The Photography and Video Show Podcast, Season 1 Episode 7
Published on Thursday, 7 December 2023
Hosted by David McClelland with Jim Marks and special guest, Jo Bradford
In this month’s show: award-winning DoP Jim Marks joins David to talk about professional video from mirrorless cameras and smartphones, while photographic artist Jo Bradford shares her smartphone photography journey, the role of colour in her work, and details of her new book.
Stories in this episode:
The Photography & Video Show Podcast:
Subscribe to The Photography & Video Show Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
The Photography and Video Show Podcast, Season 1 Episode 7
Published on Thursday, 7 December 2023
Hosted by David McClelland with Jim Marks and special guest, Jo Bradford
In this month’s show: award-winning DoP Jim Marks joins David to talk about professional video from mirrorless cameras and smartphones, while photographic artist Jo Bradford shares her smartphone photography journey, the role of colour in her work, and details of her new book.
Stories in this episode:
The Photography & Video Show Podcast:
Subscribe to The Photography & Video Show Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hello, and welcome to the Photography and Video Show Podcast. I'm your host, David McClelland. And in this month's show, we lean quite heavily into smartphone, photography, and video. Photographic artist, award-winning smartphone photographer, and best-selling author Jo Bradford talks us through her philosophy and her work.
Jo Bradford:And I was the most analogue person ever, so I would never want to put them anywhere publicly but I was persuaded to stick some of them on Instagram and, rapidly actually picked up a really huge Instagram following for, the time, what I thought was, you know, smartphone photos, having a hundred felt like huge to me that it accelerated really quickly and so I stopped being ashamed of being a smartphone photographer and tried to kind of engage with this idea of smartphone photography
David McClelland:We also look at the latest kit announcements and dissect the recent'Scary Fast''Shot- on- iPhone' Apple event. Joining us to do this is award-winning photographer, DOP editor, and nice anarchist. It's Jim Marks, everyone. Hello, Jim. Thanks for joining us.
Jim Marks:David, lovely to be here. Thank you.
David McClelland:Give us the Jim Marks one oh one!
Jim Marks:Oh my God. Um, well, first of all, I'm very old. let's be clear. Um, I've been, I've been in this industry. Been lucky enough to be in it for over three decades. Which is a mighty amount of time. I'm very grateful. I love it. You can split my career actually in two. You can say the first half was photography. The second half was filmmaking. It's all my career's always been about change and I mean that in in a positive way technological change Client change delivery change, you know, we've I started with film. I went to labs. I did clip tests. I bought stuff I pushed and pulled my exposures You know, I had roll film. I loved that heritage and
David McClelland:It was a very manual process then, which we'll be talking about later on with our feature guests.
Jim Marks:Yeah, hugely manual, but also hugely social, because we'd all meet in the pub waiting for our film, round the corner from the lab, you know, and there was, the assistants all knew each other, and I was lucky to assist some great people, and it was, it was, it was a very vibrant, photographic scene, and then of course we had the massive shifts, whether it's the internet, digital, And then and now film, obviously, and the way media is changed and the way it's consumed. So, uh, the last 30 years have been quite busy, but I enjoy that.
David McClelland:This qualifies you well. This is the Photography and Video Show Podcast. You tick both of those boxes amply. In terms of your recent work, just help us to tune into the sort of projects that you get involved in and the roles that you play in them.
Jim Marks:Um, well, I it kind of splits. I mean, I kind of go into it now with very much a filmmaking approach. If without wanting to offend any photographers, photography is a day off. Okay, photography is, photography, photography is easy. Okay, and I know they're probably throwing something at the screen now. Um, it can be one bag, it can be one light, it can be fixed in post. Okay, but. You know, I love photography. I love what it offers. But filmmaking has a completely different set of challenges. Uh, you have to make a story, even if it's eight seconds long. you have social media. You have a beginning, a middle, and an end. You have the whole joy of audio. Then you have the editing process, which can be both torturous and beautiful. So, You've got all of that stuff, but there are loads of skills, um, that a photographer does bring to filmmaking and vice versa. It's a, it's a two way street.
David McClelland:So if you agree with Jim that photography is a day off, then great. If you vehemently disagree, then we'll be finding out what Jim's handles on social media are later on. But Jim, thank you for setting us up. So, let's take a look at what's been happening in the news over the last few weeks. Now, these days, November is, well, somewhat dominated by Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Sales exclusive, deals, double cashback, triple discount, all the rest of that. retailers and manufacturers obviously trying to shift their stock before the end of the year. And that can mean that news is a little bit thin on the ground, but not necessarily this year. Uh, Jim, there's been a few bits and bobs that, uh, have risen to the top of my news bag over the last few weeks. Sony has been releasing lots of cameras this year. I the A9 III, which the headline specs there, it can shoot at one eighty thousandth of a second, shutter speed. And, the bit that I want to, have a chat with you about here, Jim, is world's first, big rabbit's ears I'm giving there, full frame global shutter sensor. Now I know that, that you, you have your feet in the, in the Fujifilm camp there, so let's kind of park the Sony bit to one side. But from a, from the development of digital videography when it comes to cameras like the A9 and many others as well. Just talk me through the importance of the full frame and in particular the global shutter bit there, because that's what Sony seems to be going to market on, or at least lots of journalists have been picking up on. How important is it really to have that? What difference is that going to enable, if any, to creatives?
Jim Marks:Global Shutter or Shutter Readout in all its forms, you're right, it's become more important as videos sort of come up and you can see it sometimes, but it can be, it can be overstated and there are many ways to skin a cat. in ways to approach this. I mean, there are certainly subjects and kind of material that global shutters very useful for very fast moving sport, for instance, and there are things where sensor readout, certainly in the past, especially on large format or big cameras have been slow, and so you might shoot a high resolution sort of 6K, 8K K and you might have a slower processor in the camera. And, you know, if you're doing a lot of whip pans, you can see that sort of jelloed effect in a conventional sensor, in a CMOS sensor, you can see the movement, and that can be distracting. That's absolutely a fact. Now a global shutter because obviously it's reading it in an instant, instantly you don't get that. But there can be a dynamic price to pay. There's no such thing as a free lunch with any camera. Um, so it's a balance, isn't it? I'll tell you one quick thing about sensor readouts that I really noticed when, when they launched the new GFX Mark II, you know, the large format sensor
David McClelland:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Ange. Ange was talking
Jim Marks:yeah, and you would,
David McClelland:on with that a couple of months
Jim Marks:and previously for video, you know, you might say actually the readout on that sensor, cause it's massive, it's too, it's too slow, but in 4k narrative on that camera, it's 15 milliseconds, which is exactly the same as the previous A1.
David McClelland:Okay.
Jim Marks:what we're seeing with all manufacturers is increased processor speed.
David McClelland:Yes.
Jim Marks:More grunt under the hood, and a better application of that grunt on the sensors to give you those faster readouts. I welcome all innovation from all manufacturers. When I think of what I spent on old Red cameras, I'm going back like 12 years, the amount of money. That we spent to get something now that your phone can do in a superior way years later. I mean, that, that's, that's the sheer progress, uh, you know, and also affordability. Because a lot of the features and the readout speeds and the stuff that we can now do with our cameras. They are, they are affordable in relative terms. You know, we're not paying, we're not paying what we paid ten, ten or even five years ago. You know, XS20, 1200 quid. It's got a 6K oversample sensor. There is all sorts of advantages that then trickle down from your high line camera, from your, you know, flagship hero camera. You know, and it's just picking. I think it's very much for the photographer or the filmmaker to try and pick the correct brand with the correct feature set that works for your work.
David McClelland:So, just to, expand on that a little bit. I was away this week, in Frankfurt of all places, having peak Christmas as we're recording on the 1st of December right now. Uh, we had snow in Frankfurt. There's an amazing Christmas market out there. Basically Christmas is already done and it's the 1st of December for me. But with my in front of the camera at work, uh, the videographer who I was working with was shooting with a, with a Fujifilm. And that is not usual, Jim. I'm going to say it. Usually it is, either with a Sony camera on the shoulder or it's going to be something like a Panasonic GH5 or a Sony a7 or something like that you know, we've seen the kind of event stuff and even broadcast as well these days let's face it move to smaller and smaller and mirrorless cameras and hybrid cameras and so on but I haven't seen Fuji films so much in that space Why do you think that has been? Is it just down to choice? Is it down to perception? Is it down to, well, if I'm a jobbing videographer and everyone else is using an A7 or whatever it is, then just to fit in and make sure that the stuff that I'm shooting will cut in with what they're doing, will match nicely in post, then I will get the same as them. What kind of reasons are there, do you think? And are they really valid reasons now?
Jim Marks:I mean, it began with the XH2S, the very fast sensor readout, um, camera. And then from that camera, we've had the XH2 and the XS20 and then obviously the GFX. Fuji have like many manufacturers seen that the growth in the need for video features, drives the market drives the technology drives drives where where they should be. I mean, one of the nice things about Fuji. You remember they made film. We go back to my old my old world. Yeah, they made film and they've taken all of those films and made film simulations. So you have Provia. You have Astia and you in the in the new GFX. You have you have Riala these new simulations and they work in video. So I mean absolutely as you said it's great to see them making inroads Into that market being used, I think I think a lot of it is down to the to the great color Um, and the, and the features, particularly on that smaller XH2S, it's got an incredibly fast sensor readout. Um, we talked about global shutter, the rolling shutter on that is very, very low. Um, you know, it's, it's literally unnoticeable. Um, it's got ProRes internal, so if you want a decent codec inside that's recognized by any edit NLE, ProRes, you've got that, you've got H. 265, 10 bit 422, CFast Type B, all of the standard stuff that a lot of manufacturers are doing, but with, I like to say, that Fujifilm twist. Because they do tend to do things a little differently, you know, you think about the 100V, you think about the large format, they tend to slightly go their own way, which is quite fun.
David McClelland:Moving on to our next item of news, we've also seen only, uh, only a couple of weeks ago, Kodak bringing to life a new Super 8 limited edition camera. Did you ever shoot on Super 8, Jim?
Jim Marks:I have played around with Super 8 in my youth. I think it's brilliant they've done it. I know they announced this like five years ago and everyone's been going, is it, is it vaporware or does it, or will it actually exist? Um, I'm pleased to see it. I think it's a really fun thing. Uh, I think the price is a bit, you know, like a
David McClelland:Five thousand dollars.
Jim Marks:with a mini, with a mini HDMI or USB at the back, which is like, hang on, can we have a
David McClelland:that is from five years ago,
Jim Marks:Yeah, I know that is maybe they designed it then and forgot to update it. But joking aside, it's really fun to see. think there's a lot to be learnt in terms of craft from something that is very finite with film. there, there's a limit. It's a bit like going back to 36 frames or 12 on a roll. you have to really consider your choices of when you turn, when, when you take a picture because it's expensive and it is a very finite medium. And, but, but there's a lovely quality to it and, uh, it's a really interesting camera. I can't wait to try it or see it. I think it's quite a fun thing to look at. Definitely.
David McClelland:You talk about the economy of shooting stills on a roll. You know, when you're shooting film on a roll, you are, you really do have to learn economy. You need to get your shots right. You need to be very.
Jim Marks:And, and don't forget
David McClelland:Purposeful about what you're shooting.
Jim Marks:I got told a horror story actually yesterday by someone about, um, some students who shot a whole load of film and never checked the gate on the
David McClelland:Oh, check the gate!
Jim Marks:check the gate, check the gate. So they put the camera down on the carpet and then they went back and they discovered to their horror when they developed it, that it was covered in lines of hairs. You know, it's, it's a craft and like anything finite, it teaches you about the art of when to push the red button. And what do you really need to make your story? And it's just a really fun thing to have. I think, even Instax cameras, instant cameras, you know, you've only got a certain amount within there. And that means you have to edit in a different way. You have to shoot in a different way. You can't just fill a memory card up and put another one in. Uh, I'm, I'm all for that. But I actually think it makes you a better shooter.
David McClelland:check the gate. I've only been involved in one film job that well closely involved in one film job that was shot on film and we're going back to the mid 2000s. It was actually an advert or a promo right in the very early days of internet video or, you know, social sharing of video for a Sony PlayStation game. It was on the Sony PlayStation 2 Buzz the Mega Quiz and that was shot on film in a flat somewhere in, in Trendy East London. After every shot, it's almost as though the crew was crossing their fingers and there was that, that shout, check the gate, you know, it's like, right, everyone hold, crossed your fingers just to make sure that that shot was good and just, just that kind of sense of danger after every take, was really palpable for throughout the whole day.
Jim Marks:I mean, could you imagine if today's generation of photographers couldn't see what they'd got until they went to a lab? I think we'd all have a collective breakdown.
David McClelland:Just to cover off a couple of bits of news in brief and then we'll chat with Joe Bradford, our feature guest this week about smartphone photography, Canon has announced, what I think it was James Artais on Digital Camera World said is, uh, meet the Trinity Buster. Obviously, Canon has been releasing a whole new load of lenses since the R system came out just over five years or so ago now. And it's a very impressive looking 24 105 great focal length at f2. 8 with a zoom capability built in as well. Um, that looks like it's going to be very high on many people's Christmas lists this year. We spoke earlier this season with Boris Eldagsen about his controversial work, the electrician, Pseudomnesia, the electrician, to give it its full title. I was delighted to hear from Boris a few weeks ago, and the exhibition that he spoke about on the podcast, uh, has come to bear. So, uh, unfortunately I wasn't able to make it over to Germany to see his exhibition. But the work that he created that did win the creative category of the Sony World Photography Awards earlier this year, The Electrician, went on sale for twenty-thousand euros in Paris. Don't know if anyone has picked it up, but uh, if you were a fan of Boris's work, maybe get in touch with the gallery in Paris. And also something we touched on last month when we were chatting with Peter Dench is about authenticity in a world of. AI images and, uh, we saw that Sony and Associated Press are on a mission to tackle fake images once again with in camera authentication of images and, uh, like I say, Leica's also been doing some work in this area as well and there does seem to be some other moves by other makers throughout the workflow also that, also that somebody somewhere in the workflow can go, was this created by a camera? Can I trust it? And particularly when we're talking about journalism, photojournalism and so on, does that become important? On this authenticity piece and the way that we're seeing generative AI become more and more a part of our workflows in, or potentially, should we say, available as part of our workflows in our visual work, how is this sitting with you at the moment? Do you find yourself using some of these tools at the moment to augment your creativity or? Are you still of the camp that, no, I need to be creating it myself? Whereabouts are you?
Jim Marks:well, really interesting topic. the first thing I will say is that I'm all for authenticity in camera. I think a standard, I think Adobe had, has created this standard or something. I think it's a good idea. I don't think it's a bad idea. I think it's a good idea. I think it helps. I think if we can have something on everyone's frame that says a human being made this, I can't see the downside. I think that's a positive thing. AI generally. Well, we fall, don't we, between the dystopian, it's the end of days, there'll be no work, Elon Musk, and Is it a useful tool? I, I, I think it's a bit of both. I remember what the internet did to photography as a business and I remember how suddenly There were enormous libraries available of images for very little money. And, uh, working photographers struggled. Because where you might be commissioned to go and shoot something or, you know, actually I can buy that in a library for two pence, I'll do that. Or I'll get it free. And that really impacted photography. And I think AI has the potential to do that to all media. Be it photography, video, content or adverts. I I think you can't stop it sadly, but I think you can put in place strategies like authentication and also perhaps business practices for individuals to to kind of mitigate it.
David McClelland:Jim, thank you very much indeed for now. We'll press pause on the news there for a moment and switch over to this month's feature. Joe Brentford is an award-winning photographic artist and best selling author. Her books on smartphone, photography have been part of a movement over the last decade that's helped shape the perception of smartphone cameras as serious creative tools. Jo when I look at your work, I'm immediately drawn to the application and your sensitivity to colour. Can you describe your approach, your philosophy behind colour?
Jo Bradford:In my other part of my photographic career, I work in a color darkroom still to this day. And I'm very interested in the way light and color, um, perform and the way they can be recorded on light sensitive material, but also on the light, not just light sensitive substrates like I find in my darkroom, but also the sensor on your camera is another way of Um, recording light and color and I've always been fascinated with, um, the work of color theorists like Josef Albers and the way that Bauhaus taught photographers to work, um, in shape and form. So applying those kind of color theory things to the way shape and form is I think is essentially what makes a good photo. I kind of feel like each opportunity to make a piece of work is a way of thinking about the artistic things that go with making pictures rather than just snapping and snatching images and walking away. So thank you for noticing.
David McClelland:Well, I go to the front page of your website, and we'll put a link to that in the show notes, and, let me write at the top, photographic artist there. It's not, well tell me. I'm not seeing one. palette of colour there, for example. It's not as though you focus on pastels, necessarily. I'm seeing some really vibrant blues, lots of greens, lots of reds here as well. Do you find yourself drawn to a particular, a particular set of colours? A particular feel? A particular, aesthetic? Or is it really a celebration of whatever colours come to you in context?
Jo Bradford:I think I used to find that I made most of my work in blues and greens. I'm very drawn colours of nature. but recently I've been enjoying kind of pushing myself outside of my comfort zone and making the colour work that you're talking about work that I sell in galleries. I've got representation in London and Paris and, the work that sort of sells well to buyers of fine art through fine art galleries is kind of dependent on what they're kind of looking to buy in their home. So I feel like if I spent too much time thinking about what the audience wanted, it would be really difficult. So I tried to just make work based around colors that inspire me. So quite often I have a huge window in my studio and I get to, I'm very high up on Dartmoor where I live off grid and I have this opportunity to watch the light change in the evenings and change from blues and greens. On the landscape to these kind of reds and warm orange tones and yellows and so on. So I think that I kind of end up making work depending on what I've seen out of my window for the last few weeks. But when I'm in my darkroom, I'm recording colored lights. So I filter away the lights that I don't need out of the visible white light spectrum. And then just those images that you're looking at on my website are literally just the record of certain colors. And I can kind of mask one in and mask another one out physically with my hands and bits of card to make. Colours change. So it's a very physical thing, my interaction with colour happens on a very physical level in a pitch black darkroom with no other light apart from what's happening in my uh, in my enlarger. It
David McClelland:window there, but I know that Dartmoor's where you're based now, but that wasn't where you were raised. You were raised in South Africa. Do you find colours from that part of your life still have an influence? Because I imagine it's a different colour palette there than what you experience now.
Jo Bradford:It really is. the, the African colour palette is far more autumnal, sort of browns and reds and warmer tones to the Dartmoor colour scheme that I have. So I feel like I do lurch between the two from time to time and I wear a lot of warm colours these days. I went through a phase of wearing all black all the time for ages and now I'm really enjoying dressing more like my African childhood again with lots of bright reds and warm tones because all the colours of clothing are dyed in such warm, vibrant ways in African culture. So, I feel like it's a big mishmash of all the parts of me put together to make me the person I am now.
David McClelland:And speaking of mishmash, as you put it, not me, it does seem as though there are different processes that you go through an artist. It's a photographic artist. It's not just capturing pictures. You have an element of processing and masking as you describe it there. So it is kind of bringing together different media, treating them in different ways, feeling very, manual. is really important to you, I take it.
Jo Bradford:It is. I think, with photography, the medium has so much potential and you can make so much work in ways that are unexpected and creative and unique. And I feel like often when people just think about the camera on its own, that that can be almost limiting in a way. So thinking about what the medium of photography can do in general, if you take in all of the analog aspects of photography, which is something that I'll be talking about, um, at The Photography Show on the Analog Stage this year. It's just looking at the way analog processes can be explored to give you something else from the photographic medium other than just what you get from lens based work. So, I think, um, for me, process is fascinating. It's returning as often as I can to that original magic of being taught to make photos in a dark room as a very small child and understanding the way that the light would make this image appear and the kind of emotional feeling that you would have from seeing a picture appear out of the darkness onto a sheet of paper, so. I feel like, um, my process driven work is very much about exploring those same ideas and searching for those same feelings that I always had as a, you know, a starter out in photography many years ago.
David McClelland:And like you say, that process is what you'll be describing some of at the photography show in March. And it just occurs to me, do you feel as though we've seen, and the photography show is just one reflection of this, but we see it elsewhere as well, this almost a return to to manual. We've seen a lot of analog, a lot of film photography returning. Do you feel as though in a way this is a response to the fact that digital photography is almost moving in the opposite direction with all of the amazing autofocus, computational photography, everything that modern digital cameras can do, that With every action, there's a reaction, and this manual process, getting manually into the art again, is some kind of artistic balance?
Jo Bradford:I think it really is. I, I have a, a new Fujifilm GFX 50 S2, which I absolutely love and will spend many a happy hour out in my local woodland photographing scenes around me and absolutely adore the pristine, wonderful, clean, digitally perfect photographs that that camera takes. I love it. And I love the photos that my phone takes as well, my iPhone, but on the other side of things, there's something about that kind of um, the balance of being in touch with photography in all its forms that I feel like I can't let go of. I'm just a fan of photography in every single way that it exists. And so you'll happily find me making cyanotypes one day or working in my colour darkroom another and then taking one of my digital cameras out. I've also got some, like an old couple of Olympus, um, Pen FT half frame cameras that I shove. I've got a black and white film permanently in one and a colour film in the other. And they're always in my handbag. I'm excited. I'm always out and about with some form of camera, engaging with photography in some form.
David McClelland:You mentioned that your smartphone is one of the cameras that you go out shooting with there, Joe, and of course this is another part of your journey over the last few years that you've explored very publicly, and in fact you've published a number of books including one very recently in this area, so tell me about how the smartphone part of your journey began and where it's taken you since.
Jo Bradford:in 2013, when I was pregnant with my daughter, it would have been wildly inappropriate to be spending time in a dark room mixing up chemistry and having given birth as well. I was in the same, situation. So I felt like I still was out wanting to take photographs every day. And it felt important that I did, keep being creative. for me. Having my camera phone in my pocket at all times was just a way of, to start with taking sketches of things in my mind. So we'd go out for walks, my baby and I, and out on the moor. And I think this place would be great to come back with one of my medium format cameras and re photograph. So I'll take a picture with my phone for now and have it as a sketchbook of places to come back to when the opportunity presents itself. And, um, over time I would show friends my photos on my phone. And I was the most analogue person ever, so I would never want to put them anywhere publicly but I was persuaded to stick some of them on Instagram and, rapidly actually picked up a really huge Instagram following for, the time, what I thought was, you know, smartphone photos, having a hundred felt like huge to me that it accelerated really quickly and so I stopped being ashamed of being a smartphone photographer and tried to kind of engage with this idea of smartphone photography. So, my smartphone photography specific Instagram account is at Green Island Studios and I just post pictures of Dartmoor there and everything on that Instagram is just photos taken with my phone and it's kind of had a, A loyal following for such a long time now that I feel that that's very much part of who I am. It's part of my DNA as a photographer that the smartphone is a way of me engaging with photography whenever the whim takes me. I never have to miss a second of wanting to take pictures because I've always got some form of camera. And my smartphone is very much an important part of my arsenal, as it were. Mmm.
David McClelland:you mentioned there in the early 20 teens. There was a real realisation that the smartphone isn't just a make do camera. This can be used for professional work, professional creativity, whether that's photography, videography, journalism, content creation in the broader sense. And there was a real movement. was such a fantastic time to be part of that community and seeing, um, the likes of Brendan O'Shea, for example, over in Ireland, and so on, and yourself creating and also building up such a following. Leveraging platforms like Instagram. Where, where do you feel as though we are, we are now because we're some 10 years on from that awakening, I think, do you see them in the same, um, area, the same category as maybe smaller digital cameras, or do you still think there is a, a real uniqueness about what they are capable of, about the feel of the output that they produce?
Jo Bradford:let's say for example, when the little Sony XR 100s and, you know, those other small cameras that are also really easy to slip into your pocket and a lovely extra thing to have in your arsenal. The difference between them, of course, is the phone. itself has a lot of algorithms and computational photography attached to it that you see less of with the, um, kind of pocket cameras, the small digicams and so on. So I think it has a different place because it provides a different kind of image. But for me, I kind of just think of it as another tool in my box. Um, and the one that will come out. If I haven't made the effort to go out with a big camera and specifically look for images, a lot of stuff that I photograph is incidental, things that I just see in my day to day life, and so that's the perfect camera for that part of the job. But interestingly, my new book, Viewpoint, is um, the kind of premise for writing that or putting that book together when I approach publishers about that one. It's my first not how to book and the reason why I wanted to make that was to say that I feel like we're at a point in our history is in photography that the smartphone is now. Indistinguishable photographically, the images from smartphones, should I say, are somewhat indistinguishable from other forms of, photographic devices or photographic cameras. And I kind of had found a large collection of photographers whose work is absolutely stunning. Brendan O'Shea is one of them that you mentioned earlier. and had sort of said to my publisher, is there any chance I could make a kind of, just a book that shows a collective, view of the world through smartphone photography taken by amazing photographers all over the globe and the idea here being that you would not look at any of these pictures and think they were taken on a phone. They just look like any other beautiful. Collection of images that you might find in a, in a, in a book, in a, an art gallery bookshop or so on. So, it ended up being something that I was super proud to make. I have 54 contributors in that book. And when you through the pages of it, it's hard to believe that these people are just working with phones. And I say, just as if that's in some form diminishing what phones can do, but it's just shows that any tool in the right hands can be used to great effect.
David McClelland:I think we've spoken about this on the show before, about the different feel that you get when you're interacting with, uh, It's device that we, kind irrespective of whether it's got a camera or not, we carry one around with us every day, we feel comfortable with it. We're used to cracking open the camera and doing a selfie, or filming ourselves, or doing a FaceTime call, or whatever it is. So, what I find interesting here about the storytelling that you were looking to tap into, the intimacy that you're looking to tap into with Viewpoint, the smartphone, kind of, It creates, it facilitates that intimacy, and certainly when you are going and filming an interview with a contributor, if you're turning up with a hulking great big ENG camera and lighting and microphone and sound, you're going to get a very different contribution to the one that you would get if you were filming on a smartphone. And maybe that plays into the type of conversations that you are facilitating with Viewpoint.
Jo Bradford:I think it's, really interesting that when I was pitching this book, one of the ideas that the publishers pricked their ears up about was the idea that in the past we're so used to seeing photographs places that are not our own homes, you know, that as a kind of, view taken by perhaps wealthy Western photographers who can kind of turn up at these places with their big expensive cameras. And we all see the world, we often see the world through this kind of particular viewpoint, um, which is quite Western centric and elitist in that people that can afford that kind of technology. And one of the things I liked about the idea of taking photos shot on phones is it was far more democratic that there's, you know, a wider. section of the global community that have access to that particular camera. And a lot of the photographers in the book aren't shooting on particularly modern or, high spec cameras at all, but they're still producing really interesting work. But the idea that I was collecting stories told by the people in the places where they live their own daily lives shot in the same way that I shoot my daily life, just seeing something of interest and taking that picture, capturing moments with families, political changes in the world. And. You know, beautiful artistic stories and some, some people who are making kind of conceptual art and others that are looking at, stories about migration or, refugees all these different things that are coming together in this way. And people are using their phones to connect those stories because it just feels more personal, more intimate and more immediate. So yeah, all all of those reasons, I think the phone definitely has a place in the Canon.
David McClelland:Right tool for the right job, and I guess my final question is, if you are going out for a walk on your beloved Dartmoor, how do you decide what the right tool is for a given, a given feel that you have that you want to create something?
Jo Bradford:I guess, if I'm honest, I'll usually have two or three cameras with me if I have the opportunity. So I'll always know that my phone is there because I'll take it with me for lots of other reasons other than just taking photos. Um, and there are times when things are happening quickly that I'll always reach for my phone. Because in that instant, the fleeting moments can only be captured with something that doesn't require a lot of setup. And obviously with your phone and having that access the camera on the home screen, you don't even have to unlock it to be able to engage the camera. That means it's always at the ready. But at the same time, I'll happily go out with my GFX 50, the Fujifilm medium format camera that I love, to go and get. Large photographs of trees and landscapes and things like that, because I know the detail will be amazing and it's got the most fantastic image stabilization in that camera, so I can shoot it really, really low light situations in the woodlands and handhold kind of late in the day. So I'll tend to take those two out with me. They're my two favorite cameras to go wandering around the mall with one slightly heavier than the other, but they both fit comfortably in my backpack in my pocket. So, yeah, I'll start with those two because they cover both ends of the spectrum.
David McClelland:Joe, so amazing to hear about your, creative process and I can't wait to hear more about it, The Photography Show in March.
Jo Bradford:Looking forward to being there.
David McClelland:And a big thanks to Jo Bradford. We'll put details of that new book, Viewpoint Human Stories, through the smartphone lens in the show notes. Jim, Jo clearly does a lot of photography shot on iPhone. Actually, I didn't ask her what smartphone she used, and I don't really think it mattered too much to her. Um, Shot on iPhone rose to the top of conversation again, but from a filmography point of view a few weeks ago at Apple's latest product launch, its scary fast launch, where it unveiled the new M3 processors in its new MacBooks and iMacs. I have one, I went and bought one of those MacBook Pros a couple of weeks ago now with an M3 processor in there, but that's for a different podcast, not for this one. But, right at the end, and if you're one of those people who likes to stay behind and watch the credits roll, people noticed, as did I, to be fair, I was there and I tweeted it straight away, even though it was a midnight showing here in the UK, shot on iPhone. And this was the first that we're aware of, anyway, of one of these glossy Apple product launch videos that said it was shot on iPhone. Now, Shot on iPhone has been a program, a campaign for many years that Apple has gone to market with, and big billboards on the London Underground and elsewhere as well of the still images that it is capable to make on a phone. We also saw, I think it was Olivia Rodrigo who my daughter likes very very much as soon as the Apple iPhone 15 Pro launched, I think her video was filmed on that. But seeing an actual Apple product launch filmed on an iPhone took, uh, a lot of conversation out of the internet. And Apple came out with a making of video, of course they did, a couple of days later. Jim, we were talking about a high end filmmaking, as well as the accessible stuff as well, depending upon your choice of camera. What did you make of what Apple did with that, video the launch itself, and then the making of behind it?
Jim Marks:Well, I think, I think, first of all, I think it's a, it's a brilliant piece, piece of promotion. I also think, and here's a first, um, we've all got the EU to thank because if the EU hadn't forced Apple to replace their lightning connector with a USB C, none of this would be happening. And there's the irony. That's what the EU have done for you. They brought smartphone proper filmmaking to you because what that change has done. Is it's enabled Apple to actually have proper connectivity to an SSD.
David McClelland:Yes.
Jim Marks:with, which enables ProRes to go straight there, because there's been a lot of bottlenecks in terms of how you record ProRes on your smartphone, on your iPhone. But having that USB C is actually enabling us to put little SSDs on the back and little holders. And you're absolutely right. create really quite amazing image. I mean, if you look at that behind the scenes film, you'll see 400 people and lighting and cranes and movement and gimbals and all sorts of things. It's actually quite great. It's a great thing to see to kind of decode the craft of how they made all of that. And then you'll see a tiny phone right at the end on the end of the crane.
David McClelland:Well, this is the FrankenRig that I was talking about as well, and I've been involved in this smartphone videography, mobile journalism, we've called it movement, for maybe about ten years or so, but to see that little phone, I don't think I've ever seen as large a production built around a smartphone as I had there, and you mentioned the lighting, there is a lot of lighting there.
Jim Marks:of lighting because it's, it's all about the other stuff. You know, it's all about the light, the lighting, the movement. what we've been able to do though, I must just give a quick, a quick note to Blackmagic. Because they've brought out a free app. And it's not often that I try a free app that's worth it. But what they've done is they've simplified the interface so that you can change your frame rates. You can, and I think it's a fantastic enabling app. I mean, I met some film students when I was at Camerimage in Poland. I went there recently and I said, try it. They loved it because they could learn about frame rates. They could put it on their phone and shoot stuff straight away. And it was just, it was incredibly enabling. That, you know, you could see that you could also bypass because you can put it externally, you can bypass the Achilles heel of the phone, which has been oversharpening and all of that kind of down compression that they do in the phone. It's the ability of an app like that. The phone and the external recording via the USB C to an external SSD. Suddenly, you're absolutely right. Are we, are we all putting iPhones as a wide B cam on top of our other cameras? Because if you're in a bind, you know, you can now color it. You can, you can put a LUT on it. You can do all sorts of things that would have been actually unthinkable when we were even at the iPhone 14. So it has been a big change.
David McClelland:yes, the Blackmagic app that launched at NAB, I think, just a few weeks before, it's certainly not the first pro video app. I'm thinking of the likes of Filmic Pro, which has been around for a very long time, available on
Jim Marks:but they went to a subscription model and there's a lesson here. There's a lesson here for all
David McClelland:a lot of its user base. Yeah.
Jim Marks:mean, you know, Blackmagic are disruptive in that way in many different ways. And in this sense that I think they've, it's the right app, you know, at the time for that phone. Would it? I don't look, it's not replacing another camera. Because you can't really put many lenses on it. You can screw some lenses on the front. You can put a sort of telephoto, you can kind of fix nds because obviously ndss are a problem. on such a small flat device, you have to have a way of doing that if you want to keep, to 25 50. But it's, it's a really interesting step forward. I, I think it increases everyone's interest in filmmaking. Be because,
David McClelland:shot a job on a
Jim Marks:because I've done jobs in the past for Samsung launching their phones, and I had to shoot the entire job on the phone. So the answer is yes, but the iPhones, I mean, they've also been used, I think there's a company called, is it Akerson who do like, you can turn the iPhone into a monitor now on your camera
David McClelland:with iOS 17 it accepts, input so you can use your iPad as an external
Jim Marks:Because they're incredible screens. And, and so, these are devices with incredible screens, better and better cameras, you do need an app that enables that, and enables the manual control that you actually want to do as a, as a filmmaker, which comes down actually to frame rates. Shutter angle, shutter, and also being able to record it in, you know, with a, color profile that allows it not to be crushed in camera. I think that's what people often forget. I always think of it, if you think of your arms out wide, as being dynamic range. As wide as you go, yeah? and you think of your delivery. If you crush it, if you bring those hands in and you crush that dynamic range in camera, you can't Put your arms out wide again. Once it's crushed, it's crushed. So there's a reason why we use flatter profiles, why we shoot in logs sometimes is because I know it's kind of silly visual gag, but it's for people to understand that if you crush it down, if you make it brittle, if you over sharpen it. I always have minus four on my Fujis, bring the sharpening down. you, you wanna have a nice flattened egg that you can then apply or, or treat. Uh, which has a wide gamut, which hasn't clipped the highlights. And that's, that's, that's the first time with this iPhone 15 that we've been, been given a glimpse, perhaps, of what's coming in five years time. I, I'm intrigued with what Apple, with what Apple do as a company in that space. It, it's very interesting. you know, it's really interesting to see how the device has changed. Maybe they'll have a flying one that floats behind our shoulder next. Captures it all.
David McClelland:I think we're going to be wearing these cameras on our face with the Vision Pro that be launching early in 2024.
Jim Marks:Yes, you're right.
David McClelland:the idea of slapping a camera on your face excites you, then, well, stay tuned because I'm sure Apple or anyone else comes out with any compelling cameras that do that, we will be covering them here on the show. But that is all that we have time for this month, and indeed, for this year. But we will be back on the first Thursday of 2024 when Gavin Hoey will be joining us in the news hot seat. A reminder that tickets are now on sale for the photography and video show at the NEC in Birmingham, England from the 16th to the 19th of March. All of your favourite brands will be there. Uh, your favourite speakers too, including Jim, you, you will be there at the show. Astonishing
Jim Marks:but true.
David McClelland:Also just announced our Photoshop, legends, Scott Kelby, And Adobe principal evangelist, Julian coast. I Head over to photography show.com to find out more and back your tickets. If you enjoyed the show, then please do all of the things that podcasts normally ask you to do hit subscribe, tell your friends, share with your local camera club and Hey, even leave us a review. There are show deals, giveaways, and competitions galore over on the socials this Christmas, and very shortly we'll be announcing our emerging artist award and create a con star creator competition. Look us up over there. Where on Insta at the photography show. And such as up on Facebook too. Jim jolly good of you to join us this month. Where can people keep up with what you get up to?
Jim Marks:Well, that's very interesting because I'm terrible at social media.
David McClelland:ha!
Jim Marks:They can come see me at the show and I'm happy to talk about any topic literally that we've discussed. It's been, it's been a very enjoyable process. Thanks. Thank you very much.
David McClelland:And remember, you can go and see Jim at the show if you want to vent your frustration at him claiming that photography is a day off. Buy your ticket 16th to the 19th of March and go and confront Jim. I, I will be your bodyguard, Jim, I
Jim Marks:they're going to throw buns and cakes at me. It's, it's not good.
David McClelland:maybe they'll throw lenses instead. That could be a good thing or a bad thing, thank you very much indeed. Thank you all for joining us. Until next time, bye bye.
Jim Marks:Bye.