Around the Web This Morning

Looks like he's found the place to me. A frame of motion picture film shot by Bob Chappell.

The Valley of the Shadow [con't.]
Errol Morris has published Part II of his fascinating investigation into the famous Fenton photograph, this time detailing his excursion to the Crimea, the perfect (as in perfectly futile) war, Khrushchev and Kennedy, and a surly guide named Olga. Morris is now intimating that the series may eventually extend to four parts.

Chris Jordan video
I actually stumbled on Bill Moyers' video profile of Chris Jordan on late-night television (insomnia again), changing the channel to it virtually the instant Chris poured the batteries onto the tabletop. Kismet. A fascinating piece, of  particular interest to photographers—recommended when you have a few minutes to watch it (video is one of the real advantages the web has over printed books).

More Shore
The always interesting Jorg Colberg has published a short interview with Stephen Shore.

You faked that
It's always good to keep up with Hany Farid of Dartmouth's Imaging Science Laboratory. I especially liked the bit about the fishing contest photos.

Everybody needs one....

The bug's eye lens
Last but not least, Adobe's spectacular Computational Photography. The post is in French, and the video's in English. Don't miss this one if you're interested in digital imaging technology, or lenses.

_______________________

Mike (Thanks to Oren, Stan Banos, Au Nguyen, and Ken Tanaka)

Comments

[Josh Hawkins]

Well, apparently I'm not the only one that wants that Leica. But for that heart stopping moment I fell in love.

[Ctein]

Computational photography..... oooooh, I soooo WANT!!!!!

Rampant photogeek lust.

Gimme. Here. Now.

pax / Ctein

P.S. Wasn't it frustrating how the video cut off just when it was starting to get really good?

[expiring_frog]

You covered the Adobe story earlier, remember, Mike? http://theonlinephotographer.blogspot.com/2006/03/whoooosh.html

Ren moved to Refocus Imaging (http://www.refocusimaging.com) -- I wonder if Adobe acquired them, because they're using the exact same image (see the top of the RI homepage) :).

[William Carter]

I found "The bug's eye lens" article particularly interesting, as this is something I've been doing off and on for years. What I've done was to divide up the aperture to get that same effect (but without all the glass)... Now, where can I get that cool software?!?

[Fred W]

The Adobe talk on audioblog is a cool glimpse of the possible future - Thanks for sharing the link!

The talk introduces a 3D-lens insect lens which seems similar to Light field Photography with a plenoptic camera:
http://graphics.stanford.edu/papers/lfcamera/

Both approaches let you take a photo now and focus later. The "Adobe insect lens" additionally allows to move the camera slightly after the picture was taken.

The biggest problem of all these approaches is the low resolution.
To get a 6MP result image you'd need about (I'm estimating 6*19 + ) 150 Megapixels in a large (i.e. expensive) sensor.

The Stanford plenoptic system has even lower resolution and is disproportionally harder to make as it involves fitting specialized microlenses ONTO your sensor.

The "Adobe insect lens" seems the better way forward - just make a version with a Canon EF mount, stick it on a Canon 1DsMkIII (21MP) and you get post-exposure focussing at about 1 Megapixel.

Correct me if my resolution estimates are incorrect - I'm not an optical engineer.

[wtlloyd]

Chris Jordan video was great, thanks.

re: the Leica - I like how the first bidder was in for $5.....there's an optimist!

I also note that at $70,300, the reserve price has still not been met. We're talkin' 10 1Ds MkIII's.....

[Robert Davis]

I'd rather see the original content that something that lurks on other news sites for weeks. C'mon give us a break.

[dyathink]

Chris Jordan, huge WOW! A news commentator said last week that the horror of full-blown child pornography is difficult for most of us to grasp because we're not allowed to see it. Well, thanks to Chris Jordan we can see full-blown consumer porn and it's a train wreck..albeit a highly aesthetic one. He's amazing! Thanks for this link!!

[Adam Isler]

The adobe bug-eye lens is both fascinating and terrifying. I remember when I understood DOS and could help everyone in the office. That was before Windows and networking. Now I'm one of the dinosaurs who just prays my laptop will boot PhotoShop.

In the arts one always has to work with the constraints of the tools and the medium. Brilliant artists are often those who are masters of the tools and understand how and when to bend or elude the constraints. Taking away some constraints can be liberating (autofocus has increased the number of usable shots I get, for instance).

Take away too many tool and medium-constraints and you may overwhelm the artist (especially novices). When there are only a few things you can do, you do them well and look for ways out of the box. When you can do anything, where do you start, what do you do?

Is computational 3D photography just an advance like autofocus or is it opening up a wide new vista that will remove "useful" constraints and, more selfishly speaking, leave old fogeys like myself behind?
Adam

[Salvador Moreno Rivas]

When I see this kind of future technology I feel fear, lol

[Frans]

About Stephen Shore: I found a link to an interesting short video showing him at work, carrying this huge view camera around like someone from the early days of photography.
http://www.jaymovies.com/2006/05/stephen_shore.html

[julian]

To Robert Davis: I only regularly visit a handful of photography websites, so for me Mike's occasional roundups of interesting things from around the web is much appreciated. Keep it up Mike!

Julian

[Chuck Holst]

The description of the Leica M3 contains the following sentence: "After testing the cameras came back to Leica factory to be dismantled and the internal parts were completely analized." Ouch! Not even a spell-checker could help here.

[Dirk]

Hany Farid's work will essentially elimate the need to put some sort of "image authenticator" into every camera, as discussed on this site previously.

Once the technology is commercialised and made available to publishers there is simply no need to put something into cameras which adds more cost and is of no use to 99% of users. Publishers can then enforce their no-manipulation policy to the extent of what's technologically possible, at the ease equal to that of a virus scanner. The level of detection may not even have to so high to detect a sloppy cloning job by a naughty PJ in the field. Have the software at all the wire services and major news networks and you're done.