Friday, time to cleanse the palate. part 2

ok, lawyers' turns:

"These are from a book called Disorder in the American Courts, and are
things people actually said in
court, word for word, taken down and now published by court reporters
that had the torment of staying
calm while these exchanges were actually taking place.


ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that
morning?
WITNESS: He said, "Where am I, Cathy?"
ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you?
WITNESS: My name is Susan..
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: What gear were you in at the moment of the impact?
WITNESS: Gucci sweats and Reeboks.
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: Are you sexually active?
WITNESS: No, I just lie there.
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: This myasthenia gravis, does it affect your memory at all?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And in what ways does it affect your memory?
WITNESS: I forget.
ATTORNEY: You forget? Can you give us an example of something you
forgot?
_______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Now doctor, isn't it true that when a person dies in his
sleep, he doesn't know
about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam?
____________________________________

ATTORNEY: The youngest son, the twenty-year-old, how old is he?
WITNESS: He's twenty, much like your IQ.
_______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken?
WITNESS: Are you shitting me?
_________________________________________

ATTORNEY: So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And what were you doing at that time?
WITNESS: Getting laid.
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: She had three children, right?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: How many were boys?
WITNESS: None.
ATTORNEY: Were there any girls?
WITNESS: Your Honor, I think I need a different attorney. Can I get a
new attorney?
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death.
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?
WITNESS: Take a guess.
___________________________________________ _

ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual?
WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard.
ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female?
WITNESS: Unless the Circus was in town I'm going with male.
_____________________________________

ATTORNEY: Is your appearance here this morning pursuant to a deposition
notice which
I sent to your attorney?
WITNESS: No, this is how I dress when I go to work.
______________________________________

ATTORNEY: Doctor, how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead
people?
WITNESS: All of them. The live ones put up too much of a fight.
_______________________________________

ATTORNEY: ALL your responses must be oral, OK? What school did you go
to?
WITNESS: Oral.
_________________________________________

ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body?
WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 p.m.
ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at the time?
WITNESS: If not, he was by the time I finished.
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
WITNESS: Are you qualified to ask that question?
______________________________________

And the best for last:

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a
pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you
began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive,
nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and
practicing law. "

Friday, time to cleanse the palate.

Rant time. If I can't rant on my own blog, well where the hell can I?

After a long exchange from a supposedly established photographer who shall remain nameless, but has somehow avoided "going digital" but, since his agent is threatening to drop his ass if he doesn't switch...

AND, out of respect to all you out there who've worked your asses off TO learn how to shoot with digital, I offer this:

email from Ted...

...Ah, I was under the impression you wanted to actually know the process, not simply appear that you know it.

Sorry, but you had that coming.

First, I just spent, out of courtesy to ..., a great deal of time (that I cannot afford) with the distraction of trying to get in contact with you, and then putting together some of the best advice you will get, regardless of how much you did, or did not, want to hear it.

Second, I have spent a great deal of the last ten years of my career trying to do damage-control resulting from the ignorance of photographers who decide to shoot digital and don't know how to process or deliver files, only to blame "digital" for the outcome. The entire industry suffers from this irresponsibility. The capabilities of a full-frame sensor far exceed that of film, and all anyone needs to do to prove that is to know how to process the files. Now, if you work with a good assistant, or production team, as I suggested, you may be able to avoid that embarrasment, but my guess is you feel you don't need to take that step.

One more bit of advice you may ignore as well. If you feel that shooting digital is no more difficult and complex than moving from one film format camera to another, you have some very rude surprises coming.

Oh, and, frankly if, in fact, anyone out there is still paying in the neighborhood of the $7000 day rate you claim, then my vote is it should go to someone who has a commitment to the medium and has learned his tools. ..., for example. I know for a fact she's spent over $100K in education and tools to do what she does today.

I'm done.

Ted


This is in response to this line of emails, read them from the bottom up:

but what is the objective then?
my agent 2 decades ago told me I needed to get a hasselblad
I got one, never had used one before
4 days later I got the biggest catalog of the year at 49k from ...
It was booked in Africa and cancelled
I shot in a studio, my first time in a studio ever, and first job with a hasselblad
and my first time ever with my two assistants
at the end of the 2 weeks the art director said that he'd never had a job go more smoothly and that we must have worked together for years. they subsequently booked me for 10 years.
I've shot with those two cameras before. and have done epson prints, and downloaded the files. I did a 2 week modeling job all over S. America and watched the photographer shoot digitally and think that I could have by the end of the two weeks easil.

I think in a week with help I'd be able to do a $3500. a half day job and without it I won't.
and that is my point.
Thanks
...


On Jul 29, 2009, at 9:15 AM, ... wrote:

Thanks for your input.
Months and years?
...

On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 8:19 AM, Ted Dillard wrote:
Sorry, I don't think that is realistic. Our time issues aside, if you want to get up to speed on digital, it's not something that takes weeks, certainly not at the professional level. Think months, years, honestly. What a lot of photographers in your situation do is to hire a production/digital assistant who handles the cameras and processing, it's a great, hands-on way to learn. I'd actually suggest ... for that, she's among the best I've taught.

Ted

On Jul 29, 2009, at 8:11 AM, ... wrote:

Thanks
but
I need to do this now. The summer is the only time for me to make money. and I need to.
My photo agent needs new images and there a crews of models ready to come up.

On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 7:02 AM, Ted Dillard wrote:
beautiful work...

OK, I think we need to rethink this, since it seems we're unable to connect via telephone. For my part, I apologize, I've been simply buried, especially in meetings and appointments... I'm thinking we need to postpone this and try again when we both have more time, maybe in the late Fall? However, there's a lot of work you need to do before I can even make any worthwhile contributions to the effort. Here are a few suggestions-

Get a good digital camera, I'd suggest a full-frame chip, like a Canon 5D Mark 2 or a Nikon D700. If you want to make prints that are 4x6', that's what you need. Shooting with the Kodak is just going to give you a bunch of beautiful shots that you ultimately can't do anything with- it's just too small a file, not enough resolution.

Get Photoshop, and tear into it. Even if you want to save some money and get Lightroom or Photoshop Elements, you've got to dive in, and Photoshop is the language that digital photography speaks.

I'd suggest a good book to help you start learning Photoshop correctly. Mine, of course (RAW Pipeline), or any of the books that seem to strike a chord with you.

(I'd encourage you to start right off by shooting RAW files, by the way...)

Maybe pick yourself up a nice printer, like an Epson R2800 or something to make prints with.

Dive in the deep end, and try to learn as much as you can... then if you're looking for help, whether from me, or someone else, maybe ... you at least have a foundation to build on.

Again, sorry... bad timing, and I hope this doesn't feel like "take 2 and call me...", but I don't really see a practical way to get this rolling.

Best wishes, feel free to contact me with any questions along the way.

Ted

New Liberal Arts- site and book

"New Liberal Arts
200 copies. 80 pages. 21 ideas... and one secret.

Earlier this year, we wrote:

It's 2009. A generation of digital natives is careening towards college. The economy is rebooting itself weekly. We have new responsibilities now—as employees, citizens, and friends—and we have new capabilities, too. The new liberal arts equip us for a world like this. But... what are they?"

...an interesting, and in the spirit of Web 2.0, free, book on the impact of the internet on Liberal Arts. Download it here.

So. What about Leica?

Thanks to this translation of a Q&A session with Stefan Daniel during the Hessenpark member meeting, here's the inside gossip, er, spin, er, uh, scoop.

Strategy In General

Panasonic Cooperation

* The Panasonic cooperation will continue
* More compact cameras to come

Leica and Micro FourThirds

* Leica is not going to offer MFT cameras
* Leica may offer MFT lenses
* MFT is and interesting system
* Sensor size is a very limiting factor

Leica And The Forum

* Leica is not going to run an own forum on their website
* Collaboration is seen as running well and constructive
* Positive example is the first L-Camera TV show from the Leica production
* Many Leica employees are reading in this forum regularly, so that important contributions in the forum are reported immeditiately to the management
* The forum provides many contributions to the product development
* Stefan Daniel agrees to answer forum questions more often in the future

Leica As Lens Supplier for Other Camera Systems

* Patents needed are only swapped inside of the Japanes camera industry
* Zeiss lenses are manufactured by Cosina who are seen as Japanese company
* That way Zeiss receives the patents, Leica as German company does not
* Leica's attempts to come to an agreement failed until now
* Reverse engineering is legally too risky

Extending The Product Range

* No Leica scanners are planned
* The LCD projector range is continued but won't have interchangeable lenses
* Maybe the customer service will offer to implement different lenses


R-System

R10 and Alternatives

* There will be no digital SLR aka R10
* But there will be - and we are working on this - a suitable solution how to use R lenses digitally
* It's very important to us, that owners of R lenses can take pictures digitally in the near future
* This solution will have nothing to do to with the S2
* Leica has examined intensively which features and what price tag a R10 had to have
* Price would have been 6000 - 7000 Euro and it would have been far behind the competitors
* This would have been a solution for the existing customer base but not for new customers
* Therefore the R system is discontinued, the existing system runs out
* There is no due date for the new solution
* Indirect notes by Stefan Daniel to 35 mm full format
* Definitely it's not going to be a SLR

DMR
The reasons for stopping the DMR were

* Cooperation with Imacon now Hasselblad ended very abruptly
* Sales figures were low (approx. 10% of M8/M8.2)

The DMR firmware will have no updates.


M-System

M9

* A LEICA M9 will come
* Developing full format is technically very demanding because of the M lenses
* We are one step further but still not there where we can announce the camera

M8 Upgrades

* No more upgrades are planned
* Dealers don't like upgrades as no additional sales are generated
* The M8 upgrade constrained Leica M8.2 sales
* Used cameras are entry level cameras thus attracting new customers to Leica
* This would drop by future upgrade offers

Sensor Supplier

* Kodak is prepared to Leica's needs, for example the special size of the S2 sensor
* Other manufacturers like Sony only offer a fixed range of sensors

Summarits / Entry Level Lenses

* Summarits are true Leica lenses
* The LEICA ELMAR-M f/3,8 24 mm was already an extension of this line
* More affordable Leica lenses are to come - perhaps not named Summarit (reserved for 2.5 lenses)
* Summilux 50mm sales are 100% above of Summarit sales

Super Wide Lenses
Asked for super wide lenses:

* Leica already has an 16mm - Leica can only offer shorter lenses
* This is a topic we could work on...

18mm Finder Availability

* 18mm finder to come in June
* The frame precision wasn't sufficient yet therefore a rework was necessary

NOCTILUX Availability

* NOCTILUX wa announced for February
* Production turned out to be more complex than assumed
* NOCTILUX consists of 8 elements in 5 groups
* These groups are first cemented (?), then coated
* This process had problems which are solved now
* End of June, beginning of July larger quantities will reach the market


S-System

* Pilot lot is in production by now
* Everything is on schedule
* Price will be on the same level as the top cameras in the digital professional segment - like high end solutions by Hasselblad and Phase One
* Body will be below 20,000 Euros
* Because of the Leica lens quality and the lacking low-pass filter LEICA S2 can compete with 50MP cameras of the competitors
* Target group of the S2 are professional photographers (studio, fashion, automobile)
* Total market are about 10,000 cameras per year
* Leica is going for a at least two digit market share

Here's the German original.

Thanks to Andreas Jürgensen, from the Leica User Forum.

Olympus ad- a nasty twist

wow, ok... check this out:



(posted 3 months ago 2,011,874 views, comments: 5,653)

This is from Takeuchi Taijin's site- really nice stuff, he seems not too interested in commercial work.

"Read me
I am making a new work now.
I want to devote myself to making it.
So, I can not accept to the invitation of working,
interview and screening of my video now.
I am going to finish my new work.
But, the completion may be late.
Please kindly give mail to me if your invitation avoids it after that.
However, my replying may be late.
And, I am not good at English.
Thanks."

Send him love here.

...his site says: "olympus of "The PEN Story" video that I was not involved." and he gives a link.

Is Olympus playing not so nice? They do say " Thanks to all the stop motion artists who inspired us... ", but here's the part I love:



...indeed.

Why I Love Photography.

parenthetically. this is the very definition of a great viral video. everybody i know is posting it to their whatever page... LOL

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OK, holy crap it's LIVE! In BETA, so check it out and use the link to submit any feedback, but it's UP!!!

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