LF: Susan.

[Maris Rusis]

Susan​

Gelatin-silver photograph on Kodak Polymax Fine Art VC FB photographic paper, image size 19.5cm X 24.6cm, from a 8x10 Tmax 100 large format negative exposed in a Plaubel Profia monorail view camera fitted with a 10 inch Commercial Ektar lens.
Titled, signed, and stamped verso.
Susan is an artist. Her aircraft pictures are famous.

How do you photograph a busy, dedicated artist?
First get them out of the studio and into the garden. At least there will be enough light for a tolerably short exposure.
Then sit them down on a turned kitchen chair. The back of the chair offers support for the subject who is enjoined not to move. And it is a passably comfortable place to wait while I fuss with focussing and exposure arithmetic. A quiet ciggie helps calm the artist's nerves.
The back of the camera was swung to angle the focus plane through the subject who was not sitting square to the camera. This angled focus plane just catches the end of the wooden rail at the right hand edge of the picture.

Camera exposure was 1/2 second at f11 on an overcast day. Soft daylight makes for easy portrait lighting and delivers sympathetic skin tones (borderline flattering) on someone who was chain smoking through too many late nights trying to get an exhibition into a wall-ready state. At the bottom of the chair leg is a part empty cup of dynamite espresso coffee. It has been said half jokingly that an artist is a machine for turning beer, pizza, coffee, and cigarettes into masterpieces.
The Commercial Ektar lens is very sharp stopped down a bit and it is possible with a magnifier to do a thread count analysis of the artist's faded Levis.
In her studio the exposure would have been 4 seconds at the Ektar's maximum aperture; a blistering f6.3. I reckon no one, not even a well motivated sitter, can stay really still, not breathe, not blink, for that long.

 

[Asher Kelman]

Maris Rusis: Susan
Gelatin-silver photograph on Kodak Polymax Fine Art VC FB photographic paper, image size 19.5cm X 24.6cm, from a 8x10 Tmax 100 large
format negative exposed in a Plaubel Profia monorail view camera fitted with a 10 inch Commercial Ektar lens. Titled, signed, and stamped verso.​

Susan is an artist. Her aircraft pictures are famous.

We'd love a link to her website! We need it to fully appreciate the portrait, although of course, it's good!


Asher

 

[Asher Kelman]

How do you photograph a busy, dedicated artist?
First get them out of the studio and into the garden. At least there will be enough light for a tolerably short exposure.
Then sit them down on a turned kitchen chair. The back of the chair offers support for the subject who is enjoined not to move. And it is a passably comfortable place to wait while I fuss with focussing and exposure arithmetic. A quiet ciggie helps calm the artist's nerves.​

The back of the camera was swung to angle the focus plane through the subject who was not sitting square to the camera. This angled focus plane just catches the end of the wooden rail at the right hand edge of the picture.[/quote]

Maris,

The point is that you designed a system in which your subject became manageable to fit into the limitations of your camera. After all, the challenge is to get a great composition and have it in focus. You're technique is masterful.

I was talking to Mickey Adair about photographing Ray Charles who was constantly moving around on a swivel chair and rearranging his libs and pose continuously. He should have had your solution. In the end he back off until the DOF was a foot and then had someone creep up and hold the chair still.

Camera exposure was 1/2 second at f11 on an overcast day. Soft daylight makes for easy portrait lighting and delivers sympathetic skin tones (borderline flattering) on someone who was chain smoking through too many late nights trying to get an exhibition into a wall-ready state. At the bottom of the chair leg is a part empty cup of dynamite espresso coffee. It has been said half jokingly that an artist is a machine for turning beer, pizza, coffee, and cigarettes into masterpieces.
The Commercial Ektar lens is very sharp stopped down a bit and it is possible with a magnifier to do a thread count analysis of the artist's faded Levis.
In her studio the exposure would have been 4 seconds at the Ektar's maximum aperture; a blistering f6.3. I reckon no one, not even a well motivated sitter, can stay really still, not breathe, not blink, for that long.

Think of the old days when ISO 50 was high speed. People had to stay still for 30 seconds or more! Sometimes they used an iron rig to stop the head from moving!

Asher​