Constantine Manos (Magnum) lecture highlights, + Stewart Frankling

[arseniii]

Constantine Manos of Magnum was giving a free lecture in Toronto this week. The Magnum series of lectures is a part of the Contact Festival which takes place every year here in T.O.

Below, I've tried to highlight the major points he made:

1. Take your camera and go out, practice, shoot as much as you can. Manos himself could use 500 films for a 10 picture project.

2. Be determined, know what you want and look for it!!!

3. Image processing is very important to him. He does/have done every step in the process from clicking the shutter to final print all by himself. Now, he uses Leica M8 and home inkjet printer.

4. He would not take portraits of people he knows, nor he will ever manipulate image in any way but colour, contrast and crop. Yes, he did say cropping is OK, as for the colour manipulation he justified it as a way to interpolate the colour he saw when clicking the shutter...

5. Manos himself does not carry camera with him all the time. He purposely goes shooting at certain times. Usually 3 hours in the afternoon.

6. Make your images to stand out, surprise the viewer with unexpected, controversial objects/composition!

I hope that was some interest to you!

P.S. On May.7th Stuart Frankling will be lecturing, so if any of you would like to pass a question by, write it down here and I will do my best...

 

[Nikkor AIS]

Great summery. It's good to learn from other photographer's. So has this seminar influenced your own work since you took it. If so in what way. I only ask because sometimes in art it's the lines you erase that make are just as important as the ones you draw. For me not photographing people I know is a no go as well as well purposeful intent. While I agree that pre-visualization is important being open is the key. Anyways, thanks for sharing.


Gregory

 

[robert blu]

Interesting, thanks for posting this summary. Always some idea to catch.
robert

 

[zenlibra]

Thanks for posting the summary. I heard an interview with him on Rangefinder Radio and he seems like an interesting guy.

 

[arseniii]

Great summery. It's good to learn from other photographer's. So has this seminar influenced your own work since you took it. If so in what way. I only ask because sometimes in art it's the lines you erase that make are just as important as the ones you draw. For me not photographing people I know is a no go as well as well purposeful intent. While I agree that pre-visualization is important being open is the key. Anyways, thanks for sharing.

Gregory

I would not say it's influenced my work in any manner. But it was certainly interesting to listen to what photographers of this class are up to these days. I bet one can learn much more by taking a Magnum workshop that lasts around a week, I think... A friend of mine took it last year and he was very happy with the project he did under David Alan Harvey's supervision, he has had some gimmicks to share 🙂

 

[easyrider]

Thanks for posting. Very interesting.

I was a little surprised to read that he does not take portraits of people he knows.

I like shooting people I know. When shooting people I don't know, I like to find out something about them. He did not exclude that, I presume. If he said any more on that topic, please poset briefly.

Thanks.

 

[arseniii]

The last lecture of Magnum series was given by Mr. Stuart Frankling. Very intelligent, well-traveled man. I find his personal work a bit strange. He has some "fetishes" like chairs and trees but he can put them in such a way that makes them look stunning.

Mr. Frankling uses large (6*7) and medium formats very often. He also mentioned that he likes Rolleiflex 75mm Planar (White Face) very much, mostly for the Zeiss lens.

Some highlights:

1. It's not the place itself that inspires him(and he was literally everywhere). But the people around him and experiences that he has.

2.On digital photography: He thinks that digital cameras has given photographers an opportunity to take a picture in a very low light conditions. And they are very good for that. He also adds that there are days when he doesn't feel like touching digital at all.

3. Hint: If you do not know what to photograph or stuck on the project. Go out and walk for a mile with the camera and you will find something. 🙂

 

[arseniii]

Thanks for posting. Very interesting.

I was a little surprised to read that he does not take portraits of people he knows.

I like shooting people I know. When shooting people I don't know, I like to find out something about them. He did not exclude that, I presume. If he said any more on that topic, please poset briefly.

Thanks.

Well, he said that his interest lies in "Public Domain" as he calls it. The most he can do is to have a few words chat with the person he took the picture of on the street, but he does it occasionally. Henry Cartier-Bresson on the other hand was a "Bird" as he calls him, and would never talk to anyone, he was flying on the streets... That's all I can add on this topic

 

[sevres_babylone]

Arnseniii, I was also at the Constantine Manos talk. My recollection of what he said about cropping is a little different than yours. I believe he said cropping is not okay, except when because the framelines on rangefinders are not accurate, and when you capture more than you thought, it's okay to crop to what you visualized.