Photographing flowers with my Deardorff 8x10

A beautiful hand crafted wooden1930s Deardorff camera complete with the factory offered "extended bellows" feature - A gift from my dear friend, Wally Seawell, one of Hollywood's magnificent Golden Era photographers. Every iconic artist of the Silver Screen from Mary Pickford to Betty Davis, Gregory Peck, John Wayne and Elizabeth Taylor has played a starring role in front of this camera, appearing upside down and backwards on it's shimmering ground glass. That history never fails to tap on my shoulder every time I slide under the dark cloth. 

 

“The single most important component of a camera is the twelve inches behind it!”
― Ansel Adams

Other Skies

I'm working on the new pictures from Paris, called " Sketches for Atget." These prints are a group of photographs taken on several walks over a period of three days in Paris. All of the photographs were taken with what remains of my 4x5 Polaroid stock. What a better place than Paris? I've posted these two.