Hahnemühle USA–my new sponsor and new favorite paper

A couple of months ago a friend of mine went to the Houston Camera Exchange to get me a box of 13″ X 19″ cotton rag paper and my usual brand wasn’t in stock. Talk about serendipity-the paper they had was Photo Rag Matte 308 by Hahnemühle USA–and I loved it. It’s about the sharpest rag matte I’ve ever worked with and it beautifully rendered my images, so of course I wanted more of it. I very rarely print on anything but matte–if you use current Zeiss lenses and your film images  were shot with Leicas, Hasselblads (there’s Zeiss again!) and Commercial Ektars and Schneider glass for large format, you really don’t need gloss==and I appreciate not necessarily mimicking the look and feel of traditional wet darkroom fiber base paper. This next trip to the store I was “stuck’ with German Etching since the Photo Rag Matte was sold out. What am I gonna do with this textured stuff?!? The image below of Gary Clark Jr. printed on the German Etching as if it was shot just to be on the paper, it was absolutely gorgeous. So was the featured image in this post of Richard Danielson of Vintage Trouble backstage at the Woodlands, the one of Nalle Colt from that same shoot, my Stevie Ray Vaughan Headdress shot, and on and on.

Gary Clark Jr. at the Paramount in Austin 12/05/16. German Etching!

Nalle Colt of Vintage Trouble, 8/06/2016. More German Etching. 🙂

Stevie Ray Vaughan, 1/31/1987. Most definitely German Etching!

And so I was also sold on the Hahnemühle USA German Etching, obviously. Next I decided to go ahead and try some of the glossy and pearl finish papers, the Baryta Gloss and Pearl and the Photo Rag Pearl 320. Lymon Hall, who owns the Houston Camera Exchange, and Veronica Cotter from Hahnemühle USA provided me with samples so why not, right? I used it for a few Black and White images of Jimmie Vaughan, Joe Ely with David Grissom, and SRV 3/25/1983 for State Fare, one of Lee Ellis’ great Houston restaurants. Guess what-I loved it! Very much like heavy weight glossy fiber based wet darkroom paper, but even better, and something I’ve never seen on digital fine art or older style paper: no dry down phenomenon. That’s pretty amazing, and it saves time, ink and paper for sure. I also decided I really like the Gloss and Pearl for color images. When I do shoot for color I want it to really knock people’s socks off. Clean and very sharp but not too subtle-sorta like a good Les Paul! These are great papers for that, and so is the Photo Rag Matte 308. All of these papers I’ve mentioned handle beautifully with my Epson Photo R2400 and that isn’t always true of other companies’ papers I’ve used. A few examples of images these two papers work particularly well with:

Return to Fitzgerald’s: Ian Moore Band, June 11

Vintage Trouble, Woodlands, 8/06/2016

Doyle Bramhall II and his sister Georgia, Austin, 12/31/2013

Jimmie Vaughan, July 1983

Stevie Ray Vaughan and Joe Ely backstage at Fitzgerald’s, Houston, TX, July 1984

Of course most of these images will be in my print exhibit at Antone’s opening 2/17/2017 from 6-9pm. The one of Gary Clark Jr on the German Etching is going to be part of a package with my Epiphone Blak and Blu GCJr model and hard case donated by Mike Fuller, owner of Fuller’s Vintage Guitars we’re auctioning for the SIMS Foundation. See my previous blogpost and my website http://www.theheightsgallery.com for more on all that or contact me at thgall2@gmail.com

Once I started using these papers by Hahnemühle USA I decided to contact them and I’m very happy to say they returned my enthusiasm and they’re now a sponsor of my shows, “Absolute Music” starting with that big one at Antone’s 2/17/17. I’m very, very happy and grateful for Carol Boss’ help with that. I have also printed all of the installation for State Fare on their papers. What a great find! Truly the best series of substrates I’ve ever printed on. Thank you,  Hahnemühle– more to come soon.

Meeting Stevie, ala Hunter S Thompson

Something I wrote a little while back about my first encounter with Stevie Ray Vaughan at Fitzgerald’s in Houston. Truly a life changing experience. The memories will come flying back tonight when I see Ian Moore at the Old Polish Hall.

I first saw him at a soundcheck and I was blown away:
WE WERE SOMEWHERE NEAR THE STAGE WHEN THE MUSIC BEGAN TO TAKE HOLD……(March 25, 1983) I’d been sent with two writers in tow by a local free new wave paper to photograph the guitar phenom who was about to become David Bowie’s right hand man and leave Oak Cliff behind for good. This small, unassuming Texan stood up there with his battered Strat and his beautiful, huge hands and let loose a flurry of chords that flew around us and enveloped us in–in-disbelief? Shock? It was the second coming of Hendrix, Muddy Waters, and something so unique and alive there was nothing to compare it to. And this was a sound check? He was playing for us, for his bandmates Whipper and Tommy and his man Cutter, he was playing for himself, he was playing for a ride on the train to glory, he was playing because he just couldn’t hold back from the sheer need to wring and wrench those sounds out of his hands, his heart, and his soul. I was in heaven: I’d dreamt of capturing Hendrix on film but I was several years shy of that goal. Here was a man who made me forget I couldn’t be Jim Marshall, that my Leicas had been denied their shot at immortality. This music man would fill that classic 35mm frame with a talent enormous enough to match any headcutter who ever filled a club with his riffs and his voice–he and his instruments voices–and sear that sound onto the film and into our brains with an unmatchable intensity. The desire to raise my photography and my (as Ansel Adams would call it) fluency with my instrument near his level was almost unbearable. It was truly the turning point in my work–that special moment when everything becomes clear and sharp and intuitive–and it was because of Stevie Ray Vaughan. Time stood still for me–the first video Stevie made for MTV scared the bejesus out of me–did his hands really move that fast? Through the rangefinder his motions slowed to 1/30 of a second-an attainable photo, on TV it looked unimaginable that any camera could catch a fragment of his action. Something about him, his playing, the way he gave made that possible for me. Through some wonderful gift, and the size of his spirit, I hear him still. And this, this first witnessing of the sound that shot right through us-this was just a sound check?

Sony RX10: A Very Cool Camera

I had the pleasure of borrowing the Sony RX10 camera from Kayla Lindquist at Sony Artisans of Imagery recently, and in this blog I’ll show you some images and review my experiences with it.

I used the RX10 at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, especially the Carnival, in March:

Close Up, Carnival Horse. Sony RX10, ISO 640, Built in Flash, f5.6 at 1/125

The camera and its built in flash were perfect for all of this, I used Manual Focus, Auto Focus and DFM, Manual Exposure and Aperture Priority, all with pleasing results. The viewfinder worked well for me in all lighting situations, I was at the Rodeo from daylight to night, inside and out. I have pretty lousy eyes so that’s saying alot.

I shot closeups of individual Carousel horses as well as overviews of the carousel in motion using Manual and Autofocus, the RX10’s quick Autofocus in poor lighting really impressed me.

Its probably hard to tell from a JPEG but the RAW images are pretty great, clear and sharp and brilliant. See the second moving carousel image below.

This camera has a Zeiss lens with a constant aperture of f2.8 throughout the zoom range of 35mm equivalent 24mm-200mm , and basically it weights and costs less than the lens on its own. Its a Sony 1″ sensor, if the sensor were any larger the thing would be a monster and not the very adept travel companion it is.  It also is pretty amazing for video, but unfortunately I didn’t shoot any-still         the Luddite its hard to believe I even trusted the auto features at all-but I did, and it responded beautifully. Sony and Zeiss are a pretty fine team, since Zeiss has been battling Leica since the microscope days you have to give a lot of credit to that lens. Gibson or Fender? Sorta the same thing!

The third image is a live shot of the extraordinarily talented singer, guitarist and songwriter Ian Moore at the Continental Club in Houston.  I had a little trouble here trying to manual focus but it was right before new glasses: mea culpa.

This is a very sophisticated camera, you can see in it in all of the menu options among other small but not inconsequential  things such as the ISO choices: more to choose. Wow, 320, 500 and 640 ISO-thank you Sony. No big gaps as in the NEX-7, which I own and really like but c’mon. Zebra for video, Wifi and much more.

Next up an image of Azaleas: nice close focusing, too. Yes I intensified the color in Lightroom 5. But this IS Zeiss glass with T* coating so not too much.

With the band  image,  I have some criticism. The RX10 supposedly has a universal hot shoe, but I tried several Sunpack and Vivitar flashes and much to my disappointment, not one of them worked on the camera. I guess Sony wants us to use proprietary accessories only? The small built in flash struggled here, and unfortunately my shots show it. However with the proper flash I’m sure they would have been more than up to my standards. BTW the band pictured, Los Lonely Boys, rocks!

To sum things up, as a Pro I would buy this camera as a travel tool, video camera, and great backup to an interchangeable lens Sony with a full frame sensor, and I would recommend it to an enthusiast or amateur as a main camera. The many menu settings make it an easy camera to learn photography from, too. Its high quality and versatility more than justify the price. And if you see the price of the new mirrorless Leica, this camera is a real bargain. I had a blast with the RX10, and hated giving it back. Please see more of my images at http://www.theheightsgallery.com

 

 

Sony RX10, 100mm, ISO 640 f3.5 at 1/40

Sony RX10, 81mm, ISO 250, f2.8 at 1/80

Sony RX10, 50mm, ISO500, f8 at 1/4

RX10 at 24mm, ISO 640, f5.6 at 1/25

Buddy Guy, Stubbs, and Stevie, 5/04/1990

Among the musicians playing at the ACL SRV Hall of Fame induction Saturday is Buddy Guy. Here he is with Stevie and Stubbs of BBQ fame at Auditorium Shores in Austin, Texas May 4, 1990. I was very, very lucky to be there with my Leica to get this picture.