Perth photography workshop filling up fast.
February 17, 2012
Places are filling fast for the March 24th workshop. If you want an opportunity to see what large format photography can offer in realising your photographic vision, then this workshop is for you. We will be outdoors, using 4×5 cameras, you and a workshop colleague setting up a camera, viewing the composition, getting first hand experience and expert guidance. We are not just stuck in some boring classroom discussing theories and looking at an example. Only two spots left. So grab a spot before they run out! Details online.
Intro to Large Format Photography
February 6, 2012
Introduction to large format photography workshop, Point Walter, March 24th, 2012, 1.00pm to 4.30pm
During the month of FotoFreo 2012 I will be holding an introductory workshop to large format photography.
The aim of this workshop is to introduce you to a large format 4×5 inch field camera, provide some first hand experience with its workings and techniques, with applications for both portrait and landscape work.
If you have ever wondered about the advantages of using a large format camera in your work and what’s involved, or are considering large format for your photography, then this is for you.
This workshop will be conducted outdoors along the foreshore of the Point Walter Reserve, so you can see and experience using a 4×5 field camera on location. Through discussions and field demonstrations, I will guide you through the process of setting up, and the camera techniques in using a large format camera. I will also talk about choice of film types and applications, film loading, processing, lens choices and printing options including digital output.
Point Walter Reserve will provide ample subject matter in a relaxed learning environment for participants to gain experience in using a 4×5 field camera within a group setting. Participants who don’t own a 4×5 are encouraged to attend, if you have one then it bring it along. To maximise the experience, workshop numbers are limited to 6 people.
During the workshop I will be assisted by friend and colleague, Peter Kovacsy. We are holding an exhibition, “Changing Places” at the Barracuda Studio Gallery, U3&4/56 Pakenham St, Fremantle, March 17th to 31st, as part of the FotoFreo Fringe Festival 2012.
After the workshop relax and enjoy a coffee at Walters Cafe. Peter and I also invite you to a special evening viewing at Barracuda Gallery, Fremantle, on Saturday 24th March from 6.30PM to 8PM, where we will discuss our work.
Book online or download a pdf form and post to Alex Bond Photography.
Bracken Ferns, Augusta.
January 13, 2012
During summertime I have to vary my darkroom routine to account for the heat. This means that I usually like to get to work early before the heat of the day sets in. With tasks like film processing it is important to be consistent, and that means keeping the temperature of the developer constant with the use of tempered water baths. It’s simple to do really, just add refrigerated water (during summer) to the room temperature tap water. You may also like to use a pre-rinse which can help adjust the temperature of developing tanks, film and reels prior to the actual development process. These days I just stick to a water bath and choosing a time of the day when you don’t have to fight too great a temperature differential between the room temperature and developer. Anyway, my point is that the window period for film development for me during summer is shortened, so it can take a while to catch up with a back log of film. So I was delighted when I viewed this morning’s processed black and white sheet films and rediscovered what I was photographing exactly one month ago during a trip to Augusta; in this case, bracken ferns. Developing films can be a bit of an adventure, you can never be absolutely sure what you have on film is what you see, and in this case I think I see more in the image than what I remember at the time on the ground glass.
Foto Freo 2012 Fro on the Fringe
January 6, 2012
Yes, the news came through this afternoon in a collective email from Foto Freo headquarters for this year’s fringe dwellers to be given the “go ahead”. So there we have it, ladies and gentlemen. According to Bob Hewitts’s Foto Freo December 2011 newsletter, “Landscape photography, along with wild life photography, has not received much attention in past Festivals.” So I am pleased to assist by doing my small part in addressing this imbalance by participating in this year’s Foto Freo Fringe Festival 2012, along with my good friend and colleague Peter Kovacsy. Our exhibition, “Changing Places” will be held at the Barracuda Studio Gallery, U3&4/56 Pakenham St (corner of Pakenham St and Nairn St, Tele 08 9430 6606), starts March 17th. Come along, see some traditional hand made prints and catch up for a chat.
Introductory Large Format Photography Workshops
April 25, 2011
Swamp Sheoaks, Canning River Reserve
During May and June I will be offering some introductory workshops to large format photography.
The aim of this workshop is to introduce you to a large format 4×5 inch field camera, provide some first hand experience with its workings and techniques, with applications to both portrait and landscape work. If you have ever wondered about the advantages of using a large format camera in your work and what’s involved, or are considering large format for your photography, then this is for you.
This workshop will be conducted outdoors along the wooded banks of the Canning River Reserve, so you can see and experience using a 4×5 field camera in a real life situation. Through various discussions and field demonstrations, including some with Polaroid instant 4×5 film, Alex will guide you through the process of using and choosing a large format camera. Discussion will also include choice of film types and applications, film loading, processing, lens choices and printing options including digital output.
The Canning River Reserve will provide ample subject matter and an ideal learning environment for participants to gain experience in using a 4×5 field camera within a group setting. Participants who have their own film or digital camera, regardless of
format, are encouraged to bring it along.
To maximise the experience, workshop numbers are limited to a maximum of 6 people. For more information about dates etc, you can down load a printable pdf or you can get more details and book online.
You will be the envy of other photographers with the strikingly fashionable dark cloth hairstyle.
Groundhogs Day
November 8, 2010
I often rise early before sunrise. I like to think its because I am a dedicated landscape photographer, but truth is this: the cat has me trained so well to let her out at that time in the morning it has become a habit. When I am at home the morning starts with a brewed cup of coffee. As the predawn light softly filters through the kitchen window I survey the sky for a whisp of cloud or any other clues as to what the day is bringing. At this time of year, Perth summer weather can be very predictable, just like in Groundhogs Day. Today was no different, the cloudless grey sky was slowly turning blue and a gentle but persistent easterly breeze was coming off the scarp, just like yesterday.
I went into the backyard and stood under the jarrah and marri trees with my cup of coffee. Above me in the trees I could hear the industrious sound of insects buzzing. Looking up, the jarrah tree was heavy with tiny yellow blossoms, which stood out in the soft predawn light. With the extent of its flowering I wondered why I had not noticed earlier? During the day when the sun is blazing in the cloudless summers skies, these soft yellow flowers become almost invisible, lost amongst the bright light and glare.
I got out the 4×5, and focused in tight on the tiny flowers and a cluster of seed pods. The magnification was life size on the film and with every breath of wind the pods and flowers jumped in and out of my ground glass viewing frame. Working at this magnification depth of focus is very shallow and I used some back tilt on the camera to help bring the foreground seed pods into the plane of focus. For just a moment the breeze stopped. In a rush I placed a single sheet of Polaroid Type 55 PN film into the camera back, set the shutter for 1/2 second at f8. Both these settings were a compromise to sharpness, but it was all I could get. To make matters worse I could hear the leaves in the tops of the trees rustle in the breeze as I pressed the cable release to make the exposure.
I like to process my Polaroid in the darkroom, preserving the negative and clearing it in sodium sulphite solution whilst in complete darkness. Most my Polaroid prints are overexposed as my aim is to obtain the negative, which I expose at the slower 32ISO rather than the recommended print speed of 50ISO.
The first rays of sunlight began hitting the blossoms, the sky turning a bright pale blue. It was going to be a fine summer’s day in Perth. What remained of my coffee had gone cold, but at least I had awakened my senses as to what was happening in my own backyard and saw something anew. Maybe it wasn’t going to be another Groundhogs day after all?
Swamp Sheoaks, Canning River
June 20, 2010
Living in Perth I am lucky to be so close to the Canning River and its reserves. There are kilometres of cycleways and walkways traveling up and down the river, passing through parklands of flooded gums and sheoaks, were you can always find some peace and quiet. Then there is the river itself, which is wonderful to paddle your canoe or kayak on. Upstream near my neighbourhood, the Canning River diverges into many leads with dead ends. The river banks are covered with bushland, giving you an impression you are anywhere but in the city. There is a multitude of bird life from ducks and swans, even large kites.
This image of the swamp sheoaks, Casuarina obesa, was taken during Spring, just on dusk. The little white flowers (Hesperantha falcata) open up only in the full shade or very late afternoon. Like so many of our most successful weeds, Hesperantha falcata originates from South Africa, and it literally carpets sections of the Canning River reserve. In previous years during Spring, I have resisted making a similar image, because I did not want viewers to misinterpret these as wildflowers native to the park. Eventually, I decided to work amongst the swamp sheoaks over the course of a 12 month season, recording the changes in their immediate environs: from sombre deep winter tones to abundant white of spring flowers, then to the stark black charcoal from summer fires. Even though the photograph may not show an ecological ideal of native bushland, it never the less offers a glimpse of its seasonal state during these times.
Artist Lounge Talk, 7.00pm June 14th, 2010
June 5, 2010
I have been invited as guest speaker for the next “Artist Lounge Talk”, a quarterly evening event providing a forum for local art and craft minded people to listen to a professional artist (or in my case photographer) discuss their art experience and knowledge.
I will be giving an overview as to how I began my photographic career, my choice of subject matter and the founding of Stormlight Publishing. Photography has undergone rapid changes over the last decade brought about by the advancement of digital technology. Even so, I will discuss my preference for using a large format wooden field camera which I will bring along to show. Finding the balance between personal artistic expression and commercial needs is my aim in using both digital technology and maintaining the use of non digital, traditional, wet darkroom techniques. You are invited to come along for an evening of discussion and view some of my recent work.
Artist Lounge Talk, 7.00pm June 14th 2010
Liddelow Homestead
Cooper Avenue, Kenwick
for bookings and information call 9452 9903
Wave Rock, Hyden.
May 10, 2010
A few days ago I visited Hyden a small country town about 350km inland, east of Perth. Hyden is famously known for its nearby tourist attraction Wave Rock, a 15 metre high, 100 metre long granite wall that has weathered into the shape of an enormous breaking wave. The rock is one of a series that are spread throughout the region and there is a strong Nyoongar history present amongst them. During the last century Europeans settled within the region to farm wheat. This is an area of low rainfall, about 300mm annually, possibly less now with the impact of climate change. Another 100 kilometres east and you enter isolated desert country.
An obvious photographic subject would be Wave Rock with all its immensity and streaked rock face, however, I was interested in other aspects of the rock. This fractured layer of granite, virtually an exfoliating layer from the larger body below, with its zig zag of lines, caught my attention. The early morning sun had just risen over the rock summit, lighting its western flanks and I was needing to look straight into it. Using the combination of the rise on the lens board, pointing the camera down and using the double dark as a lens shade, I was able to minimise lens flare, whilst preserving good contrast. The negative was given about half a stop more exposure with N-1 development, film was Tri X Pan.
FotoFreo 2010
April 13, 2010
Having been away during its launch I finally got down and saw a little of the FotoFreo 2010 in its last days. The biggest joy for me was at the Fremantle Arts Centre with the photographs by Qin Wen of the demolition of old Chinese buildings under a wave of new western style high rise. They were big images, about 1m x 1.5m inkjet outputs (see above pic), probably from 4×5 format given their great detail. The compositions had a theatrical air about them. You could really stop and stare into these images, seeing the new buildings on the horizon all the way forward to peoples’ faces, tangled powerlines, jumbled tiled roofs right through to intricate foreground detail. The images were almost monochrome at the edges, with wonderfully soft, muted colours, except for the woman in traditional red dress who was the thematic link in all images. The soft muted colours of this exhibition were also shared by Eugene Richards’ “The Blue Room” at the Fremantle Prison Galleries. So refreshing to see subtle nuances being displayed again in colour photography, rather than the gawdiness often associated with a heavy handed photoshop technique. Also squeezed into the prison was Brad Rimmer’s exhibition “Silence – the West Australian Wheatbelt”, one of the few local, contemporary works supported within the main exhibition program by the FotoFreo organisers.
