Dispatch one
DISPATCH
one
Circumstance has warranted that the creative industry that I know has now been shelved for the time being. I don’t find myself particularly humorous, but the underlying thought of the matter is this need to vent and begin an engaging, thought provoking space which might full well help me quell the angst. As I come to terms with this idea of ‘social distancing’ it’s not necessarily about passing time, but rather a time to approach the internal desire of writing: be it in one form or another.
Navigating this Dispatch:
1. A Book Review: Pentti Sammallahti
2. James Mor Bras Taylor
3. Guest: Mark Mahaney on Polar Night
4. The Elderly Are Using Memes
5. Guest: Josua Stäbler on ‘Cajsa’
6. Coffee: Aeropress
1. A Book Review: Pentti Sammallahti
I travelled to Vancouver on the 9th March 2020 to begin a new chapter here. With our two year working holiday visa granted and accepted in Calgary, I leafed open my one packed book... a photo book as matter of fact. It’s simple, an awkward size of 7.5” tall and 4.75” wide. The exterior, Black and White, much the same as its contents. It smells as any new book should, with a lustre printed quality: (my knowledge of paper lacks and although I have taste and tendency, this is somewhat inky glossy text with an almost matt textured print out. But it’s not matt… I digress.)
There are 66 photographs all taking up a double page spread, I just wish it had some form of coherency, rather than some portrait, landscape, single page, double. As somewhat a collector of photo books, the design is not perfect. Did I mention all of the Copy was in French.
I knew this going in. I’d stumbled upon an exhibit of Sammallahti’s work in London | at the photographer’s gallery.
Printed, his images had life and provoked a creative response. I resorted to the internet to understand this guy, his patience never ending, and some of his works carried a charisma I’d seen in the street works of Henri Cartier Bresson.
This man was mostly invisible. To the most part, Dogs and Birds make up the subject in rather desolate landscapes. But the pictures most striking were those 10x23cm cinematic, layered, masterpieces, which included an element of human interaction. In book form, I weep. They overlap the central reservation and lose a little bit of character. So this book for me is clearly to make notes in. Learn what I can by poorly translating French and understand a little more about his practice.
To say but the very least, Sammallahti’s work is fantastic.
When They started traveling, the first photographers were attracted to the light, as if they remembered that the images were originally shadows cast on a wall or on a floor. These new “sun worshipers”, as Baudelaire calls them with as much mistrust as they are of rudeness, therefore went to North Africa, to Jerusalem, at the edge of the Nile, to bring mirages and oases into their dark rooms, and transform the desert sand into a dial where you can still read the time, thanks to the giant shadows of the ruins and palm trees. With Pentti Sammallahti, we find ourselves antipodes, in a country without shade which knows two long seasons, an endless winter and a summer which seems to come out of the egg, when the ice starts to crack. If we look with astonishment at this end of the world, this finisterre that is Finland, it is firstly because we are not saturated with images of this little visited region, but also because black and white are more justifies that more faithful to reality. Finally, because from one season to another the values seem to be reversed: black on white in winter, like those dogs and passers-by whose silhouette prints on snow, but white on black in summer, like this rabbit with a luminous profile in front of a dark forest, or like these swans swimming on the surface of opaque and dark water. Vision that goes from negative to positive, and which summaries the alternation of the seasons.
“As for the frozen trees, the lopsided barracks, the stopped trucks which always seem to be broken down, they give the feeling that man and animals are housed at the same sign, the silent sign of an inn open to all winds.”
Photographs By Pentti Sammallahti
2. James Mor Bras Taylor
I began to write a short script two and a half years ago: it’s funny to think that this form of gathering may not now be so applicable to today. I say this rather broadly in our current outlook on life, god I cannot wait for social distancing to be a thing of the past.
Monologue/
”With discretion I see it fit to explain that although young, James is full of bite. Picture a room filled with languages, There are nations of all flavours, a mixed basket, languages thrown un- co-ordinately about the room, a recipe of chaos. He pipes up, his voice undistinguishable above the chatter, sounding small like a mouse caught in a mouse trap… well… this is not James.Rather see here the wrath of a man child standing above all, breaking the boundaries of mixed languages and rather unequivocally condemning any unrest. He’d say something such as…”
"I implore you to know I am not just boy James”
NARRATOR:
With discretion I see it fit to explain that although young, James is full of bite.
-
All voices are spoken alongside, one another. A heated Volume. Angst. Delivered towards a delirious James. He sits amidst the crowd silent.
NARRATOR:
Picture a room filled with languages (but you are just a boy ‘James’)
Italian/ French/ Spanish/ (overlapping)
ma tu sei solo un ragazzo James
mais tu n'es qu'un garcon James
Pero ero solo es Chico James
NARRATOR:
There are nations of all flavours, a mixed basket, languages thrown un- co-ordinately about the room, a recipe of chaos. He pipes up, his voice undistinguishable above the chatter, sounding small like a mouse caught in a mouse trap… well… this is not James.
CUT TO:
The Frame switches, presenting an empowering James stood tall above the adults, speaking… heard and captivating!
NARRATOR:
Rather see here the wrath of a man child standing above all, breaking the boundaries of mixed languages and rather unequivocally condemning any unrest. He’d say something such as…
James:
“I implore you to know I am not just boy James”
3. Guest: Mark Mahaney on Polar Night
Introducing Mark Mahaney @mahaney_mark. I discovered Mark’s work approximately May 25, 12:36pm in accordance to my instagram stories: thereby give or a take a few weeks. This is around the time I was living in Bodø in northern Norway, enjoying the midnight sun: a strange phenomena of the arctic circle. With constant sunlight, this was directly the parallel season to that of Mark’s Book ‘Polar Night’ and as the times fast forward northern Norway does too arrive in this winter season of no sun and harsh winters. I’d seen articles speaking of the project on the whole, but wanted to delve into a few anecdotes that would unearth the story further.
http://markmahaney.com/
/ As you move the camera away from your eye, you're reminded of an encounter… a sound… a feeling… tell me about it?
In general during my time photographing Polar Night in the town of Utqiagvik, Alaska, I was regularly checking my surroundings. The wind was often loud and we had to wear so many layers, even around our heads. Hearing was slightly impaired as a result. To add to the prevailing general eeriness of the place, polar bears sometimes make their way into the streets of the town in search of food. There are warning signs posted throughout the town in shops, in the motel, at eateries. You don’t want to mess with a hungry polar bear. I think they can get up to 12 feet tall if they’re standing on their hind legs. So, I was always looking behind me and my assistant was always on the lookout. I remember this house being on the edge of town, at the end of a street. Once a street ends in this town, the lights also end and all you see in the distance is a slow gradient to pitch black. One night, we were told there were some bears a few miles out of town. We drove in that direction and found a mother and two yearling cubs eating on the rotting carcass of a bowhead whale. We parked at a safe distance, turned the car off, but left the lights shining on them as they devoured the whale. The noises they made were terrifying as they ripped through frozen blubber and flesh. I took a video of it and it’s hard to listen to it with the volume turned up.
Photograph By Mark Mahaney
/ If the limitations of the cold hadn’t co-existed with the making of this photograph, how would you have worked differently?
If it hadn’t be negative 30 degrees Fahrenheit or so when I was photographing these dogs, the flash wouldn’t have misfired on this frame, creating the silhouette of this dog. Batteries drain extremely fast in such extreme temperatures and I was shooting quickly, so the recycle time couldn’t keep up. I’m glad it failed in that moment.
Photograph By Mark Mahaney
/ Your stood facing the scene, what moments are playing out behind you?
There was literally nothingness behind me while making this photograph. I was standing on the road that runs along the beach on the north side of town, en route to Point Barrow. Behind me was the frozen over Arctic Ocean. You can’t tell where land ends and the ocean starts. It’s just frozen in all directions. Of course below the ice, there’s a wild world of ocean life. To my back looked due north and nothing but frozen ocean for a thousand miles or so until you’d hit the North Pole.
Photograph By Mark Mahaney
4. The Elderly Are Using Memes
It’s a disaster, the elderly are using memes in group chats. With an influx of people now subscribing to daily internet usage, we are having mass learning of meme’s and pictures and video sharing. It’s frightening to think that an exhausting number of people are somewhat catching up. I thought my grandparents using ‘WhatsApp’ to contact me across the hemisphere was absurd, but now with the need of isolation, Skyping, FaceTime is almost being freely promoted.
What if now all of those new clicks per minute were used to generate some form of hope, perhaps even delivering an unobtainable surge of tree planting: With us delving deep into the search engines why not use a platform such as Ecosia. It’s almost like a passive income for our planet, at a cost per click basis. I have no idea why this came to mind, but I was googling income streams and the idea of affiliation links, which led to CPC links. I’ll refrain from boring you with the details, but I think you actually need a readership in order to pursue this. But with all these statistics trickling by of earth having some “me time” it’s paramount that we water that and actually amuse ourselves by planting a hell of a lot of trees. So 45 Searches means 1 tree planted (apparently). Without going outside at least entertain me and get your numbers up.
Update: It’s now been five days since I started using Ecosia and it’s a pretty useless and terrible search engine. It’s not that i’m not giving it a chance. example; I am not the best at spelling. My tendency is to search - define (useless word) to see how to spell it and if it’s applicable to the circumstance. Google happily hands me the answer straight away. Ecosia on the other hand, gives me 5 lines of waffle and advertising that has no relevance to my question. I still have it running the more ordinary searches, however when it comes to something important, i’m hopping into another browser.
Photograph by Josua Staebler
5. Guest: Josua Stäbler on ‘Cajsa’
Introducing Josua Stäebler @josuastaebler I discovered Josua’s work upon seeing his passion project with Director
Marko Roth: The Encounter. It being shot on 35mm Vision 3, I couldn’t help but reach out and follow along from there. Delving a little deeper into his latest project ‘Cajsa’ enlightens a little into the behind the scenes of working as the Director of Photography on a shoot for BMWi.
/ Tell me about yourself?
My name is Josua Stäbler, I am a Director of Photography based in Stuttgart, Germany. I work as cinematographer on commercials, documentaries and passion projects internationally. Film grain gives me goose bumps, I love working with film. From the beautiful lens-flares to light touching human skin.
/ Shot on Digital: feels analogue? Camera, Lenses, Why did you decide to shoot it as such?
Without the available budget to shoot analog, it made sense to work with the Digital Arri Alexa Mini. Additionally choosing vintage lenses, the Hawk V-Lite Vintage 74 1.3x Anamorphic’s and using some soft filtration allowed each scene to look as much like film as possible.
Photograph by Josua Staebler
/ Behind the Scenes, what was happening in the studio?
With the director Pascal, we talked a lot about colour during pre production. From there I made a detailed plan. Film is about contrast, which is why I tried to light each scene differently. Some scenes were lit softer whilst others lit with harsh and hard light. Arri skypanel’s are the perfect tool to dial in colours really fast without needing to change gels every minute; using amber, BMW blue.
The acting scenes were shot handheld with an A-Cam. I liked being as close as possible to the Cajsa’s face with a wide angle lens. This creates intimacy and develops personality. The B-Cam was on a Ronin-2, fixed to a Mini Jib on a Dolly, which we started with shooting establishing shots. The C-Cam was handheld on an easy rig. This combined allowed for a fast workflow.
/ A Recommended must watch?
Paolo Nutini’s Iron Sky from Daniel Wolfe is still the best music video out there!
'Iron Sky' by Paolo Nutini directed by Daniel Wolfe.
6. Coffee: Aeropress
This is what I prioritised packing into my suitcase…To all those who doubted me; thank goodness I did. Self isolation with coffee is better than self isolation without coffee. Thankyou.
/ Aeropress
The most affordable part of this set up would be without a doubt the Aeropress and of course what I’d perhaps suggest most to anyone in desperate need of making a decent cup of filter coffee. My friend Luke headed to the Hague for his masters in September 2018: I think within the first week, he’d stated ‘I don’t think I can afford to have my usual coffee, or two, or three, a day from a cafe. Help.’
Aeropress! I work with a recipe of 16g per serving, so with a 340g bag that equates to approximately 20 cups/ give or take a few if your saving money and avoiding a household scale. This means savings which is smart: but also, during a time like now we can continue to support our much loved roasters, cafes & friends by at least picking up beans online.
This is by no means my recipe, I’m sure it’s come from a long line of aeropress users: it is however how I make coffee with an aeropress.
Inverted Brew:
(I don’t think i’m explaining that very well. The plunger sits much like a stand, you can now pour water into the chamber and the water will steep the coffee grounds for however much time you’d like, as oppose to dripping whilst brewing.)
I take 16g coffee: ground to a light / medium coarseness. Tip it into the inverted aeropress.
Water, just off the boil. Pour in 40g and taking a long piece of cutlery, stir the coffee bed ensuring that all is well saturated. Wait for 20secs, enough time to allow the coffee to bloom.
Add 180g water and start a timer for 2 mins 16 secs.
Wet the filter in the lid, followed by screwing into place.
Times up. Put your Cup on top of the filter and invert the brewer. Slowly push the plunger, Coffee should appear in your cup or you have very much completed the steps wrong. Go back and start again.
Then play cards because honestly right now there is not much else better to do.
