Sundays In Silesia

Spending four days traveling around Poland proved to be more exciting than I could have predicted.

The first two days, in Zakopane, were relatively uneventful affairs filled with cheese, beer, lamb and rain. Sofia, the woman whose home Marcin and I stayed in, was very nice and she made sure to stuff me full of food the first opportunity she got. Zakopane is in the Tatra mountains, and close to the border with Slovakia. Having exhausted the possibilities for photographing mountains and eating cheese, Marcin decided we'd go on a beer run in Slovakia.

In Slovakia we bought beer. I got yelled at by the angry gas station man for photographing his gas station, and I got waved at by the happy farmer. The happy farmer was particularly exciting since hardly anyone in Central Europe smiles much (with the exception a few of the guys at Platige). I don't smile much, either, so it must be genetic. Unfortunately, my photo of the happy farmer is pretty bad -- as it was taken just as we were narrowly avoiding a traffic accident, jostling me and causing a blurry and oddly framed image.

Sunday we went to Oświęcim, and to the Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps. The museum at Auschwitz is quite extensive, and both impressive and depressing in its scope. A group of Israelis was visiting the site, which I can only imagine was a terribly emotional moment for them. My (Polish Catholic) grandparents were in labor camps in Germany during WWII, and while all Poles suffered greatly during the Nazi occupation (the museum addresses this), Jewish citizens (of all the occupied territories) suffered the worst. So what I was feeling, the Israeli visitors must have been feeling even more deeply. For many in Central and Eastern Europe, it seems that Jews are now considered mythical creatures from the past, so I felt the presence of the Israeli group was a good reminder for the other visitors that there are indeed Jewish people alive today.

We then spent the rest of our Sunday in Silesia, hitting Katowice, Bytom, Ruda Slonska, and Gliwicia. We took some nice photos of the Huta Katowice steelworks from a neighboring hillside, and of some interesting looking old factories in Bytom. My hotel in Gliwicia was near a railway siding, which was both interesting to observe and not very conducive to sleeping.

Monday we went to Częstochowa, where I saw the famous Black Madonna painting presiding above a morning Mass. The reliquary that was open to the public had other fabulous pieces of art (paintings and metalworks, mainly), and the museum had lots of interesting artifacts from the Jasna Góra monastery's political and military history -- including the repulsion of the Swedish army in 1655 during The Deluge).

In the Łódź district we stopped to take photos of the Bełchatów Power Station. This resulted in our being detained by the guards of the plant, after we stopped to take some photos near one of the coal feeder conveyor belts and Marcin asked one of the workers if it would be ok with him. During our nearly an hour spent at the guard offices, one of the guards proceeded to tell us pretty much everything a terrorist could want to know about the plant -- including telling us which photo had the sensitive municipal power feeder line that I'd inadvertently snapped a picture of (and wouldn't have known what it was without his info). So, had we been terrorists, we'd have gotten more info than we ever hoped for. Of course, as Bruce Schneier points out, terrorists don't generally take photos (and if they did, they would not likely stop and ask the workers for permission).

Police were brought in, and we were taken to the station. For the most part, the Police thought the whole situation was a waste of their time. Marcin pointed out that we were movie makers taking reference photos, and the chief of police believed him but said he was being pressured by the guards to do something. He decided he'd have one of the younger cops take a report. The police were mostly quite nice. The officer assigned to our "case" took our statement and (at the request of the head of the factory guards, who called the station) checked out Marcin's laptop to see what other photos we had. Afterwards, he gave us a map to a location where we could take photos of the power plant without any problems. Clearly he didn't think we were much of a terrorist threat. Neither the factory guards nor the police made me delete the photos that had caused such consternation, and once we were released we were thus free to take hundreds more photos of the facility.

A fine example of the absurd, time-and-money-wasting, feel-good nonsense that Bruce Schneier calls "security theater." At least in this case the police knew their time was being wasted, and were all too happy to have the affair be over and done with as quickly as possible. Maybe Polish police have a more realistic perspective on the true nature of crime and terrorism than their paranoid American counterparts, like the Rodeo Police who illegally drove me out of town (literally, with a squad car less than 10 feet off my bumper until I left the city limits) after I took photos of the refinery in town while standing on a public street.

The Lights Flickr As They Fade

I'm finally making good on a promise to myself to show my photo work outside my photo club (which I've been absent from for a long time) and circle of friends, and to try to do more with it in terms of both artistic growth and more professional exhibition venues.

I'm still not certain what I think of Flickr as a service (I don't like their un-customizable display interface, but there are some good things about them, like having an API, and the community aspect of groups), but I've decided to make use of it until I find something better or roll my own for my photo portfolio at bugaj.com website that I keep stalling on re-launching. I am, however, enjoying being able to organize and present my photos on-line.

My next step is to locate a good printer to work with, so I can create a portfolio and at least two full-scale works to present to galleries and nonprofits for show consideration. Thus far I've had no luck whatsoever finding a printer who does archival quality digital printing (preferably lightjet, but perhaps giclee) onto a vellum, frosted/translucent film, or a similar material. (If you know of a place, let me know.)

In my Flickr travels, I also found Diego Bauducco's Picto Browser, which lets you displa Flickr images in a Flash app for embedding in a blog post or other site. It's simple, yet effective. Here is my "atmospheric" images set from Flickr in Picto Browser (if you're using NoScript, you need to allow db798.com to have script access):

This set of images encompasses both some of my semi-abstract very soft focus work, as well as nice environmental atmospheric effects. Unless otherwise noted, all these effects are in-camera using one or more of: environmental atmospherics, defocus, and slow shutter + slight motion (but generally not enough to be a "motion" shot). It's more of an emotional / mood description than a technical one, anyway, but several of my favorite shots are in that group.

Burtynsky: My Industrial / Landscape Photography Idol

I first saw Edward Burtynsky's work at one of the myriad galleries on Geary St. in San Francisco. I was absolutely engrossed by the photos: industrial landscapes from China. Each piece was amazing. The color. The composition. The fascinating scenes he captures. Burtynsky is a master at capturing the horrific beauty of degenerate industrial landscapes that has for so long drawn me to them.

Chinese Oil Refinery

Burtynsky is not only a master of form, but his subject matter is chosen in such a way as to reveal the dichotomy between economic necessity and environmental decay present in all our industrial activities. Thus, his work succeeds both as industrial formalism and as social commentary.

Bangladeshi Shipbreaking

Burtynsky is, for me, a role model for both aesthetically engaging and socially relevant industrial photography. If this kind of work appeals to you, I highly recommend checking out Burtynsky's work.

End of an Era: Polaroid Getting Out Of Film

Polaroid is shutting down its film operations. They had, of course, already discontinued their most interesting film: SX-70 "Time Zero" film with the gelatin based emulsion, but now SX-70s (and other Polaroids) are rendered completely useless (since there will be no readily available 600 film to hack into it). A shame, too, because it had a "nice" look that's not trivial to replicate digitally.

The only option left is to try unsaleable.com's SX-70 BLEND film, which is apparently just 600 film modified and put in SX-70 cartridges w/ an ND filter to compensate for the 600 film being 2 stops off. The price is quite steep at $37/pack plus shipping from Holland, which isn't worth it for any SX-70 film that hasn't got the gelatin based emulsion. Better off just putting the SX-70 up on the display shelf with other cameras for which film will never be available again.