Coyote pup sitting beside yellow daisies, Jasper National Park, Canada. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.

BBC = bBS

Hey Folks,

Here’s an interesting article from the UK Telegraph; the first paragraph pretty much sums things up: “The BBC is accused of routinely faking footage in wildlife documentaries, by using studio sets, sound effects and tame animals to portray creatures in the wild.”

Now, I know what you’re thinking: yes, indeed, the UK Telegraph commenting on any media source of ‘faking’ anything is pretty sad. Let’s disregard tabloid integrity for a moment and consider what this is really about (and what’s WAY more fun); wildlife photography.

Wildlife photography does not include zoo and game farm animals; shooting captive subjects, given that some folks are perpetually going to choose to do this, should always be labelled as such, even if only via context (see Darwin Wiggett’s bear photo for an example; and notice that he captioned it regardless).

I have yet to hear anyone explain how photographing a bear in a cage is wildlife anything. The root of the word ‘wild’ is free-willed, not Free Willy. I understand, for certain, there are degrees of what that might mean. Is a zebra migrating hundreds of miles across the plains in Africa before being hemmed in by a fence really free willed? *

The fact that there are indeed myriad shades of gray, woven through every possible facet of our world, does not make charcoal black any less black. We might differ on where 18% gray is, but we know what black is.

A bear in a cage is a bear in a cage, and not wildlife. Steel bars and free will aren’t friends.

Wildlife photography must be about wild, as people photography must be about people. Photographing captive animals is no more wildlife photography than photographing my pickup truck parked in front of the house might make me a Nascar photographer; a photo of me in my stylishly stunning goretex jacket is not fashion photography.

So what is “wildlife”? In thinking of how critically different a captive animal is to a wild one, I’m reminded of a powerful passage by Derrick Jensen in his great book, Thought to Exist in the Wild, Awakening to the Nightmare of Zoos: “A sea lion is her habitat. She is the school of fish she chases. She is the water. She is the cold wind blowing over the ocean. She is the waves that strike the rocks on which she sleeps and she is the rocks. She is the constant calling back and forth between members of her family, this talking to each other that never seems to stop. She is the shark who eventually ends her life. She is all these things. She is that web. She is the process of being a sea lion, in place. She is her desires, which we can only learn by letting her show us, if she wants; not by encaging her.”

That’s what wild is. A bear in a cage relentlessly pacing back and forth thru its own shit is not.

The power of photography is in its capture. What makes a photo so appealing to a viewer is the moment. Reality portrayed on a 2 dimensional plane. If we look through great moments in all forms of photography and ask the question of what is it that evokes a reaction in a viewer, it’s clearly a response to some perceived sense of reality, to some actual experience; even if that sense is simply someone else’s “take” on reality. We understand that moment. We feel it. We relate to it.

I think it’s important that we don’t deny that power, that integral function of a photograph. Photography might, translated literally, mean ‘painting with light’, but that’s a superfluous definition. Photography is most definitely NOT painting. Photography is photography.

When we present that photography as something other than what it actually is we’re not documentarians. It’s a copout to hide beneath the veneer of “artists” as well; the only use of the term “artist” that might be appropriate for those photographers who don’t disclose captive subjects is “con-artist”.

Speaking of such, even the National Advertising Division recently made a similar statement when they banned an ad by Proctor & Gamble for too much digital manipulation. The NAD took things a step further, however, and pointed out that even a footnote isn’t enough; that is, full disclosure should be FULL disclosure: “You can’t use a photograph to demonstrate how a cosmetic will look after it is applied to a woman’s face and then – in the mice type – have a disclosure that says ‘okay, not really.’

Some folks claim that labeling their photographs reduces nature photography to a form devoid of ulterior meaning, but I disagree. We humans label things. We label animals, features, subjects, moments, days, places, etc. We label each other. We label ourselves. And yes, we label our art. We label sculptures as ‘sculptures’, paintings as ‘paintings’, poetry as ‘poetry’, and so on. We even subdivide each form into further categories, and label pieces and subdivisions accordingly. Photography becomes ‘journalistic photography’, or ‘still life photography’ and ‘nature photography’. This is what we do. Its how we know the world.

IMO, the power of nature photography is its expression of the natural world. Portrayals of captive animals as wild animals loses much of the power that comes through our relationships and experiences with nature. I see no harm in expecting artists and documentarians alike to pronounce their work for what it is. The phrase ‘nature photograph’ carries with it certain intimations. A trip to the zoo is NOT one of those.

Cheers

Carl

* PS: the answer to the question about the zebra is (a), yes.

Brown bear, Ursus arctos, standing raised upright and rubbing her back against a birch tree in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.

Hey Folks,

I can’t imagine my father ever calling himself a “professional University lecturer” or my brother referring himself to as a “professional math teacher”.

The word professional means many things; but when it’s followed with a vocation, such as “photographer”, it doesn’t mean that you enjoy photography a lot, or that you speak politely about it, or that someone bought a print from you. It doesn’t even mean that you have a website. It doesn’t mean you teach workshops and lead tours, either.

Show me a professional photographer, and I’ll wager a dollar I’ll show you someone who’s struggled to pay their rent, who’s sold gear to make their car payment (or sold their car to make their gear payment), someone who’s eaten peanut butter sandwiches because that’s what was available to eat.

A professional photographer has made real sacrifice to do what they do (there are always exceptional cases, with trust funds, a wealthy spouse, etc). It’s a risk. It’s giving up an awful lot to choose to pursue a particular vocation. It’s losing on that risk, picking up, and swinging the stick again. And again. And yet again. Repeat, infinitum.

It sounds much more glamorous than it might be. It means you take the bus sometimes, it means you sit in the rain and wish you were somewhere else. It means you sometimes take a lower price for a sale because you need shoes. Pardon my French, but it means you’ve been sh** on. It means you’ve wished, cursed and swore that you had chosen some other manner to live by. It means you say ‘yes’ when you think ‘oh sh**, that gig sounds like hell’. It means you say ‘yes’ and then that gig actually IS hell. And you then say ‘yes’ again. Still you pursue it.

Being a professional photographer (or musician, or actor, or writer) doesn’t just mean you’re good at what you do, or that you’re very passionate about photography. It doesn’t just mean you spend time promoting yourself. It doesn’t just mean you write invoices and receipts. It doesn’t simply mean you work hard to ‘get the shot’ (it doesn’t mean you use such ridiculously lame phrases as ‘get the shot’, either). It certainly doesn’t mean you have a facebook/twitter/google+ page.

It means you took a step. And another. And another. You consciously chose a path less traveled. You stepped into an unknown world and wondered ‘how should I live?’ It likely means you’ve also wondered ‘will I make it?” That’s an incredible dilemma to have; and for many people, continue to have. It’s a very different place to be in.

Being a professional photographer means you’re probably not striving to become something else (though some certainly do); you’re not doing it to make some bank while you try to get your law business off the ground.

The term “professional photographer” means so much more than how you see yourself, your own sense of identity, though that’s certainly a part of it. You ARE a photographer. It’s not a simple advertising slogan. It’s not just a banner for your website. It’s real, folks, and it does mean something. And to every professional photographer out there, hats off to you.

Cheers

Carl

View up Arrigetch Creek toward the Arrigetch Peaks, Xanadu, Ariel and Caliban, from left to right. A popular rock climbing and backpacking destination, the Arrigecth Peaks lie in the heart of Alaska's Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, right near the Continental Divide. Arrigetch Peaks, Gates of the Arctic National Park, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.

Hey Folks,

You perhaps saw this recent story in the news about our ‘drowning in a sea of images’. It’s an interesting view, and, I believe, a very valid point. Any kind of inundation makes staying afloat a difficult task. And sometimes it’s impossible.

A photographer and artist I admire, Chase Jarvis, recently posted a response to this on his blog, about how we’re not drowning, but getting richer with this unabating torrent of images. That’s kind of a weird take on it. What kind of flood can we swim through?

Chase argues “shouldn’t it be said that we’re not drowning in photography at all, that we’re perhaps getting metaphorically rich off more and more of these veins of gold?”

“veins of gold”? Gold has value because it’s rare. And because it’s durable. If gold were produced quite as readily as iphone “pics” seem to be, and had a similar lifespan of any digital file, it wouldn’t cost eighteen hundred dollars an ounce right now. I’d suggest a better chemical analogy might be carbon dioxide. CO2 seems to be pretty prevalent right now, becoming ever more so, and, contrary to what the s(k)eptics tell ya, it’s not enriching our world.

I suspect the ever increasing barrage of images only serves to dilute how we respond to great work. When we DO see an image of value, we no longer know how to savor it. Or why. Images (and content in general) are thrown at us so constantly, we can’t begin to appreciate them. We don’t have time, and we don’t have the interest. We don’t have the capability. Humans are creatures of habit; we’re being conditioned, and ever more strongly today, to quickly move on to what’s next, to discard and proceed, to eat on the run. We don’t know how to sit and relish some tasty tidbit.

We have no idea what we’re missing. I’ll quote Wendell Berry (always good form):

“Nothing is more pleasing or heartening than a plate of nourishing, tasty, beautiful food artfully and lovingly prepated. Anything less is unhealthy as well as a desecration”. – Health Is Membership, from Another Turn of the Crank. (Buy yourself this book. And then buy it for someone else. The first sentence above could be well used, metaphorically, to describe Wendell’s writing)

Chase’s argument, in my opinion, is like arguing that the world of fast food, of sliced Wonder Bread and pre-packaged everything somehow improves our diet over eating home baked bread (which, I can assure you, after my delicious sandwich on wheat today, it does not!) and garden grown veggies. We’re not getting richer on a diet of genetically modified grains; and we’re not getting richer via an endless deluge of pics that we’ll maybe see one time before they’re deleted or lost on some corrupted hard drive. Simply because it’s abundant and easily produced doesn’t mean we’re prospering because of it.

But the real killer, the coup de grâce in the post is this statement: “I prefer to make the argument that the snapshot has become perhaps the most human, the most important photography of our modern era.” (my emph. added)

“our”? His maybe. I’m not sure he and I live in the same universe, nevermind era. This statement is simply wrong on so many levels. “The snapshot is the most human photography of the modern era”? What an absurdly bizarre comment from a great photographer and artist. Is the text message the most human literature of the modern era? A 140 character tweet? Are 30 second advertisements on TV the most important film of the modern era? A junior burger the most human of our culinary efforts? Are

This is not simply incorrect, it’s precisely the kind of thing that contributes to the drowning. We’re also drowning, you see, in a sea of blogs and articles and essays and posts and tweets and shares and retweets and circles and status updates and  texts and … well .. squalor.Everyone’s so keen to make the most noise, and get heard, they’ll write anything, about anything, to ask for attention. Someone writes an article about how noisy the world is? Respond with an article about how rich our ears are. Someone writes an article about how the internet world is too hectic? Respond with an article about slovenly you used to be. Someone writes a great article about anything? You retweet it; you don’t actually READ it, you retweet it. That, imo, is drowning.

Now, if Chase COULD support his point of view with the odd coincidence that this sea of images has coincided with the most expensive price ever paid for a pic. But he didn’t.

What we don’t need is people like Chase adding to the nonsense; he’s usually an astute and insightful guy, and I enjoy his work. A lot. But this kind of post is all of what’s wrong with the internet, the digital age, and precisely what the original column he mentions is in reference to.

Cheers

Carl

PS: The undrowned image above was taken on my trip to the Arrigetch Peaks, in Gates of the Arctic National Park, this past fall. And not with a telephone.

Hey Folks,

Just spreading the word here: You’re all familiar with GoDaddy hosting service. The CEO, Bob Parsons has posted a video of himself on vacation to Zimbabwe, where he, gets this … shoots a bull elephant. The video is presented here.

The guise that this is “saving people’s crops” is simply ridiculous; I suppose next he’ll save by handing out free GoDaddy caps to villagers he not only fed, but clothed, the villagers.

If you host your site with GD, I hope you’ll take steps to move it elsewhere. I certainly would. There’s no way I’d want any of my money going to fund this idiot’s business.

Photographer Jim Goldstein has a blog on this topic, as well; and full props to him for getting the word out there on a subject like this. HIs blog is here.

Cheers

Carl

An adult Bald Eagle silhouetted headshot, on perch, Homer, Alaska. (Haliaeetus leucocephalus). This photo was taken with photo equipment, by a photographer. The 2 worked together. The eagle co-operated only briefly. Pesky eagles. Click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.

Hey Folks,

I read it again last night. This nonsense has to stop. Why do photographers so often have such a hard time simply acknowledging that what we do is inherently technological? As such, technological advances (i.e., new gear) can (and typically do) play an enormous role in the work we produce. Perhaps much more so than most other art forms.

You’ve all seen the kind of commentary I’m talking about; another piece about how painters don’t talk endlessly about their paintbrushes. Or, even more inanely, how if Art Wolfe were to shoot with a P&S camera, he’d still produce a remarkable portfolio. It’s the photographer, not the camera, that produces great work, blah, blah, blay.

Right?

Wrong.

While it’s true that no camera ever went out and took a photograph by itself, it’s also true that no photographer ever went out and took a photograph without a camera, either. Clearly, then, things are not quite as simple as some folks would have us believe.

Photography requires both photographer AND photography equipment. The relative weight of the role of each varies, for sure, but to deny the significance of the equipment in photography, and particularly wildlife photography, is to deny reality.

Even a cursory examination of photography illustrates how valuable the technology is to what we do. Recent advances such as Image Stabilization/Vibration Reduction, Auto-focus and focus tracking, High ISO, etc, etc play a critical role in much of what many of us shoot. It’s always amusing to me to hear Joe Schmoe talk about how secondary the gear is to taking photo, standing there with $20 thousand dollars worth of camera hanging off his shoulders. I’d invite Mr Schmoe the present his portfolio of images taken without any gear sometime.

But let’s look at some of the common arguments heard, such as those presented above.

a) Painters and their brushes. Wrong. Talk to painters sometime. Here’s just one example:

“Make sure you have the best possible brushes you can afford. While it is possible to save money on paint and canvas, one should never work with cheap brushes. In my experience, cheaper brushes are simply not worth it.”

Serious painters often spend years studying not just composition and form, but even paint makeup, etc, of the old masters.

And even though we can see the argument is simply incorrect, what if it weren’t? So what? We’re not painters, we’re photographers. Writers don’t look to dancers for direction, why should photographers mimic painters?

b) Art Wolfe and his P&S camera. Art’s one of my favorite photographers. Amazingly talented and hard-working man. And he knows his gear, wonderfully well. And, he doesn’t use a P&S, but typically is carrying some of the most advanced, technologically involved camera gear available. Here’s just one example from his blog. This post, from 2 years ago, lists his basic kit. The fact that he lists his sponsors liberally across his website supports the idea that his gear is, at least to Art, critical.

Secondly, and more importantly, what highlights how silly this argument is, is that it ignores the most fundamental point about all ‘gear’; one has to know how to use gear, regardless what kinda gear we’re talking about. Hand Mr Wolfe a P&S that he doesn’t know how to use, and I’ll wager he doesn’t produce much worth a damn with it. Hand him one with the camera manual, and he’ll do much better.

3rd point; offering Art Wolfe as an example to make a point is like suggesting we might all become wealthy by running fast, and then pointing to Usain Bolt to support your case. Statistically speaking, those people don’t even exist.

4th point; hand Art Wolfe that same P&S and his current DSLR system for a week, and I’ve little doubt with which system he’ll produce a stronger portfolio.

c) It’s the photographer. Sure, it is indeed. A great photographer produces great photographs. But I don’t know very many at all who don’t use good, or really good, gear. And I know quite a few photographers. And I’ll suggest that regardless of what they might tell their workshop clients, or write in their articles, they use good gear, if not the best they can scratch out, because they know they’ll produce much better results with it.

Gear matters. And I spent a helluva lotta money on it last year, so I damned well better be right.

Cheers

Carl (wishing he had a D3s)

Black and white photo of Great Egret, St. Augustine, Florida.

Hey Folks

“The word photography is based on the Greek φῶς(photos) “light” and γραφή (graphé) “representation by means of lines” or “drawing”, together meaning “drawing with light” (ya gotta love Wikipedia).

“Photography means painting/drawing with light”.

It’s time photographers (and photography) mature, and walk away from this virtually meaningless phrase. The phrase is a fabrication, deception at best, and  has never been valid. Let it rot. We’re not painters, we’re photographers. We no more “draw with light” than does any person with their finger in the sand. Pixels and film aren’t light, they don’t even “capture” light, they merely represent it – to propose otherwise suggests only a childlike understanding of what light might actually be.

If interpreted in this callow manner, all painting would similarly be “painting with light”. Indeed, all visual art could be a form of painting with light; drawing with pencils and crayons, digital graphic arts, sculpture, pottery, dance, et al. Van Gogh painted with light. Michaelangelo painted with light. Early aboriginal cave paintings were painted with light; with no light, there’d be no painting. Most certainly, there would be no viewing these paintings. The idea that we paint with light is no more valid than saying carpenters sculpt houses with stardust.

The point here is that photography is not painting at all, any more than sculpture, pottery or dance might be painting. Photography is photography, regardless of the ancient Greek root; Ancient Greeks didn’t own cameras Photographers make photos, they don’t paint.

So why do so many folks love to recite this silly phrase?

One reason; it’s a futile grasp for artistic credibility. Futile not because photography isn’t artful, but because art (and artistic credibility) comes through, and only through, one’s own creating. Art is not a function of merely claiming alignment with other artforms. We can call our work whatever we want, but that plays no bearing on what it actually might be.

Photographers have long felt disenfranchised from the prestigious ‘art world’. But it’s time to mature and understand that the moniker of ‘artist‘ does not come via grasping at straws and clever exegesis, but via devoted and passionate creative pursuit. If photographers seek to be embraced as artists, they should aspire to achieve that on their own artistic merit; in short, be artful. Photography is not, and need not, be some kind of paintings little brother, art-by-proxy. It’s past time to cease perpetuating the concept; ironically, that very concept is quite probably one of the reasons so many in the art world have balked at including photography as art.

A second reason is a little more disheartening; photographers often explore the “art versus journalism” idea, and the Greek roots of the word are tossed around as we if actually converse in alpha beta kappa. In making an argument for the creative artistic freedom to infinitely manipulate images on a computer monitor, or present their captive animal images as wildlife photography, photographers love to align themselves with the creative spirit of a painter; “We’re artists, we need/deserve our freedom”. The idea that photographers might compare themselves with painters regarding the degree of reality in their creations is simply fantastical. Further, it speaks to photographers’ own discomfort and poor sense of artistic worth that they might wish to do so.

It’s a little distressing to see how many photographers fall back on this phrase to discuss what they do. Photographers, for whatever reason, seem unable to find their footing; when they feel their own artistic legitimacy is threatened, they stand on messy filament like “painting with light” to gain some kind of street cred in the art world. The flawed logic is simple; painting is unarguably a valid artform. Ergo, if we ‘paint with light’, we too are artistés.

Finally; just to be clear; there’s an immeasurable difference in kind between taking a photo and placing pixels on a computer then using mathematical algorithms to instruct those pixels how to appear. The latter, though understandably part of the photographic process, is most definitely not “painting with light”. It may very well be artful, even incredibly artful – but that’s another issue for another conversation.

“A photograph is not only an image (as a painting is an image), an interpretation of the real; it is also a trace, something directly stencilled off the real, like a footprint or a mask.” –  Susan Sontag, US novelist and essayist. ‘On Photography’.

Photographers don’t paint or draw or sculpt or throw pots or dance or sing or act; we photograph. And we photograph with cameras, and lenses and tripods and fancy vests, all which most of us pay far more money for than we need to. What we do not do is ‘paint with light’.

Cheers

Carl

Arctic fox and oil barrels on the coastal plain, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska. Please click on the image to view a larger version of the photo.

Hey Folks,

Excuse my rant; but, this is my blog, and I’m about to wander in the mtns for a while. Before I go, I need to speak out.

I read earlier today of ex-Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s latest comments about the current disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. She states “Radical environmentalists: you are damaging the planet with your efforts to lock up safer drilling areas”.

Her basic premise is that the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe is the work and responsibility of “extreme environmentalists”. Let’s disregard, for now, the fact that she’s been a proponent of offshore drilling for years now (including her 2008 run for VP where she repeatedly claimed that Drill Baby, Drill “also means safely tapping into our offshore sources, safely, environmentally safe”. In her own words, whilst debating then-Senator Joe Biden she stammered “You even called drilling — safe, environmentally-friendly drilling offshore — as raping the outer continental shelf. There — with new technology, with tiny footprints even on land, it is safe to drill and we need to do more of that“.

“friendly”? If it weren’t so sad it would be farcical; what the hell is “friendly” about extracting crude oil from beneath the ocean? Makes me wonder what kind of “friends” some of these people keep.  If one of my friends came over to the house and started drilling a hole 20 000′ into the lawn I’d say they’re outta their mind.

I’ve no problem with a discussion of the collective responsibility owned by our society. I hopefully made that clear in my earlier post here. But I won’t absolve the oil industry of their responsibility, nor the clowns who would reduce a discussion of the energy policy of the world’s largest energy consumer to a 3-word bumper-sticker slogan: “Drill Here, Drill Now”  of theirs, which is the intent of Palin’s outburst. Sarah Palin’s remarks, along with this childish assessment from Ted Nugent is not an honest critique of any social construct at all. In fact, it’s nothing more than the opposite of that; an attempt to divert attention from the direct and very palpable targets of hella-oil, political corruption and bumper-sticker political campaigns to a somewhat more nebulous, transparent target. That is intolerable.

A cursory examination of Sarah Palin’s recent article, where she musters the troops by pointing the finger directly at their favoritest of enemies: environmentalists.

“This is a message to extreme “environmentalists” who hypocritically protest domestic energy production offshore and onshore. There is nothing “clean and green” about your efforts. Look, here’s the deal: when you lock up our land, you outsource jobs and opportunity away from America and into foreign countries that are making us beholden to them. Some of these countries don’t like America. Some of these countries don’t care for planet earth like we do – as evidenced by our stricter environmental standards.”

Better yet, how about a message to “extreme idiots”? Don’t pretend this is about outsourcing jobs; BP is a British Company – what better outsourcing than to siphon the profits from American oil to foreign countries? Or, better yet, she works for FOX News, a corporation whose 2nd largest owner is from where? Saudi Arabia. I’d ask if it’s not OK for us to buy foreign oil, why is it OK for her to work for their media outlets?

Anyway, she’s wrong. There is plenty clean and green about extreme “environmentalists” who work to protect wildlands in the US. The coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is one of the few places still “green and clean” and that’s largely thanks to the folks she’s insulting with her accusations. Here’s green:

Brooks Range meets the coastal plain, Brooks Mountain Range foothills, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, ANWR, Alaska. Please click on the image to view a larger version of the photo.

A greater point might be made in reference to jobs though. How many jobs in the Gulf region have been lost by this single incident? What economic cost is escalating daily because of these strict environmental standards?

Why do these “stricter environmental standards” exist at all? Are they a function of hysterically screaming “Drill Here, Drill Now”? Of course not! Those standards, though clearly far from tight enough, are the result of protests, studies, activism (including, yes, lawsuits) and diligent, hard work by the very same extreme environmentalists she’s now attacking. If it were not for some of these “radicals”, this kind of disaster wouldn’t be as uncommon as it is. If the environmentalists are guilty of anything, its of not resisting this ecological violence forcefully enough. It’s the compromises they’ve made, not the positions they defended, that contributed to this situation.

“You’re not preventing environmental hazards; you’re outsourcing them and making drilling more dangerous.”

Excuse me? She just got through months and months of telling us how “totally safe and environmentally friendly” this offshore drilling is. Or perhaps we shouldn’t have taken her word for it. In (BP America VP) David Rainey’s own words, offshore drilling is “both safe and protective of the environment”. The oil industry has been clamoring for years about how their fancy new gizmos and gadgets, the very latest in technologies, afford safe, friendly offshore drilling. Now Sarah is claiming this drilling is dangerous and hazardous. Why were they lying all this time?

“We need permission to drill in safer areas, including the uninhabited arctic land of ANWR. It takes just a tiny footprint – equivalent to the size of LA’s airport – to tap America’s rich and plentiful oil and gas up north. ANWR’s drilling footprint is like a postage stamp on a football field.”

You already DO have permission to drill in “safer areas” (your husband used to work for BP – how much time did he spend in the Beaufort Sea?). Onshore? How about 95% of the entire Alaska arctic coastal plain is open to drilling? What Sarah means is “permission to drill in those areas we haven’t yet squeezed dry”.

Re; the postage stamp. Seriously, if I hear this absurd remark once more, someone needs to lose an eye. Here’s an analogy that might bring some perspective to the ecological sensitivity of the arctic coastal plain known as Sec 1002: If I stab you in the eye with a tiny little needle, are you going to be OK, simply because the hole, the tiniest pinprick, is like a postage stamp on a football field?

Further, on Oct 21 2008 Sarah Palin said of the McCain/Palin strategy for energy development:

“John {McCain} and I have to adopt an all-of-the-above approach to meet America’s great energy challenge for you. That means harnessing alternative sources, like wind, and solar, and biomass, and geothermal.

And we will develop clean-coal technology. And we will safely drill for the billions of barrels of oil that we have underground, including off-shore.”

Clearly her position was not one of opposition to off-shore drilling. Sarah Palin didn’t advocate for drilling off-shore as an alternative to on-shore drilling; there was no “in lieu of” here. She advocated off-shore drilling in ADDITION to on-shore drilling. In fact, she didn’t even mention the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Why not? Because this isn’t about “extreme environmentalists” at all. She knew, and still knows, that virtually every poll taken has shown the majority of the American public are opposed to opening the Refuge to drilling. So we’re a country of extremists now, apparently.

Other pro-drilling comments recently have included Alaska Congressman Don Young parroting Rush Limbaugh’s statement that

“This is not an environmental disaster, and I will say that again and again because it is a natural phenomenon. Oil has seeped into this ocean for centuries, will continue to do it. During World War II there was over 10 million barrels of oil spilt from ships, and no natural catastrophe. … We will lose some birds, we will lose some fixed sealife, but overall it will recover.”

No, Mr Young – stupidity is a natural phenomenon, not oil rigs exploding in the Gulf of Mexico. Unfortunately for the communities (human and other) directly affected by this tragedy, the oil is not “seeping” but spewing into the ocean. To pretend this disaster is a “natural phenomenon” is the equivalent of calling the Vietman War a natural phenomenon – people have been fighting and killing and dying for centuries, no? How about a drunk driver tears his Mack truck into you as you walk across the street? What could be more a “natural phenomenon” than violent death?

To claim that this is not a catastrophe merely because “overall it will recover” is as insulting to my intelligence as it is an expression of Mr Young’s own lack thereof. Catastrophic does not mean unable to recover from. In fact, it means

1. “involving or causing sudden great damage or suffering” or,

2. “extremely unfortunate or unsuccessful”

The tragic events still unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico fit both of those definitions. This is indeed a catastrophe, and to attempt to leverage political gain out of the harm being done to people, to wildlife, to plants, to the ecology of the Gulf suggests a boundless moral bankruptcy. Mr Young, screw you.

Red Phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius), Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, ANWR, Alaska. Please click on the image to view a larger version of the photo.

That these 2 people are Alaskans, both of whom saw firsthand the devastation of the EXXON-VALDEZ disaster barely 20 years ago makes their commentary here all the more reprehensible. To borrow a phrase from climate scientist Joe Romm, rather than sitting on her porch straining to glimpse Russia, Sarah Palin would do well to look over her shoulder where she might really see Valdez, where at least (and probably far more than) 11 million gallons of crude oil dumped into the pristine waters of the the Prince William Sound. Mr Young, ask the herring fisherman of Cordova if they felt the events of March 1989 were catastrophic? Ask the nearly seven thousand people who reported chemical induced illnesses from the oil toxins. Ask the 250 thousand seabirds, thousands of marine mammals and countless other coastal marine organisms that died as a result of Exxon-Mobil’s mess.

A catastrophe, Mr Young, is not the 1-plus million dollars you’ve spent on your high-priced DC lawyers fending of the Justice Dept’s ongoing investigations into your own political liveliness. A catastrophe is the lives lost when a Blowout Preventer failed to stem a gas leak in Transocean Limited’s oil rig, Deepwater Horizon, and the devastation it’s wreaking on a whole host of people and creatures who can’t fend off toxic sludge. That, Don, is a catastrophe.

The final comment I want to make (for now) pertains to the noise in the media about whether President Barack Obama is angry enough about this. I’m not going to defend everything this administration has done, particularly in this instance, because I do think they’ve dropped the ball in a few areas. But really? “get angrier”? Folks, I don’t want a president whose response is to stamp his feet and fume. A tantrum isn’t a solution. Not for grownups. I want a president who ensures things are done, and done correctly. If you want to argue that particular issue, please go right ahead. But if all you have to worry about is does the President’s expression of anger measure up to your requirements, I’d suggest you should perhaps start asking WHY you want him to be angry? Why don’t YOU get angry? We don’t need to outsource our emotions. Ratchet up your own feelings, and demand swift political action and complete, immediate retribution.

I’ll be back in a few weeks.

Cheers

Carl

Coastal plain, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska (aerial photo).

Hey Folks,

Last night I attended  public comment hearing for the preliminary stages of a Comprehensive Conservation Plan (CCP) for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). In short, this comment period allows the public to offer information and thoughts on some of the issues they feel might need to be addressed, and oftentimes their thoughts as to how those issues should be addressed. The CCP will be a document that “outlines and guides long-term management” of the Refuge. The US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) are the land management agency responsible for managing the Refuge. If you would like to add your input at this stage, here is Comment Form for the Refuge. Before you do, it’s worth browsing the FWS ANWR webpage for some useful ideas on how this works (they’re not looking for reasons why the coastal plain might or might not be opened to drilling – that decision is to be the work of Congress, not the simple folks of the FWS).

One of the critical topics up for discussion is the designation of  ”wilderness” in the Refuge. Currently, nearly half (41%) of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge 19.3 million acres is designated wilderness. The remaining 10 million acres are not currently designated “wilderness”. The FWS are presently proposing to study these areas and determine whether or not they qualify as wilderness; the ‘Wilderness Review‘ section of the CCP. A recommendation could then be made to Congress to designate these areas wilderness. Such a designation would render the Refuge off-limits to oil and gas extraction.

The arguments were the same tired commentaries we’ve heard countless times now; “we need the oil, we don’t need to send our money overseas, national security, billions of dollars worth of economic value, etc, etc”. Yadda Yadda Yadda. What everybody failed to mention is reality; the area IS wild. I challenge anyone to visit the Refuge, traverse those majestic mountains, feel the vastness of the coastal plain, and argue that this is not wild land, is not wildness and wilderness. We can draw up our arbitrary lines of demarcation, our imaginary boundaries, but all this illustrates is how far removed we are from a real understanding of wildness, of wilderness.

The caribou herds know. The great grizzly bears know. The Arctic Tern, returning home from their world travels, know. The countless mosquitoes swarming up from the tundra know. The lichens know, the sedges and shrubs know. The mountains know, the rivers and glaciers know. How is it that we don’t know? What have we lost that we are now unable to feel this place and know it’s wildness? Or, if we DO know this wildness, what kind of fantasyland are we living in that we might deny it? I’m reminded of a great book by writer Derrick Jensen, The Culture of Make Believe. Derrick writes, “For us to maintain our way of living, we must tell lies to each other and especially to ourselves. The lies are necessary because, without them, many deplorable acts would become impossibilities.”

Last night I sat through 4 hours of public ‘comment’ that was largely a bunch of lies. Lies in the sense that the intent is to deny reality. The coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is indeed wilderness. A great wilderness, a beautiful wild place. A wilderness, like all wild places, that is like no other.

Below is the (rather clumsy, if not nerdish) definition of wilderness, as per the Wilderness Act:

(c) A wilderness, in contrast with those areas where man and his own works dominate the landscape, is hereby recognized as an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain. An area of wilderness is further defined to mean in this Act an area of undeveloped Federal land retaining its primeval character and influence, without permanent improvements or human habitation, which is protected and managed so as to preserve its natural conditions and which (1) generally appears to have been affected primarily by the forces of nature, with the imprint of man’s work substantially unnoticeable; (2) has outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation; (3) has at least five thousand acres of land or is of sufficient size as to make practicable its preservation and use in an unimpaired condition; and (4) may also contain ecological, geological, or other features of scientific, educational, scenic, or historical value.

While I find the very idea of defining ‘wilderness‘ to be oxymoronic (the minute we define it, we lose it), I’ll leave that discussion for another article. The landscape of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is indeed a wilderness. The US Government might not yet understand that, but, it seems, that’s their own shortcoming; I realized it the first time I visited the place. Every single person I’ve travelled in the Refuge with, and every person I’ve met who’s ever been there realize it as well. To argue that this is not a wilderness is akin to arguing against gravity; it’s simply absurdly dishonest.

The FWS would do well to deal with reality here; and recommend that Congress do the same, acknowledging fully the great wildness of the Refuge. Denial is, they say, one of the great signs of addiction; to live more honestly is to see things the way they actually are. And the wilderness of the Refuge, including the awesome coastal plan, is every bit as wild as we are.

Cheers

Carl

Playing a Native American Indian flute on the arctic coastal plain, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), Alaska. Please click on the image to view a larger version of the photo.

Hey Folks,

I’ve been wanting to write for the last week about the current Gulf Oil disaster, but haven’t really been quite sure what to say. There are simply so many tangents to this mess that I’ve not known where to start. The deaths of 11 people seem, unfortunately, to fade into the melée of concern about big oil, political ineptness, poisoned ecosystems, fathomless litigations, ad infinitum. The web we weave seems larger than the spread of oil.

It makes sense, to me, to start at home. The reality is that this catastrophe stares us right in the eyeball. The mirror reflects our own lives – I drive a car, I love my gore-tex and silnylon tents, my synthetic-fill jacket, my polycarbonate cameras. I eat fresh bananas and whole grain breads shipped here from afar. My computer was flown directly from Shanghai, China. The world I live in is a fossil fuel world. That world includes crude oil belching from the ocean floor into the Gulf of Mexico, and on to Gaia knows where.

So I bear responsibility in this mess; I want cheap gasoline, cheap oil. I complained about the soaring gasoline prices just 2 years ago. I failed to demand that the federal government not exempt BP from an environmental impact study. I failed to demand that Minerals Management Services mandate a remote-control shut-off switch on all drilling operations. I failed to demand that the oil industry follow the strictest, safest procedures possible.

But it goes further than that; I failed to say ‘enough‘. I have enough gear, enough technology, enough information, enough shoes (trust me, I have more than enough shoes). Enough of everything. The Pavlovian demand for ‘more‘ that we’re conditioned to believe is ‘normal‘ drives this rig. The push for more oil, more power, more energy, more economy, more technology, more information, more shoes, more blogs, more photos, more Gore-tex, more noise. It is critically insane to believe that more pollution, more disaster, more dysfunction, more unhappiness, more hunger, more disease, more war and more tragedy won’t be a part of that system.

Because the 2 are inseparable. More energy is more pollution. More consumption is more extinction. More technology is more dissatisfaction. More information is more misinformation. More gasoline is more oil is more drilling is more than 5000 barrels of oil haemmorhaging from the earth; is more dead terns and pelicans and oil rig workers killed on the job.

If we decide to start at home, then I think we HAVE to start with remolding our economy; the word “economy” is a combination of 2 Greek words: “oikos” or “house” and “nemos” which means “to manage”. “Economy”, then, translates to manage your house or to manage your affairs.

We have to see our economic ideal of unmitigated growth as a death sentence, because it’s killing the planet. In fact, how often do we use that very word to describe economic activity? We WANT to make a killing, we HOPE to make a killing; that’s a good deal, no? When that killing washes up on a Louisiana beach in the form of an oil-soaked shorebird, why don’t we understand THAT is the killing we’ve been in pursuit of?

Can I do with less? I know I can do with less pollution. Less energy, less noise, less frenetic pursuit of that infernal more. When is enough enough? When is enough too much? When it comes in the form of 200 thousand gallons of oil spewing into the ocean? Or when we get that new G3 iPhone?

Let’s do better.

Cheers

Carl

Bull Elk bugling, Jasper National Park, Canada.

Hey Folks,

I had another photo request for free use of my images today; they come in pretty regularly, it seems, particularly for wildlife and landscape photography. We nature lovers obviously love what we do, and so must have a desire to give our work away for free. How can we not?

I’ll be the first to admit it folks; these are tough times, for buyers and sellers alike. There’s no denying that truth. I thought I’d try to find some kind of compromise here. I always like to develop a relationship with someone who may potentially pay for my work, and I also wanted to help these people out – theirs is a just and worthwhile cause. And hey, maybe helping these folks out might provide the impetus for some real economic activity in the world? I hoped to do my bit to help the economy get rolling, my own little stimulus plan, if you will (I still can’t believe the government got away with labeling theirs a ‘stimulus package‘). At the same time, I didn’t really want to give away my work for free. What to do?

I tried to explain to the person on the phone; I listened closely, and sympathized – “yes, I realize you’re a non-profit organization, but  my business, on the other hand, is NOT a non-profit“. This didn’t clarify things, apparently.

A different tact:  ”Well, you see, my rent doesn’t go down according to the charity work that your business does, and the food I eat doesn’t become free simply because I did a good deed for the day“. We got nowhere.

What to do? I had to think harder. How does one find that confluence of non-profit and profit, that junction of free and I can eat this week? I thought further; ‘well, when people license my images, or buy a print, they are paying for the quality of my work – they buy quality’. So, I made up a little Action in Photoshop that solved the problem (for those “non-photoshop users”, an ‘action‘ is an automated series of steps to process the image – it may include contrast, saturation, resizing, etc, whatever little steps one might use regularly – a handy tool).

If you click on the photo above you’ll see a larger version of the standard Rights-Managed version of this bull elk photo. Scroll over the image and click on the arrow, center left, for the ‘non-profit‘ version.

I presented both images to the lady, (not this exact photo here, a different one) and explained how I’d solved the dilemma; they could use the “non-profit version” for free. Within a short period of time I had a credit card #, and they had the version of the photo they liked most.

I think this might be a useful program. For fellow photographers out there who might be interested, I can email you the action, if you’d like to add it to your arsenal of digital processing weaponry. But really, I’d suggest you get creative and try to come up with your own version. And remember, non-profit doesn’t mean that YOUR business needs to be non-profit. Respect your work, respect yourself, and respect the business of photography. If you can’t do that, why should anyone else?

Cheers

Carl