Pain(t) Spotting: Cheers to the Photographers that made 2014

There will be no images in this post. This is a written tribute to the spotters. That unique pack that are religiously devoted to the documentation of what is happening in street art in Melbourne, this year. You fuckers call us paint spotters. Pfffff.

Us 'paint spotters' will know the following questions well and will ask ourselves daily:

1. Am I an artist?

2. Am I just a collector of names, images and knowledge?

3. Am I a hobbyist?

4. Do I take the shot so people see the work, or so that they see me?

I don't doubt many of us street art photographers are artists who have chosen to stick with the medium of photography. Yet frequently we are derided. Most insultingly, we are often viewed as fans, when in reality, we can be, and often are, the greatest wing-man an artist could hope for.

I want to take my hat off to a special few who I admire greatly in my own little hyper local world.

1. David Russell - energetic, open, generous and collaborative. He is amazing. What he doesn't know about the inner workings of a camera is not worth knowing.

2. Dean Sunshine - he is so easy to be in love with. Not like that, just in terms of wishing you could bottle a piece of him for yourself.

3. All those shapes - how does one person know so much about so many?

4. Arty Graffarti - in the Graff world, he is the equivalent of All Those Shapes.

The four people above, in my opinion, are shaping this scene more influentially than I think anyone gives them credit for. 

Copping the worst of it (Comme des Fuck Down)

I have overstimulated myself these past few weeks. I have a new camera: a Sony Alpha 7r. It's two purposes are: to do amazing pre-processing of JPEGS to upload by wifi to my phone and share. In essence, to be my smart phone.

The second purpose justifies the cost. Raw files that will end their journey as kick ass Tiffs that I will, the hope is, produce HUGE work from.

The reason I know that I am overstimulated is that I am seeing everything through an aperture, or an ISO or shutter speed. Not just the good stuff. Yesterday I spent 10 minutes taking photo's of the dashboard of my car.

The dog has copped the worst of this new obsession. That is okay because she is a super cute subject. And besides I need to learn. But soon I will need to remember what it was I used to capture when it was just me, my dog and the Samsung in my pocket.

Below is one of my early shots, I think it may have been taken on a Nokia, or an early iPhone.

Watch this space...

The best that I saw this week in the Roy

Power Grouse

Yes, grouse. There is no other way to describe walking through a massive space full of people doing art. I mean the painters and the spotters, too.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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#Blackandwhitechallenge

This week I have been playing a game of  Facebook chasey. Facie Chasie. Preprint Poetry nominated me for the black and white challenge. Five days. Shoot, post, nominate and pass it on.  

 It has demonstrated either my acutely insular social media circle, or how widespread this method of communication can be. But that is another conversation, best had in my head or at night with variously drug/alcohol affected philosophers.

 In a blog post apparently it gets a bit boring, ruminations about the nature of social interaction in modern day.

 This is not boring though, this black and white challenge. I have selected a bunch of pics I took, unedited aside from being shot in black and white mode on my Sony Alpha 7r. Plug Plug...and aside from any change arising in the transfer from the world to me to camera to Picasa to JPeg to Blogger to you.

 Oh yeah, and I threw in a colour one - Yeh-Nah - you decide if black and white is awesome.

 I reckon nothing beats it