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The Month of Peoples Photography, a completely inclusive and community-orientated photographic festival is about to hit Cape Town. Its an interesting venture that aims to exhibit pictures taken by photographers from all walks of life, and displayed in venues across the Cape Metropole - from Long Street to Langa.
Aside from the official opening exhibition, MOPP encourages everyone to bring their own photographs to display on Open Wall at the grand opening event. The theme for this year’s feast of pictorial observations, which is open to all, is “Home Sweet Street”, an investigation of the various interpretations of street photography.
The committee of the project are passionate about using art as a medium for social cohesion and collaboration.
“Home Sweet Street”
The new theme is an investigation on the various interpretations of street photography. The functions can be historical documents, political propaganda, pornography, files for personal memories as works of art, as fact, as metaphor, as poetry — there is no one interpretation.
Our question to u is ”What is YOURS, What is your opinion on street photography?
open wall is coming,
Hola
In the past few weeks a few of us have been operating in the background, to prepare the structure of what must and will happen over the next two months with the MONTH OF PEOPLES’ PHOTOGRAPHY. Now is the time to get everyone together, get down to the details, and make the magic work!
Friday is the date for the first all inclusive very open ghettogether for all MOPP people.
We will be talking about where we are in the MOPP process, and what still has to happen. This is also a good session for exhibitors to asking questions about the process, and to make contact with the other people involved!
So, Friday 25 January 2008, 6pm-8pm, at Carnical Court Backpackers (in Long Street - Cape Town, above Long Street Cafe, the entrance is next to Long Street Cafe ~ press the buzzer to get through the gate, go up to the bar, and go out to the balcony. If you don’t know who to look for, i have a head full of dreadlocks)
If you can’t make it, and you want to be involved, please let me know, and I’ll brief you with details afterwards.
See you there!
Francois
082 940 9191
MOPP (Month of People’s Photography) was initiated by a group of independent photographers whose intention was to create not only a platform for their own work but a social interaction with photography outside of the bounds of dictated media.
Although reluctant to be named in their altruistic respect of the collective power individuals, Abdul Dube, Isgak Stemmet and Francois Rubenheimer are the driving force behind the collective. A cooperation between three cape-street-intellectual
Their debut exhibition, which had no theme, was held on Green Market Square. This square was once the heart of the Cape Town and in many ways with all its controversies remains at the centre of the cities melting pot of euro-afro-safro eccentricities.
It seems in the time of apartheid there was a lot of time spent NOT saying or talking or reflecting about a lot. It seems now that we spend too much time focusing on saying, talking and reflecting. The hype around talking and reflection in south Africa is somewhat misplaced in its direction of evolutional thought. We forget to see the positivity and we get bogged down in our own nostalgia and inherited anger, forgetting to honour the beauty around us that is in all of human, landscape, beast and bush.
Photography oftentimes honours the beauty in these earthly details and MOPP’s focus is on OPEN exhibitions that are OPEN to all photographers and FREE for ANYONE to view.
Home Sweet Street is an excellent theme for this years exhibition focus. The MOPP crew traditionally open the exhibition with a festive eve and main exhibition of selected works from all participating photographers. Their real street cred falls into place when your central cape town coffee shops and trendy restaurants bear a colourful testimony to the talents of local capetonian photographers.
Mandy Schreiber
writer/photographer/creative
http://purplewhizzball.blogspot
“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all art and science.” Albert Einstein
Twelve Essential Photographic Rules
From Sunny 16 to Moony 11, 8, and 5.6, these facts, formulas, and photographic rules can get you out of a jam and help you get good shots when nothing else will.
By Jason Schneider
September 2007
What happens when your systems go belly-up, when all of that cutting-edge technology dies and you must rely on (gasp!) your own knowledge? It pays to have these basics in your head. They can get you out of a jam and help you get good shots when nothing else will.
1. Sunny 16 Rule
The basic exposure for an average scene taken on a bright, sunny day is f/16 at a shutter speed equivalent to one over the ISO setting—that is, f/16 at 1/100 sec at ISO 100. From this you can interpolate, and try f/22 at the beach, f/11 on a cloudy-bright day, etc.
2. Moony 11, 8, and 5.6 Rules
There are many different rules that work well when shooting the moon. One favorite for a proper exposure of a full moon is f/11 at one over the ISO setting. For pictures of a half moon, use the same shutter speed at f/8, and for a quarter moon, use the same shutter speed at f/5.6.
3. Camera Shake Rule
The slowest shutter speed at which you can safely handhold a camera is one over the focal length of the lens in use. As shutter speeds get slower, camera shake is likely to result in an increasing loss of sharpness. So, if you’re using a 50mm lens, shoot at 1/60 sec or faster. Not enough light? Use a flash, tripod, or brace your camera against a solid object.
4. Anatomical Gray Card
Metering off an 18-percent neutral gray card is a good way to get a midtone reading that will give you a good overall exposure of a scene. Forgot your gray card? Hold your open hand up so it’s facing the light, take a reading off your palm, open up one stop, and shoot. (Various skin tones rarely account for even a full-stop difference.)
5. Depth of Field Rules
When focusing on a deep subject, focus on a point about a third of the way into the picture to maximize depth of field, because the depth-of-field zone behind that point is about twice as deep as the depth-of-field zone in front of it. This works for all apertures and focal lengths, but the smaller the aperture and the shorter the focal length, and the greater the distance you shoot at, the greater the depth of field.
6. Largest Digital Print Rule
To calculate in inches the largest photo-quality print you can make with a digital camera, divide the vertical and horizontal pixel counts (see your manual) by 200. For critical applications, or if you want exhibition-quality prints, divide the pixel counts by 250.
7. Exposure Rules
The classic advice is, “Expose for the highlights, and let the shadows take care of themselves.” This works with slide film and digital. But with negative film, especially color negative, you’re better off overexposing by one stop.
8. Quick Flash-fill Rule
When using an automatic flash unit that doesn’t provide auto flash-fill ratios, set the flash’s ISO dial to twice the ISO you’re using. Meter the scene, select an f-stop, set the autoflash aperture to the same f-stop, and shoot. The resulting 2:1 flash-fill ratio will produce filled shadows one stop darker than the main subject.
9. Flash Range Rule
Want to know how much extra flash range you get by going to a faster ISO? The rule is, “Double the distance, four times the speed.” For example: If your flash is good to 20 feet at ISO 100 (film or digital), it will be good to 40 feet at ISO 400.
10. Megapixel Multiplier Rule
To double the resolution in a digital camera, you must increase the number of megapixels by a factor of four—not two. Why? The number of pixels in both the vertical and horizontal dimensions must be doubled to double the pixel density across the image sensor.
11. Action-stopping Rules
To stop action moving across the frame that’s perpendicular to the lens axis, you need shutter speeds two stops faster than action moving toward or away from you. For action moving at a 45-degree angle to the lens axis, you can use a shutter speed one stop slower. For example: If a person running toward you at moderate speed can be stopped at 1/125 sec, you’ll need a shutter speed of 1/500 sec to stop the subject moving across the frame, and a shutter speed of 1/250 sec to stop him if moving obliquely with respect to the camera.
12. Sunset Rule
To get a properly exposed sunset, meter the area directly above the sun (without including the sun). If you want the scene to look like it’s a half-hour later, stop down by one f-stop, or set exposure compensation to minus one.
Originally published November, 2004.
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