Tuscany MAGIC from Alessandro Ornelli

I spent a day in Tuscany. When I left, part of my heart stayed behind. We are planning a trip back to that wonderful region because a handful of hours simply wasn’t enough. Actually, I don’t think a year…a decade...or even a lifetime would be enough.

Tuscany is everything you imagined it to be and much more. The countryside is a perfect canvas for all artists. It inspired the artist, Michelangelo and birthed the incomparable singer Andrea Bocelli. It’s where you will see vineyards and history and the kind of countryside you thought could be found in storybooks.

It’s also where Alessandro Ornelli makes his art. Alessandro lives in Toscana. By day he is a PC technician but when he packs up his camera and heads out for the fabled countryside of Tuscany, he’s on his way to becoming one of the top graphic artists on flickr.

He is absolutely one of my all-time favorites.

I wanted to start this series of articles with Alessandro because the first time I saw his work, it took my breath away. I mean it. I saw an explosion of colors and light and I distinctly remember my jaw dropping as I sat in front of my computer having one of those “oh my God” moments every photographer hopes to inspire with his or her work.

It’s difficult to speak with Alessandro. His English isn’t good…and my Italian (beyond phrases like “Where is the red dog radiator banana located?” and “Please, madam, may I have three of your large green ears?”) isn’t much better.

We had to do all our talking through translators.

But look at these images and try to tell me Alessandro has a hard time making himself understood. I dare you.

“I love clouded, dramatic skies,” Alessandro writes. Okay. He didn’t have to tell us that. Both of the images he selected to be shown to you feature those huge Italian skies. Up top is one of his favorites. The Italian title translates to “Rain Threatens.”

You need to have a look at this image’s full size so click on it, spend a minute or two looking at it (and wishing you’d taken it…because I sure do) and then click on the “Back” button and meet me back here.

First, let me draw your attention to the leading line. Alessandro crops his image so those lines lead right to the sky. Open the picture again and have a look. As you look at the image, you will more than likely find your eyes following the furrow directly to that fabulous sky.

There are three beautifully ordered color grids being used here: the foreground is this awesome earthy brown. To the sides and the middle is vibrant green. The sky is comprised of varying shades of grey and black.

You need also to watch and see how this artist has used light. There’s light in the clouds as well as two lines defining the break between the brown earth and the green middle ground. See how he has used light to create that division?


Light plays and even bigger role in the second canvas Alessandro chose to show to you. This is the effect we have all seen and find very difficult to replicate. My wife and I call these “God rays” – bright lances of sunlight breaking through the clouds and shining perfectly on the earth below.

There are two really interesting things about this image to me. First: it has to be about 85% sky. The artist has decided the light and texture of his work are what he wants you to see. Where the first image started your eye at the bottom of the shot and then led you to the clouds – this image starts with your eye wandering around those wonderful dramatic clouds and then riding the rays of light down to the ground. In this image, earth is more of an afterthought…and, with a sky like this, why shouldn’t it be?

Look at the colors: strong greens and blues and whites. Bold and so very lovely.


This is my personal favorite. I chose it from Alessandro’s Photostream to share with you. I looked at this for a very long time the first time I saw it. The English translation is “The Party Ends.”

Do you see a continuation of what makes this artist truly exceptional? The sky, the perfect textures and the LIGHT – so lovely that it almost hurts your eyes. One lone umbrella remains and the people have vanished. The clouds are reflected in the water, the sand is textured with lines that lead to the water and then onto the sky. To me, this work is incomparable.

Alessandro says he spends about half an hour on each HDR image and shoots about 60% of his work in HDR. There’s a deftness, confidence and skill about his work, isn’t there?

I wonder how many Tuscany businessmen have watched him working on their PCs and had no idea who he was…or the awareness of beauty that waits within him.

Alessandro Ornelli’s flickr photostream can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/10235766@N08/

Pop by for a look. Who knows? You just might learn something.

I certainly did.

NOTE: All photos in this blog segment are by Alessandro Ornelli and are used with his permission. He reserves all rights.

"flickering" Thoughts

I’ve been playing around on flickr for the past while. For those who don’t know, flickr is a photo sharing website with teeming millions of photographers.

Some are scary good. I’ve seen utterly remarkable Photoshop and Photography work.

I’ve also seen some really awful stuff: snapshots of vacations, "cute pet" pics, endless wedding and family reunion photos.

(My photostream, loaded with travel and Photoshopped stuff is here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/41659872@N00/ in case you want to go there and begin writing wild notes of praise and send me blank signed checks.)

Times at my company have been really busy – which explains why I haven’t been around much. It’s not that I don’t think of you guys. But it takes me quite a while to put together a reasonable blog and time has been a real luxury lately.

But back to flickr for a second. Here are a couple of thoughts:

1) We are talking about a site that is as much about politics and networking as it is about the photos. Those who are well-connected get a TON of immediate response to their work.

What is “response?” People can “comment” on your photo. They can also choose to make your photo a “favorite.” Or they may make you a “contact” – which means they want to have constant updates on your work. The "genuine" compliments are the latter two.

My issue with this is that no one really seems to want advice. The comments are unstintingly positive. If people really wanted to hear what you think, they would say so. Read through the comments on pictures and try to find one…just ONE…that has a real suggestion for how to make the image more effective.

2) The awards are mostly meaningless. Since many flickr groups are intent on spreading their name around, there is a tremendous emphasis on giving out “awards.” As an example: some groups will demand that if you post one of your pictures, you are expected to make group “awards” to at least two other pictures. (“Awards” are codes you cut and paste from the sponsor group.)

The result, somewhat predictably, is that there are tons of awards given. This means that people aren’t really looking for “award worthy” work. They are looking for likely candidates to dump awards on. Not the same thing. Many people cut and paste awards and make no comment at all.

I think this leads to “fickr fever” – a condition where the patient is unable to sleep for fear of missing even one positive comment the very instant it arrives. The patient is constantly trying to cook up new ways to curry the favor and attention of other flickrites.

I’ve created my own award that I give to work I genuinely respect.

2) BUT there is a mind-blowing variety of material available on flickr. I’ve learned a LOT just from looking at the hundreds (maybe thousands) of photos. You see how different artists approach the same topic, how they visually depict various ideas and concepts.

You’ll see illustrations and Photoshop. You’ll see photography and snapshots, landscapes and portraits. You’ll see photographs from all around the world of interesting people doing interesting stuff.

This is probably the very best reason to check flickr out. The compact exposure to all kinds of new art and visual “muscle” is candy for anyone’s eye. There are outstanding artists on flickr.

3) It’s interesting to see what people comment on…when they do comment. A great photograph HAS to be about more than a great subject. Everyone likes to see cute kittens, pretty girls and fabulous sunsets. These images really draw tons of comments on flickr.

But often it’s a lousy photograph of a great subject that also draws comment after comment. Sure. It’s a cute kitten or a lovely girl. But often it’s a badly composed or poorly exposed image. Sometimes the images are over-processed. A great subject in a terrible photo is still a terrible photo.

I am astounded at how often the viewer chooses to overlook this stuff and “oooh” and “ahhh” about the subject instead. Reading the comments will give you a great insight on how your image might be viewed by its audience…an audience you never meet.

4) The absolute “proof in the pudding” about all things flickr is the answer to these questions: “Has being there made me a better artist? Do I think about the things I have learned from other people at flickr? Has the bar for my own work been set a little higher?”

The answer to all three questions, for me anyway, is “yes.”

So I am planning to devote the next few blogs to discussing the work of some of the exceptional artists I have found on flickr.

Stick around. It’s going to be interesting!

See you later, Butch

Paul Leonard Newman

(January 26, 1925 – September 26, 2008)

It's a rare and wonderful thing to catch a glimpse of Hollywood royalty. And it's even better to have the opportunity to photograph them.

It makes me sad to hear of the death of Paul Newman.

My sympathies go out to his family, his friends and his fans. My encounter with this man was brief...but memorable.

In the very short time that our life paths intersected, I found him to have Sundance's smile, Luke's cool and Fast Eddie's flash.

He made me smile and he blew a kiss to my wife.

The last time I saw him, he was puttering off into the sunset on a red scooter and waving good-bye over his shoulder.

That's how I will remember him.

It's here on my blog: http://photoshopbasicsin6hours.blogspot.com/2008/06/stalking-paul-newman.html

My sympathies go out to his family, his friends and his millions and millions of fans.

It was good to know you, Paul.

Safe journey.

Secret Worlds

There’s a secret out there. You can find it if you simply take a second to look over an occasional hill. Usually it’s in a place the rest of the world is only marginally aware of, the kind of place people cease to see after a while.

But it’s there.

There are people in these secret worlds as well – but they are the kind of people you only see only out of the corner of your eye as they melt into the background. The years have made them experts at disappearing, and the selective perceptions we (on the other side of the hill) have developed makes it easier still for us not to see them.

Sheree and I went to one of these places last night.

The hill you have to look over is in a neighborhood formerly occupied by the military. It’s at the end of a nameless street. Watch carefully because, as with all enchanted places, you will miss the flash of color it offers if you aren’t watching for it. It’s there for a just a second and then it’s gone.

We were a fellowship of three: Sheree was taking one of her photography students out on a photo safari. I tagged along to drive the car and serve up tasty and nutritious snacks if called upon. The student was Laurie, a sweet young thing armed with a big Nikon.

I’d done a show recently in the neighbourhood and during my ritual pre-event pacing, I’d noticed a burned out building: deserted and old. All the windows were boarded over or smashed. It had the look of a toothless crone. I came to the conclusion that if a place was going to be haunted, this is probably it.

There was graffiti all over it and within it. This building was custom designed as a photographer’s feast. Since I was about to do a magic show, I didn’t have a camera with me – but I was delighted to be reunited with the building again.

I lobbied immediately for stopping there. But my wife suggested we go out to the end of the street. I was chaffing at the bit, but I drove to the end of the street anyway.

There was this hill, you see.

And on the other side of the hill – this. We were, all three, seized by the “OH! OH! OH!” photographer reflex. When this happens, you can’t get out of the car fast enough and even as you’re parking, you’re taking the lens pen to your lens and opening the car door. It’s been my experience that photographers in particular have the ability to recognize an enchanted second or a magical ray of light and they understand what rare and wonderful things they are.

As I crept deeper and deeper into the rabbit warren of fallen walls and cubbyholes, I noticed four people noticing me and immediately starting to disappear. I turned to see if the women were coming, and when I looked back the people had vanished, like a magician had waved a wand and they were gone. There wasn’t even a puff of smoke hanging in the air.

There was a sofa in the middle of a clearing. There was graffiti all around me. Broken pottery, smashed toilets and piles of garbage. The light was perfect and I kept shooting. As I did, I realized that I was actually taking shots inside someone’s home and the fact that this home was outside didn’t matter at all. I could feel eyes on me…but maybe it was just the ethereal-sort-of-spooky feel already there. But there was definitely charged atmosphere.

There were other deserted and destitute buildings we wanted to get to before the light went and we were happily photographing these when a voice came out of nowhere.

“What are you doing here?”

I turned and met Jeremy. He said he was one of the military police and that we were photographing in a restricted area. His credibility was hampered just a little because he was missing two front teeth, pushing a baby carriage and had two really odd looking women in tow.
With thoughts of little dark rooms with naked light bulbs, getting taped to a chair and beaten with rubber hoses dancing through my head, I explained that we were just taking pictures.

It didn’t take long for Jeremy to warm to us. (I used my most charming smile and when my wife and her companion joined us, his heart melted.)

“You saw the shack then?” he asked finally.

“The shack?” I repeated cleverly.

He nodded. “If you like stuff drawn on walls, you should go to the shack.”

“Where is it?” I asked – suddenly eager to get there before the light went.

“It’s just over the hill from where you were before,” he said.

“…there’s another hill?” I asked. I had been congratulating myself on looking over the first hill. Finding out there was a second hill deflated me just a little.

He nodded and led us past the first enchanted area into the fabulous treasure that waited just behind.

My eyes rested on what initially looked like a blot on the wall in the corner. As I looked at it, I began to see that the blot of black was actually a body outline. Then it looked like someone forced to stand in the corner…and that the bedspring mattress could be…what? Bars?

Look at this graffiti. It’s not a cave drawing. It’s art. The notion that someone did this in a remote cabin where only a handful of people will ever go is amazing to me. Have a look at the mattress. I was blown away. Then I noticed another painting.

Jeremy was telling me about his tactical handcuffs and that his aunt and uncle are on military tactical squads and I wasn’t even listening. True. It was the kind of talk that would have set off alarm bells in my mind before.

But now?

Nah. I was busy. I was looking at this astounding wall stuff, thinking about the mind that created it, the hands that executed it and the great honor we had to be looking at it. The image on the wall was one of such complete desolation that I couldn't hold back a sudden rush of emotion and empathy for the person who had done this wonderful artwork in this deserted and marked-for-demolition building. The idea of bulldozers destroying this was pretty hard to take.

A brass...thing....had been twisted up in a very specific way and I had the inspiration that this anonymous artist had placed it right where it was and in a curious way, it completed the picture.

When I was a kid, I was blown away by the notion that there really could be an enchanted world you accessed through the back of an ordinary wardrobe, that this mundane world really did have some magic to offer. I am so very glad I was right. And the magic is easier to find that I had originally thought.

You just have to look over a hill or two.

Bob's Magic Horse

Take a second and click on the picture to the left. Look at this merry go round horse. Look at the fracture running down his neck. Look a the amazing detail in the hand carved flowers. (Click on the "Back" arrow when you've finished looking at it and I'll meet you back here.)

Here's how that San Antonio horse came to be here in front of your eyes.

Doug, one of our two traveling companions, did most of the driving on our San Antonio / Houston trip. He’s a little guy who reminded me of a bantam rooster. He drove the streets of San Antonio like Mario Andretti going for the checkered flag but, since he never actually killed anyone, I mostly let him alone except for the occasional sharp intake of breath and soft whimpering sound.

We were on our way to the Botanical Gardens and out of the corner of my eye, we saw an amusement park that looked so completely out of place that all I could do was say “Oh! Oh! Oh!” and point furiously. The long-suffering Doug, who had spent considerable amounts of time in the car with two photographers understood me perfectly. “Oh! Oh! Oh!” in photographer means “Excuse, me Doug. But I see a subject I would very much like to photograph. Would you mind pulling over so we get out of the car and make some photographs?”

To his credit, Doug didn’t sigh or growl. He just pulled over and Sheree and I piled out of the back seat and walked into another era.

The Kiddie Park has been on this tiny strip of land in San Antonio since 1925. I love amusement parks, especially when they are deserted. There’s a very specific feeling that creeps in a place designed to entertain crowds of people when the people are gone. It is a pleasant desolation.

The gate was open so, even though there weren’t any people, Sheree and I walked in. It was the now-familiar San Antonio trick of stepping back in time and listening to the voices and songs of people long gone.

I was standing there, camera limply held in my hand, drinking this in. We’re talking about a place that has entertained children over three plus generations. The rides looked lovingly maintained but so very old. I have no idea why I felt emotional standing there but I did.

“Can I help you?” The voice jolts me back to reality. I see a tall thin man advancing. His arm is in a sling but there’s a manner about his approach that tells me I am about to meet the owner. For just a second I think of him with a striped shirt and armbands. Maybe a straw hat and a bamboo cane. Then the image is gone.

“…the gate was open,” I say. I do NOT want to be sent out of this place yet. “These things are beautiful.”

He looks at me for a long second. I suspect he’s formulating an opinion as to whether I am really a gang-banger cleverly disguised as a genial kinda round Canadian tourist with a camera.

“How old is this park?” I ask. I figure the bestdefense is to get someone to talk about themself.

The look continues for a few seconds and then suddenly his face cracks into a smile and I realize I’m in.

I have met Bob Astin.

“When I was four,” he says with the air of someone who has told this story before, “I came here with my dad. I asked him to buy it for me. He didn’t. So when I was 27, I bought it myself. Been here ever since.”

I am swept up for just a second in how much I immediately like this man. I recall riding merry-go-rounds as a kid and wondering how we could get one to fit into our living room. I remember the sound of the music and the gentle up and down motion of the horse. I remember looking up and watching myself in the mirror and scrunching my eyes up tight and rocking back in the saddle. Yeah. I remember the magic of a carousel. But I grew out of it. Bob didn’t.

He’s warming to his subject now. He takes me to the merry-go-round.

“These horses here?” he says with a daddy pride, “All original. Each one unique. Each one carved by an artist from wood. No additions. Been here since 1925.”

Is it wrong for me to think that this is so cool I can hardly stand it? I look at these horses. So many of them are cracked and lovingly reassembled. They, like the San Antonio Missions, are time travelers. How many little hands have touched these creatures? I cannot stop my own hand from running over the pitted paint and the cracks.

“Kids,” says Bob. “They climb on the legs. They break them.” He shrugs, apparently deciding that children are a force of nature. He doesn’t seem to mind much.

I am blown away by the thought that most of the children who rode here when it was brand new are dead now. Maybe they grew into men who died on a lonely beach during the second world war. Did some go off to nearby NASA and help put a man on the moon?

As I look at these horses, I start thinking about how I am going to convey their stark beauty in a graphic. These are hand-carved horses. Each one is unique. Each one hand painted. These horses served as templates for their modern counterparts. These are the originals.

Bob and I talk for a while. How long, I do not know. But we are chatting like old friends. I suspect it’s because we both get the whole merry-go-round thing. Neither of us has forgotten the sensation of friendly motion and the wind in our hair and each ride that ended too soon. We both see these horses as utterly wonderful things.

I ask him if he will pose for me on the merry-go-round.

“People always asking me to do that,” he says. “Don’t know why.”

But his tone sparkles just a little and we both know why.

“Look straight at the camera, Bob,” I say.

“I’m lookin’ at ya,” he says. He isn’t sure whether to smile or not so there’s this odd expression on his face. It’s perfect.

I wanted the image to be a little off center to draw the eye. I want the image to be odd because the subject is odd. The background is black and white while he is in color to bring the modern man into the historical context. The flag is a wonderful background component, so I allowed a little color here.

The horses are the stars of the show, though. I cannot stop looking at them.

My wife comes and reminds me that our very patient travel companions are waiting.

I smile and nod at Bob.

He smiles at me and for an instant I see at once the face of the kid who wanted to have his own amusement park…and the man who bought one.

The Missions of San Antonio

I have a picture in my mind: there’s this little Franciscan monk wearing a black robe. He has a fringe of hair around an odd-looking bald spot. The sun is hot, maybe a hundred and ten degrees. This guy is lugging fifty and sixty pound rocks across an empty clearing and piling them carefully one on top of the other. Maybe he pauses to take a drink of tepid water. Maybe he takes a second to wipe his brow. Maybe he prays.

As my “eye camera” draws back from a perspective in the clouds somewhere, I see many of these dark shapes moving across a desolate clearing carved out of a savage desert. What are they doing? Why are they doing what they’re doing?

They are building Missions – churches. They are literally building San Antonio.

There are four Missions here. They were all built in the 1700’s – I imagine by sweaty little guys in black robes with some help from the local Indian population.

These Missions are amazing to me. It’s history you can touch. And it’s history with the magical ability to touch you back. You can put your hand on the same warm rock that some anonymous person placed there over three centuries ago. I defy anyone to say that’s not magic.

Sheree and I packed up the cameras and crept out of our lodgings three mornings in a row to get these pictures. Even before the sun comes up, you can feel that Texas heat the instant you step out of the door of your air-conditioned home. It’s not a nasty heat. It’s an enveloping warmth.

When the sun starts to come up, the air fills with this wonderful energy and the sky is painted with such vibrant colors you can hardly snap the shots fast enough. (Photoshop users can make a dramatic sky much moreso by going to Image> Adjustments> Contrast and Brightness and working with those “Oooo” and “Ahhhhh” inducing sliders. A good rule of thumb is to move them only a little. Remember that you are simply trying to enhance the sky…not make it look like Armageddon.)

Sheree, being an intrepid sort, suggested we go back to one of the Missions for sunset.
I wasn’t getting anything that night that made my heart flutter until it was almost dark. Green lights from the trees nearby came on. They bathed the Mission with this other-worldly glow. I set the ISO on the camera to 100, set it on a concrete block (I don’t carry a tripod) and used the Self Timer feature to eliminate any camera shake. The exposure must have been thirty seconds or more. But when the shutter finally clicked closed, I had a wonderful image.

There’s really no way to capture what the Missions feel like at night or in the early morning. When I look at these images, I remember the peace drifting through the air around them. You can feel that these Missions have been here for centuries…and they will still be here long after we’re gone.

I remember the multitude of cats that crept out in the early morning hours to keep us company. I remember the excitement we both felt, standing in the middle of a field, watching the sun slowly creep along the stonework.

And I remember, most of all, thinking of all those little guys in black robes, sweating under an unforgiving sun to build a monument to their God in the middle of a desert.

Peering Near-Sightedly at the REAL Texas

What is it about Texas?

Something gets under your skin here. It’s an infection you want to get. Maybe it’s the wide open spaces. It could be the casual beauty of the cities or the pleasing Tex Mex blending of pastel colors. It might even be all the history you can touch at the Alamo, the Missions – all the famous faces and all the legendary places.

But I think the real secret of Texas isn’t the people. It’s not the history.

It’s the Bar-B-Q.

Texas Bar-B-Q is one of man’s great creations. Forget the wheel. The internal combustion engine? Pffft.

I invite you to give Texas Bar-B-Q just a few seconds of your consideration. Think about a plastic plate loaded down with enough glistening meat to make a vegetarian run screaming the other way. Think about savory sweet sauce, the kind of fatty juicy pork ribs that give your doctor nightmares. Consider thick slices of melt-in-your mouth brisket. Think about sinking your teeth unrepentantly into meat that falls off the bone…and being surrounded by other unrepentant carnivores doing exactly the same thing as you think to yourself “These are my people.”

I love Texas Bar-B-Q.

I love that the napkins come right off the paper towel roll and they expect you to help yourself. I love that the meat is heaped up on plates until they strain under the weight. In short, I love Texas Bar-B-Q…and I especially love Texas Bar-B-Q served up at Bob’s Cook House in Weimar (which is pronounced, with flagrant disregard for the English language as “WEE-mer”) Texas. (I’m pretty sure this is where the Queen eats when she’s in town.)

You’ll have to hunt for it. And when you find it, you’ll only see the sign that reads “Bob’s Cook House” if someone remembered to prop it up against the building. But wveryone in Weimar knows where Bob’s is. Just ask.

Treasures like Bob’s are worth looking for. They are worth hunting for. They are worth flying thousands of miles, renting a car and traveling through 104 degree heat for.

Chances are that Bob himself will be on hand to greet you with a big smile and a completely unaffected Texas drawl. (That's the aforementioned "Bob himself" to the left.) Both of the times we went there (yes…we went back…you betcha!) he told us about something that was on the menu that they were out of. Who cares? Bob’s is about food. Lots of food.

If you time your arrival right (and you HAVE to time it right because Bob now closes shop at 2:00 in the afternoon “due to football season”) you’ll see various members of the Weimar football team arrive for lunch. I stand to be corrected, but I think roughly half the team is related in some way to Bob. These guys look like they stepped out of a “small town Texas” movie. They are polite, they nod affably to a table full of strangers from Canada, and chat in muted tones with sweet looking cheerleaders and each other. They don’t throw things. They don’t swear and they tuck into the food with almost as much gusto as I do.

A policeman was chowing down when we got there the first time and warning Bob that the Bar-B-Q was making him sleepy and his crime-busting instincts would be dulled – which may or may not be a big deal in Weimer.

I know what he was talking about. Somewhere between the last morsel of brisket and the final scrapings of potato salad, a happy little “meat sweat” broke out on my cheekbones. This is the direct result of being unwilling to throw any of this feast away…but also not quite having enough room inside me to put it all.

In Houston and San Antonio, I had the sense that many of the people we met were “putting Texas on” for the tourists. Does that sound strange? Let me put it this way: it felt like a lot of the people we met were trying to act like they thought we expected Texans to behave.

Exaggerated accents and an almost annoying determination to work the word “y’all” into the conversation as often as possible made me suspect that most of them were really from New England.

But there’s no pretention at Bob’s. They took the time to get to know us, they greeted us like old friends upon our return and they fed us more than any mere mortal could be expected to ingest at any one sitting.

You see this woman to the right? It was a week between visits. She not only remembered us. But she also remembered what we ordered.

I don’t think Bob’s has a website. I only have their email because they wrote it on the back of a business card and asked almost shyly if we would send them copies of the pictures we took.

If you want to spend a few minutes having the kind of authentic Texas experience you were hoping for when you booked your flight…you would be nuts to pass by Weimar and not take your tummy to Bob’s Cook House.

Just make sure you get there before two if it’s during football season. I understand football season is a "Texas thing."

So is Bob's.