Open invitation to my Artists Reception 10/14/2010

Mark your calenders, October 14, 2010, 7PM to 9:30PM for my artists reception at Bolt Barbers in Los Angeles. The addy...460 S Spring Street (corner of 5th and Spring) Los Angeles CA. The reception will include a hosted "Candy bar"...perfect to kick off Halloween. There is no need to RSVP as this is open to the public.

It will be held in conjunction with the Downtown LA Art Walk that runs 5-10PM on that day. Be prepared for tight parking. The Hotel Alexandria at 501 S Spring Street has underground valet parking and you can buy discounted parking from the Bolt good at the hotel. Worth every penny to avoid the other more known public lots in the area.

As soon as Bolt has their artists page updated.

The curator of the exhibit, Betsy Matz designed the post cards and chose one of my favorite images to use on the card. "Abandoned Church, Paris" is one of my favorites for many reasons. Chief of which is that its proof that the greatest rewards are when we stray from the beaten path.

We were on a walking tour of the old Jewish quarter when the guide had us change directions and pointed out there was "nothing to see" down this one small street as the church there was being gutted to turn into retail shops etc.,. Fine I kept walking. We rounded a couple more corners and he pointed out again "nothing to see...." and gave the same reason pointing down the general direction we had been. I broke ranks and jogged down the half block and look what I found, this terrific old church, built in the 1500's being gutted. What a wonderful patina to the walls, the rough hewn beams and on the other side of the wall, the church's old courtyard in full spring bloom with Victorian era apartments on the other side.

I had the camera set in seconds for bracketed exposures and shot it with HDR post processing in mind. I used Photomatix for the post processing in to the HDR file and kept it adjusted for photo-realism with maximum detail in the shadows to highlights. Had I not used HDR file generation I would have had either a beautifully exposed courtyard with a blacked out church, or church detail with blown out highlights for the courtyard. Classic win/win that you can get with HDR and keeping it real instead of surreal.

See you at the reception!

I'm just a little jazzed....I got front window

I'm jazzed, it wasn't by some grand design I got front window...but I did and I'm not complaining. The location is totally accidental and placement was alphabetical order. Pays to be a "Z" sometimes doesn't it? (Thats me on the far right, 2nd from the top - an abandoned rail car).

The show I'm in is the take all comers, worldwide pool of contributors for the "Snap to Grid" show at the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art in the DTLA Arts District. Tonight was the opening reception for the show that will run through the end of the month. I put up a short post this morning on LA Metblogs. Cool show if you want to see the many directions people are exploring with digital art I highly recommend stopping in. Its free and there is cheap parking right around the corner so you don't have to tip-toe through bums to get to the show.

Snap to Grid runs now through November 1, 2008

Just a little reminder the Monrovia Association of Fine Arts is holding its 45th Annual Celebrate the Arts event in the Monrovia Community Center. It is located just off Myrtle at 118 W Palm Avenue in Monrovia's historic Old Town section.

Also, Saturday night is a new facet to the Celebrate the Arts. We are having a Reception and handing out out some awards to some great people in town who contribute to the arts here. First is the "Renaissance Award" going to Kathie Reece who owns the Aztec Hotel and has supported MAFA over the years including donating her lobby and two street front stores in the hotel for Gallery space featuring MAFA artists. Also James Farmer a MHS is getting an award for his 38 years of teach art and inspiring artists.

The reception has a donation of $25 per person, which is tax deductible as MAFA is a 501(c) non-profit. With that you get to see the art while nibbling away at goodies and sipping wine (do tip the wine-tenders as they are donating their services and wares). You'll get some music, meet some artists and a chance to bid on some reserved pieces of art in a silent auction donated by artists for this event.

Oh yeah, come see me too - I'm the feature artist at this years event. Not sure what it gets me other than some publicity, but free is still better than a kick in the pants. Hope to see you!

Bullitt and San Gabriel Mountains - perfect mix

If you follow my antics and rounds you show know that a I blog about all sorts of stuff.  I love adventures, add in cars and it gets to be even better.

This weeks addition to the old experience bucket is a day long drive in a Mustang Bullitt.  Long story short.  In July I got to spend sometime in a 2010 Camaro.  I was impressed and said when it launches the base Mustang will be a gelding in comparison.  Ford didn't appreciate it.  They dropped me a note and let me know I was probably a little harsh and offered up a GT500 to prove the Mustang still has it.  No GT500's exist right now but they had a Bullitt.  They asked if I would settle for that.  HELL YESSSSS!!!!  Full story on what I think about the Bullitt will be up on metblogs later today.

The image was shot up on the Angeles Crest.  I can tell you that the Bullitt was made for that highway.  No stress, no fuss, no constant shifting, just pick a gear and carve up the curves on the twisties.  Lawdy be...if I could get rid of the Dad car I'd opt for the Bullitt.

Anyway what better way to illustrate a surreal day than HDR?  I shot this frame overlooking downtown LA from up on the crest bracketed +/- 2 stops from average.  Photomatix was used for the HDR file generation and tonemapping.  The final image was run through virtual photographer to heighten the saturation a bit more.  

Enjoy the image.  Do click it for a slightly bigger version...and note you can even see downtown in the fog.  More images in my flickr Bullitt set.

Dioramas and the surreal capbilities of HDR

Museums love their diorama's recreating some era in history more than elementary school teachers do at California history lessons when they require a Mission be built.

They are always too neat and clean versions of how things were. Key period elements are usually neatly in place. Sometimes they go as far as to include paintings or photo's in the "windows" to give that added bit of "realism". It is very surreal, certainly more imaginary like the world of Wally and the Beaver than it ever was back in the day.

This week I ventured out to the Autry National Center and Western Heritage Museum in LA's Griffith Park. After checking out the newer rotating exhibits I took a meander through the permanent exhibits. To my surprise it was more than just the wild wild west, it included discussions and diorama's documenting how the western states developed right up to the post war era. Key feature was the Mrs See's home where her kitchen and den were recreated. Very clean and sterile, more romantic memory than it probably looked in real life, but interesting none the less.

It begged for a surreal rupture in the time warp. HDR helped me get there.

Once an HDR file is generated with photomatix you can use the tone mapping portion to take that file and adjust how your highlights/shadows are blended to preserve detail. Do you want more or less micro contrast? More or less luminosity to the entire image? How about blending between the two, coarse or fine? In the end you have a lot of control over the final images real or surreal qualities. Of course I gave the final image a post processing cleaning with Virtual Photographer to enhance those qualities.

Enjoy "Davy Crockett Bedroom" and "Mrs See's Kitchen".

Baseball inspired HDR work

My neighbor Craig is a pro-baseball scout and batting coach. He has a client who has season tickets to the Dodger's game. Those seats are 16 rows up from the 1st base dugouts. Last night he passed the tickets on to Craig and I got an invite to attend. Primo seats at one of my favorite games. "The Freeway Series" with the LA Dodgers and LA Angels.

It was a pretty good game. Dodgers were on top of it all pretty good, actually very much on top their game as the final score was 6-0...yes the Angels didn't score a single run. I can't remember the last time the Angels were so completely shut down like that. I almost feel sorry for the Angels' fans that drove up from the OC to watch the game.

As always I bring the camera along and shoot. One of my fascinations still is HDR and how movement is recorded during the conversion from 3 RAW files shot in sequence to an HDR file. Tone mapping allows you to go real or surreal. I went both with these, though one is definitely more on the surreal side. Final images are post processed with Virtual Photographer. Regardless of the options available I still go to the exaggerated saturation of the early Kodachromes.