Sean Duggan Blog

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

Birds in Flight [Canon 5D]
July/August 2009  Auerbach, Germany
(click in the image for a larger version)

Last summer my wife, daughter and I spent about four weeks in Germany visiting with family. My wife's father has raised show and racing pigeons for most of his life and he has many birds. One of the flocks flies free for most of the day and these photos were taken over the course of several days. I took a lot of photos of these birds zooming through the air during our stay there. It became a self-assignment (not to mention a challenge) for me to try and get good shots of the birds in flight. They are amazingly fast and you have to take hundreds of exposures just to get a few good ones. Thank god for digital photography!

My father-in-law still shoots 35mm film and I could see his envy at my digital SLR's ability to shoot at high ISOs and fast shutter speeds in order to freeze the motion of the flying birds. Not to mention the "free" nature of taking hundreds of shots in an afternoon just to hopefully gt a few good ones. Of course, while taking the shots is "free", the cost comes later in editing them, in terms of time spent at the computer. But editing in Lightroom is a breeze and so much easier than dealing with so many shots in a pre-Lightroom or, (shudder) film-based situation.

This image is a composite of four separate photos. I needed to create an illustration for a column I was writing for Layers Magazine and this fit the theme of multiple-image composites based on image motion sequences. Look for that column in the May/June issue.

Upcoming Workshop in Carmel, California

I'll be teaching a weekend workshop March 20-21st at the Center for Photographic Art in Carmel, California. This is a laptop-based class, which means you do have to bring your own laptop with Photoshop CS3 or CS4 on it. There will be some Lightroom coverage but it is mostly Photoshop and having Lightroom on your laptop is not required for the class. This workshop is being offered at a really great price: $250 for CPA members and $275 for non-members

Lightworks & Shadowplay: Digital Darkroom Essentials
March 20 & 21, 2010
Center for Photographic Art
Carmel, California

Here's a link for more info and registration.

Upcoming Workshops in Hawaii

I will also be in Honolulu, Hawaii on April 22nd through the 25th, teaching three Photoshop classes:

April 22: Restoration & Retouching Essentials

April 23: Selections & Masking

April 24 & 25: Creative Collage with Photoshop CS4

Here's a link for more info and registration details.

In The Cypress Swamp

Swamp Studio [Canon 5D]
January 24, 2010   Big Cypress National Preserve, Florida
(click in the image for a larger version)

I was in south Florida last week giving some presentations and digital darkroom sessions at FOTOfusion, the festival of photography and digital imaging that is hosted every year by the Palm Beach Photographic Centre. This was the first FOTOfusion to take place in the Centre's wonderful new home in downtown West Palm Beach. It was great to link up with old friends and also meet some new ones. All in all, it was a very fun and inspiring week (not to mention missing the torrential rains and some snow that doused my area of California all week while I was away).

Whenever I travel I always try take advantage of the possibilities for making new images in different landscapes and this time was no exception. Although my schedule did not allow for as much free photo time as I would have liked, I did manage to spend one extra day in the cypress swamps of Big Cypress National Preserve, which borders on the northern side of the Everglades National Park. I had a specific pinhole photograph that I wanted to make for my Artifacts of an Uncertain Origin series.

My first visit here was last March,  but the fact that it was the end of the dry season, combined with the effects of a long and serious drought, meant that there was no water in the cypress swamps. This put a definite crimp in the plans for the photograph that I wanted to make.

A couple of weeks before I went to Florida this time, I called the visitor center and found out that there was plenty of water in the swamp this time around. The weather and lighting were perfect when I arrived. Since I was heading into unfamiliar terrain that might be populated by large carnivorous reptiles, I did the responsible thing and filled out a back-country permit and told the rangers that I expected to check back in before the end of the day. Then I donned my grubby swamp clothes, grabbed my gear and hiked south along the Florida trail and headed for a nearby stand of cypress trees. It was wet and muddy in the grasslands right from the start, but once the trail ("and "trail" is an approximation...it's hard to call it a trail when it's underwater and hard to see!) entered the stand of cypress trees, the water became clean and clear and there was no more squishy mud. As I continued into the trees, the water got deeper. The average depth was ankle to knee-deep, though in some places it was waist-deep.

At work in the swamp studio (click the image for a larger version)

I finally found an area that would work well for my "swamp studio". There were many beautiful trees, festooned with bromeliads (an "air plant" that uses other plants for support), an area of deeper open water and plenty of places that were not too deep for me to set up my small tripod and the artifacts I was photographing (three industrial gauges). One challenge was the fact that since water covered all of the ground, there was no easy place to set down my camera bag and backpack. Fortunately, I found a tree that had fallen across some other trees and a portion of it formed a perfect level platform where I could stash my gear.

After I had been in the "studio" for about an hour, I noticed an alligator on a log in the middle of a deep pool that was adjacent to the shallower water where I was working. It was not there when I arrived. But he was probably at least 100 feet away and didn't seem too interested in leaving his log. So I kept an eye on him while I continued to make photos. I made a fair amount of noise sloshing through the water taking a few self-timer shots and at that point the gator slipped back into the deep pool and I did not see him again, though I did keep a close watch on the edges of the area where I was working.

My swamp "neighbor" (click the image for a larger version)

In all I spent about three hours in my swamp studio. It was a very beautiful and peaceful place; a biologically and visually rich environment that was fascinating to experience. It is always exciting to explore a new landscape for the first time. And while this was not the first time I had been here, the presence of water made it a very different place from the one I had seen the previous Spring.  I will definitely return for another visit to Big Cypress Preserve the next time my travels take me to south Florida and I look forward to wading into the cypress swamp again one day.

Keep an eye on this space. The pinhole photograph I made that day will eventually be posted here.

Looking Into the New Year

Looking Into the New Year  [Canon 5D; 17 seconds]
December 31, 2009
(click in the image for a larger version)

Happy New Year to You!

This is my last image of 2009. It was taken on New Year's Eve, just past 11pm. The subject is my favorite old oak tree on our property. I had gone out to take photos of the Blue Moon, but in the time between deciding to take the photos and getting the camera and tripod set up, the scattered cloud cover had become pretty much constant cloud cover (though it did move through the sky is a very atmospheric manner).

With the moon taken off the menu as a reliable subject, I concentrated instead on the silhouettes of the oak trees around our property. For some shots the upward camera angle was so pronounced that the 24-105mm zoom lens would not stay zoomed in. So after taking a few standard shots holding it in place, I began playing around with slowly zooming from 105 to 24 during the exposure and I liked those interpretations much better. Although it looks like the moon is behind this tree, it is not. It was actually behind me. The "light beam" effect is created by the zooming of the lens during the shot. This exposure is 17 seconds.

The Recent Blog Hiatus

My last update here was back on November 22nd. I think that must be a record in terms of my own blog inactivity, or close to it. An incredibly busy, deadline-heavy schedule is the reason, as well as the fact that I just felt like it was a good time to take a break. Of course, since we have just passed into the New Year, one resolution is to bring that hiatus to a close and resume more regular posting. My schedule is still slammed for the next several weeks, so I won’t be making daily posts, but at least two or three per week is my goal at the moment.

Newsletter News

The Creative Digital Darkroom Newsletter has also been on hiatus since late September and that break will also be coming to an end sometime this month. So, if you have signed up since last September and are wondering when the newsletter would show up, it will be back in action soon.

Upcoming Appearances

I will be giving a presentation, doing some portfolio reviews and teaching a couple of hands-on computer sessions at FOTOfusion in West Palm Beach, Florida coming up January 19th through the 23rd . My sessions are as follows:

Wednesday Jan 20 10:30am – 12pm– Lightworks & Shadowplay (Presentation)
Thursday Jan 21 10:20am – 12:45pm– Portfolio Reviews
Friday Jan 22  4:30pm – 6:00pm – Creative Collage with Adobe Photoshop (computer lab)
Saturday Jan 23 2:30pm – 4pm – Painting with Light, Shadow & Color (computer lab)

April Hawaii Workshops

I’ll be in Honolulu teaching 4 short workshops April 22nd through the 25th. Here’s a link for more info on those classes.

2010 Artifacts of an Uncertain Origin Calendar

My 2010 calendar featuring 12 selectively sepia toned pinhole photographs from my Artifacts of an Uncertain Origin series will be on sale through mid March. Follow the link to preview the images and get more information.

New Calendar for 2010

(click for a larger view)

Introducing my Limited Edition Calendar for 2010...

A brand new collection of twelve pinhole photographs from the ongoing Artifacts of an Uncertain Origin series. If you purchased one of the 2009 Artifacts calendars, the images in this edition are all different. Eight were taken in the past year.

Follow this link to find out more about ordering the calendar, as well as view a gallery and slide show of the twelve images.

Preston Contemporary Art Center

Preston Contemporary Art Center  [Canon 5D]
Mesilla, New Mexico  November 6, 2009
(click in the image for a larger version)

I am currently in southern New Mexico teaching a 4-day workshop on Photoshop Creative Collage at the Mesilla Digital Imaging Workshops, which is located at the Preston Contemporary Art Center. This photo was taken earlier this evening after class as I walked back to my hotel, which is just around the corner. We are halfway through the class and everyone is doing great and having fun discovering all of the amazing collage possibilities offered by Adobe Photoshop CS4.

The Mesilla Digital Imaging Workshops is a really fine facility which has one of the best digital classrooms I have yet taught in. Plus, to be able to hold the workshop at a very elegant and impressive art gallery is an added creative bonus. It's great to be able to take a break and walk right out the classroom door to view the work hanging on the gallery walls, or in the outdoor sculpture court. I look forward to coming back and offering more digital darkroom workshops here!

Happy Halloween!

The Doctor's Bookshelf  [ZeroImage Pinhole Photograph]
Germany July 27, 2009
(click in the image for a larger version)

Here's one for Halloween. And though it is a little early, I may not be posting on Saturday due to my attendance at various spooky doings.

This was photographed in Germany this past summer, at the home of a doctor we visited. I felt that this was a fitting bookend, especially next to a volume of Edgar Allen Poe. And yes, it is a real skull.

Coming Up in 6 Days...

There's still room left in my workshop that starts late next week in southern New Mexico:

Creative Collage with Adobe Photoshop
November 5 - 8, 2009, Mesilla Digital Imaging Workshops
Mesilla, New Mexico
Click here for more info