of carpet a photograph needed to be taken.

Yet Another Empty Chair.....

2010-08-14T22:16:00.003-04:00

The fact that I take images of empty chairs has almost always been an unconscious one. It was pointed out to me in graduate school and I still marvel at the frequency at which I take them.
In retrospect, the painting behind this one and how the figures seem to have a reaction to it, attracted my attention.

Round and Round We Go....

2010-08-08T23:17:00.003-04:00

There is some very interesting mathematics going on in the world of pixel manipulation. The software I discovered for this image is called iDorste ( named after a designer who used this technique). I took an image that looked like it might be suitable for this particular effect from my collection of entries found in the blog "Big Happy Funhouse" and began to experiment. This one seems to work well.

Bookends.....

2010-08-02T22:10:00.004-04:00

I have been playing with the serendipitous nature of different photo apps on the new iphone 4. The app I used for this quadtych has the unfortunate name of "You Gotta See This". I enjoyed the way this one work. As always you can click on the image to get a lager view.

From somewhere underground......

2010-07-26T22:15:00.002-04:00

How an image might connect with the way you think or feel at a given moment in life and maybe at no other time has always intrigued and baffled me.

It Could Be.....

2010-07-23T22:31:00.003-04:00

a Sunoco station bathroom in Barstow CA. or the washroom in the physics building of Ball State University. Its another institutional places that seems empty of any humanity. A place of pure function.

Just Some Faces....

2010-07-18T23:11:00.001-04:00

....I sketched while watching a video.

Sometimes it's not so much who is speaking....

2010-07-14T21:40:00.003-04:00

....as more what and how they are saying it. There are times when the limitations of the camera will give you an unexpected gift. This was an image that came off my iphone as a throw away. But, the more I looked at it, the more it grew on me.

Heavy Flowers.....

2010-07-12T23:00:00.002-04:00

Once, a few years ago I got the opportunity to view an original platinum print of Edward Steichen's Heavy Roses. There are many reasons that an image will stay with someone and become a part of their visual vocabulary. That image happened for me and on occasion I crudely use it to say something myself.

Maybe Again....

2010-07-10T12:23:00.003-04:00

Not sure why this image or this day, but I wanted to see if I could jump start this puppy once again.

First entry from my iPad......

2010-04-07T16:24:00.002-04:00

This is an image of a blood orange taken with my iPhone and sent to Corner Dust on my iPad.

Coming out of obscurity.... Maybe....

2010-04-06T23:16:00.001-04:00

Another Steven Spielberg Special Effect.....

2010-03-03T21:38:00.003-05:00

This is an image taken with an inexpensive Lego digital camera. I have not taken enough images with it to define specifically why it is I enjoy this camera's characteristics, but I do. This was taken one foggy morning on my walk to work.

Another cool blog....

2010-02-25T22:54:00.003-05:00

Found a blog that is up on all the new photo and video apps and gadgets for the iphone. You can find it at: http://www.iphoneography.com/

Nude descending stair case....

2010-02-21T20:59:00.003-05:00

I have been working with my iPhone and doing some random shooting with it. Two images happened to capture my hand. This one remined me of Marcel Duchamp's "Nude Descending Staircase, No 2".

Sky Pilots....

2010-02-18T21:53:00.003-05:00

I found an iPhone app that will take an image and turn it into a vector pdf that is very reminiscent of a Peter Max painting. The apps name is phototropedelic. This was one of the images from my collection of photos from a blog called Big Happy Fun House. I think with the right subject matter and the right app settings this can be a very useful tool. Click on the image to get a larger copy. Because of the fact that it creates pdfs, files of any size can be saved and printed.

Guillermo del Toro....

2010-02-16T23:26:00.005-05:00

A Spanish film director that has made two very wonderful films. The newest one is Pan's Labyrinth and the other is The Devil's Backbone. The visual way that he tells a story is extraordinary, mixing horror, fairy tale, and the real world in amazing new ways.

I was away for a while....

2010-02-15T23:29:00.001-05:00

There were a lot of reasons why I stopped, but let's just say I'm back and move on. Thanks to anyone who might still be holding on.

Corvus on an October night....

2010-01-10T21:23:00.006-05:00

This was taken from an image I took of a dead crow. There are some things going on it that I like but, it's still a work in progress. The mythological story behind Corvus is also quite interesting.

The art of Shuan Tan....

2010-01-08T21:19:00.001-05:00

I have several of his children's books and have enjoyed his work for several years now. His way of making the surreal seem almost common place is a wonder to see. His books can be found on Amazon and his web page is here.

Paper Craft.....

2010-01-07T21:14:00.002-05:00

I have been interested in paper craft for about five years now. I have a large collection of PDFs. But, I seem to do much more collecting than building. The two blogs I follow on this subject are Paper Forest and PaperKraft.net. I hope to one day build the model of Howl's Moving Castle I have.

Six Flight books....

2010-01-04T21:15:00.000-05:00

I've read all of these graphic short story anthologies, and thoroughly enjoyed both the art work and the stories. It ranges from the simplistic to the complex and the sublime to the ridiculous. They can all be found on Amazon. I am currently reading No. 5.

Evening snow on the veranda....

2010-01-03T22:40:00.000-05:00

Another image taken with the Hipstamatic camera on the iPhone. The camera simulations that are coming out for the iPhone are amazing. I have several "toy" cameras but this one is the best.

A look in other photo albums....

2010-01-02T23:12:00.001-05:00

I can't image this guy's collection. But, he picks some of the best vernacular photography I have ever seen. I frequent his blog bighappyfunhouse. You really have to look at the photos to see whats going on. Take a look at the expression on the guy's in this image.
Oh, and I'm still waiting for my slice of Old Fashion.

The start of a new year....

2010-01-01T23:54:00.002-05:00

Well, I made it through the first year and got close to 300 entries in. I had hoped to have an entry for every day. When I started that seemed like a very doable thing, but as the days grew into weeks and the weeks into months, just keeping up with mining my past works and producing new work became much more of chore than I wanted. I'm glad I did it.... but, I'm glad that resolution is over.

I am going to continue with the blog, but now I'm going to add entries that are based on art that I have discovered, enjoy and think is worth sharing.

I will still be putting up entries with my work in it and I will shoot for an entry a day again.

Well, on with the journey.....

On a long trip to.....

2009-12-31T23:00:00.001-05:00

Woven Nature #2......

2009-12-30T23:58:00.000-05:00

Woven Nature....

2009-12-29T23:54:00.001-05:00

Painterly patina....

2009-12-28T23:51:00.002-05:00

Out across the frozen lake.....

2009-12-27T21:11:00.002-05:00

On a train.......

2009-12-26T20:46:00.001-05:00

Christmas Eve, 11:53, Downtown......

2009-12-25T20:44:00.002-05:00

Down across from the Cloak Room....

2009-12-24T22:06:00.001-05:00

From a poem called "Night Driving" #3......

2009-12-06T20:42:00.001-05:00

From a poem called "Night Driving" #2......

2009-12-05T20:37:00.001-05:00

From a poem called "Night Driving" #1.....

2009-12-04T20:34:00.000-05:00

A still from an imaginary early color film....

2009-12-03T17:30:00.002-05:00

The embryonic finger.....

2009-12-02T17:25:00.000-05:00

At the car wash.....

2009-12-01T17:23:00.000-05:00

The look of Banana Pancakes....

2009-11-30T17:20:00.001-05:00

Out on the wild red terrain.....

2009-11-29T17:17:00.000-05:00

Sun cutting through the trees.....

2009-11-28T17:14:00.001-05:00

An old truck side panel....

2009-11-27T17:11:00.004-05:00

The colors of Jean-Pierre Jeunet....

2009-11-26T21:27:00.001-05:00

This is the start of a new series of images shot using a software package on the iPhone called
Hipstamatic. You can change "lenses" and "frames" and "flashes" to get different effects. I like what the software did with muted greens and reds in the image.

The last of the Fall Color...

2009-11-25T22:29:00.002-05:00

I took this a few days ago, just before the real winter weather set in. Just an exercises in color and texture.

Working on the Cheap Hotel Room

2009-11-24T22:13:00.001-05:00

Worked on creating physics based sheet for the bed. It has its problems and I may just sculpt it myself. Added the lamp. Might be a little too detailed. It has a bulb in it and a turn knob. Image is still vary much a work in progress.

Ain't nothin' like a brisk walk....

2009-11-23T21:58:00.002-05:00

This was created with an algorithm in Flash using a principle called a random walk. The original only allowed for up-down/left-right movement. I added the diagonal movements of up-right and so on. I also changed the iteration numbers to give it more of a gradient from black to orange. I have made subtle differences in the original and am still debating if I have made it mine yet.

Sometimes a face just appears...

2009-11-22T21:34:00.002-05:00

This is my first attempt at creating and posting a blog entry entirely on the iPhone . This image was taken using a macro lens "stick" on called a jelly lens. I have also ordered a wide angle lens as well.

The Miro wall

2009-11-21T23:13:00.002-05:00

It was odd, but I saw a Miro painting in the texture and wires of this wall.

Christmas in a small town....

2009-11-20T22:56:00.003-05:00

This last weekend I able to go on a photo road trip on the Ky. side of the Ohio River. In this one absolutely dead town there was this Christmas storefront right out of the 50's. The notion to start photographing these decorations didn't hit me until late in the trip and this was the only image I got that I felt good about.

One other view...

2009-11-19T22:28:00.001-05:00

..... of the old theater a little later in the day. The shadows changed and the sky opened up.

Face in the wall....

2009-11-18T00:19:00.001-05:00

Recently I had some time to go out photographing and found this back alley wall. I saw several figures in its weathered layers.

Looking at old things....

2009-11-17T22:20:00.002-05:00

I was out photographing a few days ago, and stopped into this little town. I didn't see anything right away. But after getting out of the car and walking outside the town square I found this abandoned theater. It must have been quite a lace at one time for such a small town. I like the way the afternoon light was falling on it.

Fabric Abstraction....

2009-11-16T00:11:00.002-05:00

One morning I was about to make our bed and the light that was coming through the window cast this abstraction across the sheets. I tinkered with the contrast and orientation.

The sleeping crow....

2009-11-15T23:14:00.001-05:00

Here's a quick sketch I did in Painter. Just trying to catch the essence of the bird with its eyes closed, head cocked to one side and talon up.

Somewhere between order and chaos.....

2009-11-14T21:39:00.004-05:00

I tend to collect odd things and place them about my workroom at what seems to be random places. And then rarely move them. There seems to be something disquieting and human about chaos and comforting and less human about order. It is also very dangerous to except any new insight at face value. But, I do like this image as well.

The 500 year old door....

2009-11-13T23:01:00.002-05:00

The plaque on the front of this church said it was at least 600 years old. The amazing thing about a lot of the places I've been in Europe is the sense of history. A holding on to the past and having a healthy skepticism of the future. Maybe the metaphor is way too obvious... but I liked the image.

Looking more carefully....

2009-11-12T23:24:00.001-05:00

The more of these blurs I make, the more I begin to see in them. The big difference between the iphone blurs and the GF1 blurs seems to be the distinction of "brushstrokes". This iphone image has much softer elements than the image that I posted a few days ago taken with the the GF1.

The dissection of an orange....

2009-11-11T23:15:00.000-05:00

Sometimes the photographs of my food organizations start taking on the look of scientific records. Photos that should have labels written on them explaining the different parts. I caught myself laying out an orange like this the other day. And of course made an image of it.

A chair is not a chair....

2009-11-10T23:04:00.002-05:00

The house this image was taken in had just been emptied and I was told about it by a friend who's grandparents had owned the place. There was nothing in the house ( not even a pin on the floor) but this chair. The words from an old song came back to me. Two months later the house was bulldozed.

Some where between the light and darkness....

2009-11-09T22:15:00.003-05:00

The view from our booth. Stopped at a pizza joint in a small town that was recommended to us. The dining area looked like an old office break room with second hand restaurant furniture pushed into it and three teen aged boys who looked like they couldn't afford a Wii killing time at a pinball machine. The food was not very good, but I'm glad we stopped.

Say goodbye to the old store fronts....

2009-11-08T22:02:00.003-05:00

An old 4x5 that I remember being an exercise in shape and texture. I was happy with the way the aged paint and the telephone lines reflecting in the glass came out. It was probably built in the late 20's or early 30's and in the Midwest that was what I could find that was "really" old.

Blur Painting No.7....

2009-11-07T23:41:00.004-05:00

One of the interesting side effects of doing these blurs with a digital camera seems to be what I'm calling the brush stroke effect. I like the look of pixels being pulled across the image. At the moment it is taking about 15 to 20 images to get something interesting.

Sometimes it has everything to do....

2009-11-06T23:30:00.002-05:00

.... with the way they look at you. It was spooky... I found myself in and amongst some stuffed animals the other day and happened to caught this evil eye.

First pinhole from the GF1....

2009-11-05T22:32:00.000-05:00

I was able to build a pinhole adapter for the GF1 using the plastic body cap that came with the camera. After fashioning a flexible holder ( I will hopefully be able to attach plastic camera lenses as well ) I had to set the camera to accept just the body cap as a lens. From this I see that I will need to sand down the hole and turn up the noise reduction. Will post any interesting results.

New small drawings...

2009-11-04T22:17:00.001-05:00

The image is the size of a slide mount opening. I was looking through some old reference material and found a set of small sketches and thought I would like to try my hand at some. This is the first. I chose a slide mount opening to give me a real world limitation on size.

Taken out of context....

2009-11-03T22:51:00.003-05:00

When you play with in camera blurring, one of the interesting side effects is how far out of context the composition can be taken. And how an expressive piece can come from such an ordinary source.

Día de los Muertos...

2009-11-02T21:31:00.003-05:00

A little something for the day. Its a day to laugh at death. Its a day to laugh at life. Remember someone passed. Hug someone living.

The doors to a church.....

2009-11-01T22:15:00.001-05:00

An iPhone image of the construction to the side of a church. The way the sunlight was pushing through the top of the image and the shadows turning blue makes it look like some kind of underwater ruins.

Where the Boogie men run off to.....

2009-10-31T22:20:00.000-04:00

This is another blur experiment. I shot it using the B&W mode and forced the aperture down to the cameras smallest and the ISO down to 100. With the streaking it looks like a pencil drawing.
The dark figure right center top looks like a stylized figure running away.

Clouds rushing by....

2009-10-30T22:31:00.001-04:00

There are two things about this season that are not photographed much and are a visual treat for me. One is the long shadows that happen in the early evenings. The other is the dark fast moving clouds.

Strange Obsessions....

2009-10-29T22:41:00.002-04:00

There are two odd things I've noted about myself. One is that I tend (on occasion) to organize my food. The other is that when I note that I organize my food, I photograph it.

Quick Sketch Nude....

2009-10-27T23:53:00.003-04:00

In life drawing class we were give 2 minuets to find the "essence of the form". As the semester went on I got better at finding the right lines in the time given. But, of course its all a bit of Zeno's principal.

It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to.....

2009-10-26T23:27:00.000-04:00

This was taken from the front of an old passenger train car. It was very cramped and hot in the little compartments that joined the cars and seemed to take forever to set up the camera. The layering of doors and chairs are what brought this image together for me.

Noodling about on the iphone.....

2009-10-25T23:15:00.000-04:00

Trying to sketch with one's finger tip is a rather strange sensation. There is a program for the iphone called brushes that lets you draw, using different brushes and colors on the screen. It will take some getting used to. A silly little something for the season.

In the spirit of the season.....

2009-10-24T22:22:00.003-04:00

I don't even remember where this was taken. I do remember wanting that plant in the image and playing with the tripod for quite a long time getting the composition just right. I really liked the broken light that fell into the scene.

Late evening Underground.....

2009-10-23T22:12:00.003-04:00

I wanted to catch one of the platforms with no one on it and 7:15pm ( it had to have been pm, because I couldn't imagine me up at 7:15am.... even for an image.... on vacation ) downtown London gave me that opportunity. It was a long exposure and as I recall someone did walk in and sit on the bench to the lower left.

Something about bears and a little girl.....

2009-10-22T22:02:00.003-04:00

Still raiding my old 4x5s. This image was taken at an auction. For a few years I was taken by how the things that define a persons life were strune out in the yard of an estate. I bought things and took images.

Mother's Dark Star......

2009-10-21T21:49:00.002-04:00

Tell the moon child
Hours through
And offer him my sleep
That the earth and sky
They ask
And so will many more
Why shadows celebrate
These painful lifeless evenings

And let him wander
Cold and dark
Through these
A gift
My deepest, warmest dreams

Another poem I wrote using only the words in a set of refrigerator magnet words. I sometimes found myself standing at the refrigerator door at two in the morning still switching out words to find a subtle change in meaning.

Another Catholic Girls School Washroom....

2009-10-20T21:57:00.004-04:00

Raiding my old 4x5s while I get some new stuff together. This was a view outside the tub stalls from a previous image. This place still hunts my dreams on occasion. There was so much more there to photograph than I got a chance to take.

When they just get up and leave....

2009-10-18T22:08:00.002-04:00

Although the rest of this abandoned farmhouse had little in it, the kitchen table still had food on it and there were clothes, shoes, and other items covered with dust in the closets. The plaster walls were starting to weather and take on a painterly look.

A poem in memory of a giving soul....

2009-10-17T23:08:00.000-04:00

The Gape Seed Sofa (revised 2009)

The mysteries of
What is remembered
And what is chosen to be forgotten
Stand at the edge of
What remains

We define our boundaries
We place our shrines and fortresses
And gather tokens
For that which we might never traverse again

The place in the photograph
Doesn’t exist anymore
But, strangely enough
The longitude and latitude
The day and the season
Can, if one truly puts effort,
Be carefully deduced

The air, the light, the furniture
The smell of dust and ozone
Were all a part of that painful chronicle
That memory of alum and sweet water
Filtering down through the sediment of time

A shaft of afternoon sun
Would peek out from the corner
Of the neighbor’s house
For such a short moment
And fall upon her heart
Her eyes closed
And lying quiet upon the sofa

And all of this
Within synapse and silver
That is slowly fading away.

I wrote this after the passing of her kind spirit.

Standing in the middle of the past......

2009-10-16T22:35:00.001-04:00

A few years back someone told me about an amazing resort hotel on the middle of nowhere. It was abandoned and starting to fall apart. I found it and went back there several times. It was a great place to photograph.

No-one belonged there any more....

2009-10-15T22:18:00.002-04:00

One of the small rooms in a larger room that was cut up into these bath stalls. This one was at the end of a row of five and had the frosted outside window. It was housing for students and nuns on the campus of a small Catholic girls school. The light and the two curved shapes are what made this image for me.

Where have all the English gone......

2009-10-14T22:01:00.000-04:00

I was digging around in my old 4x5 negatives and found a few images I had not scanned. This is one from a courtyard just off Hyde Park. An elderly German woman came out and asked me why I was photographing around there. I remember being blown away by the detail a larage negative would have.

Impressions of a place....

2009-10-13T21:53:00.004-04:00

This has the feel of some contemporary abstract expressionists painting. With large white strokes on black and yellow. There is something happening in these images that I like.

Flowers and Picasso...

2009-10-12T22:19:00.003-04:00

In painter I found some really well done gouache brushes. I played around with some bright colors and came up with an image that looks a lot like one of Picasso's quick sketches from what I call his cartoon period. Like I've said before, I'm not comparing myself to these great artists, I'm finding connections.

Taking your time with an image.....

2009-10-11T22:32:00.003-04:00

The layers of detail that comes out of an image can sometimes be so impressive. This image was taken with the new Lunix gf1. I took it into Photoshop and browsed around the pixels at varying
magnifications and found so many little images inside the bigger one.

A verbal image....

2009-10-10T22:47:00.001-04:00

Samuel was robbed of his soul. Not as if at gun point and all at once. But, little by little. His soul ( a thing that Samuel considered to be the center of his essence and humanity, and not necessarily some ethereal clone of his existence that God would scoop up from the earth and take home with him) was picked at and ingested by the world around him. It was intact through his childhood and he was fairly certain that a substantial portion of it made it through his adolescence and into his early adulthood. But, now the reality had hit him, like a bus driver suddenly realizing that all of his passengers were gone and he had not been aware of them getting off. He panicked that so much of it was missing. He re-adjusted himself in his chair and the smell of rose water and chocolate ( that had been so strong just a moment before) began to fade from his senses.

At times I toy around with trying to write. Most of the time it comes out as poetry that I endlessly edit. At others, it comes out as these passages that I call verbal images. This is one of my most recent.

Trippin' on the industrial...

2009-10-09T23:00:00.001-04:00

Another blur that happened by accident and stood out from all the rest. What it is really isn't important.... whats happening in it is what caught my eye.