Canson booth – PhotoPlus Expo 2011
Tomorrow I am heading to southern France as an invited guest of Canson Infinity for their “Customer Appreciation Days” yearly event. Basically they invite their best customers from around the globe to join them in a week long educational conference where they learn about all of their newest products (mostly fine art papers and canvas’) and how best to use them. As an official evangelist, my role is to talk about why I use Canson papers for my own work, my fine art printing workflow, and my landscape photography in general. I’ll also be taking many photos of the event, and Canson will be using these for promotion and web use.
While I’m taking my full gear bag with me, I’ll be using my Pansonic GH2 with a Lumix 20mm f/1.7 panacake lens for the event photos. I haven’t used this camera much for still photos (using it mostly for video), so this will give me a chance to put the camera to work, and also dive into the new Lightroom 4 beta.
I’m deeply honored for this opportunity, and also really excited about traveling to France for the first time. I’m not sure how much free time I’ll have to shoot some landscapes, but I’ll keep you updated here with photos and updates. I’ll be there for 10 days so hopefully I’ll find time to sneak away into nature!
I’m very grateful to have been invited to be a Guest Artist with Canson-Infinity at PhotoPlus International Conference & Expo this coming weekend at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in NYC. Canson will have 6 of my images on display in their booth (#1158) in a fairly large size of 22 x 30, and I will be there all three days to answer questions and talk about why I love and use Canson paper. To say that I am honored is an understatement, and I am very appreciate of the opportunity extended to me by the great staff at Canson.
The way this came about is simple – I always carry a portfolio with me, and for the last few years have been printing on Canson paper pretty much exclusively. The basic reason is that I love the selection and quality of the papers they offer and feel confident that I am presenting my customers with the best possible medium for the photographs they purchase. Anyhow, at last years expo I visited the Canson booth and showed them my portfolio, at which point they asked it they could hold onto one. Of course I said yes, and a few months later was invited to their headquarters in Massachusetts to meet their staff and discuss a mutual working relationship. The rest is history as they say, and I am really excited about future projects that may come to reality with Canson.
For this particular exhibition, I was asked to select the paper and make the prints myself in my studio. To be honest, I don’t think I would have done it any other way, being as familiar as I am with the images and the specific qualities of each print. Of course the portfolios I have given to Canson were not only printed on their paper, but printed by me so they had confidence I would produce the best prints I could of this collection.
I feel like I did, working really hard with my Canon iPF8100 and custom paper profiles which I created myself for this particular project. Canson selected 4 color images and 2 black and white images which allowed me to use different papers for each category. For color, I used BFK Rives, a 100% rag matte paper with a nice velvet texture and great color rendition. I’ve used this paper many times in the past and knew it would not only look great under general lighting, but also eliminate glare issues at the convention center.
For black and white my choice was easy – Baryta Photographique, which has really great blacks and a nice luster finish that looks and feels like traditional dark room prints of the past. Once printed and approved, I shipped them off the Canson for mounting onto stiff backer boards, and they will be displayed this way without any glass.
If you are in the area and have the time to visit, please stop by the booth and say hello! Canson will be giving away $500 of products as well as paper samples. See you at the show!
Light Mind, Rockefeller Preserve
Canon 1DS Mk III, 1/3 @f11, ISO 200, 24mm (EF24-105 f/4 L)
I’m always drawn to textures and colors, especially when the light helps accentuate them in an image. Back lighting is probably my favorite light to work with, though it is also the most difficult in my opinion. But there is no better way to bring out dimension and depth that really helps a viewer “step into” the scene photographed, both visually and emotionally.
I used an 2 stop graduated filter in the field to darken the sky, and then used Lightroom to dodge some areas around the trees that became too dark. I haven’t printed this image yet, but for sure the rich detail deserves at least a 24 x 36 print. I’ll share the specifics of how I print it, what paper I use, and how it turns out – thanks for reading!
