Real Life Instagram: Holga Plastic Camera Photos of Paris

Cleaning out my home office the other day, I came across an undeveloped roll of 120 film from my Holga plastic camera. I took it to be developed, and was happily surprised to see the roll had a few pictures I'd taken during a trip to Paris over two years ago.

Looking at the contact sheet of these photos, I started thinking that two years ago was also the year Instagram got started. The cool vintage photo filters Instagram applies to your digital photos are a big reason why the photo-sharing site has such appeal. The filters are meant to mimic the imperfections of old analog cameras such as my Holga. I'm not an Instagram user, but I do love the look of many of the photos. Are my plastic camera photos really do different from a photo taken on a cell phone with an Instagram filter applied?

On that 2010 trip to Paris, I took pictures with a digital camera as well, which is why I never remembered to get this old roll of film developed. I haven't taken my Holga with me on a trip since, and I wonder if I will again. I love the camera, but it's another thing to carry, and I can create the same effects in Photoshop when I get home. Yet there's something different about plastic cameras that draws me back to them—I think it's the fact that I don't have total control the way I do with Photoshop. The light and the color captures a moment I experienced as it was really happening, with light seeping into the plastic box through the duct tape...All right, if I don't stop rambling about this I'll turn into my college age self in a Hal Hartley film. So here are those Holga camera photos of Paris!

—Gigi

Gargoyles of the National Cathedral in Washington, DC (Part 2: History)

When I think about the construction of cathedrals and the carving of gargoyles, I tend to think about work done centuries ago. But construction of the Washington National Cathedral didn't begin until 1910, and wasn't fully completed until 1990. The first gargoyle on the cathedral was carved in 1960.

There are 112 gargoyles on this cathedral, and over 1,000 grotesques (carved ornaments that often look like gargoyles but don't have rain spouts). I spent over an hour walking around the site, but only saw a fraction of the gargoyles. The gargoyles are perched on three levels, and only the carvings on the lowest level are easy to see clearly.

A large crew of artists and stone carvers were required to complete the ambitious project. In addition to skilled craftsmen, twelve apprentices worked on the carvings. In 1959, a competition was held for members of the public to submit gargoyle designs. Several designs from the public were chosen for inclusion the cathedral. The final gargoyles and grotesques are the work of dozens of professional and amateur artists and carvers.

This last photograph here is the image of a stone carver holding his mallet and chisel. This gargoyle was made in honor of "master carver" Roger Morigi, who was the head stone carver on the project.

For further details about the gargoyles of the Washington National Cathedral, I recommend the comprehensive Guide to Gargoyles and Other Grotesques: Washington National Cathedral Guidebooks by Wendy True Gasch.

—Gigi

Gargoyles of the National Cathedral in Washington, DC (Part 1)

While in town for the Malice Domestic mystery convention, I visited Washington, DC's National Cathedral, which is covered in gargoyles.

You won't spot them at first, because they're high above the ground...

...but if you look carefully, you'll see them. 

I bought a book on the history of these gargoyles, but I shipped home all the books I bought at the mystery convention and the box hasn't yet arrived, so I don't have the history in front of me. Therefore interesting historical tidbits will follow next week!

—Gigi

Infrared Gargoyles

I've been doing some further infrared effects experimentation. I thought I'd show a couple before-and-after photos. I like the originals, too, but there's something about the cooling colors of infrared light that bring stone gargoyles to life.

 

—Gigi

An Infrared View of the Sacramento Old City Cemetery

While in Sacramento for a mystery convention over the weekend, I couldn't resist visiting the Old City Cemetery. The cemetery was established in 1849, the year California's gold rush began. It's Sacramento's oldest cemetery, and has some beautiful stone carvings.

The day I visited, the weather was dramatic, so I thought I'd try some infrared photo effects of the cemetery. Infrared photography picks up a different spectrum of light from normal photography, so it's great for creating dramatic images. I first became interested in infrared effects when I was intrigued by the castle photography of Catriona Fraser. Now I'm toying with the idea of turning my old digital SLR camera into a digital camera that will shoot infrared. For now, I'm doing a combination of using an infrared filter on my camera lens and playing around with Photoshop effects.

This last photo below isn't of the cemetery, but is a view of the dramatic sky outside my hotel window.

—Gigi

Turning a Photo into a Book Cover

Last week I finished designing the book cover for my mystery novel, Artifact, that comes out this summer. This week I've been doing the interior layout to the book. Therefore I've been too busy to do much in the way of photography lately. But I realized I have been working on some cool photography—just not in the way I usually do.

Today I thought I'd show the process I used to turn a photograph I took in India into my book cover.

I took the photo below of Red Fort in Delhi, India, almost fifteen years ago. It's a nice enough photo, but not especially great. But I love the structure of those arches, so the image stuck with me. When I scanned a batch of my old negatives several years ago, I digitized the photo.

Once I knew I'd be designing my own book cover for my mystery novel, this image immediately came to mind, since the plot involves an artifact from India that has somehow wound up on a Scottish archeological dig.

I knew the photograph wasn't strong enough on its own to become a book cover, but certain elements were. In Photoshop, I turned the image to black and white, and used Threshold to make all the values of the image black or white—no shades of gray.

I liked the look of that high contrast image, but it didn't lend itself to the kind of background image I envisioned. So I inverted the image, with the result show below.

Now this was an image I could use. In InDesign, I took the image and applied some color and used a transparency to show a map of the UK behind the Indian arch. Here's the final cover.

—Gigi

Saving my Old Photos of Prague

It was over a decade ago that I visited Prague. That was before I switched to digital cameras, and I shot two rolls of 35mm film during the few days I spent in the city. I was shooting high speed black and white film, which doesn't play nicely with airport x-ray machines. Many of my photos from Prague were damaged. The photo immediately below is one of my favorite undamaged photos from my trip to Prague. But now that I've been spending time going through my old negatives, it occurred to me that I could attempt to salvage some of the prints in Photoshop. Digital salvation isn't as good as the real thing, but it has still been fun to see the foggy prints come back to life. The second and third images below show two photos I'm in the process of restoring: the stone detail of the Charles Bridge and the city lit up at night.

Shooting digital brings its own challenges. While the images on memory cards won't be damaged by x-ray machines, they can still get corrupted, as one of my friends learned the hard way recently. And  even though you can fit hundreds of photos onto a memory card, you need to remember to download the photos so you don't lose them if anything happens to your camera or card. I've got over a hundred photos on my camera right now, so I need to follow my own advice.


 —Gigi