[Hugh]

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Yep, the business is selling gallery space.

[Hugh]

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As in many matters: if you’ve got a ‘name’, or are already ‘in’, or have the right connections, your path is easier.

[Hugh]

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This use of AI in a restricting/censoring sense is fraught. I’m reminded of a terrible scandal in Australia, popularly known as ‘Robodebt’, wherein the government used a computer program supposedly to identify people who had wrongly received benefit payments. Whoever wrote the program and imposed it didn’t understand the law (or didn’t care), and based the assessments on a whole years income, whereas it should have been assessed over a much shorter time frame (6 weeks springs to mind, but I may have that wrong – a long time ago that I had any contact with this side of the system). As a result thousands of people were cruelly required to ‘repay’ debts that in reality they didn’t owe. Several were driven to suicide and many had to navigate great trauma before eventually, way too late, another government abandoned the process. How it ever passed the ‘pub test’ is beyond me (presumably written and imposed by people who had never been in need of this type of assistance, and so were totally ignorant of how it worked and how much impact it had). We need human oversight – much more ‘I’ and less ‘A’. Another related example is mechanised telephone answering systems that present a series of options, none of which actually fit the peculiar circumstances at play (arguably still sometimes better than 50 minutes of one of Bach’s less inspired pieces!)

[Hugh]

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Yeah, tripped over one of these recently just a couple of blocks away. They wanted €5000 for a three month showing. Nuh!

[Hugh]

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That’s more or less what I was meaning Abbie – I just sort of drifted off into the more general rant about the current scene because I’m finding it frustrating. The ingrained and institutionalised discrimination is not in question in my mind – makes all of us poorer.

[Hugh]

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This whole situation is a real challenge. Thinking of male artists is so ingrained and so overwhelming in history that one’s mind jumps straight to Picasso, Carrevaggio, Monet, Rembrandt et al. ad nauseum. The only really renowned female in the visual arts that I (as a dabbler rather than being immersed) can think of off hand is Sarah Moon. There are one or two contemporary artistes who I’ve come to know through online photo/art sites whose work is wonderful, but I’ve still not heard of them on the wider world stage. Added to that is that contemporary art is off on what I find a really unfortunate tangent wherein it seems it can’t be both attractive/pretty and also considered ‘real’ art so, for example, Monet wouldn’t get a look in. If there isn’t some blood or a skull, or hints of physical or mental abuse or anguish, or at the very least impenetrable obscurity, then it isn’t ‘art’. BS, but there we are. Through this fog it is difficult for anyone, male or female but especially the latter, to attract wide attention.
I’m most interested to hear other’s views!

[Hugh]

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An interesting subject, and as you suggest not clarified at all by the intervention of AI. I’ve heard of AI guardians of respectability closing down posts discussing little hollow lumps of galvanised steel with a thread on each end (aka a nipple). Funny, as long as one is not trying to have a sensible conversation about plumbing, but exceedingly dumb and frustrating if one is – much more ‘A’ than ‘I’.

[Hugh]

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My experience (both receiving and giving) is mixed. When confronted by a work that I think is wrong on many levels I usually try to escape the whole situation, as anything I say will sound (at least to my own ears) patronising at best or more likely just plain insulting: out of focus, flat light, no composition to speak of, ordinary and uninteresting subject, highlights burnt out … why are you even asking, just look yourself! (I wouldn’t say most of that, but what can one say? That leaf buried in the background is exposed quite nicely, if oof?).
On the other hand I’ve recently received a string of comments (unsolicited) along the lines of “normal photo of ‘X'”, when the subject (X) has been an everyday thing, but in my opinion and that of many others who have made extravagant (and also unsolicited) positive comments about the composition, lighting, dof etc, see the photo raised well above the ‘normal’ – unhelpful, not thoughtful, and seemingly blind to anything except the everyday nature of the subject.
A fraught area, to be trodden with extreme caution.

[Hugh]

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Interesting Ludwig. I wrote a book about my amateur fumblings whereas you’ve condensed your professional career into 8 succinct lines. They say empty ships make the most noise – probably a case in point – lol.

[Hugh]

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Salvation is at hand! The new(ish) mirrorless jobbies don’t require one to know anything much about numbers – one can see the more or less finished job on the screen (or in the viewfinder according to your preference), so even in manual mode just set 100 ISO, f8 (or other at your preference), then twiddle the shutter speed knob until it looks about right (if you want to get REALLY sophisticated you can even have a histogram up on the screen and then just twiddle until nothing is at the black end and nothing at the white end, and … PRESTO!

[Hugh]

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I manage to ignore the early advertising fairly successfully, but the bl**dy awful christmas musak that seems to flood the shopping areas gets right up my nose. There has been some wonderful music composed and performed over the centuries (Mendelssohn, Mario Lanza …), so why are we afflicted with this poppy bilge instead? An affront to both ears and soul.

[Hugh]

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Had a box Brownie briefly as a child. Then got a Praktica initially with just the 50mm lens. Then got more serious with a Pentax Spotmatic again with just the 50mm, then got a Vivitar zoom (something like 30-105mm – very slow and not the best), some close-up rings, a cheap and nasty (quite nasty really, but fun) 400mm which lot I carted through SE and S Asia and Europe in a backpack.

Eventually after having a decent job for a few years upgraded to a Pentax LX with 50mm, 24-35mm (top little lens), a Tamron 80-200 or similar and a Tamron 500mm mirror-lens and a 2x extender as well as a variety of close-up doovers. Then had a bunch of kids in short order and did virtually no photography for about 20 years – survival mode.

Emerged from this hiatus to find that all things were now digital. So via eBay: Nikon D700 (terrific camera), 50mm f1.4  (also terrific), 28-85 (also terrific), 80-200 push-pull zoom (good optically but a bit clunky – subsequently got a 70-200 f4 which I still use with an adaptor – great lens) and 80-400mm (had a lot of fun with this, but eventually decided that the optics weren’t quite there – I’m missing the reach), also a Tamron 90mm macro (wonderful optics) and a Kenko x1.4 extender. Somewhere along the line acquired a Nikon D5300 (smaller format) as a 2nd camera with an 24-180mm zoom (lovely light little lens and surprisingly good optics for such a baby).

Then came the new mirrorless developments, so I’ve migrated to a pair of Nikon Z6, one with the 70-200 attached, the other with a 24-70 or occasionally 14-30mm. Still have the Tamron 90mm macro too. All excellent kit, but missing something longer. Checked out the Tamron 100-500 and Nikon 180-600 the other day, and am sorely tempted (took a pic with the Nikon at 600mm 1/13s hand held – perfectly sharp! Extraordinary!), but not feeling quite financial enough at present, and concerned about how to cart it all on aeroplanes.

Why Nikon? At the time I had no idea about the digital world, so it was a steep learning curve, and I simply found the Nikon model range easier to understand than the Canon. Ruled out Pentax, Sony and others simply because they didn’t have the range of lenses. No idea what I’d choose now if I was starting from scratch.

[Hugh]

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That sounds lovely Abbie – much more exciting than our interminable drives about 300 miles from the family farm to Mandurah on the other side of Perth (classic “are we there yet” territory for a little kid!)

[Hugh]

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I’ve got to admire your dedication in writing up your notes! A great idea, but for me it just wouldn’t happen. Sometimes when looking back through my photos I think “Ah, yes, that was great, I remember … whatever”. Other times: “A void … where the h^ll was that and what were we doing?? That’s not a bad picture though – lucky I keyed in a couple of  keywords to jog the memory.”. Both can be rewarding experiences.

The attached is from a day wandering back and forwards over the border between France and Switzerland. Can’t quite remember whether the edge of the cliff was the border, or whether I’m more or less standing on it and this is all Swiss – either way not a bad way to spend a day!

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[Hugh]

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Oh dear John!

Alaska or Yosemite on the table and I’d be in like a shot, but despite many people whose views I respect saying how interesting (or whatever) it is (and I think can imagine what they mean) I’d almost pay good money to avoid Vegas (or so I tell myself anyway! Maybe if I had more and better money?). The Fatburger sounds particularly appealing – lol.

[Author]

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