New York 2018 February Camera Carnival/Meet-Up

[Phil_F_NM]

I haven't seen it yet but would like to. I may this coming weekend. War movies and I haven't been friends since about 2005.
But I AM fascinated and impressed by the technical artistry of it all. It is a skill and an artistic vision to make one photograph and having all control of aperture, lighting and shutter speed. It is something beyond that to do it 24 times in a second for hours, only having control of the aperture and lighting but also stressing movement. Its amazing.

Phil Forrest

 

[Prest_400]

I would like to see an extended "making of" documentary about this film. I recall seeing a short feature about how they used 65mm and the plane scenes, will have to dig that.
Particularly stricken by the "Portraits" of the characters, showing the short DoF of the format and using it to express the desperation of the situation.

Watched it on 70mm as thankfully there's a cinema in Barcelona that screens the format ocassionally. Brutal. First one I saw was the Hateful Eight and I would like to see interstellar in this format.
I recall going out of the theater slightly dazed, as it was quite an experience.
The sound had to do. There was an interview to war veterans who watched the first screening and they said it was lounder than reality. Probably the restlessness of nat sound also has to do.

Wish you luck with the submissions. Indeed there's nothing to be taken for granted, but it can be used for learning.
A friend had lunch with a professor we didn't know about for a long time. Turns out he was diagnosed with a metastatic cancer at the end of '16 and given 6 months, but went through it and has cured.

 

[Phil_F_NM]

There was an interview to war veterans who watched the first screening and they said it was lounder than reality. Probably the restlessness of nat sound also has to do.

Combat is strangely normal sounding as far as the din is concerned. Explosions are loud, local gunfire is loud, screams can be loud. Otherwise it is a normal city day. I'm sure a lifetime of riding public transit causes far more hearing damage than 6 months in combat as long as the eardrums didn't rupture during combat. There is also the phenomena of the brain canceling out a lot of sound. Things become muffled somewhere between the ears and the brain. Could be the psychological part just blocking it out as a protective measure, could be physiological where the receptors are pegged at 11 and simply can't vibrate any more or have suffered acute damage. Probably both to some extent.

Phil Forrest

 

[Calzone]

I haven't seen it yet but would like to. I may this coming weekend. War movies and I haven't been friends since about 2005.
But I AM fascinated and impressed by the technical artistry of it all. It is a skill and an artistic vision to make one photograph at having all control of aperture, lighting and shutter speed. It is something beyond that to do it 24 times in a second for hours, only having control of the aperture and lighting but also stressing movement. Its amazing.

Phil Forrest

Phil,

I have to warn you that your past and combat experiences might haunt you. Please be aware of the triggers.

For me it was September 11th. I thought I had processed all this loss in my life and had learned how to cope, but I soon learned that I was stll a full bucket that couldn't contain anymore. I was full and had to empty myself. I had mucho unresolved grief.

It was after September 11th 2001 that I tried to make sense of non-sense and tell a story that had a beginning, a middle and an end that I had blocked out. It took me over a decade to write and it was all about emptying all these memories and loss that I was too young to process or understand.

I am a 60 year old man, but I remember having this flashback in a shopping mall out on Long Island when I was in my early thirties.

A flashback is not at all like in a movie; I heard a baby crying; and something happened where this primal fear and terror from my past just came out.

I could feel that I was becoming an animal, I could feel I was being overwelhmed by instinct to survive, and that was leading to a break where I would loose control and become violent.

I was able to get myself outside and away from people, and I had this breakdown. I still don't know why on that particular day the sound of that particular baby crying caused me to freak out, but the terror was real and came from my past.

It is kinda funny how memories can be blocked out to protect your survival. Be aware and please be careful if you go see Dunkirk.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Combat is strangely normal sounding as far as the din is concerned. Explosions are loud, local gunfire is loud, screams can be loud. Otherwise it is a normal city day. I'm sure a lifetime of riding public transit causes far more hearing damage than 6 months in combat as long as the eardrums didn't rupture during combat. There is also the phenomena of the brain canceling out a lot of sound. Things become muffled somewhere between the ears and the brain. Could be the psychological part just blocking it out as a protective measure, could be physiological where the receptors are pegged at 11 and simply can't vibrate any more or have suffered acute damage. Probably both to some extent.

Phil Forrest

Phil,

I have been told by athletes that I have a tremendous threshold of pain. Perhaps because of all the fist fighting and street violence, perhaps to make up for my lack of weight and size, perhaps due to suffering...

In those life and death situations it seems like a heightened reality of distended time.

Three wheeling in an overloaded Jeep seemed like an extended amount of time; the sudden impact of a 45 MPH car that spun my car like a Frisbee and removed my glasses that flew out my open window; the impulse to give my best friend an uppercut when he was falling into my fist to give him permanent brain damage when boxing and lost control; when NYPD almost run you down with their patrol car and jump out with their guns drawn; again when NYPD have their guns drawn pointing at me during a McDonald's robbery and the guy with the box full of money that was pistol whipping Hector the Manager is standing right in back of me...

No need for combat experience to experience near death.

On a lighter note: one day in my loft in Williamsburg Maggie and I hear a sound: it sounds like someone dragging a large airconditioner down concrete steps. Maggie asks me, "What is that sound?" and my response was "Gee, I don't know," but I recognized the sound of someone seeing how fast they could empty a magazine from a 9mm handgun.

Real guns don't sound like on TV.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

SELF DEFENSE: Yesterday I went to B&H, and on my way home on the subway I was forced to defend myself from an assault.

I entered the subway on 34th Street on the downtown side and had to get to the uptown side to get the "E" train. There is a subterainian interchange that links the uptown and downtown sides with the center platform. I was aware of my surroundings and took notice that passengers that were waiting on the center platform were initiating a scramble to catch the train on the downtown platform that I was leaving.

So I kinda had the heads-up leaving the stairway to expect people stampeding my way. When I came around a blind corner there was this guy who was mucho bigger than me (I only weight 150.5 lbs) running right at me at full speed.

Suddenly it was all just instinct and I flipped the switch. I made a fist with my right hand, I cupped that fist in my left hand, I crouched and dropped my right shoulder, and at the appropriate time I accelerated and swung my elbow into this guys solar plexis without getting knocked down.

Pretty much it was a "man-ball drill" from Lacross days or a football dirty trick. The laws of physics were on the other guys side because he was at speed, but E=MC2 was on my side as well as my low position.

I did not get hurt, and I'm pretty assured that this guy with be bruised. Not sure if I succeeded in knocking the wind out of him. Hope I did.

All this happened in a blink of an eye and was partially training and conditioning that kinda happened as a reflex without thinking. This is the part that scares me: when the response is involantary.

Cal

 

[Phil_F_NM]

Cal,
Don't worry about involuntary response. It is SELF DEFENSE. Not offense. Your brain is wired to protect itself, not to lash out. Just remain with that fact and be happy the best outcome was had.

Phil Forrest

 

[Calzone]

Cal,
Don't worry about involuntary response. It is SELF DEFENSE. Not offense. Your brain is wired to protect itself, not to lash out. Just remain with that fact and be happy the best outcome was had.

Phil Forrest

Phil,

It is scary where one just becomes an animal just trying to survive. When boxing with 16 ounce gloves, my best friend split my lip with a good jab, and suddenly in a blink of an eye I hit him with a left and then with a powerful right that rendered him defenseless.

I barely caught myself from hitting a defenseless man who already was falling forward because I had rattled his brain against the back of his skull.

This still truely scares me. My conditioning is so profound.

A friend from Grumman who was a Navy SEAL tried to teach me the seven connected deadly moves he was taught. Zingo tried to explain that once he started it was almost impossible to stop, but he tried to slow it down anyways. Zingo ended up hurting me even though he tried to slow things down.

Pretty much conditioned like a reflex and these moves were beyond one's control. This animal instinct to me is very scary because it is so advanced and developed. It requires no thinking.

Cal

 

[dshfoto]

Indeed -- sometimes training just kicks in. I was walking around Market Street in San Francisco one day and stepped out from a building's column. I just caught a peripheral glance of some jogger coming at me full on. It was just reflex, but I dropped into a Taekwondo front stance, and the jogger ran into me non stop, hit my shoulder, bounced off and fell down in a heap. He was laying there trying to figure out how the guy in the suit knocked him down instead of the other way around, when I just turned and walked away. You got to be careful out there and assume you will cross paths with some nut.
Steve

 

[Range-rover]

You alway's have to watch where you walk and watch others walk(and run) in the City.

 

[Calzone]

Indeed -- sometimes training just kicks in. I was walking around Market Street in San Francisco one day and stepped out from a building's column. I just caught a peripheral glance of some jogger coming at me full on. It was just reflex, but I dropped into a Taekwondo front stance, and the jogger ran into me non stop, hit my shoulder, bounced off and fell down in a heap. He was laying there trying to figure out how the guy in the suit knocked him down instead of the other way around, when I just turned and walked away. You got to be careful out there and assume you will cross paths with some nut.
Steve

Steve,

That's where it gets more scary. I'm already in that space where it is instinct kicking in, and if this bigger younger guy yesterday wanted to brawl, it would of gotten ugly real fast.

Since I'm not a big guy I use speed, agility, and hyper aggression as my tactics, because I have to win a fight by overwelhming a larger and more powerful opponent. Pretty much I have to take apart a man and finish him.

I know that night when the cops thought I was a perp and drew ther weapons on me, if I would of ran (fight or flee instinct), I likely would have been ventilated. That Rolling Stones song "Heartbreaker" was a popular song at that time and was a constant reminder of what happened almost happened to me. "In a case of mistaken identiy- the police in New York City chase a boy' into a park- and put a bullet right though his heart- Heartbreaker..."

As far as crazie's go there are mucho/plenty.

Also things get carried away and out of control really fast especially when violence is involved.

I have had the wrong reaction too and hurt people. I was on a subway platform in Jamaca, Queens at 169th Street station. It was a matter of free association became a triggered response beyond my control. Realize the time was the early 70's in NYC, when I was counting my subway tokens, I was in the subway where crime was highly probable, and someone tapped me on my back.

I thought I was getting mugged, so I turned swinging. I connected to this guys face and laid him out.

It turn out all he wanted to know if he was on the correct platform to head towards Madhattan. "Why did you punch me?" he asked.

In these types of situations things get crazy fast.

Cal

 

[jsrockit]

February Self-Defense Meet-up? 😉

 

[Calzone]

February Self-Defense Meet-up? 😉

John,

I could of been taken out yesterday.

Those seventies survival skills worked this time. Imagine a guy your size bowling me down.

What do you do if some fool stampedes your woman? Also what scares me if I get too carried away. When that switch gets flipped anything can happen, and that is truely dangerous.

Cal

 

[icebear]

[ SELF DEFENSE: Yesterday I went to B&H, and on my way home on the subway I was forced to defend myself from an assault.]

....

I thought I was getting mugged, so I turned swinging. I connected to this guys face and laid him out.

It turn out all he wanted to know if he was on the correct platform to head towards Madhattan. "Why did you punch me?" he asked.

In these types of situations things get crazy fast.

Cal

February Self-Defense Meet-up? 😉

John,

I could of been taken out yesterday.

Those seventies survival skills worked this time. Imagine a guy your size bowling me down.

What do you do if some fool stampedes your woman? Also what scares me if I get too carried away. When that switch gets flipped anything can happen, and that is truely dangerous.

Cal

Hi Cal,

YOU could have seriously injured somebody that day. You realize you're sometimes seem to act like a loose cannon, don't you? Or at least you are telling it that way.😉
Ease up, relax, do some yoga or thai chi breathing exercise and just step aside instead of going in full frontal.
Being aware of your surroundings should give a split second to step out of harms way or to pull your woman to safety.

If I hadn't anticipated stupid drivers crossing lanes w/o turn signal, changing their mind half way and going the other direction again, I would have totaled I don't know how many cars already. Zero so far. Luckily I also haven't been in any fight nor being attacked or robbed. I guess, I count as a defensive driver.😉

And sorry to hear that the NYT review opportunity did not work out.

 

[Phil_F_NM]

^^^
This.

Phil Forrest

 

[thambar]

Just got my dee-luxe bus tix for the trip tomorrow, so barring any last-minute problems I'll be there. With any luck I'll be able to get a cab/uber from Port Authority in the rain!

 

[dshfoto]

For Rochard (Lex and 97th Street).Take a A or C subway to 96th St, and then an M96 cross town bus to Lexington. Walk up town one block on Lexington. Lot faster than an Uber, + mucho cheaper.

 

[stompyq]

For Rochard (Lex and 97th Street).Take a A or C subway to 96th St, and then an M96 cross town bus to Lexington. Walk up town one block on Lexington. Lot faster than an Uber, + mucho cheaper.

A - train is express from 59th to 125th. Take the C (or the 1 train) to 96th. Trains run on weekend schedule. Also beware. The M96 is RIDICULOUSLY slow. I recommend uber or a yellow cab if you are impatient.

 

[Range-rover]

Or! Take the 1 or 2 trains uptown one stop, get off at 42nd street and get the shutter to
Grand Central Terminal then just walk across and get the uptown 6 train to 96st and Lex.

 

[Crazy Fedya]

I am on the train to NYC. See y’all soon.