The Pike Drive-in

The Pike Drive-in by Carl Weese was the third print I got in my small fine art print collection, and for now it is probably the one I am most found of. I bought it at one of the print sales at The Online Photographer. The Online Photographer (or TOP for short) is my all time favorite photo site and the only blog I have ever cared to return to more than a few time. Actually I do not think I have missed visiting TOP many days in the last couple of years. If I know just a little about photography today, then most of the credit should go to Mike and the other writers at TOP. I have bought quite a few of the books recommend and also a couple of the prints sold.

For someone sitting in Europe there is a little of the same desolate very American-like feeling about this print as there is about my Motel Bien Venido print. There also is some of the same rectangular angels that is all over the Motel print.

Everything else is different of course. This tells a great story with very few means - for more about the story and for more pictures yous should definitely visit NY Times Lens. It is sad, but also a little humorous. It has a tight simple composition that is both effective in telling the story but also is just damn pleasing. Mike Johnston at The Online Photographer surely had a hand in selecting this photograph for the print sale - Mike likes a simple line-in-the-middle composition instead of the all beaten to dead golden rules and two-thirds.

As you can see, this is a black and white print. But not just any black and white print (whatever that is these days) - it is a platinum/palladium print. I will not try to describe the process, but this print is a contact print of the 8 x 10" negative. It is just amazingly beautiful in real life! The tones, the details and the physicality of it is just very different from an inkjet print.

The reason for me to write this blog post just today is that today The Online Photographer had a link to Kickstarter. I had of course read about Kickstarter and had previously visited a few projects. I am fascinated about the idea of it, and just a few weeks ago I had decided with my self that I should find something interesting to back. I just hadn't gotten around to do anything about it.

So when I read at TOP that Carl Weese was doing a project at Kickstarter, I knew right away that I had to back that. And the project is about visiting and photographing some of the few remaining drive-in theaters! And you get prints as gifts! Not palladium prints, but still.