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Do you keep a version of your portfolio on your cellphone? I can’t think of a reason not to. You never know who you’ll meet when you’re at an exhibition opening, on a plane, at a party, whatever, and while proffering a business card and mentioning who you’ve shot for can be effective, it seems like your actual work would be your best representative. And if you have an iPhone (or iPod Touch), you can get an app like Portfolio for $4.99 or download Flickr’s iPhone app for free. Having your portfolio with you at all times, in other words, costs a pittance.

Right about now, I’m feeling self-conscious about the fact that I only just got an iPhone and am in awe over it in a very 2007 way. Then again, I still see photographer websites that use Flash—new websites by established photographers—even though it’s well known by now that Flash makes it much harder for your site to be found by Web crawlers. (“Putting your entire website in Flash, or including captions and keywords in the image itself instead of as text below the image, is not advised if you expect search engine traffic,” notes PhotoShelter in an article on photographer websites.) So I’m operating on the premise that what’s old news to some people is a full-on discovery to others.

If you’re interested in exploring the possibilities of your iPhone for your photo business, pay a visit to this blog, where a photographer has posted her tips for using the iPhone as a “multipurpose tool,” like making albums of reference photos. And check out American Photo’s recent feature “Photographers and Their iPhones.”

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“…Cameraphone photography has become more than just a visual notebook, a journalistic record of events or a way to send friends photos of your dog,” the article asserts. “While most photographers will claim that they simply fell into shooting with their cell phones, saying, “What the heck, I’ve always got my phone with me,” it has rapidly evolved into a legitimate tool for artistic expression and has even shown up in commercial outlets, such as Robert Clark’s commissioned book Image America, shot entirely with his cameraphone. Fullana landed a cover gig from Time Out New York for his urban iPhone images.”

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The American Photo story focuses on four specific photographers, and the magazine’s blog “State of the Art” offers perspective from an additional three who’ve made the iPhone part of their daily routine. Meanwhile, if you’d like to share your own experiences with or advice for using the iPhone in your photo biz, please do post a comment or send me an email (kristina at stocklandmartel.com).

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Love her hair on this cover. That is what women should want to attain.

Don’t care what people say, I love LiLo. People need to back off and let her get on with her life. Oh, and she looks amazing at Marylin Monroe.

Again, focusing on the hair…which I love.

Love Kate Moss, also. Cute hair. Cute tattoo. All around amazing.

Absolutely georgeous. Want these pants…might require her body though…no food.

Classic John and Yoko. P.S. I love this woman.

And a blast from the past…

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Grids, the Society of Publication Designers’ blog, is inviting the design community to comment on American Photo’s redesign. This is what the magazine used to look like:

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And here’s the new look:

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What do you think?

The art director is Donna Reiss, and Larry Nighswander is serving as director of photography. Chelsea Stickel is the photo editor. The current issue, by the way, features an article on “Who Shot Rock & Roll,” the big music-photography exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum that includes Timothy White’s Axl Rose portrait. Here’s a sample spread from Grids:

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The annual American PHOTO Images of the Year event is an

international competition that that showcases the very best of

contemporary photography. This juried photo contest offers

exposure to both established and emerging photographers in a

wide range of fields, from documentary/photojournalism to

cutting-edge commercial work, and will provide an opportunity

for peer review of your work by professional photographers,

museum curators, art critics and editors.

Categories include photojournalism/documentary, 

advertising/editorial, and personal and student work.

A new category is Extreme, which will highlight the passion of

photographers who actively participate in life’s adventures.

Deadline: Entries must be postmarked no later than midnight, October 12th, 2009.

Click on the link for full details:

#mce_temp_url#

Click on this link to view last year’s winners:

#mce_temp_url#

And click on this link for the latest entries in this year’s competition:

#mce_temp_url#

Well, since everyone else in the tech community seems to be posting their Snow Leopard reviews, I guess I’m allowed to reveal that I too have been playing around with Apple’s latest operating system this week. With a background in photography, I was curious to see what new backgrounds Apple decided to include in Snow Leopard. I did a double-take when I saw one of Apple’s OS-themed “Nature” backgrounds. The image, captured by National Geographic photographer Steve Winter, was of a Central Asian snow leopard, and appeared in a slideshow for an interview I did with Winter for American Photo last year (it made a second appearance as my desktop background around that time as well). Congratulations Steve! Apple obviously has great taste.

Matthew Rolston's column in the May/June 2009 issue of American Photo.

Matthew Rolston recently wrote a column for American Photo magazine called “Digital Future,” but the title is somewhat misleading. Matthew’s piece is a sort of overview of the changes in the magazine industry, how publishers are responding, and what readers now expect from imagemakers. It’s both a wake-up call for his fellow photographers as well as a comforting shot of a reassurance.

“What about the seductive power of images?” he asks, after several dark paragraphs on the time of “tumultuous change” in which we live. “Thankfully,” he writes in the magazine’s May/June 2009 issue, “that’s going to stay as strong as ever.” And he goes on to assert that “the only way for magazines to be truly competitive is through the deeply satisfying emotional appeal of memorable imagery.”

In other words, publishers, if you want to keep going, now is the time to align yourselves with talented photographers. Scrimping on photos may save money in the short term, but the long-term risk is that you lose your audience and wind up joining the growing heap of magazines that have folded in the past year. “Power to the imagemaker,” Matthew concludes—and, I would add, to the photo editors bold enough to harness that power.

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My thanks to American PHOTO magazine’s Editor-in-Chief David Schonauer for the great feature about our Haven House celebrity shoot in their current May/June 2009 issue.  American PHOTO’s publisher Jeffrey Roberts was a key organizer of the project – my thanks to him for his support.

It just goes to show that life sometimes takes your full circle, since in my younger days as one of American PHOTO’s “New Faces.”

We’re in New York, shooting more celebrities for The Creative Coalition’s book “Art & Soul” which will be distributed to President Obama and Congress this May. Assignments this good are really rare. Even though I’ve been l blessed with more than my share of unbelievable assignments in my career, shooting portraits of so many Oscar winners, Tony winners, Grammy winners and Emmy winners was about as cool gig as I can imagine.

Photographing Anne Hathaway is the sort of experience that can hardly be topped, except of course when Anne showed up at our shoot with a box of her favorite cupcakes for our crew. Thanks Annie for being even sweeter than I’d imagined. Thanks also to Anne’s hair stylist Ted Gibson. Not only is Ted one of the top stylists in the country, but he knows how to work a wind machine…

After that we headed uptown to Tony Bennett’s Central Park apartment where we talked about what the arts has meant to him, both as a singer and as an artist. Tony credits Frank Sinatra for giving his career a big break. As a way of giving back Tony founded the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts in his hometown of Astoria, Queens.

In the end we shot over 9,000 images and 350 gigs of RAW data without a single slowdown or problem. During the shoots, the artists in this book and I rarely spoke of fame, fortune or fabulous performances. We spoke about their childhoods and what led them to where they are today. Regardless of whether they grew up in small towns and large cities, rich or poor, their lives were all shaped and influenced by the arts and the artists who influenced their careers.

My thanks go out to Ted Okada, Steve Sommers, Phil Lubell, Kristen Elder and Mark Weir of Sony for their support of this project, Kayla Lindquist, director of Sony Artisan’s of Imagery program, Jeffrey Roberts of American PHOTO, Al Silvestri, Alissa Reynolds and Anna Martin of Hachette Filipacchi Media, Eileen Gittins of Blurb, and special thanks to Robin Bronk and Barbara Horvath of The Creative Coalition.

EQUIPMENT:
Sony a900 Cameras
Sony Zeiss 24-70/2.8 Zoom
Sony Zeiss 85/1.4
Sony Zeiss 16-35/2.8 Zoom
Profoto 7A 2400 Packs
Profoto 7 Heads

Annie Leibovitz is broke (almost). I was wondering why the latest issue of American Photo was totally dedicated to her. I thought AmPhoto was running out of ideas. They were probably just trying to raise money for the most successful photographer of her (my) generation. That magazine hasn’t had a good idea in a decade or two. It’s getting thinner with every issue. I assume they are also going broke fast. Anyway, it is more sad news about crazy times. I don’t even want to post a Leibovitz picture, but thanks to Robert Tobey for telling me about her.

I’ve just wrapped a three-day shoot at Haven House in Beverly Hills photographing 68 celebrities over a three day period for The Creative Coalition with generous sponsorship from Sony and Hachette Filipacchi Media. 

Our crew included my wife Fazia who always makes certain everyone looked fabulous on our shoots, Kayla Lindquist, Director of Sony’s Artisans of Imagery program, produced the shoot and made certain even the smallest detail was under control, Matthew Schulert, our fabulous digital tech from Splashlight never missed a beat through 5,370 exposures, Joel Warren and Eddie Tricomi and over a dozen hair and make-up artists from Warren-Tricomi.

Our shoot began in during Oscar Week at Haven House in Beverly Hills. Thanks to thanks to generous support from Sony and Hachette Filipacchi Media we photographed 68 celebrities over a three-day period in Los Angeles where we shot 5,370 exposures with over 200 gigs of raw images using Sony’s a900 camera. That’s a great test of the durability and quality of a camera. The a900 never missed a beat.

The lenses are quite simply the sharpest lenses I’ve ever used. I love all of Sony’s Zeiss glass, but I’m becoming particularly fond of Sony’s Zeiss 24-70/2.8. I was able to shoot very quickly on this project using that lens to shoot 90% of the images for the book. This lens is sharper than prime lenses in that range and it absolutely blows away the competition. The remaining images for the book were shot with Sony’s Zeiss 85/1.4 that I kept mounted on second a900 body.

When you imagine shooting in a Beverly Hills mansion, you can only envision big massive rooms. Yet our shoot was relegated to a less than opulent 9×14’ maid’s quarters.

Since the biggest part of photography is problem solving, we had to find a way to make it work. I decided to make our small pace even cozier by wrapping the entire set in black. Normally, the idea of using a DSLR to shoot celebrities dressed in black against a black background is a recipe for disaster. Other DSLR tend to block up in the shadows, but one of the things I love about the a900 is that it holds unbelievable detail in the shadows, so I was confident we could pull it off.

Highlights included Kerry Washington and Tichina Arnold fighting it out for bragging rights in a pose-off. For the record, in situations like that, it’s actually the photographer who wins.

Kerry Washington and Tichina Arnold

Speaking of posing, celebrity stylist Philip Bloch might very well still be posing in front of the camera if they hadn’t threatened to turn the power off on us.

My thanks to all of the celebrities who took part…Alfre Woodard, Alyssa Milano, Amy Collins, Barry Bostwick, Benji Schwimmer, Chris Mann, Damian Bichir, Dana Delany, Daniel Stern, David Hyde Pierce, DeRay Davis, Oscar-winning writer/producer Dustin Lance Black, Fisher Stevens, Frances Fisher, Gilles Marini, Gina Gershon, Harry Hamlin, James Denton, Jamie Kennedy, Jason Ritter, Jeannine Kaspar, Jeffrey Ross, Kerry Washington, Kim Kardashian, Kyson Lee, Mary Murphy, Paula Abdul, Paul Hipp, Robert Davi, Sharon Lawrence, Stephen Collins, Syd Butler, Tamala Jones, Taraji P. Henson, Tichina Arnold, Tim Daly, Wendie Malick, Vik Sahay, Zoey Deschanel, Celebrity Stylists Philip Bloch, Joel Warren, Edward Tricomi, Producer Tom Molloy, Gay-rights activist Cleve Jones, WWE Wrestlers Cody Rhodes, John Morrison, Kofi Kingston, Ted DiBiase, Jr., The Miz and WWE Divas Kelly Kelly, Maria Kanellis, Maryse Ouellet and Melina Perez.

Quincy Jones has suggested that it might be an opportune time to lobby President Barak Obama to appoint a Secretary of the Arts. While many other countries have had Ministers of Art or Culture for centuries, The United States has never created such a position. We in the arts need this and the country needs the arts–now more than ever. If you agree, you can sign onto this petition and then pass it on to your friends and colleagues.

EQUIPMENT:
Sony a900 Cameras
Sony Zeiss 24-70/2.8 Zoom
Sony Zeiss 85/1.4
Sony Zeiss 16-35/2.8 Zoom
Profoto 7A 2400 Packs
Profoto 7 Heads

By Angie Lovelace

Feb. 18, 2009

Lauren Greenfield combines cultural anthropology with photography to examin young people in a cultural context.

Anorexia, cutting, exhibitionism, self-esteem and money are among the many cultural issues of young people that photographer Lauren Greenfield has explored in her 15 year study of body image.

Greenfield spoke at Randolph Community College in Asheboro, N.C., tonight as a part of the Jerry Howell Lecture Series. The lecture series began in 1996 as a means of bringing presenters to Asheboro.

Greenfield was named by American Photo as one of the 25 most influential photographers working today. She is known for her work on youth culture, including projects Fast Forward, Girl Culture, THIN, and Kids + Money.

With a background in anthropology, Greenfield strives to look at people through a cultural context.

“I was really inspired by the work of street photographers in the 60s and 70s, and I wanted to reveal issues through the photographer’s eyes,” Greenfield said.

Kids who grow up quickly

From "Fast Forward" by Lauren Greenfield

Her first project in Los Angeles was Fast Forward, which examined the loss of innocence among kids who grow up quickly in Hollywood.

The everyday lives of L.A. youth reflects the values of Hollywood. Materialism, trends, and image characterize Fast Forward and these ideas catapulted her other projects, next moving onto Girl Culture.

Body image and self-expression

From "Girl Culture" by Lauren Greenfield

“Girl Culture came from my interest in the ways girls construct their identities,” Greenfield said.

The project looked at the self-esteem crisis among girls and how the body had become the primary means of expression for girls and women.

Girl Culture grew into more than a photojournalism project and went out into the public as an education tool for teachers to use in high schools and universities.

It is also a traveling exhibition which has been viewed by more than 600,000 people.

The eating disorder struggle

THIN, Greenfield’s first feature-length documentary, focused on eating disorders and the Renfrew Center treatment facility in Coconut Creek, Fla. The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2006 and was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Direction in 2007.

In this film, Greenfield followed girls as they struggled to accept themselves and overcome their eating disorders.

THIN is a multiplatform, multimedia project which was Greenfield’s first experiment in filmmaking, which was filmed over a 6 month period.

“Control is really what an eating disorder is all about,” Greenfield said.

Greenfield describes one girls struggle with cutting.

Há pouco tempo eu postei aqui no Barril um ensaio que a Gisele Bündchen fez para a revista “American Photo”. Pois bem, confira agora as fotos.

Gisele Bundchen is a knockout on the cover of this month’s American Photo magazine. Long hair styles do not get much better than what Gisele has. It looks amazing. And of course the photos of her in sexy high heels is pretty damn hot too. She has such fantastic sexy legs. In general I never considered myself much of a fan of Gisele’s, but when she is featured in photos like this it is hard not to be.

A revista American Photo comemora seus 30 anos com um ensaio fotográfico de Gisele Bündchen, feito por Nino Muñoz. Eu não me canso de olhar para Gisele. Então, lá vai:

Nesta última foto, a supermodelo está ao lado do fotógrafo, Muñoz.

La supermodelo brasileña Gisele Bündchen, de 28 años, se sacó el corpiño y demostró su sensualidad en una sesión de fotos para la publicación norteamericana “American Photo”.
La diosa destila belleza, es una de las modelos más ricas del mundo y, como si esto no bastara, es muy generosa con su familia. Según trascendió, le envía a su familia residente en Brasil alrededor de 10 millones de dólares por año.

What is it about cats and empty boxes? I spent the entire day cleaning my studio and every time I cleared a box of papers out, in jumped Jasper or ZenaB. Here’s a shot I got of Jasper in a black canvas storage box.

Speaking of spring cleaning…it is amazing (and somewhat shameful) what things I find when I go through boxes I’ve put aside “to file some rainy day.” Here are the more interesting items I’ve come across so far today:

— a bank envelope with $41.00 (prompting delight then dismay then delight again)
— an old letter from an old boyfriend (a valiant effort to console me, the “dump-ee”)
— 20-year-old letters from my Dad; one that mentions he and Mom were going fishing. This was a revelation. I never knew she was interested in fishing.
— three letters of acceptance for jobs I had when I was in my 20s…one where I was informed I would make $838 every two weeks. Wahoo! Ah, I recall the days of an unairconditioned apartment, ramen noodles, burned biscuits setting off the fire alarm in the building, staying up ’round the clock doing multiple freelance design jobs, and scurrying roaches (in the apartment, not on the menu)
— various birthday cards from acquaintances I’ve since forgotten how I knew them. Egads….the boxes are dusty and so is my brain, apparently.
— a National Enquirer clipping where Cassandra Delaney claims, “John Denver kicked me out of our bedroom for 8 months!” Yes, I’m a John Denver fan…why else would that be in the pile?
— a newspaper article from the Washington Post titled, “On the Road: From Mortgage Slave to Happy Vagabond.” P.S. I’m still a mortgage slave and not (yet) a happy vagabond.
— A copy of my friend Karen’s resumé before she started working at the place where I met her in 1986. Wonder why I have this?
— A 1994 letter from Sue Feld, then Editorial Administrator for American Photo, notifying me that I had two photos to be published in two categories in their 3rd annual contest for reader photos (I had two out of the total 146 images published from about 46,000+ images) Ah, that was a day of elation at the mailbox!
— the formula Karen gave me for growing perfect tomatoes. Yes, readers, I will share the magic formula shortly!
— glow-in-the-dark animal tracks decals from The Nature Company (doesn’t everyone need those?)
— a printed transcript from an AOL live forum conversation with John Denver, dated 8/2/1995. My question posed to him was: “Years ago, I read about your interest in photography. I also saw a photo of yours in American Photo magazine’s Celebrity Photographers Issue. With all the traveling you do, you must have a vast collection of photos. Have you ever thought of publishing a book of your nature photos and personal essays on the environment?” His reply was: “Oh, we thought about that and I’m not sure it’s going to happen as a book of photo nature essays, but I’m not really sure I ever want to do another book!” I suppose I could have asked him “why did you kick Cassandra out of the bedroom for 8 months?” but I doubt it would have passed the muster with the AOL forum host!
— my laminated ID, dated June 21, 1985, that I had to wear when I worked for the U.S. Customs Service as a Clerk-Typist (and made something like $12,000 a year as a Grade -4 (what it felt like). I moved up from the Rio Grande Valley, lived with my parents for a year, and Dad found me this job in the FOIA office (Freedom of Information Act) at Customs in D.C. I typed 100+ words a minute, so the job was easy. My co-workers were really nice, my boss was most certainly not (and in the end, I did get the chance to let her know what I thought of her—tactfully and truthfully, of course), and I was just biding my time until I could find a job in graphics (pre-computer days, mind you…see how that fact dates me?). I commuted with my Dad to work (which was actually quite fun), and I typed letters to prisoners (mostly), informing them their request was being handled, blah, blah, blah. When the papers were ready, I typed a “Dear Prisoner Man” letter telling him how much he (it was almost always a he) owed for the copies. The photo on the ID shows a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed (figuratively), unjaded twenty-something with a really good hairdo (which is unusual, trust me), and a hot pink blouse (did I dress in the dark?). Where did that girl go?
— my prom photo with my friend Ray…I didn’t go to prom when I was actually in high school. Ray was a year behind me and asked me to be his date after I had already graduated. I decided I was “too mature” to wear a long dress (the thing to do in those days), so I wore a knee-length, seafoam green, polyester dress (sounds ugly, but it was actually quite tasteful). My Farrah-Fawcett-wings completed the look! UPDATE: My prom dress was silky, and when I came across the prom photo, the word “Quiana” popped into my head. I did some reading and I was right—my dress was made of Quiana, a slinky nylon fabric popular in the 70’s. I was so cutting-edge with my fashion choices, wasn’t I? Raise your hand if you want to see my prom photo!
— a very lovely letter, dated July 12, 1995, from nature photographer Art Wolfe. He thanked me for writing (I praised a workshop I took with him in Cape May, NJ) and for sending him a package of my Polaroid transfer notecards. His letter ended with him off to Grandfather Mountain, Cuyahoga Valley, Canadian Rockies, Alaska, Paris, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Germany, New York, and back to Kenya for a Smithsonian assignment. Sigh…do you need an assistant for low pay, Art?

See more photos of my pretty boy here.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

What do John Mayer, Bryan Adams, Lenny Kravitz and Patti Smith have in common besides being talented musicians? They are also talented photographers.

American PHOTO magazine, Nikon with additional support from Epson, sponsor Visions of Rock, a Website and exhibition that highlights photography by some of the world’s most well-known musicians.

Visit Visions of Rock to see the works by these and other top musicians.