Just Making Things Up

Authenticity is key to creating a compelling story. Without it, the story falls flat -- or worse, the end user knows more than the author and can correct them. Oof.

The constant research into the area where FTS takes place is an effort to make the piece feel authentic. As I noted in the previous post, the area's accent is central to its success. Pandemics and politics have kept me from finishing this piece, but I will. I must.

I replayed my two-hour conversation with six local intellectuals. One topic that surfaced was how people are prone to making things up -- and how central locating the facts is to a project's accuracy and authenticity. One of the scholars noted that people often do not intentionally invent things; they simply mix up information with stories, memories, or legends.

He told the story of a person who was said to have studied medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Michigan. The local newspaper was about to dedicate a story on his life. That is, until the facts were checked. The Mayo Clinic registrar did have a record of someone with that name enrolled in the medical school there, but at a different time -- twenty years later, in fact. Then, when a pack of envelopes was carefully pored over, invoices from the Rochester Institute of Technology showed that the person had actually studied radiology in New York State.

Discovery adds a layer of research -- and irony -- to my project, since many of the places I visited have been transformed over ten decades. The journey itself adds the layer of authenticity that completes the bridge.

Fact or Fiction? Real or Fake?

Creating generated imagery is challenging—but the challenge is ethical. Some fear being replaced by boorish hacks who appropriate others’ work; while this is possible, that concern ultimately exposes itself for what it is.

More pressing is how serious artists use tools—any tools—with ethical practice. Once, coloring images digitally seemed unthinkable compared to traditional methods. Yet digital work demands the same depth of knowledge and sensitivity. Without that understanding, the result is predictable and uninspired.

I gave a brief talk the other day on FTS at the college where I teach. I showed the 3-minute video with the spoken-word narration in my previous post. The room gasped when I told the audience that the man's voice was sampled from generated AI. A professor asked me about my ethical use of AI in this case, and I said I had no problems with it, since the voice was generated by a computer. I mentioned my pursuit of the comedian and spoken-word raconteur Reinaldo Ruiz and how a sample of his voice could more accurately express the color of the language in Cordoba. That statement generated even more gasps.

I counter that with:

• Music is routinely sampled. How is sampling a voice by AI any different?

• Is tweening in animation legitimate image processing?

• Decades ago, engineers programmed musical instruments in songs in all genres of music. 

• And CGI is responsible for...finish this sentence for me, please.

Is it the degree? The Origin? The Attribution? 

For my project, studying the language of someone like Reinaldo is essential. Achieving authenticity in the spoken work is where the artistry lies when using a new tool.

 

The Long Story Continues

 While many scorn AI, I think it's awesome. What most of my creative colleagues believe will happen to them, I think, won't. Technology serves us, and fearing it will just get in the way of using it creatively. In reality, AI can make work better....if you're already doing good work. Bad work will always weave its way in. People who made shitty images on film went on to make shitty images digitally. 

It's argued that the digital camera has ruined photography. But the same could be said for the hand-held camera; in actuality, it democratized the medium and allowed us to photograph everything. You can't shoot the Vietnam War with a view camera...you can't report on the flattening of the Middle East with platinum prints.

When I went to Colombia last summer, I didn't photograph much. As reported a few posts ago, I spent much of the time in the Library researching. I interviewed elder scholars from the area who shared meaningful insights--and shaped four narratives. I passed one of these to a friend from the area for an opinion, and he said he couldn't read it...since what I'd written hit too close to home. I'd had a similar feeling when I read Marquéz's Love in the Time of Cholera (which takes place in Mompox, a town near where my project is set), since the characters' lives closely mirror my relatives'. One of the characters in the book even has the same surname. 

I want to return to Colombia this summer, but the current political climate makes that unlikely. A colleague recently planned to visit Mompox, but was strongly advised against it. Recent instability in the area has made travel there unsafe, underscoring the distance between intention and reality. The impending presidential election there forces me to find ways to add to my project.

https://youtu.be/d45sda7WBs0

Enter AI. From the narratives I wrote, I translated them into Spanish. Ugh. Very stuffy and slow. I put them through a filter of Cordobés Spanish: the dialect of the area, so fast and so modified with colloquialisms that many Colombians themselves can't understand what's being said. I took out my digital recorder and mic and taped it. After I slapped together some footage, I ran my voice through an AI filter approximating a "northern Colombian accent". Not bad, but nowhere near as colorful as the speaker Martina La Peligrosa, right. 

But then, I replayed a segment from a spoken word artist (comedian, I guess...but more on him another time) and realized there's still a lot of work to be done.

Difference of Opinion

There is often a struggle to get people to backtrack and observe what got them to the present point in time...meaning their heritage and history. We're going through this crisis in the US, and it's going on here in northern Colombia, for different yet parallel reasons.

I was invited to a conversation among six intellectuals in the area, held in an exquisite house with a tropical garden. Each was a professor at one of the local universities in either architecture, history, or the social sciences, and most had the complaint of the resistance met with their investigative projects by citizens of the area, as well as the lack of accurate documents kept for proper reference. 

Already a consideration is that the humid climate and mold consume everything, and climate-controlled storage for antique documents is a recent development, in this area at least. Therefore, much has been scanned to official websites and the original materials were sent to the capital, where resources exist for the safe storage of photographs, documents and historical artifacts.

What was interesting about the 2-hour conversation is that each gentleman had their own foundational knowledge of the various aspects of the area. However, I quickly picked up that most of the developments of the area occurred in the 1970s--not the 1700s when the city was formed; not even the 1950s when the area was awarded autonomous statehood. Only after the 1970s were more roads paved and zoning laws put into use, even if the old ways were already established and not apt to change--ever. This development is disappointing...since this project is all about memories. 

Forgot how hot it can be...

Purposefully, I came outside of rodeo season. There's a lot going on in those wild three weeks; it's distracting. I'm working with the assets I have, refining the message and researching the delivery.

Researching content like this is difficult no matter where it finds itself. You really need to travel far distances to get the first-hand information to give a project depth. Through contacts I made long ago, I was able to meet with a historian at the cultural center in town, and she informed me that much of what I'm looking for can be found in one of two places: a digital archive within the center, since the original materials are in Bogotá and, quite illusive but infinitely more exciting, by knocking on doors and requesting to see family photo albums. There's another six months of my life, or, with some help and luck, maybe not.

She also directed me to an architecture professor who teaches in the area and who possess the high-res files of everything available online. That saves me a lot. He's gonna WeTransfer vintage scans from which I'll recreate backgrounds for my story,
.

OK, I'm going again.

Moments ago, I posted about the illness that flattened me for a year after my last visit to Tierralta—highlands of Córdoba near the Antioquia border. Those days, and the angry, xenophobic U.S. administration, don't matter to me now. I'm leaving in June for yet another journey to finish this installation. Something tells me it won’t be the last.

It only took a phone call with a historian. I held my breath before dialing—his work parallels mine, both of us chasing something fleeting and elegiac. His project is about preserving the architectural landmarks of the region, a fight against not just time and climate, but also a local skepticism rooted in survival. For many who live there, preservation feels like a luxury they can’t afford.

A bulldog's snout is a bottle cap opener.

As I described my work again, our visions aligned. He asked me to send more information, and—generously—offered his time. He’s opening a window into a history I would struggle to access alone. I’ll be meeting friends and colleagues of his from the region to help fill in the missing pieces—essential fragments of a story about how tradition is being left behind.

Even without the Venezuelan crisis spilling across the border, Colombia has its hands full: fighting corruption, confronting the legacy of cocaine, and striving to be seen as a serious center of American culture. Tourism helps. Planes to Cartagena are packed with gringos flying in for the weekend, partying to the rhythms of Palenque music. The old city, which I’ve written about before, is a 500-year-old sleeping beauty, stirred awake by a rapid and tasteful renovation. It’s charming and expensive. I don't know if the same can be said for the interior. I'm focused on the Coast.

I’ve been thinking about this project for years—through the pandemic, through politics, through my absorbing work of printmaking. I'm packing. My heart aches to tell this beautiful story.

Learning the Lingo

 The collar bone of South America spans three "Departments" (the equivalent of the US "States") of Colombia, going from west to east: El Choco, Antioquia and Cordoba. I've attached a screenshot map I swiped from Google maps, and it shows why this tiny neck of horribly inhospitable land is so valuable. 

It rains several times a day in these parts, so a quick plane will get you from town to town, landing on an asphalt strip in the jungle. 

At the moment, with the South American migration halted by the unforgiving US Administration in favor of South Afrikaners (they're white, of course), the Darién Gap is further overrun with strife as people are mired in the extreme instability, crime and violence of Venezuela and neighboring countries to the north in Central America. And, the continued market for illicit drugs and other products we Americans covet ensures that the strife will continue for some time, perhaps indefinitely. 

Even when times were a little calmer, it was not an area to be fooled with. It's one of the most challenging ones to navigate with downpours so extreme that people have drowned in their sleep during a rainstorm. The flora and fauna are relentless as well, with plant growth overtaking the Pan American highway within days and sleeping under mosquito net still a necessity. Window screens mean nothing to many of the bugs in the area--some are so small that they fit easily--and others leave bites with poison lasting in the skin for six weeks. I was there shortly before writing the last post in September 2023 and returned with an unexplained infection that kept me hospitalized for over a week and ten months on antibiotics. Fun.

But, now that I'm fine, I'm going back. 

From Chaos Comes Opportunity

The correct quote is 

In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity.

It's attributed to Sun-Tzu, a military strategist from the Han Dynasty. He wrote The Art of War, a book filled with thoughts about warfare and battle. The amended version applies better to our current state of affairs; the expression Social Distancing is a perfect example. 

During the three or so years since we've taken uncertain paths in and around the COVID crisis, what's emerged is a panicked approach to communication. Before the pandemic, being taken seriously would mean jumping on a plane for a show of face. Now, turning on your computer mic and camera is sufficient.

Likewise, going to see art in a museum or gallery changed. Art became a fully personal experience since the pandemic closed the venues down. Once the doors reopened, we'd taken steps to make art accessible from devices and, with that, on-demand. 

Enter Augmented Reality. 

AR artists and technicians "built" backgrounds and conditional scenes in paintings to give viewers an interactive insight into artworks. Further, artists combine all kinds of still, motion and archived images to create scenes that can jump back and forth between past and present. This is of great interest: my work deals with reassessing the present by examining overlooked nuances. How convenient to have both instances at the same time...

A FB page called Mi Vieja Monteria proudly opens its page with an old image of one of the main drags showing a muddy avenue. Asking around about why it took so long for the town to pave its roads, the answer was simple: Monteria was--and continues to be--a cow town. Of course, now livestock gets around by truck; but then, the heavy animals couldn't possibly walk around on anything other than mud. 

Just wondering what it would be like to add footage to some of the old roads....

The Journey Continues

The living room of a house in Monteria. It's slated for preservation. 

A memory popped into my head from long ago, which seems like yesterday. One of my genius designer buddies, came up with a small, hand-held folding viewer that could show kids their sports heroes--or any collection of images--in 3D. The lenses did all the work.  It was gorgeous, but no one picked it up to produce it commercially. 

Maybe it was ahead of its time, but, more likely, time jumped far ahead of it with digital video. At that point, he was still very interested in 3D imagery and worked with various investors and developers toward building a business.

Rather than the still image, AR has taken over. The super imposition of images from the personal device has the potential to draw in the viewer from their phone. Sound can easily be accessed, also from the phone.

Looking at the pieces out there, museums were the first to create apps so visitors could get background on the exhibits easily. We are screen-addicted, after all, and seeing a painting's source or the origins of an invention in real time gives a deeper, more fun experience. It's an avenue worth exploring as institutions of all kinds mine any possibility to increase attendance.

Numerous examples with a description live on Evergine.com, a 3D graphics development company. 

How this relates to Finding the Sky is that, with the help of the various archivists I've met, and additional access to available footage, I can link what I've already done to previous materials; if necessary I can shoot additional. What's interesting, and at the crux of this project, is not so much how things have changed in the life of the subject's life, but how much has not. Many of the AR art works I have seen so far deal with memory, history, the ability to go back and interact with what is irrevocably lost.

As I write the story board for my project, I keep thinking that a comparison is more appropriate, possibly because, in my eyes, so little seems to have changed.

(above) The second floor balcony. (below) The comedor (dining room).

Robert Irwin

Busy with other projects for a while kept me away from the gallery show openings in Chelsea. I went last night. Some things don't change much; a parade of posers of all ages still crawl the streets, dressed to the nines and weaving their way through Beuys's steeles. They sinewing past the art, pretending either to know one another, or not.

The Pace was showing Robert Irwin's Unlit, a series of gel-covered fluorescent tubes covered with gels, with a grey stripe painted intermittently between the fixtures. I'd seen his scrim work at the Whitney a few years ago, fascinating how his elegant control of the space alters distance perception. And, while disappointed that this work wasn't lit, stepping up close to analyze the subtle "bar codes" is sweet.

There was a lot written about Mr. Irwin in his 91 years of working, and I'll report on it in the coming days. The images are courtesy of Pace Gallery and ArtNEt.

Coming Back To Life.....

SIS is on a roll again.

Finally with the time and wherewithal to get this show on a roll, I'm getting the "family" ready to go on the road again. I have a few prospects out, and hopefully one will accept the piece, even if it's in an abbreviated form.

Every place I've corresponded with the curators has so far given me space limitations. The smallest, 430 square feet. So that limits me to bringing three of the nine panels. Which?

Far more important, is which of the three would work well with the sound? It would, of course, have to be one steel, one ice and one stone. And, choosing which three look well and sound well will be taking the bulk of my time over the next weeks.

Ever since Picassa went dark, I don't have the nine images cycling though the sidebar of the blog; and, simply put, I haven't uploaded to Soundcloud the rest of the comps. I have some time, in between a show I have opening in Texas next week (an old work also resurrected in the new year) and revving up for the new semester at work, I'll somehow get all this done.

In the meantime, here are the pieces, and , should anyone care to send their opinions on the three they think would work best, I will consider each one. Feel free to recommend.

Note that, Steel 2 (second down left, above) is not available and was replaced with the shaved steel image, right.

Travel Through Time

Above:  Cartagena's train station; now
greatly altered. Below: the building
still exists in the old city by the
Customs House.

As I wait the final hours to board the last flight home and, for the moment, relax this image-amassing marathon, I reflect on the biggest change to the life of my centenarian subject, who now approaches 102 years old: Travel itself.

To get to Santiago from his native north Colombian town, he didn't jump the two-hour flight to Bogota and take in the snow-capped Andes from the six-hour flight to Chile as I did. He took the three-week train journey.

I went to the Museum of Cartagena, from where I traced the fate of the railway that carried my elderly friend the 4297-miles (6915 km) to his university studies. The railway from Cartagena began in 1894 as a way to ship tropical products like sugar cane to the interior. Construction was undertaken by private companies and later, subsidized briefly by the government.

The line's use steadily decreased as another port city--Barranquilla--grew and operated its own rail service to the south. The Cartagena line was ripped out in 1951, pushed out also by air travel that was more cost effective for travel [Avianca, Colombia's national airline, is the second oldest (after KLM)].

The museum's curator gave me a series of original recording of the steam engines pulling into the Cartagena station; the collection was made by various train buffs over twenty years (how awesome!). The engines were never electrified or converted to diesel engines--another contribution to their demise as cargo needs increased and the little steamies couldn't make it up the steep Andean inclines.

The station house in Antofagasta still exists
 happily; built from pine and lovingly
maintained.

From Bogota, another long train ride followed with stops along the coast to Guayaquil, Lima and Antofagasta. The routes along the Pacific were built mainly connect with the trains from the Andean mining areas of Bolivia and Peru.

Stories of luxury train cars from the mid-1930's pale today as the trains no longer transport passengers, only mine freight. The big transfer spot was Antofagasta, in the northern Chilean Desert. From there, the trains went inland to Santiago. What remains of that depot is the Antofagasta Rail Museum just north of the city with a few steam locomotives, train sheds and a turn table. Riding those freight trains through the deserts would be an adventure. Next time.

Quite ironically, there is a Cartagena-Santiago railway--in Chile. The railway station in Cartagena, Chile is a beautiful historical monument on the coast south of Valparaiso, however not visited by the young Colombian traveler.

Here's a video of the train from Cartagena (Chile) to Santiago. Skip the first minute; the old footage is wonderful.

Rock of Ages

Yes, SIS is finished, but I can't resist following up with all things steel, ice and stone.

With all shooting for FTS in Santiago finished, I peeled of the $ 500 and 6-hour (each way from Santiago) flight to one of the world's great stone capitals: EASTER ISLAND!

A friend on my FB page said it was the Holy Grail of travel designations. Honestly, it falls short of that. Not that I don't recommend it, I do. But, after viewing the Moai (pronounced Mo-ah-ee--say it fast), there isn't much of the original culture left to round out the experience due to all kinds of errors--environmental; over-priced, overreaching construction; mind-control antics from self-serving leaders and their descendants; governmental in-fighting....ehem.

A cautionary tale, the Polynesian-origin inhabitants got to the island with just about none of their provisions--the sail had taken longer than anticipated and rather than fishing for food, they ate their domesticated livestock. The only things left were a few chickens and the rats on board.

From there, they cut down trees--eventually all--for fuel to keep warm. The island is temperate, but has cold trade winds in the evening. So, from a lush sub-tropical forest, they were doomed to live in a desert in a mere hundred years with no trees left to build boats to get the hell out of Dodge.

"Maybe they shouldn't have cut down the trees..."

"Ya think?!?"

Along the way, the population divided into thirteen tribes whose leaders consigned the massive sculptures hacked out of the mountainsides. They themselves lived in 3-foot shacks built from reeds stuck in holes bored into blocks of volcanic rock, while the plebes were relegated to caves with nothing but rocks to keep them warm.

This lasted about 500 years, with very little input from other cultures--even the sea-faring South American indigenous. Research and genetic studies confirmed that mainlanders came to the island to try to trade, but left quickly donating edible roots like sweet potatoes, ginger, taro and a resistant breed of chicken. No doubt the Rapa Nui's preference for cannibalism had much to do with the short-lived relationship. Even further in the 1800's, the very few visiting traders refused to set foot on the island for fear that they, too, would be the ultimate dinner guests.

The population almost became extinct due to civil wars and slave raids adding to a lack of sustenance farming. Only as recently as the 1970's was the island and its archeology appreciated for research and preservation; only since the 1990's has tourism turned into viable option for the original 118 Rapa Nui inhabitants which have coupled with (mostly) Chilean nationals.

Valparaiso

As one car goes up, the other
returns on the same cable.

Finding correspondence to my subject's address in Santiago, I inferred that he had gone to Valparaiso to view the Pacific Ocean for the first time. I hadn't seen it in years, and I thought it was cool that the Pacific was, in Chile, in the same time zone as NYC. So I plunked down the six bucks for the bus ride and went for the day.

Like most port towns, the mountains come straight out of the ocean, and Valparaiso is an enormous precarious group of shacks forming a large favela on the precipitous Andes. I took a bus ride around hairpin curves at 45˚ angle elevations, hanging on at every turn.

Now I get it: Run for the hills. The design
work says it all.

But that was not the attraction: To get to the very tops of the hills, 12-storey staircases aren't enough. There are seven or so "asensores" (elevators) that bring you higher. The one I rode was built in 1906 and runs on a pulley and cable system, much like San Fransisco's cable cars.

I was told the crime at the top is astounding but walked around anyway, musing the Tsunami signs indicated that this was a safe zone--unlike other sides of town. Ahhh, Life in Quakesville!

Chilly in Chile

Packing for southern South America needed more thought. Asking around, I was told to pack for autumn in Milan. The fact is, it's winter in Santiago. Not like NYC, but still winter.

Santiago hadn't seen snow in 20 years. Waiting for me, I guess.

I glided into town on the surfboard of a major storm with below-zero temperatures, 6 inches (20 cm) of snow, a 48-hour blackout and a little earthquake. Add to that just about NO apartment in Santiago has heat, and I developed a major attitude problem. I almost left.

With the tiny bit of resolve I had, I layered my congealed ass with everything in my suitcase and took to the streets. Many spots my centenarian told me to look up are gone, devastated by various earthquakes over the last 80 years. Others are in tact, existing quietly alongside their neighbors, in varying states of graceful age since the Pinochet years.

Most industry has been privatized since, so the price of everything but wine is high. To meet costs, everyone--who owns a property or not--has to take in a boarder. Santiago is city of roommates and everything that comes along with it--some 70's furniture, fingerprints around light switches and doorknobs, and refrigerators with unspeakable contents.

Clear on the other side of the bohemian-neighborhood-perched-on-hip-gentrification where I'm staying, is the financial/commercial area, a sprawling collection of glass towers and conspicuous spending similar to Battery Park City pre-9/11. The backdrop for the city is the snow-capped mountain range, which most Santiaguinos say is the reason they vow never to leave--though they weekend in Buenos Aires, Valparaiso, Rio, etc, etc, etc.

Also remarkable is a weak sign of indigenous people--a chief reason to suffer seasonal jet lag. After coming from the diversity overload of Colombia, this was a jolt. Looks like you're in downtown Madrid.

And, while the street signs are amusing, I noticed a scarcity of federal buildings, compared to other capital cities. Every man for himself. Maybe this is what the US will become.

¿Como Estas?

I came down with an infection. What a drag.

I consulted with a contact in town, who picked me up and said he'd bring me to the doctor's. The doctor's house, that is. After a few questions, he reached into a credenza in his dining room for a stethoscope and BP belt, checked my vitals and wrote two referrals for lab tests.

As I suffered through the pain silently (everybody hates an ailing guest), I awaited the results of the lab tests needed to confirm which hideous bug has crawled under my skin to make voiding a few drops every half hour so excruciatingly painful. Add this to the bacterial lung issue I caught the day after I got here and the rash on my neck from something else that bit me and I strain to tell myself it's going to get better. It must.

Thanks to digital imaging, the patient
knows exactly what they're
getting into as they walk through the
door.

There's no such thing as one-stop shopping medical care down here; and, judging from the sheer number of labs, radiology facilities, pharmacies and drug stores, dentists, pediatric centers, dialysis and colonic centers, on and on and on, the population seems to battle the same stuff I do on a routine basis, hopping from place to place to get healthy.

The health facilities open at 6:00 AM. Gathered in front of each clinic is a waiting crowd of spouses, family and friends of the patient; fruit, juice and coffee vendors to ease everyone's pain; and a parade of taxi drivers and motorcyclists offering their services to bring you home. Geez!

Inside is a receptionist, an electronic number dispenser and a second receptionist behind a protective window who, I suspected, takes the payments. Everyone wears a uniform. When entering, the first receptionist--a young man who doubles as a security guard--asks the reason for my visit. None of your business is not the approved answer. Instead, you politely answer questions like: do you need a general exam? Is it an emergency? Is it an x-ray, ECG or something else?

He directed me to the electronic number dispenser and showed me which of SIX tabs to push so I'm assigned to the proper second receptionist. Seated, I watched for my number on a flat screen TV alongside a silent soccer game. The waiting room is quiet, ice-cold and so clean you could eat off the white floor; a feat that catches your attention because outside is astounding confusion and dirt.

What you see is what you get.

To the second receptionist you show your physician's referral and she, like in the US, asks for identification--Official ID, please! 
Give me a break! If I'm writhing in pain in front of you, pleading for an appointment, the name on the script says Anita Giraldo, and I've got cash in hand to pay for medical services, why do I need to prove that I'm anyone other than Anita Giraldo? 

OK fine. Here's my passport and the cash. I was annoyed at myself for not having gotten traveler's health insurance, but you never really know if it's gonna be accepted in a place like this. But hey, an x-ray set me back $ 15.00 and the lab test $ 11.00. (I'm not joking. That wouldn't even have met the co-pay). Take my money.

Sat down again. A few minutes later a door opened and a technician called me in for the test. Now we're getting somewhere...Perfect painless phlebotomy technique--never felt the needle going in, couple of pulls and I was done. Come back Thursday.

Groan. I'm in horrible pain now! Smile. What do you suggest? She: Your physician gave you two pain medications. Fill them both and take them wisely. See you Thursday around 4:00. Me: Can't you send the results directly to the doctor? Apparently not.

The pharmacy experience was better. In a faintly perfumed, again, ice-cold shop with gliding cabinets, an impeccable man took the script, gave me a bunch of bubble foils (to protect the pills from melting). He went over the instructions THREE times and charged me $ 3.50 for two sets of pain killers to last fourteen days.

Keep smiling!

Shooting Notes III

Cartagena, a city on the Caribbean with a rich and long history, is surrounded by a huge mangrove formed by the flood plains and lake lands of the River Magdalena and its tributaries. While the Magdalena does not flow through Cartagena, a series of natural lakes, lagoons (ciénagas) and man-made canals dug by the Pre-Colombian Zenú form an enormous thorn mangrove that stretches all the way to Santa Marta.

To defend the city from bands of pirates and invading navies often numbering in the thousands, the colonial Spaniards built a network of walls around the city's outermost shores, leaving the waters behind it to ebb and swell sustaining a diverse ecosystem of birds, fish and crustaceans.

Further to the west, the mangrove winds behind a sandy beach area, an area of extreme poverty where a native population--mixed with Spaniards and the slaves they brought throughout the 1500's and 1600's--eek out a meager living on the water.

The first time I went, I shot within the tunnels of reeds and trees from the slow-moving canoe guided by a young man from the area, fairly knowledgeable about the flora and fauna. Toward the end of the tour, near sunset, I saw, on the flat calm beach, the villagers unwinding from a day at work. Some were coming home from meager jobs in the hospitality industry, but most, were fishermen in the ocean and mangrove. The light and the scenery was captivating.

I pushed my equipment as far as it would go; the shoot was a failure. Next day, I looked at the worthless footage, burned out in some areas and in grim focus in others. I revisited the equipment I brought, packed the long lens with the extra-long lens-hood and the tripod. A few hours later, at sunset, I was on the water with my tour guide again.

The waters of the mangrove are only about 12 inches (30 cm) deep, so when I saw what I wanted, I requested the tour guide to stop, planted my tripod in the water and shot, with just a little sway, because of the incoming tide. Washed the tripod in the shower when I got back to the hotel. As for the edges of the reeds, again, with the long lens, I shot from a distance to capture details of the environment as we glided by.


I used images by Frank Gohlke (left) as reference and inspiration.

Lesson learned: push your equipment as far as it can go without ruining it. And, never hesitate to shoot something twice. Three times or more if necessary.

Entrepreneurship

Turning a trade into a livelihood is the basis of entrepreneurship. Just ask any artist. And, while artists might wince at this statement, they're quite adept in finding ways to pay the rent, get a plane ticket or finish their next piece that go around selling an artwork or performance, since it's not a dependable source of income (even if famous).

The one-person, do-or-die business model is in full display in developing nations since many entrepeneurs take to the streets to do business.  Beyond food vendors, some get their living from the streets by plying their trades: Need those heels done? Hand'em over. A hem to your skirt? Hold still. Need a paralegal to create document, typed with a typewriter? No prob, have a seat.


My interest is how technology aids in that entrepreneurship. The man selling pineapples needs to get his message across: I have to sell and save my throat, so I got one of these and found the speakers in a junk yard. Works great, huh?

A different weekly message is on endless loop, and interspersed with a joke or two, so I can attract customers with a laugh.

Move Over, Hermes

Further down the Fifth Avenue of Monteria are more ranger supply shops, some with ready-made items for the cowboy in a hurry, and others that will build to suit.

Needless to say, there are many kinds of saddles, each appropriate for the type of horse and its use. This particular outfit custom-makes draft saddles; taking orders and special requests from an iPad. Love it.



Left:
top: Look at that old Singer in the backroom! Now that's a work horse. The store owner said he's waiting for a part to come in for it...
middle: The exquisite leather punching detail is not for draft horse but for a gentleman rancher's steed.
bottom: Everyone likes a decorated stirrup...Note the motorcycle helmet: You know, we deliver.....

Sound Notes

I have other stuff, of course, but
here's the main set-up on my
beautiful bedspread. 

Shooting in the topics has its challenges. Taping sound in the tropics is a challenge on steroids. While my sound buddies will scoff at my set-up, I did come prepared with a digital recorder, my two Audio Technica mics--one cardioid and one shotgun, a lavalier for interviews, quite a few XLR cables of different lengths, brackets to hold the mics while I shooting, and headphones. I brought cotton-paper ear covers to make them more comfortable in heat. Good idea since they also offered protection from the humidity.

Early on I had determined not to synch any sound to the images, I was going to tape ambient sound and mix it in post production. So, I set about taping the sounds of the city--the birds, monkeys, river sounds, all good. However, within the week, the poor recorder was shorting out; the batteries heating up the little thing until it was useless. I'm looking for a spot where I can unscrew it to see what's wrong; but, the manual indicates that the recorder will not work in high humidity environments.

Come on....this isn't a steam room, I thought. Well, it is. Ninety-six+ degrees with rain three times a day and 99% percent humidity qualifies. So, I'm retiring it for the moment and I'm off to the market to get a pound of rice where I'll immerse it to try and pull some of condensation out of it. Go ahead, sound geeks, scoff some more. But it's not working now, so how's a little rice gonna hurt?

Panicked because I didn't have any way to tape sound, I turned to the camcorder I threw in the suitcase at the last minute. I got it a scant four years ago to tape my KS video and happy home vids.

Rewind to a few weeks ago at B&H: Technology now allows a professional grade outfit for $20 more than what I paid for my pro-sumer item. So, if you're in the market, go for the video recorder because  you'll get superior sound recording capability. Even my little camcorder has various sound file formats which most SLRs don't. But if the machine says it can shoot video, it ought to. Sound is a critical part of motion media.

The only drag about the camcorder is

that both jacks are accessible only 

when the screen pops open.

The SONY with which I have been shooting all the visuals doesn't have a mic input (perhaps other digital SLRs might); the camcorder has a the jack for the mic, and a jack for the headphones too. Just tested it, it sounds great; I'm back in business.

Going forward, I'll be bringing desiccator bags.