Hey, look whose photo made the cover of Sing Out! Magazine this month. It’s illustrating a great article on contra dance, which has been a particular passion and focus of my photography for two decades now.
I’ve been wanting to do a book on the subject. I made an abortive effort a few years ago, travelling to New England to dance and photograph, but the recession hit and I dropped the project. I’ve revived the notion lately, and I’m planning several trips this year devoted just to this effort.
But where to start? This week I have been combing the archives to see what the work I have looks like in the aggregate. I’ve been scanning my old work and making prints, and marvelling at how powerful the tools are that we have now. I couldn’t have operated at this level even a year ago, between the archiving and organizing in databases in Iview Media Pro, scanning in 16 bit and bulk correcting my tif files in ACR 4, painlessly gang-printing my 5x7 proof prints through Lightroom, pinning them up on my huge editing wall under color corrected lights. I’m able to use all my equipment and skills for this one.
Yet I feel I’ve barely begun this project. I don’t have a good feel yet for what a book would look like, or what the organizing principle of it should be. I want to include essays from various important people in the scene, but I don’t even have a good sense of who those various important people are. I’m working on a project about a New England tradition from 3000 miles away; even if the Northwest is one of the hotbeds of the revival, I feel at some remove from where I properly should be doing this.
In a few weeks I’ll be back in New England. Stay tuned for updates.
hey, look how nicely those are tacked up, how easy to review... :-)
Posted by: David Adam Edelstein | December 21, 2006 at 05:33 PM
duh, also, great cover photo.
Posted by: David Adam Edelstein | December 21, 2006 at 05:34 PM