For those who have followed this blog for a while, you have noticed that a large part of my inventory on this  website is in the black and white genre. I especially showcase this 1970's direction with  a new "resurrection" of images that flow from my scanner to this website on a somewhat monthly basis. These new arrivals  flow "from the land of the dead" ( not being scanned ) to the "land of the living" (vibrant black , white and rich grey  black and white images that now have a new life of their own). Young and Old Together 1970's So what is the thing that saves these images? Is it the scanner? Or is it the images themselves that almost "yell out" to be scanned like a distant but persistent " creative, different drummer'"?

Are my 1970's images digital or analog (film)? Well  they were shot on mostly a Nikon F with Tri-X film and developed personally by me. That makes them not digital? Right? Not so Fast. They are shot as film but basically "printed" as a digitally scanned image. So the film/digital argument breaks down here.

Are my 1970's photos personal? (in the way I photographed people) or are they "historical" ( a collection of images done in real time) ? Lets take a look at another photo of mine.

Friends 1970's

Is this just a photo of student friends of mine or is it more -  a snapshot of a time and place in history?  Is it their own personalities that I captured or have I captured maybe just a little bit of their "souls" in the photo? If the questions sound ambiguous, they are not. Confusion and ambiguity can spur us on to finding a "meaning"  contained in these archived photos. "What does it mean to be young?" , "What does it mean to be old ?" , "What can young and older people learn about themselves from each other?" A dialogue begins from a photograph. What will be the conversation?

When you look at a photograph taken deep in your past , you have your memory of yourself in a certain situation. Then you have a record of your reaction to that situation. But what about a photo taken by you in the street, with or without the knowledge of your photographic subject?

So what do "street photographs" say about their subjects; their subjects in real time, and human reactions to the subjects themselves? Lets explore this for a while.

Let's take a look at a series of photos I photographed in the 70's. They can be seen in the "But Series-ously" Gallery on Stockopp.com.

So just what did we experience by "observing" what was going on, or what are the subjects telling us about this series of photographs? What are we "listening" to while they "talk"  to us about the situation they are in , in the photographs?

Are they aware of being photographed? How do we know or don't know this? Do they realize it is holiday time? How does the timing on the calendar affect the reactions of these people in these photos?

All this discussion is to acclimate us to the wonderful feedback we can get to our and others' pasts by exploring photos taken which capture certain situations which encapsulate certain conflicts or noninvolvement in the the world of the present. This helps us open our eyes to the present through the prism of the past .

You can continue "following the past" as seen on this blog  or in the Galleries at www.stockopp.com  especially under " The Seventies Archive "  on this website .

Thanks to a scanner and Black and White software on my computer, I have over the past years been able to "resurrect" many images which otherwise would have been unseen by myself and the viewing public for  over 40 years.

Many of my Black and White photographs have been published either here or in printed publications, but now I am on a schedule to scan and upload as many of my "un-resurrected" photographs as posssible (and put them in "The Seventies Archive"on Stockopp.com ) . As I mentioned in two previous articles about my photographs in Gothamist , these "newly printed" photographs tend to have a different photographic style than , let's say the photos in my "Classic OPP" gallery here on Stockopp.com.

Juxtapositions

This photo is from "The Seventies Archive" gallery here at Stockopp.com . The following photo is from my "Classic OPP"  gallery on Stockopp.com.

Manhattan

As you can see, the later photo is quite stylized and dynamic within the frame. This is my photograph that appeared in Rolling Stone Magazine in 1972 ( personally chosen by then photo editor Annie Leibovitz  ). It is composed in a slanting triangular way to emphasize the black dress and white shoes of the model in the photo.

So ultimately what is the value of resurrecting the photographic past? For young people, it is a  periscope into a period they literally did not live in. For older people it is a time to rethink their individual pasts in term of my photos (and what it shows them).

Luckily, photography redeems all our pasts by showing us clearly what was , presents it in the present tense, and refires our imaginations.

Street Crossing 1971

If you enjoyed this blog or  any other blog on Stockopp.com please spread the word by mentioning Stockopp.com or the Stockopp Blog on your blog or send the link  www.stockopp.com/blog to other bloggers (especially people interested in photography).

of photography that can be used at the same or later time to sell unsold photos online after the groups shows or exhibits have

ended  ( BWAC in my case- see previous blog ) .

For many of my Instagram photos, metal is the perfect medium for bringing out the bright colors I usually have ( in a

square format) in my photos . However in my most recent exhibit at BWAC I also printed some  black and white images on

metal and was pleasantly surprised that black and white photos held their images excellently. On the back of the metal , a

wooden frame is affixed to the back of the metal to allow it to be hung on walls for exhibit (see below) :

Whichever way you want to print and frame photographs or if you are buying photographs, the ways you want to present your prints are myriad. If you feel you have benefited from this blog's information, please mention it on your website's blog or refer other people to this website, this blog :

http://www.stockopp.com/blog   

I recently was in a show at an organization called Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition, where I am a member. There are photographers, sculptors, and performance artists that exhibit their work and they try to sell their work at the  seasonal art shows. My middle photograph (shown below)  was sold at the show. The shows are great places to gather with other artists  and art buyers and to "talk the arts" to them.

Photos can be grouped for exhibit by themes or not.

BWAC can be reached at bwac.org .  If you like the Stockopp.com photo blog , mention us on other photoblogs as http://www.stockopp.com/blog

Maybe.

I say it's more. Much more. 

Aruba Sunset

One purpose of traveling is to "discover yourself . "  What does this mean, anyway?

For instance, what did I learn or discover about myself when I photographed this scene?  Well, I discovered that I needed to look out into the world (and the sea) to find some serenity ( and I did! ).

And what of the following scene?

Aruba Boats

What I was looking for in this photo of mine was the shimmering silver waters which "took me to another place" (not my home, but Aruba ).  

Sometimes , a travel photo is not about travel at all. This photo was taken as I arrived on the floor where my room was located. The corridor revealed an orderly placement of homes , in a kind of "triptych" created by the steel window frames of the hotel. Yet it qualifies as a travel photo because the homes are so exotic-looking (to me) .

Aruba View

Finally , a travel photograph can just be plain "thought-provoking".

Aruba Flower

Or just plain beautiful.

Leaf, Aruba For more of David Oppenheim's travel photos on Stockopp.com ( prints are on sale in the various website Galleries)

click on one or more of the following:

Amsterdam  , Food in Holland ,The Hague, Netherlands , and Cologne, Germany

I say no. And I'd like to prove my point by using a few of my photographs that are available on this website. Take this photograph for example:

BK/NY

It doesn't look like a photograph at all ! To me it looks like a pen and color ink drawing. Does that make this photo not a photograph?

Or how about this photograph:

Lower East Side, NYC

Since when did I get the Superhero-like ability to melt concrete into crystalline musical note forms with my bare hands ( I wish )? But I can do it with some creativity and Photoshop.

Finally, on a sadder note, this photo , relating to the tragedy of 9/11 , carries within itself an emotional message.

Greenwich Village Facing South

So  what is the value of all this "non-literal" , "painterly-type" of photography ?

By being somewhat "poetic and non-literal" the photographs take on a "metaphorical" value. And the message that a metaphor carries is one of depth of thought and sometimes (especially with the "9/11 related photo") it is one of carrying some kind of emotion or emotional insight about our human condition for us to think about.

Stockopp.com photographs? Well, first of all , whether I shoot through the viewfinder of the

camera I use - a Canon, a Sony, or an iPhone - I shoot in a totally different way for my photos

that appear on my Instagram  page.

Here's my Instagram page:

Notice that the framing of the photographs are more stylized than perhaps some other

photographs  of mine that you have seen on Stockopp.com .

I do this on purpose. But why ? , you say.  Well, because I don't believe a photographer has just

one style that he photographs in. I shoot most of my Instagram photos on my iPhone because

it's convenient, small, and available.

But like any viewfinder on any camera, it both constrains your style and it, in a sense, forms your

style. However, I do occasionally use my Sony and Canon and put the results on my Instagram

page too.

I also find "the conversations using pictures" style of Instagram is conducive to my style of

photography. Sometimes a picture may be slightly unsharp, blurry, and not that colorful, but

Instagrammers tend to be forgiving.

At the present time, some of my  photos that have appeared on my Instagram site are on sale

(Prints and Licenses) on this website  ( Stockopp.com ) such as this one (one of my personal

favorites):

View Thru the Subway Window Brooklyn

I plan to offer more of my photos that appear on Instagram  for sale on this Stockopp.com site

in the future , but I hope you will, in the meantime , visit me at @stockoppphoto on Instagram .

P. S . - If you like this Blog, spread the word on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, and most

importantly - on  Instagram !

The red light district, the centrum , or the  older inner city, the wooden shoes and tulips. The canals. The food.

I had been to Amsterdam and Holland before. I had stayed there 43 years ago as an art student on summer vacation

(see my Blog “The Story Behind the Photo”

http://www.stockopp.com/blog/2013/4/the-story-behind-the-photo  ) .

Now, I was older and more aware of the history of Holland and Amsterdam . And Amsterdam was much more than

those cute houses :

Houses in Amsterdam

I was lucky enough to see SAIL Amsterdam 2015 when I was there and to see the Tall Ships:

SAIL Amsterdam Ship 1

But Amsterdam is not just big surprises and cute abodes, it's also the everyday transformed into the extraordinary like a dog being walked where strangers meet and talk:

Walking the Dog in Amsterdam

It's about the visual absurdity of Juxtaposition:

Amsterdam - Large Model, Small Bikers

It's about the wonderful food:

Brunch- Amsterdam

The sightseeing:

Just Rolling Along

And the flowers. Oh, the flowers:

Flowers 5

See more of my photographic travelogue in Amsterdam, the Hague, and Cologne on this website  www.stockopp.com and click the Galleries:

Amsterdam  , Food in Holland ,The Hague, Netherlands , and Cologne, Germany .

If you like this blog , please put the link on your blog and promote the Stockopp.com Blog                                              (  www.stockopp.com/blog  )  

or promote the Stockopp.com website   (  www.stockopp.com ) on social media or other blog sites. New blogs appear periodically.

Fantasia at Brooklyn Botanical Gardens ca 1990

Not too far away is Grand Army Plaza. No, it is not an imitation of Washington Square arch. It’s dedicated to Civil War Veterans. If you look closely toward the center (at the bottom) of the photo you can see the World Trade Center. Yes, it’s sad, and I feel it too.

Construction Brooklyn

One of my favorite shots in this photo-tour of Brooklyn is this one. It is taken through the newly constructed (at the time) Berkeley Carroll School building on Lincoln Place in the early 90’s. I love it because again it goes through the window out to the concrete city in the background. Also, it expresses “people working hard to make Brooklyn grow.”

Pretty Windows

This building (probably in Montgomery Place) intrigued me for many reasons—the “squaring off” of the windows. The “boxiness” of the entire building. Park Slope apartments have cylindrical shapes and rounded shapes. This building seems way out of place. The pinkish hue of the bricks in contrast with the blue in the windows complements the green of the growing plants

Parking Condo and McFeelys late'80's Park Slope

Oh McFeely’s! Oh, the great old days in Park Slope when McFeely’s was open. Those hamburgers! Those great bartenders! Oh, the camaraderie! Oh the Jack and Cokes! Great crowds were there and it was a true Park Slope watering hole. Right next to it was Park Slope’s first condo for cars garage.

Kids Bouncing Basketball (ca.1990)

Concrete isn’t all that bad (as I’ve tried to show!) It’s good for making art on the sidewalk. It’s good for walking. But most of all it’s good for bouncing basketballs on! My son, on the left, and my nephew, are on the right. This photograph was taken at least 20 years ago on 1st Street in Park Slope.

Park Slope late '80's

As we leave the concrete laden streets of Brooklyn, let’s take a sentimental drive in our late 80’s car right near 8th Ave and & 7th Street in Park Slope, as the postman delivers today’s mail.

I’ve enjoyed the tour and hope to be back with more historical photographs sometime in the future.

You can catch more of David’s photography  @stockoppphoto on Instagram and Park Slope Stoop and Gothamist.

You can follow this link to see them : 

http://gothamist.com/2014/07/25/1970s_nyc.php#photo-1

 The Gothamist article's popularity got me thinking about the past and how precious it is to have a connection, albeit a digital one, with objects, people, buildings, social situations - that don't exist anymore. But people, including myself, need to see these images, relive some of the memories of the times they were taken in, and move on with confidence into the future.

Here is a preview of a part of my historical collection which I will present on various blogs soon.

Hope you enjoy seeing them!

Union Square Manhattan ca. 1990

Concorde - NYC Airport ca.1990

Park Slope St. Patrick's Day ca.1990

By now, if you have been a reader of my blog, you realize that my photographs are not "your usual" library of stock photography images. They are not "perfectly designed" or "setup" . They are not that type of stock photography. What Stockopp represents is a photographic "experience".

Monterey Aquarium, Jellyfish

The "nature" (no pun intended) of this website is to always be adding and changing. Stockopp is like nature - it constantly adds more variety and therefore keeps on growing . However , grow too big , and you become less "vital". We are a small photo stock agency full of dynamic lifelike images.

Los Angeles, CA

To see another of  Stockopp's unique library of photo images go to this link: http://www.stockopp.com/p879419999 .We call the gallery  "Take Stock in History ". This is our "newest" gallery and represents an ongoing process of adding historical photo images on sometimes a daily or weekly basis.

Woman at Be-in Late 60's

Come back often to this blog for more news on Stockopp and it's ever-growing photo library.

Stockopp can be reached at [email protected] or  347 - 450 - 6771 .

What does a photograph capture ? Time? A vision ? Is a photograph simply just a single frame in the "Movie

of Life" ? Is a photograph a physical thing?  Is it a solid or liquid ? Is it visual poetry? Does it exist by itself in the physical world?

Let's explore this using the photographs themselves.

Duck's in a London Park

Did I just capture this moment, or were these birds in some kind of order ? Were they (as a group of organized birds) trying to send us humans a message (like "Get out of our way buddy, we're coming through" ) ?

Or did I just manipulate the physical world by capturing this "moment in time" ? Good question.

Pacific Grove,California

What have I captured here? The exact moment of the sunset or the "color" or atmosphere of a sunset ?

Art

Did I place that woman in front of the "Marilyn"  she's looking at ? Or am I using a tricky form of juxtaposition ?

'walking in the rain"

Have I "captured time in a bottle" like the Jim Croce song says ? Or have I captured an image forever fixed in a puddle?

Finally , where is this train going in this photo ? Is it coming or going ?  Or is it at its final stop for the day?

British Train

For more on Stockopp.com and David Oppenheim's photography go to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1r4j9Zlu6M&feature=youtu.be

If you like this blog or any of David's blogs at Stockopp.com be sure to link  them to your blogs and mention them to your friends and colleagues.

Does the following photograph reveal a certain style (and what exactly is this style trying to tell us) ? Lower East Side, NYC

The other day I was lucky enough to see a show at the Whitney Museum which included many  Edward Hopper sketches and paintings. One placard  describing his art had a quote where Hopper says " I am always looking for me in my paintings " and that he "used the outer world to portray his inner life." That's a good approximation of how style determines form and vice versa. My style is who I am.

However, does that mean I have only one style that runs through my photography? Is the following photo somehow stylistically the same (or diametrically different)  from the photo above ?

Manhattan

Is style an imbeded message that is similar in different pictures, or again is style a passing thing like a "phase" in adolescence? I'm not sure I know the answer to that question.

I will pose the following:

Readers of this blog, contact me at   [email protected] with the answer to this question:

Describe the similarity in the styles of the following two photos:

France

                                                                                                   and

Manhattan

(to be continued - probably in Stockopp.com YouTube  Video #2)

I think someone once asked me why I had  to do photography so much, and I always would  reply "… because something in me needs to go out in the world and capture it inside my camera and make some artistic  sense of what can be a confusing, chaotic, and frankly a scary world." And I do have to admit that, at times, my camera was kind of a an adult pacifier, kind of calming me down when things got a little crazy in my life. A photo critic of mine once said I would "freak myself out" just so I could subconsciously manipulate the images I saw in the world. He said I was some sort of Freudian “projector of my subconscious” and  I  was part of a group of artistic creators who "saw the world upside down."

I do admit, I don’t see  the world like most other people do, and at times it can get scary. But the flip side is that I get to see and record creatively what other people miss.

I really don’t like the idea of a "mission statement for my photography," but perhaps it is this (and other people may find some photo wisdom in it) :  I do photography because I have to…because there is a drive in me that makes me curious about the visual world we live in. I do not go out into the world to make “beautiful images".  I believe like Shakespeare that “beauty is truth, and truth beauty”. I hope that the beauty that people see in my photographs comes from the truth that the photos express about the  complex and conflicted world we live in, and like the glass in a lens of the camera that takes the photograph, it has many beautiful facets that illuminate the images they capture.

See more about David Oppenheim and Stockopp.com on his Video :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1r4j9Zlu6M&feature=youtu.be

Italy, 1972

The Story Behind the Photo 

This is one one of my earliest  developed and printed  pictures. It was taken in my teens around the same time I was published in a one page color spread in Popular Photography Magazine . I was in Central Park in NYC and saw a group of people  congregating in a grassy area in the center of what I believe was called  "the sheep meadow". There was a rocky area and on top of the rock was this woman holding what looked like a combination of wheat and/or feathers in a bundle.

Peace Rally Central Park 1967

This was the Vietnam War Era and lots of social and cultural changes were happening. This event used to be called "Be-Ins" - where you were celebrating being yourself . No big deal nowadays. Back in the days of conformity, being yourself  WAS a big deal.

This picture has become very iconic for me (and it has also become iconic for my generation)  because of some classic symbolism contained in the picture. The bundle she holds aloft is both a beacon of peace and a beacon to join in the celebration. The woman represents freedom and its tie to beauty. She is both a true individual and a representation of a peaceful concept.

Personally, this photo captures a part of my youth and identifies in a moment what I was looking for in my youth. In fact, when my black and white photographs were published  along with a four page article by photo critic Ralph M. Hattersley , he called the article "Youth Leads the Way".

I was led to take the photo by being "present in the moment". I became part of the picture by being a person at the Be-in . The result is a recording of a special moment in an eternity of moments that will live past my lifetime in the image itself.

The Start of a  Series

“Every picture tells a story” as the saying goes , but there’s also a story behind the photo.

Many of photos on this website (especially the black and white ones) were generated from journeys in my life where I was searching for answers to many of life’s questions .

This photo is one of my personal favorites .  I took it on a very important trip to Europe where I photographed many large cities, travelled in trains at will, and got to see a wide swath of Europe.

Holland While travelling from Amsterdam to the Dutch countryside, at the extreme of Holland, I saw the famous dikes that keep the North Sea from engulfing the entire country. As if by magic, a man was looking on the top of the dike out to sea.

A lamb or a sheep was facing the man who was at the other end of the dike. Suddenly a man on a motor bike appeared . When this occurred I was there to capture it all . Henri  Cartier-Bresson  used this technique . It was called the decisive moment. I call it “what I was looking for.”

You've  bought one of  Stockopp.com's  photographs and you want to

display it so that you and your guests can enjoy it in the room you've

decided to hang the photograph in. What kind of frame is the best ?

I like simple black wooden frames . Some people like silver . 

What type of frame do you like?   Borderless ?   Go with it!

I like matting to create white space around the photograph.

Some people don't ! You bought the picture to display .

You decide how to show it!

Blog "Framing"

Childhood On the Ferry What's the best way to compose a photograph while you  are actually taking it?

Is it to stand up real close , right in front of a subject  (and possibly intimidate them ?) , or should you  give the person some "breathing room" and walk backwards a few steps ?

The answer is, it depends on what you're looking for !

If you look at the picture of the young girl , shown here, I went intentionally close with a Nikon Nikkor 55mm Macro lens to get details on her face. With this close-up Macro lens, you can see sharp details, like the air bubbles on the sides of her lips after finishing an ice cream cone.

What did I achieve by "being in the face" of the subject ? I think the viewer feels more involved in the childhood universe of the girl as a result.

If you look at the picture taken of Lower Manhattan from the Staten Island Ferry, you can see that I composed the photograph to see things "at a distance" . By including both the man in the foreground  and the overall cityscape, the atmosphere of the scene comes through.

If you are learning from our blog, please mention it to friends, bookmark us, "like " us on Facebook  (Facebook.com/stockopp) , go to the Stockopp  page on Twitter , or give us a shout out on your blog. Spread the word !

In our last blog, we discussed the "rule of thirds" principle, a technique that helps the photographer frame the picture while looking through their camera. This has been called "the decisive moment" or "pre-visualization" by some photographers.

In a perfect world, we would be able to frame the complete picture in the viewfinder, point, click, and come out with a print-ready photograph to display. However, more times than not a random object will find itself to be a distractive influence in your photograph. When cropping is necessary, you will find the rule of thirds to still come in handy.

When cropping the first rule you should follow is to NEVER crop an original image. ALWAYS make a copy or two when experimenting and work on the copy. Once you have made a copy, you should use whatever application or software you feel comfortable with and play around with cropping the image until you have found it to your liking. One question you should ask yourself to decide on a successful crop is "is the photograph a more dynamic composition now?" If the answer is yes, you are ready to apply the rule of thirds to your new image.

Take the cropped photograph and see if you can split it into thirds. Sometimes it is helpful to print the photograph out and, with a ruler, split the photograph into thirds horizontally and vertically to plan your composed cropping.

To see how I slightly cropped an image, click on  the FRANCE gallery, then click on the "Paris d'Orsay View" thumbnail. Notice that the photo is cropped mainly around the clock face and the silhouetted people and that the photo is in a square format to fit the cropping. Also, notice that the flooring is cropped to draw the viewer’s eye to the clock and people in front of it.

By using the rule of thirds while cropping, your photographs will become more dynamic and cleaner. No longer will you have to worry about a great photograph being ruined by an unwanted nuisance.

If you are learning from our blog, please mention it to friends, bookmark us, "like" us on Facebook (Facebook.com/stockopp), go to the Stockopp  page  on Twitter ,or give us a shout out on your blog. Spread the word!

One of these techniques that I use in my photographs is called the "rule of thirds." This means that when I am going to shoot something, my eye splits the viewfinder into three sections—left third, center third, and right third. By adopting this technique taught in art schools, the everyday photographer will be able to take photographs that are truly art. 

If you look at my photographs here on www.stockopp.com, you will also notice they tend to have vanishing points, the visual focus or interest point of the picture which gives the viewer a natural point of entry. This technique adds to the overall design element of the photograph and is a direct byproduct of the rule of thirds. Below is a photograph I shot of the Millennium Bridge in London that displays both the rule of thirds and vanishing point techinques.