The Trip You Want on Your List of Experiences

May 26, 2012
ItalyJill BucknerJill Buckner PhotographyMoroccoNew Booknew projectsRichard MackRichard Mack PhotographyRichard Mack's BlogtravelWorking with another photographer

Today we are leaving on one of those trips that are on your life list probably, at least for us it is. Really more like two trips in one. We fly to Florence, Italy and shoot for a week in Tuscany. The client is a tour company so we need scenes of the area along with people shots and we get to join the tour and shoot what they are doing as well. Then we spend two days on our own in Tuscany, yes probably shooting some more for ourselves plus relaxing in a Villa near San Gimignano. Then on Monday we fly to Casablanca, Morocco and will also visit Marrakech. This is for a possible book we are working on with a working title of Treasures of Morocco: A Sensual Feast of Color. This book looks at Morocco from the aspect of its bright colors, sensual food, and the combination they bring to the country.

The book is intended to bring people together from both countries as awe work on the book and the accompanying video and music for the eBook side. Jill has been to Morocco, albeit in College, so it will be interesting to see how much has changed since she has been there. I have not been to Italy or Morocco so I am especially looking forward to the experiences of both places.

We then return to Florence and spend three days exploring there before taking a train up to Venice and spending time photographing that famous city. We hope to have images to add to all of your homes after a gallery show sometime this fall!

We are both so excited about this trip and what it will bring to us – it is a trip of a lifetime. Keep watching this space for updates from overseas! We’ll upload a few images along the way as well.

Ciao,

Jill Buckner & Richard Mack

 

Teaming up with Another Photographer on a project

May 2, 2012
Architectural PhotographyJill Buckner PhotographyRichard Mack PhotographyWorking with another photographer

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Two weeks ago I teamed up with photographer Jill Buckner to shoot both exteriors and interiors for Muffy McAuley and John Leinweber of their Excel Lofts, part of Renew Managements stable of properties here in Evanston, Illinois. They are wonderful lofts which even though it was empty had plenty of angles and opportunities to make great images. John was the architect of the properties and has a sense for the angles and features which make live/work lofts such a great place. Now I must confess I leased a loft from them for a little over 5 years at the Peacock Lofts so I might be a bit prejudice on how nice they are.

Our mission was to make 5-8 images of the building which they could use for various marketing programs. This was the first project Jill and I had teamed up on and it was very interesting to work with another photographer. We both have a background in architectural work so we split up who would do what and then began to work together leaving behind the original plan. We realized early on we both had a different style of looking at the space. Jill could see very interesting artistic angles while I saw more commercial views. We never stepped on each other’s toes, or invaded the others viewfinder as the case may be, and both of us thought the other one had made better images. We acted as assistants to each other when one of us was doing a shot and needed something moved or added to the image. The respect we had for each other and our way of working was perfectly in tune. It helped us make some great images in a short time and have a lot of fun in the process. while we were not in a competition the fact we were working with another very creative person raised our levels of inspiration and creativity as well. We made images we might not have had we done this project on our own.

In the end we brought in some props for the kitchen area, came back another day for dusk shots, and shot both exteriors (Richard) at dusk while Jill shot the interiors at dusk. So with one call Muffy and John received two photographers on the job who could produce more work in the time allotted than just one could. Makes great business sense.

If you have a project you’d like to talk about you can call either one of us! Check our websites for contact information and to see additional work. You can see more work from Excel Lofts using this link: http://www.mackphoto.com/ClientArea/Renew/Excel/

It is always great to work with someone whose work you admire so much. We are now working on several projects together so stay tuned for more news…

Enjoy!

Richard

Starting A New Project – The Great Lakes Project

January 26, 2012
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLake Superiornature photographyRichard MackwinterWinter Landscape PhotographyWinter photography

This year I am really focused on a new project and book on all five Great Lakes, currently titled Twenty/Ninety-Five, The Great Lakes Landscapes. This book will focus on the fact that 20% of the world’s fresh water and 95% of North America’s fresh water are held in these five bodies of water. Think about that. Twenty percent of all the fresh water in the world. Include all the lakes, ponds, streams, rivers and snow and 20% of the water sits in these lakes. And currently there are 42 million people who live along these lakes. Indeed mankind has lived on these lakes for thousands of years yet it is only in the last few centuries that mans impact has been felt in such great ways. I want to look at that impact and how we can insure that our children will have the same benefit of these lakes and natural areas. The book will look at the statistics on the lakes and focus on both the natural and wild areas in the lakes watershed and on some of the cities and industries which lie along the lakes, including how we use the lakes for recreation and commerce. I intend to blog along the way on this project. And since the first trip is upon me next month it is time to start. I hope you’ll join me on this voyage and follow my blog as I examine these great lakes of ours. Like most who live along the lakes for most of their lives I have not been to most of the 10,000 miles of shoreline. I will enjoy opening up my eyes to new places. I hope folks will share their thoughts of their favorite places on the lakes as we go along as well and I invite everyone to leave comments on posts they enjoy or with places they love. This is also an evolving project, one not limited to a book, but to the possibilities of an e-book with video, gallery shows of images and art installations, writings from those working to save the lakes and research the ecology of the lakes. Now a lot of folks who know me know I’ve been working on this off and on for the last few years, but now it is time to really get serious about it and concentrate on this project. So the adventure begins…

The other day a friend asked me, “So what did you do today?” My answer was complete with all the tasks we undertake during a day and also included my work on my next big project of photographing the Great Lakes. As I explained I was preparing for a trip around Lake Superior in late February she was surprised at how much planning I was doing. Yet to make sure you come back with images you can use and not just nice snapshots from your trip you need to plan. And planning takes time and energy.

I look first to the stars. Will the moon be full during my trip? If I want to have a chance at a full moon shot where do I think I want to be when it happens? Do I need to change my dates for the trip to get a better chance for being in the right place at the right time? What is my goal for this particular trip? Then looking at maps, books on the area, online websites you begin to make a determination for where you want to go. In this case it is even more challenging because I have not been to the Canadian side of Lake Superior and do not know what access I might have in the winter. Searching blogs and online sites gives me some idea. Certainly there will be a lot of serendipity involved in a trip of this kind, from the weather and the light, to the ice flows themselves and my access to the lake. All I can do is prepare myself the best way possible and know the maps and my own game plan. Will it change mid trip? Probably, but with proper planning I can know why and where to turn next. And then serendipity can play with me and I will be ready to capture those intimate moments because I had a game plan in the first place.

 

The trip is scheduled to start the weekend of February 25th. So for now you can see some of the shots I have done in the past on the Great Lakes using this link to a portfolio of images on my website. http://www.mackphoto.com/Creative/l-lakes.html (sorry this is in Flash so those with iPads or iPhones won’t see it until they use another way)

I look forward to hearing all of your thoughts on this project!

Peace,

Richard

 

 

Two Friends, their cameras and the Full Moon…

December 11, 2011
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLighthouse BeachLighthouse Beach PierMoonriseRichard Mack Photographyseeing

Last night we had another full moonrise, and in addition there was a total lunar eclipse, which unfortunately wasn’t visible here in Chicago. But I still made my way down to my favorite beach here in Evanston and the old pier at the north end of Lighthouse Beach. This time I was prodded by a friend of mine to make the journey. Jill Buckner is a photographer who has been working in Atlanta for 20 years and is now splitting her time between Atlanta and Chicago. She wanted to visit the beach with me for a moonrise. I thought why not. It’s cold which will help condition me for the upcoming winter shoots around the Great Lakes and I will have the pleasure of shooting with another photographer who I have never shot with.

It is always interesting to me when you shoot with another photographer, because they may bring fresh eyes to something you look at the same way each time. This can be especially true in the case of a location you have shot repeatedly. As luck would have it the moon came up right on time, yet we were not. So we arrived about 15-20 minutes after it had cleared the horizon. We thought we had more time from looking at the cloud layer out over the lake, which magically disappeared at the time of the rise of the moon. Clearly we should have been on time, especially because the moon was positioned far enough north of east in the sky that it came up right down the pier’s path.

Maybe because of our late arrival we both just went to work rather than looking at the scene and talking about what we would be trying to get in our shots. So you had two photographer’s plying away quietly for the next 70+ minutes through to the darkness if night.

Interestingly we never really crossed paths with each other. She went to one view I another. For me the immediate goal was to get the moon rising over the end of the pier with the posts pointing towards the moon. As the evening went on and darkness fell it was the moon’s glow on the water which came to life and became a stronger element than the moon itself. At this point you are shooting in the dark, with a high ASA – in my case 1600 – but then have noise to deal with in the dark areas of the image. My guess is that if I moved up from the Canon 1Ds III to one of the newer Canon’s like the 5D Mark III which has a much higher ASA scale topping our near 128,000 I would solve this problem.

I look forward to seeing what Jill shot – I’m guessing they are different even though we shot the same place at the same time with similar cameras and equipment. Each of us has their own unique perspective and that is what makes art an individual creative form.


To see more from this evening’s shoot use this link: Moonrise

And to see even more full moon images just search the blog for moon

Cheers,

Richard