And To Think, I've Been Here The Whole Time...

O...M...G!  Has it really been all these months since my last blog post? That's really hard to believe, considering how many things I have going on inside my head at any given moment, and also how much I like to talk about them.

But then again, maybe not, as I've gotten into the habit, like many of you, of posting many of my thoughts, ideas, and career events on my Facebook pages with great regularity.

Still, my blog needs to be an important part of my online presence. It should be informative, fun, and timely, or else why even have it?

So, with that in mind, I (also like many of you) have made one of my goals for the new year to be keeping this beast fed on a regular basis, and making a better effort to funnel my career and industry news and advice through this megaphone.


BTW, you are more than welcome to join my posse at my Photo Asylum Facebook Fan Page. 

Wow, this is like, ya know? A timely and informative blog entry! So far, it looks like I'm sticking to my goal. Awesome!

My New News Page: All The News That Fits...

I'm finally finding some time here and there to do some design work on the Photo Asylum web site. Obviously, web sites are by nature always works in progress, but every so often they need or deserve a complete overhaul visually. Sort of a "rebranding", if you will.

Culling ideas, sketching things out, even storyboarding and flowcharting are all fine and good, but it's the actual creation and uploading of the new artwork to the site that is usually a royal pain in the arse. I don't know how folks do this type of thing for a living...

Anyway, the latest Asylum section to get a makeover is my NEWS page. And I'll be trying very hard to take advantage of this opportunity by making a commitment to keep it current as well. After all, in the digital age, few things are more boring than old news.

The basic design I choose has a slight grunge-tech feel to it, something I want to keep consistent throughout the site. The top of the page (under the banner) is a "breaking news" box allowing me to draw the viewer's attention to something immediate or timely. Under that is a clean, double-column listing of various topics. I include a nice colorful thumbnail icon to go with each bit, and the HTML is a basic table, which gives me the freedom to move any of the sections up or down, prioritizing them as I see fit.

Now, what I actually consider "news" on my site probably won't change much, if at all. I'll keep you up to date on work I'm having published, gallery images available online, photo shoots and projects, workshops or talks I may be doing out in the "real" world. That sort of thing.

One interesting feature that is new (but only temporary) is my "Fashion Casting Call" section. If you're a model or stylist in Central or South Florida, you may want to pay attention to this. I'll try to keep a current list of all the shoots and projects that I have talent needs for. It won't be very detailed, and will soon be moved to its own page, so I can give more precise information about each individual job.

So, let me know what you think! And spread the news...

Ansel Adams In Color? Who Knew???

Now, I already know that I'm going to ruffle some feathers with this post, so why don't we just go ahead and get it out of the way?

I am not particularly a fan of photographer Ansel Adams, and looking back, realize I have never been. Don't get me wrong, I fully acknowledge the man as an absolute icon of photographic art, and will be the first to stand up and salute his amazing contributions to both the technical as well as esthetic aspects of the medium.

It's simply the work. His meticulous and mind-numbingly analytical breakdowns of scenic light and exposure, and absolute perfect processing and printing of large-format negatives has neither insired me nor motivated my own work.

I am most defintely from the "deconstruction - reconstruction" school of art, and I've always prefered my images include people (and their emotions), man-made structures, movement, spontaneity, elements of artificial light, and storytelling in lieu of anything purely scenic and natural. And I also think obsessing too much over the technical apsect of photography often takes away from its emotional impact.

My inspirations early on were abstract artists such as Duane Michals, Andy Warhol, Art Kane, and Jerry Uelsmann. When it's all said and done, we are what we are, and are driven by our unique individual passions. I will never apologize for that...

I'll take this blasphemy one step futher. Over the years, I have often looked at the works of Adams, tonal perfection and all, and have thought to myself, "This looks like such an amazing scene. It's a shame the image isn't in COLOR..."

Now, before you start to go round up the townsfolk to chase me up into a tall wooden structure that you plan to set on fire, let me assure you these thoughts were not out of ignorance. Early in my career, my work was almost entirely black and white (both commercial as well as exhibition). And from the time I first learned of it, I fully embraced the Zone System as the primary exposure tool for my film (and now my digital) photography. I adore a monochrome world!

But alas, when it comes to art, I usually go with my gut, and all I can say is that IMHO certain images, certain scenes, just lend themselves more to a color treatment. And to me, stripping this element from a wonderous, majestic, stunningly beautiful natural landscape, no matter how well done, bleeds it of much of its life force and emotional power.

Which brings us to the whole point of today's entry!  Last weekend, whilst browsing my favorite local bookshop on a lazy Sunday morning, I stumbled upon what I think is an absolutely marvelous photo book: Ansel Adams in Color (http://amzn.to/9yUHpj).

It was as if my wish over the years was finally granted...

Now, in all fairness, this is not a new title. It is simply revised and expanded from the 1993 edition. But it is better, the main reason being its image scans have improved, and the printed photos most surely are much closer to what Adams originally achieved in his darkroom or custom lab.

And what photos they are! This was my first time really looking at this work, and as I thumbed through the volume, I was surprised how many of these pictures moved me in a way the black and white classics never did. It's not something I can easily explain, and it's certainly not something I can argue about with a "purist", but in my heart I know I was right, at least from my point of view...

I honestly feel that these "new" images are undiscovered treasures for many photographers and art lovers who only know Adams as a black and white artist, and whether you prefer them to the iconic, traditional versions or not is really not the point. I see it as simply adding to Adams' amazing legacy and body of work...

This Month In Style Magazine...

Yeah, July is winding down, but if you know where to look, you can still find the current issue of Lake & Sumter Style Magazine with my fun cover story on the new Tavares (Florida) Seaplane Base and Marina.

Written by staffer Karin Fabry-Cushenbury, the feature showcases a bevy of my photos, including a handful of aerial shots taken while crusing high above Lake Dora hanging out of the open cockpit of a mighty SeaRey seaplane.

My special thanks to the long cast of characters that helped make my job shooting this story both easy and enjoyable: the City of Tavares' Joyce Ross, John Drury, Bill Neron, and John Ruggeri; Roger Kooser and Sherwood Heinman of AL's Landing restaurant (especially for roof access!); Frank Beek for letting me shoot his beautiful 1981 Piper SuperCub featured on the cover, Kerry Richer of Progressive Aerodyne, Inc. for flying me around with my head out the window like a dog on a Sunday drive in the country; Greg Burtner for being my seaplane "model" and patiently following my directions in the sky so I could get some nice shots; and finally seaplane pilot and enthusiast-extraordinare Dan Nickens for helping me coordinate the enitre event and enticing a myriad of seaplane owners to fly in to the base en mass so I could photograph them.

You can read the story and see the shots online: here...

The magazine is free at locations throughout Lake and Sumter County...

When I Say Hillshire...YOU SAY FARM!

So, you wanna know what's been stuck in my head the past few days? It ain't pretty...

Basically, it's been "I said a BEEF! HOT LINKS! I said a BEEF! HOT LINKS!":



So, why do these things happen? All I can do is give Madison Avenue all the credit in the world for still being able to manipulate me, especially at a point in my life when I feel I'm pretty much immune to that sort of thing.

I mean, I rarely eat meat at all, and your smoked variety is something that I don't even think about, even when grocery shopping. But here I am, singing that silly song all day (of course I use the term "singing" very loosely), and wouldn't you know it, I'm actually thinking I should take a look at this stuff the next time I'm by the deli case.

God bless America...GO MEAT!!!

New York Yankees Owner Steinbrenner Dead At 80...

Well, those of you who know me, and especially any of you that have followed my older blog on photographyreview.com , understand that I often wander far from photography and art-related topics in my musings. Sometimes very far...

So today we have the first off-topic post of my new blog. The passing of long-time New York Yankees baseball club owner George Steinbrenner at the age of 80. According to news reports, Steinbrenner, in poor health for several years now, died of a massive heart attack at approx. 6:30 this morning:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/bbo_obit_steinbrenner

As a lifelong Yankee fan, I'm sure I'm not alone in saying it has been a love-hate rollercoaster ride of emotions over the years with Steinbrenner as the owner of the team.  For many sports fans, the ends justify the means, and in that sense I've been very happy with the great success of my Yanks since the mid-1970s.  Plenty of great baseball, and American League Divison Championshps and pennants, and of course World Series Championships.

But I've also suffered greatly over the years (at least in the sense that you can suffer as a sports fan), being embarrassed many times at his public behavior and royally pissed many other times when he fired popular managers for what sometimes seemed like the slightest of reasons (Dick Howser being let go after winning 103 games in 1980 comes to mind).

Still, in the end, he not only transformed the Yankees into perennial winners, but forever changed the way baseball and every other type of professional sports franchise is operated and marketed. To me, the ultimate irony (and compliment to him) was that at some point, nearly every owner that criticized him was actually trying to emulate him, but simply couldn't do it as well, and the fans of other teams that publicly berated him, secretly wished their teams were more like the Yankees and their owners more like George...

Thankfully, George Steinbrenner mellowed as he got older and acquired championships. While his drive to succeed never waned, he took a much less public profile in later years, rarely "calling out" coaches and players the way he had done in the past.

Now, this may sound a bit morbid to some of you, but I can't help but smile thinking Steinbrenner could not have picked a better time to die: on the eve of tonight's MLB All-Star game. At a time when baseball wants the fans and media's complete focus and attention on all the teams, who should be dominating, not only the sports networks, but every news channel and outlet?  His beloved (and hated) New York Yankees. He would not have wanted it any other way.

Rest in peace King George...

New Updates At STEVENPAULHLAVAC. COM...

Well, it's been a while, but much needed updates have been made to my commercial flash site: www.stevenpaulhlavac.com.  An integral part of my multi-pronged strategy for marketing my work online, sph.com is targeted almost entirely towards publishing creative professionals: magazine editors, art directors, photo editors, production managers, agency directors, etc., etc., etc.

Powered by liveBooks, the site presents a no-nonsense, quick loading, one click, very viewer-friendly slide show format that showcases my images without any of the bells and whistles that serious folks in the industry tend to frown on.  I use it to grab someone's attention instantly, and (hopefully) hold it long enough for my work to make a good impression on them...

Due to the constraints of the site, for the time being I'm limited in the number of image slots I have to use. So chosing the right photos to show is crucial. Right now, I've decided to ease up on the fashion and creative portrait, and concentrate on my editorial lifestyle tearsheets and magazine covers.

Take a look if you will, and let me know what you think...