Filed under: Photography
©Damon Winter/The New York Times
Off to a crack-o-dawn shoot this morning…. so here’s an early post: If you haven’t done so already - check out Damon Winter’s Neighbors Lens series - something that I think truly separates Damon from most newspaper photographers out there. It’s absolutely inspirational - not only is it old school - but man does the guy have … well … you know… cojones. Double exposure on 8 X 10 sheets of film - two exposures on one single sheet of film over a 4-8 hour period - an entire day’s work… wow.
I’m just humbled by the attempt and result. I mean, I just shutter at the idea of showing up early in the day, setting up a clunky camera on a heavy tripod - and stressing out the entire time about having a single person (or myself) bump the camera prior to my second exposure… as they show up to see the movie that night. (Damon - tell us: are you really exposing only one sheet of film for the entire day… or a few just to be safe?)
Simply fantastic - and what photography should be all about. I particularly love “Metropic” ”Double Take” and well - frankly - every single one of those photos from his series…. (make sure to click on “previous lens series” towards the bottom of the page to see every double-exposure Damon has made. It’s well worth it!)
Here is another slideshow of his produced by The New York Times - it’s of Damon’s coverage of Barack Obama over the past few months. It’s one of the strongest slide shows on politics I’ve seen by a single photographer on the nytimes.com site.
Kudos to Damon (you can see his personal site here), and Michele McNally for making this hire - one of many excellent hires the Times Photo department has made in recent years. Damon previously worked at the Dallas Morning News, and the The Los Angeles Times - and now New Yorkers are lucky to have his work land on their doorsteps every day.
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Fascinating.
Regarding bumping the camera: seems like the setup is removed (!) and then put back up before taking the second exposure. Which makes it all even more impressive!
According to another NYT article: “After taking the first photo, I usually draw a sketch of the image from memory showing the light and dark areas and the position of the main subject in the frame. When I am ready to make the second image, sometimes hours, days or even weeks later, I reload the film into the camera and use the sketch of the first exposure as a guide for composing the second.”
Comment by Jarle Aasland 08.29.08 @ 7:32 amThanks for the link, Vincent. Damon Winter is one of my biggest photographic inspirations. I’ve been following his work since he was with the DMN.
Comment by Collins 08.29.08 @ 7:48 amThank you for the nice links contained in this post. I like Michele McNally’s interview.
Comment by Marco Togni 08.29.08 @ 8:37 amI just saw the slideshow last night… very inspirational… Thanks for sharing on this shot… Incredible
Comment by Jason Cohen 08.29.08 @ 10:00 amHigh five to Damon for taking the time to do it old school. Great work that reminds one of the power of controlled accidents in an era of photoshop and cgi.
Comment by todd huffman 08.29.08 @ 11:43 amA brilliant concept + excellent execution= great photograph
Comment by daniel sheehan 08.29.08 @ 12:01 pmMore details on the process from a link at the bottom of the story: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/18/nyregion/18lenstext.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Fabulous photo regardless of how it’s done! Thanks for the link!
Comment by Josh Devins 08.29.08 @ 12:13 pmhola vincent
here in mexico o do not understand
why but in the u.s. media say that john mccain and barak obama are at this moment with the same posibilities to win the presidence but when i see slide shows i just see barak and do not see mccain is this because of the democratic convention or what is this all about? because i do not understand everybody are with obama
i do not see mccain pictures or no body want to cover his derrota.
Wonderful shot.
Can I ask Vincent what assignments you have next week, or what projects you will be working on?
Kind regards
NIGEL (U.K.)
Nigel - sadly due to ridiculously stupid contracts - I can’t say - but will share pix and behind the scene pix when the embargoes are lifted - cheers - v
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Pingback by Mad Props to Damon Winter - New York Times Photographer « Vincent Laforet’s Blog 09.01.08 @ 5:44 pmGreat concept and beautiful work by Mr. Winter. I wonder, though- how much is photojournalism and how much is art? I know that the double exposure is as old as photography itself, but what if we take 2 photos and merge them together in Photoshop and run it as photojournalism? Is that the same thing? Just something I wonder.
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