© Joe DiMaggio All Rights Reserved
I’ve been working on a documentary film on Bobby Kyle for several years. Bobby is a world-class blues player and an extremely high energy person. The ability for a photographer to wait for peak action and not try to machine gun everything in my opinion is crucial. The photo of Bobby Kyle in the Blues Festival was shot with the 200mm 1.8 lens with an exposure of 1/2000th of a second 1.8 camera Canon 5D ISO 200 single shot.
Copyright 2011 Joe DiMaggio
Back in the day when I shot Leica, and used TriX and modified my carriers so you can print absolutely the whole negative with no cropping everything had to be done in camera. I studied the zone system for years and effectively was unable to use it because I stopped shooting 4×5. I one time watched Gene Smith, spend three hours making one 8×10. On my best day in the darkroom my best print on a scale of 1-10 would be a 2.25. I did better with Cibachrome. I was able to print Cibachrome and do a reasonable job. When the world threw me a huge curve ball and digital photography became the answer to everything, I was caught with my proverbial down because I thought I was an elitist there was no way I would go digital. I held out as long as I could and like a reformed alcoholic, I scream the praises of digital today. On or about the same time there was photoshop 1 or 2 Anybody who knows me knows I have the utmost respect for the Adobe programs but because of the way I shoot and the number of hours I work, I was not going to attempt to become proficient with photoshop. Maybe it’s a cop-out but I don’t think so. I have interns and assistants that are extremely capable in the program. I tell most of the students that 99% are only cleaned. I very rarely attempt to make major changes in my images. I go back to the old school.Well, now I’m ready to move into the last part of my career as a fine art photographer, a filmmaker and director and Nik comes along and makes me crazy. I finally got the programs installed and decided to play with one digital scan. That was at 8:30 in the evening. By 3:30 in the morning I had tested all of the software and was starting to bleed from my eyes. While bleeding I had a huge smile smile on my face. I was like 14 all over again – my first day in a darkroom. These programs are absolutely awesome. They are simple, straight forward and easy to use and even an idiot like me can make them work. I don’t impress easy but I’m impressed.ThanksJoe DiMaggioAll Photos ©2011 Joe DiMaggio All Rights ReservedCopyright Joe DiMaggio
Copyright Joe DiMaggio
Joe DiMaggio 