A Digital Camera Story to Warm the Old Film Heart

[Gid]

This is nothing new. Film users have done it for decades (mostly students). Mind you, the term 'tossography' could apply to all digital.

And that would make me a Tosser Hmmm .....................

Hanbags at dawn methinks 😀

Gid (unashamedly digital)

 

[Andrew Sowerby]

Some of the pictures on the cameratoss blog were interesting -- I often like photos that could be described as "playing with light."

I like that the Times' DOP grudgingly admitted that the photos had a "fleeting charm"!

 

[RObert Budding]

What's next, camera flushing? Place in a zip lock bag and flush. Fish it out of the bay the next day.

 

[ChrisPlatt]

Ironic, really. The uncertainty of the result surely adds to the excitement -
not unlike that felt by the film photographer curious about the latent image.
But the spell is soon broken by the instant gratification of the LCD screen.
Ah, progress...

"Excelsior, you fathead!"
-Chris-

 

[bobofish]

I don't know why all the vitriol...it's an interesting technique, if only to a certain point.

You don't have to toss the camera at all, I did this years ago with film. You can spin the camera on the strap, swing it around your arm, or just simply move the camera around a light source with your hand...the results can be quite predictable, and quite delightful.

And don't forget, it doesn't just have to be light sources, it can be stationary geometrical objects, with some interesting lighting out of the frame. I just shot some cool shots on my little digicam, but then the battery died.

Before you guys knock something like this, try it a few times, it's quite a bit of fun.

And speaking of the Turner prize, that German guy who won it a couple years ago is really a fantastic photographer. Can't think of theguy, but he took the large format pictures of the Hong Kong stock exchange, shopping malls, etc. that became in a sense abstract works, even though they were hyper-realistic shots. Abstract if for no other reason than the absurdity in the images....like the grocery store with the thousands of candy bars.

The pictures he won the Turner prize for were also very interesting, the result of an accident in teh dark room, where he mis-exposed some color paper....he figured out that he could make some really interesting abstracts, and there's nothing about those pictures that ISN'T photography...remember, "writing with light," and all that.

A lot of people had the exact same responses to Jackson Pollock's work back in the day, and now we call him America's great painter. Rothko, de Kooning, all those guys did some crazy stuff that was at first very very sternly objected to.

Don't forget boys, art is an evolving form, and mankind has a natural tendency to hold back the development process. Some things stay and become part of the vernacular, some things merely get included in the general perception, and some things are forgotten. Does anybody here know what "Suprematism" was?

The culmination, or the jumping off point was when Malevich painted a red square, and called it "Russian Peasant Woman."

And yet, Suprematism contributed not only to Soviet photography and painting, but also to the rest of modern Western art. Ask any Art Historian worth his or her salt about that painting, and they'll give you a list of every modern artist in the last 80 years that was influenced by that painting, and that list includes just about everybody.

 

[MikeyGaGa]

Lock and Load

Lock and Load

I'm locked and loaded...ready...PULL!

BANG!

Wooee! It blowed up good!;It blowed up real good!

Easy Share that,digi-geeks!

 

[RML]

Dang! Only a few months ago I read up on Moholy-Nagy and saw examples of his double exposures and "writing with light" shooting. Though, not quite the same effect as this toosography, it's close enough. I like it.

BTW, you don't even need to throw the camera. Just point it at the stars and keep the shutter open for a few hours. Et voila, streaks galore.

It's been done before, it's been sold and displayed before. It's not limited to digital, though that makes it much easier to get more and better shots.

I like the idea of flushography. Gonna try that once but by dragging the camera through or dunking it in the water instead of flushin it through the toilet.

 

[ywenz]

digital rules!

I'd rather chimp now than later in the darkroom.

 

[lubitel]

I love this comment:

"wowww this looks completely amazing!!!!! what was the target??? wowwwwwwwww"

 

[sf]

That's hilarious. Now we have trends. . .or should I say THEY have trends. The concept of a trendy subject . . . I don't know what to say.


Those digital fools 😉 stole my idea. I started shooting long exposures with my digicam a couple years ago, and shot some truly beautiful pieces. I didn't throw my camera around, but held it and drew onto the sensor by swinging and twirling the camera around in my hands. This started on a road trip, driving at night (riding in the back seat).

You have to admit, it's pretty gorgeous stuff. As much as the concept of trends in subject matter actually make being human embarrassing.

 

[kmack]

Just attach your camera to some elastic (too short to hit the ground) secured to a crane or similar and toss to your heart's content - the heavier the better.

Bungiography 😀

Sadly, it would probably work.

Gid

Or, attach a stout piece of chain to a bolt in the tripod mount of your Kiev and have Maceiography. Two Zorki 4's on the same chain and you get numchukiography.

 

[ywenz]

That's hilarious. Now we have trends. . .or should I say THEY have trends. The concept of a trendy subject . . . I don't know what to say.


Those digital fools 😉 stole my idea. I started shooting long exposures with my digicam a couple years ago, and shot some truly beautiful pieces. I didn't throw my camera around, but held it and drew onto the sensor by swinging and twirling the camera around in my hands. This started on a road trip, driving at night (riding in the back seat).

You have to admit, it's pretty gorgeous stuff. As much as the concept of trends in subject matter actually make being human embarrassing.

I don't know man.... I wouldn't call many of them proverbial b&w (developed in Rodinal! Yeah Rodinal Rulez! *sarcasm*) RF shots of a some dude in a coffee shop with mad bokeh, any more of an "art' than what these ppl are doing on flickr...

 

[anselwannab]

A friend's Husband is an artist (Painter) and at dinner one night she pointed out that we both enjoyed photogrpahy. I asked him what he shot, and he said some Canon P&S. I asked what his subjects were, and he said he would just walk around with the shutter opened and look at the patterns. Kind of struck me as Blasphemy, but then again he would probably cringe if I took a brush to hand and tried to paint something. The only thing I paint are houses, with 4 inch brushes.

 

[remrf]

That's hilarious. Now we have trends. . .or should I say THEY have trends. The concept of a trendy subject . . . I don't know what to say.


Those digital fools 😉 stole my idea. I started shooting long exposures with my digicam a couple years ago, and shot some truly beautiful pieces. I didn't throw my camera around, but held it and drew onto the sensor by swinging and twirling the camera around in my hands. This started on a road trip, driving at night (riding in the back seat).

You have to admit, it's pretty gorgeous stuff. As much as the concept of trends in subject matter actually make being human embarrassing.

I like your shots. Especially the first one as it has the look of (to me) of a painted abstract. Camera tossing is a little bit too random for my personal taste but I have seen some interesting variations on the theme.

I've seen a series where the camera is stationary positioned low pointing up. A view camera was used for this series. Then a light source was hung by fine string directly over the center of the lens. In one series the light was swung in a circular motion with the shutter open so that a single trail of light slowly circles into the center of the frame. The decrese in circular motion is very constant and the distance between each pass is close to identical until it reaches a rest point in the center. Another of the series uses the same light position but the light is swung across the lens in an ovoid patern which creates a light mandala. There were some with multiple exposures using different colored lights. I've been meaning to set this one up and play with it sometime. I might even put a camera on the string with fixed and then moving light sources. But I could not bring myself to toss a camera free hand into the air. Even a digital. 🙄

 

[SolaresLarrave]

I saw a similar idea in a Life Magazine's series of photos of Picasso, drawing with a flashlight in front of Gordon Park's camera. And a few years ago, the Chicago Art Institute had a show of nightshots of a guy in Eastern Europe who uses a large format camera with the shutter open, and then draws on the surfaces on which the lens is focusing.

Even if it was done before, it's new until you do it yourself. I'd like to do star trails some day... but leaving the camera out and alone scares the beejesus out of me. 🙁

 

[StuartR]

I have two words for the phenomena -- bah and humbug.

The difference between it and abstract impressionism are massive, but the telling difference is that one is created through artistic intent, and the other through blind luck.

 

[sf]

I have two words for the phenomena -- bah and humbug.

The difference between it and abstract impressionism are massive, but the telling difference is that one is created through artistic intent, and the other through blind luck.

mint weren't. I didn't just throw the camera, I was active in my choice of the lights, shutterspeed, ISO, and how I moved the camera to get the effect. It was very deliberate.

Can't say the same for our digital counterparts, though.

 

[RML]

I have two words for the phenomena -- bah and humbug.

The difference between it and abstract impressionism are massive, but the telling difference is that one is created through artistic intent, and the other through blind luck.

How about comparing it to those splattered paint paintings by whathisname? Where's the artistic intend in that? And aren't those created through blind luck? Intend and luck are not mutually exclusive.

 

[StuartR]

No, because ever time he spatters paint, he has chosen the color, the canvas size, the type of brush or implement to scatter the paint, and with every single stroke, he can reevaluate the painting's progess and decide how to proceed. The camera tossing would be more like putting several paint cans by the canvas and then exploding them.

 

[RML]

No, because ever time he spatters paint, he has chosen the color, the canvas size, the type of brush or implement to scatter the paint, and with every single stroke, he can reevaluate the painting's progess and decide how to proceed. The camera tossing would be more like putting several paint cans by the canvas and then exploding them.

Not really. The tossographer decides on white balance, shutter time, f-stop, focus distance, motion of throwing, spin, etc., and can reevaluate after every toss. In Ps several images can be put together in any form or shape.

I think people here are overly defensive to alternative ways of creating "art" and assume that sharp and "straight" photography is the holy grail, which IMO it's not. I have not seen a sharp, straight photo go for several millions of $$ while a vague, out-of-focus and darkly printed shot of a lien of trees and a forest lake recently went for, what, $3 million IIRC.

Let's face it, there's more to any form of artistic expression than what you or I consider art/Art. Any shit or vomit sculptures anyone? 🙄