Dark Light

Low Light photography is a funny old business, but one that I always come back to. Despite the 38 years since my first 'night image' and all the technological changes photography has seen, the actual method I use remains the same.  You just open the shutter and count! 

Many modern day photographers get so carried away and over complicate things technically (just look at a modern camera and all its unnecessary functions). Photographers were making images at night over a hundred years ago with just a box and a lens and they managed just fine.

So often the only thing new technology does is make people lazy, only its labelled as convenient or more efficient. This is especially true of photography and cameras that promise to make you a better photographer... If only that were true...

Where have you been..

 

                                                                                                         Marion, Indiana 2021. Marcus Doyle

 

 I'm often fascinated by the path certain photographers take in their lives and realize its often not what people would assume. Stephen Shore is one photographer that springs to mind, with most people only knowing him for the trips he made in the 70's and 80's across America. During one of Shores gallery talks some years ago I was intrigued to hear about the time Shore got married, moved to Montana and became a fly fisherman from 1980-1983. After his fishy stint, Shore then went on to produce his finest, and most important body of work American Prospects, published in 1987. I found this really fascinating in the same way I found Daniel Day Lewis' detour from acting to make shoes only come back a few years later and win an Oscar.

Not wanting to, but most willing to compare myself in such matters as Shore and Lewis, I have been; a survival instructor, a personal trainer, a knife maker (that's right), and very briefly a male model (very long ago, hair, slim, didn't know any better). But photography has always remained my number one passion, and with that a career I continued to pursue throughout my meanderings as; a knife wielding, iron pumping, forest dwelling, strike a pose northern Englishman.  

The changes in circumstance over the years, (most noticeably my move to another country),  have always brought a new and refreshing perspective not just to my work, but to life in general. I'm sure there's a song in all this somewhere, but sadly music is something I never got into...

Just Saying..

You do not take a photograph you make it, is no longer true.
A digital camera sensor takes an image and replicates it in the form of pixels, so there..

Eat your heart out Ansel!

 

Sourced from Professors Doyle's Diaries, December 27th 2021.

A year in pictures..

As the year draws to a close I thought I would share some juicy highlights right here on the Mode that is B. (As for the website, it is refined and fully stocked with no signs of getting any smaller...)

 

 This year was mostly spent out in the  Mojave with my 617 Pano, but there's also a little more besides. 

 Back to Night Vision and the old ways of working..

 Finishing off a decade of shooting fires in California. 

And a return to the everyday, wherever that may be..

Like most folk who blog, I now spend time trolling other peoples images on the fatal Instagram. 

Its a love hate thing with one percent good photography and the constant question; Why would I, or anyone else want to show images the size of a postage stamp. 

Of course you can check out my tiny images under the banner of Professor Doyle...