127/365 Equal Access Clouds

5-7-2013

 Leica M8  35mm F1.4

Leica's are for journalism and street shooting and people photos.  Those are not the primary area I like to work in my personal photography.  I like to shoot clouds and flowers and landscapes and my kids.  My time with the Leica M8 is stretching me and I am stretching it to fit my shooting.  Close focus is not a priority of the Leica and I have struggled to get flowers to work.  The iPhone 5 focuses close effortlessly so I stretch to make meaningful images with the .7 meter close focusing.  

The clouds were easy.  I have always loved clouds and after reading about Stieglitz shooting clouds to silence critics that said his photography was good only because he had privileged access to people and places I love the idea even more.  Stieglitz chose clouds because everyone had equal access.

My friend Jennings Osborne had equal access idea down pat as well.  JO would go places and serve gigantic bbq platters to everyone for free.  He believed that everyone liked bbq and everyone liked fireworks.  He was known for his firework shows as well as his bbq.  Fireworks and clouds are both equal access no privilege required.

Stainless Steel Sharpies

This past weekend I was in Staples and I saw these Stainless Steel Sharpies.  Refillable Sharpies.  I immediately thought of Jennings Osborne.

 Let me explain- in December we would go to Disney World with Jennings and Mitzi and their extended family.  We were part of that extended family and we have so many wonderful memories from those times.  While we were all spending the days in the Disney Parks, Jennings was in his room signing family photos with a Sharpie.  There was a link on his web page for an autographed 8x10.  If you clicked the link a form would pop up and you could enter your name and address and Jennings would send you a free 8x10. JO ordered 8X10s like most people order 4x6s.  He would spend his days reading the newspapers and watching the news and signing hundreds of 8X10s.

 I don't know if Jennings ever used these Stainless Steel Sharpies or not, heck he might of found Gold Sharpies for all I know.  I got one just for the memory it gave me.  Jennings would of probably got a case of them and a couple of cases of refills so he could have them everywhere.  I have so many other Jennings memories and now I have a Stainless Steel Sharpie to help me remember them.

Funerals

Today I attended the funeral of my good friend Jennings Osborne. In my years of life I have attended a good number of funerals and I've often left wishing I had known the person better. Today, I was so thankful and proud to have known Jennings Osborne and call him my friend. I am thankful for all the photos I have of him and all the memories. I keep thinking about Jennings stories to blog and there are just too many to log from my phone.

I have always loves sunsets and some of the most remarkable ones I've seen have been on days when someone I've known passed away or were buried. I wonder if it is a glimpse of the heavenly welcoming party.

The Art of the Chopper

Today, I got to shoot a Osborne BBQ at the Clinton Presidential Library. The BBQ was the Bikers for Babies fundraiser for the March of Dimes. Also at the Clinton Library today there was a BBQ Cooking Contest and inside there was Chopper Art show.

The purpose of the day was to shoot the BBQ for the Osborne Family. Jennings and Mitzi provided the lunch for the 2700 bikers that were part of the March of Dimes Bikers for Babies ride. Bikers showed up all morning but a little after noon about 1000 bikers rode in from Conway and the annual Toad Suck Days.

I was there early so I took some time and went through the Chopper Art Show in the Clinton Library. These bikes were beautiful. I am not a biker so I didn't appreciate all the engineering that goes into these custom bikes but they really are works of art. Along with all the choppers there were also stunning b&w photos of the artist who create these motorcycles. The photos were by Tom Zemberoff. Here is a link to his web page that features the artist portraits as well as the bikes they create.
The only artist I saw was Vince Doll and he was constantly surrounded by autograph seekers bikers who had questions for him about his bikes.

If you get a chance you should go see the show at the Clinton Library.

I have a couple of motorcycle memories. When I was in 6th grade I went home for the weekend with one of my best friends Sean Pearl and several other guys in our class. The Pearls owned The Pearl Grandfather Clock Company. Well, Sean convinced me to ride with him on the back of his dirt bike. We went tearing down the street so fast I could hardly hang on. I was yelling for him to slow down but he was not listening. When we stopped way down at the end of the street I got off and walked back to his house because i was not riding with him anymore. A couple of years ago at Thanksgiving Julie's cousin Chris had some kids dirt bikes that his son Austin was riding in the back pasture. I got Chris to teach me how to drive and shift the gears and use the clutch. He gave me the gear shifting pattern: one down and three up as I remember and then he said give it a little gas and slowly let out the clutch. I did that and instantly popped a wheelie for about 50 ft before I got the front wheel safely back down. Austin, who shares my birthday, Oct 30th, runs up and asks if I am ok. I said yes, but I was totally in shock that I had nearly crashed in my first motorcycle driving experience. Then Austin looks at me very seriously and says "you might want to lean forward as you let the clutch out. I rode around the pastures for about 45 minutes and had a blast.

Mount Holly Cemetery

I get to shoot a lot of different things working for a university and then there are the freelance jobs that I shoot for Jennings Osborne. It is really hard to consider shooting a picnic in a cemetery that was begun in the 1800s as work. The place has so much character and history and it is one block off the freeway in Little Rock. Everywhere you looked there were beautiful flowers and landscaping.I hope you enjoy this slide show from the 4th Annual Mount Holly Cemetery Picnic and Fair. The band that played for the picnic was excellent and they played one of my favorite pieces of classical music- Alexander's Ragtime Band- so I decided that was appropriate music for the slide show.

Here is a link to more in formation on Mount Holly Cemetery.

George Strait

Saturday night Julie and I were invited to go to the George Strait concert with Jennings and Mitzi Osborne and a couple of their friends. I had never seen George Strait before and he was excellent. Hanging out with the Osbornes is always fun anytime. Thanks JO and MO.

Xpan

Since I have no photo responsibilities this weekend I am shooting with my Hasselblad X-Pan camera and I have 8 rolls of Tri-X with me. I got this camera from Jennings Osborne one year at Disney World.