The Heavens, close to the Earth... Even this Earth.

The Heavens, close to the Earth... Even this Earth., originally uploaded by Loren Rye Photo.

Photos present very complex problems. Anyone who thinks a machine can do the job of a colorist is not an artist. People who just run their photos through Photoshop or who just say "SOOC" all the time are, equivalently, not necessarily artists. Call them purists, call them what you will. Art is, to me, an act of rearranging to suit a temperament.

Not to say they can't become an artist or can't discover an artistic temperament, but that's how I see it right now.

I'm not saying data movement isn't necessarily art. In fact, I've said in the past all life is poetry. I'm not acting like it right now, am I?

Well, those're the breaks. Someone who doesn't have a stake in something might not have the art to do it right. Bottom line: if you don't care about it, you won't do a great job at it.

Now through the gateless gate

Lighted, originally uploaded by Loren Rye Photo.

It isn't hard to see
I guess I was born to love you



Come on and take my hand

Something weird about pictures...

Something for today., originally uploaded by Loren Rye Photo.

There's something strange about pictures I noticed tonight.

After cooling off from a rant about how TV-cum-Internet video stations try to sell video without using the strengths of video at all and make you sit through an ad or two followed by inane chatter about whatever issue they think is the most broadly relevant... Actually, I'm bridging into that rant again. Suffice it to say, what can be transmitted in a few sentences is often, despite video's inherent strength in transmission of information, often completely neglected in video.

But as I was trying to transmit before being sidetracked, there is something about pictures; photographs in particular seem to slow down time. There are many other pictures which accomplish the same thing, but for now I'm focusing on photographs.

Video in contrast is centered on the movement of the universe. It can make time seem fast or slow but it is always about movement.



I'd rather not expound lengthily on the difference between the timeless and the movement in time or the slowing of it. I don't believe photos stop time any more than wanting to stop time stops time. In fact it seems more than pointless to believe anything. But I've written about that before.

What I'm writing about here is that in a photo the observer is implicitly invited to examine the photo, whereas in a video the viewer is implicitly expected to follow the movement of the imagery, of the story, of the video.

Not that there's anything bad about either one, it's just something I've noticed. Happy December! :)