January 2023

This journal records my actual 10,000 hours deliberate practice art photography study. This page details the work done in January 2023.

Hours 7,201 to 7,281

(February 2023)

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31^st January

Hours 7,277 to 7,281

(1h) Updating this journal, including adding images from Andorra

Discovered the image below, way back, in my set of current images, which I think may have some merit.

(½h) reprocessing the “Common Buzzard” image below to fix a couple of flaws identified earlier, i.e., bird’s shadow on man’s shoulder, detail in the bird’s shaded wing, and space above both bird and man. The positioning of the man vs the bird was improved in the previous version on 21^st Jan.

(1½h) shooting my photography equipment, including all accessories. So a bit more than just the image below!

(2h) at the Stoke Poges Photographic Club – competition “Buildings” competition

** With regard to the FIAP distinction criteria I have plenty of acceptances in plenty of salons and countries and more awards than I need; but I’m slightly short on print acceptances (8/12) and vastly down on number of works accepted (17/50).

Image	…..	Comments
		“The Office” Held back – 19 Interesting to show people interacting with the building – adds an additional dimension to the image. Perhaps a different angle would have made it less flat. [?]
		“Tower Bridge” Held back – 19 Very dynamic. Perhaps a little over exposed at the top of the image.
		“Five a Day” Held back – 20 Particularly complemented for the highlight on the pomegranate which still retains some detail
		“Surrealist Dinner” Held back – 20 Well executed surrealist theme. Layout of food on the plate is good and helps draw the viewer into the image.

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30^th January

Hours 7,273 to 7,276

(1h) transferring the images shot in Andorra from Capture One on my Laptop to my main computer and further processing. I was particularly surprised by how some of the early morning shots could be improved by adjusting the white balance (the auto setting was very yellow).

(1h) creating drafts of the new “My Kit” pages

(2h) Amersham Photographic Society – Lecture by Mark Littlejohn “The Romance of Landscape Photography” big user of split-toning to control the colours.

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29^th January

Hour 7,272

Long journey home from Andorra.

(1h) YouTube:

• Sean Tucker: “Giving myself the ‘Magazine’ Challenge (and introducing PARABLE)“
• The Canvas: “Basquiat’s Defacement: Racist Police Brutality and Property Damage“
• Curtis Padley: “70-200mm F2.8 GM II CITY STREET POV Photography – Sony A7IV” – same lens and very similar camera to my most recent purchases.

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28^th January

Hours 7,270 to 7,271

(1h) revising:

• the “My Kit” page, this needs a big overhaul with separate pages for cameras (bodies and lenses), lighting equipment, accessories and perhaps computer equipment and editing software
• the New Year Admin section of the “New Month WordPress Journal Workflow” post to include a reminder to update the filenames on all cameras
• Updating this journal.

(1h) YouTube:

• The Photographic Eye: “We Need To Talk About Sharpness In Photography“. Most importantly, one needs to determine the purpose of the image; what you want to say; only then are you in a position to decide how to make it.

“Atmosphere is the medium of nature”, “to see things in their true value in a photograph, atmosphere must be present”, and “atmosphere softens all lines”

Alfred Stieglitz, in defence of pictorial photography

“There is nothing worse than a sharp image of a fuzzy concept”

Ansel Adams

“Sharpness is a bourgeois concept”

Simon Ellingworth, on street photography

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27^th January

Hour 7,269

(½h) editing and processing yesterday evening’s images, including “Night Cafe – Andorra” above

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26^th January

Hour 7,268

(1h) rewriting the notes below about Philip Guston’s shoe paintings.

A few minutes street photography in the evening.

25^th January

Hours 7,266 to 7,267

(½h) Canvas YouTube: “Philip Guston’s Shoes“

• Born ‘Goldstein’ Guston was a Jew who’s parents emigrated from Odessa to Canada to escape persecution. He was born in Montreal, but the family moved to Los Angeles in 1919 when Philip was 6
• Guston went to school with Jackson Pollock, and both were founding members of the New York School (the term Guston preferred to the ‘Abstract Expressionists’)
• As a child Guston was aware of the activities of the KKK against Blacks and Jews. When he was 10, his father hung himself. He found the body
• Guston was hugely influenced by the German philosopher, Theodor Adorno’s, commentary on the holocaust and the passive complicity of the culture and society that let it happen
• The architect of the holocaust, Adolph Eichmann, was in many ways remarkably normal, merely following orders to optimise the process. Eichmann was not the embodiment of evil, the evil was the power structure he served. Eichmann was “terribly and terrifyingly normal”
• The above revelations caused Guston to leave the Abstract Expressionists in 1968 to paint figuratively, (effectively founding neo-expressionism). His paintings are often a commentary on society’s and maybe his own complicity in a culture which made possible the Nazi party and the KKK. Example, his self-portrait as a klansman
• The shoes are iconic of the holocaust where shoes were stolen from the jews and often left in huge piles

“To write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric” meaning Art is an expression of a culture and expressing a culture which can enable genocide is barbaric

Theodor Adorno, in his 1967 philosophical work “Prisms” which influenced Guston to cause him to paint figuratively about the holocaust

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24^th January

Hour 7,265

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23^rd January

Hours 7,263 to 7,264

Images shown at the Amersham Photographic Society’s PDI competition:

Image	…..	Comments
		“Common Buzzard” 20 Second Place
		“Deconstructed Stoke Common” 17

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22^nd January

Hour 7,262

Long journey to Andorra

(1h) writing my “Revised Thoughts on Art” post + a little bit of time updating this journal.

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21^st January

Hours 7,259 to 7,261

(2h) processing images from the last few days.

(½h) creating the revised version of this image; bird and man in better positions relative to each other. It could, maybe do with a little more sky above both bird and man. Plus the bird’s shadow on the man needs correcting (I didn’t move it when I moved the man down).

(½h) updating this journal.

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20^th January

Hours 7,257 to 7,258

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19^th January

Hours 7,253 to 7,256

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18^th January

Hours 7,250 to 7,252

(1h) shooting Stoke Common; sub-zero temperature.

(1h) editing this morning’s images

(½h) YouTube:

• Curious Muse: “René Magritte Says, Never Believe Your Eyes“
• Sean Tucker: “Avoiding the Gear Traps” – he’s just bought a Sony a7c (just like I did 2 years ago)

(½h) updating this journal.

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17^th January

Hours 7,247 to 7,249

(½h) updating this journal and associated Flickr site.

(½h) correcting some details on the “Surrealist Dinner” image.

(2h) Stoke Poges Photographic Club – Workshop on Flash photography. Tips include:

• using my off-camera flash with ttl monitoring – generally needed to set this to about +2 to get the best result
• using a beauty dish to achieve Rembrandt lighting, dish was only about 30cm and placed about 1m away from subject 45 degrees up and forward
• Fill-in side lighting using a scrim – low power flash behind
• Low power hair-light through a snoot.

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16^th January

Hours 7,244 to 7,246

(1h) shooting at Stoke Common

(2h) Amersham Photographic Club – lecture by Phillip Savoie “Principle of Photography”. Top tips:

• Dynamic range reduces as ISO increases above base
• Most lens sweet-spot for focus in 5.6 to 7, rather than the 9 I previously thought – there is a website where these things are listed
• Use diffusion when shooting flash with macro

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15^th January

Hours 7,242 to 7,243

(½h) shooting a Common Buzzard, specifically for inclusion in a Magritte style composite

(1½h) creating the following image.

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14^th January

Hours 7,239 to 7,241

(1h) attempting to create another version of a Black Bird image, using birds shot in Kefalonia. Not very successful.

(2h) entering the French Riedisheim FIAP salon, entered previously in 2021, so a whole new set of images were required.

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13^th January

Hours 7,237 to 7,238

(1h) finishing and publishing my “Last Paintings” post.

(½h) minor updates to the images presented at competition on Tuesday. Even though it scored 20, “White Bird” benefits from having the skin blemishes removed.

(½h) updating this journal

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12^th January

Hours 7,235 to 7,236

(½h) updating this journal/ my “Last Painting” post

(1½h) Amersham Mono group – no skin in the game.

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11^th January

Hour 7,234

(½h) updating this journal; mainly notes and comments from yesterday evening’s competition.

(½h) adding images to my “Last Painting” post

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10^th January

Hours 7,231 to 7,233

(½h) updating this journal.

(½h) adding images to my “Last Painting” post

(2h) Stoke Poges Photographic Club – Print competition, set subject “Water” my entries below:

Image	…..	Comments
		“No Diving” 17 Perfect timing. Foreground shadow OK. However, background a little light and distracting.
		“Water for Mourners ERII” 17 Good monochrome conversion; good framing of LFB woman, but
		“White Bird” – Open 20 – winning image Good colours and perfect positioning of the bird and shadow.

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9^th January

Hours 7,228 to 7,230

(1h) updating this journal with note from the last few days.

(1h) finishing the Surrealist Dinner image shot over the weekend.

(½h) learning about the background eraser tool for extracting images, particularly hair, from the background.

(½h) practicing the above new technique – not convinced that this is as good as masking; seems a more destructive way of working.

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8^th January

Hours 7,226 to 7,227

(1h) shooting and

(1h) processing the following:

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7^th January

Hours 7,222 to 7,225

(2h) setting up and shooting drafts for the Surrealist Dinner image above.

(2h) YouTube:

• wocomoCulture: “Otto Dix – Controversial painter of the New Objectivity movement” – hour long documentary of the life and work of Otto Dix
• NationalGalleries: “Jenny Saville | Life Through a Microscope“
• “The Modernist Vanguards: John Graham Willem de Kooning & Arshile Gorky at SHIN Gallery“
• Upicha: “Willem de Kooning Explained in 7 Minutes” – a photographer’s attempt to use the language of photographic composition to explain a de Kooning – not convinced.

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6^th January

Hours 7,220 to 7,221

(1h) creating a triptych of my grand nephews diving into a swimming pool as a gift for their parents.

(1h) The Canvas YouTube about Otto Dix and Caspar David Friedrich:

• “Otto Dix Astounding Depictions of War“
• “Otto Dix’s Metropolis” his famous triptych showing the nightlife of the Weimar Republic following the Great War
• “The Portrait of the Journalist Sylvia von Harden” shocking in its realist depiction of this strong woman
• “What Friedrich Can Teach Us About The Sublime” – new favourite, added to Artistic Timelines spreadsheet – top images:
  • “Wanderer Above The Sea of Fog” – famous image of a mountain scene with a man standing on a boulder with his back to us presumably contemplating the nature of existence
  • “Monk by the Sea” – small figure in a vast landscape, directing the viewer to the metaphysical meaning of the work

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5^th January

Hours 7,216 to 7,219

(2h) Entering the FIAP New York Photo Association Circuit including updating the following image for the travel section – re-cropped and re-colour balanced using my Photoshop preset to give it a bit more zip.

(2h) at the Amersham Beyond group, lots of inspirational images shown.

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4^th January

Hours 7,213 to 7,215

(1½h) updating this journal; mainly writing up and exploring links from the Contemporary Art Issue YouTubes of yesterday evening.

(½h) producing prints for next week’s competition at the Stoke Poges Photographic Club.

(1h) NetFlix “Abstract” documentary

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3^rd January

Hours 7,210 to 7,212

(½h) YouTube:

• Philosophies for Life: “Carl Jung – How To Own Yourself (Jungian Philosophy)”
  1. Meet your shadow – Why do I behave the way I do? What are the negative traits that I don’t want to identify with? Characteristics that are rejected by society as a whole.
     • Bring shadow into the light:
       • When criticising other people
       • behaviour you feel strongly about
       • traits you are afraid to posses
     • Clear your mind, meditation, etc., become conscious of own reactions
     • Create a list of possible shadow traits – goal to be as honest as possible
  2. Accept your shadow
     • Accept traits without immediately wanting to change
     • Why do I hide this trait?
     • Why do other people like me less as a result of this?
     • Who told me the above?
  3. Integrate your shadow
     • How can I change for the better?
     • Use weakness as a strength
     • Shadows are there to teach and guide

(½h) fixing my Photoshop Action for resizing images for FIAP competitions, and completing last night’s entry.

(½h) shooting

(½h) processing potential “water” images, without success.

(½h) updating facebook and Flickr with the doggy images shot over the weekend.

(½h) Contemporary Art Issue YouTube:

• “4 Must-Know Tools for Artists, Collectors & Galleries”
  1. ArtFacts – map of the art world, leading database of artist and gallery objective ranking
  2. Artenda – commercial opportunities in the art world
  3. Artsy – App
  4. Artforum – List of events organised by city, so very useful.
• “How To Get Discovered as an Artist” – maximum exposure vs the right exposure
• Do:
  • Social media
  • Art opportunities and Artenda
  • Participate in the Art World
  • Artist Website
• Avoid:
  • Cold calling
  • Online art marketplaces
  • Advertising (but consider PR)
  • Coming across as too commercial.

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2^nd January

Hours 7,205 to 7,209

(½h) preparing images for the Amersham Beyond meeting later this week

(½h) updating this journal

(1h) shooting Archie and Enzo; Fiona’s dogs

(1h) processing the above images

(2h) FIAP entry: IFSAK 9th International, Turkey; including 4 new images, mainly in the creative section.

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1^st January

Hours 7,201 to 7,204

(1h) updating this journal with all the new month and new year admin.

(3h) entering the Estonia Photo Salon with 4 new images including the following London Skyline and collating all the results from last year’s entries

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(December 2022)