Taking Photos at Sidney's

Currently over at Sidney Zion's house teaching blogging and taking photos.

Ain't technology great!

2007 World Press Photo Winners

The World Press Photo Winners for 2007 are up to see now, and there are some wonderful images in there. The pictures of the seals hunting in the antartic are particularly intense.

Zap! Pow! Pretty! Bang!

Rosemary Fiore has created some amazing images by taking long exposures of old arcade games like Tempest. I used to be fascinated by the old games that were 'drawn' onto the screen directly by vector graphics rather than pixels. They had a glow to them that Fiore's captured beautifully. [From metafilter]

Plagarising Inspiration

Slate has an interesting photo essay discussing the recent plagarism accusations over similar photos of the Nanpu Bridge. They compare and contrast the concepts of standing on the shoulders of giants, knowing nods to prior originators and the question of whether any new image is without inspiration from other artists. It's an interesting area for discussion, and with the increasing ability on the internet to image search and new copyright laws we're now faced with the much greater potential for litigation.

Ultimately I believe that it is hard for a photo to be identical, especially where natural subjects & locations are involved - at least it's a lot harder than in music where the same instruments are readily available. So we're faced with a situation that requires more interpretation and hence opinion.