Cardiac Access Nurses' Station, Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ

Every interior space has its own set of scheduling restrictions. A photographer must find a balance between quality and convenience, which means choosing a time when the space still looks its absolute best while not interfering with the business of its occupants. The guidelines for scheduling the shoot can seem like a series of contradictions:

• Shoot too close to the completion date and the construction crew may still be racing to deal with unfinished punchlist items;
• Shoot immediately after construction and you run the risk that spaces are devoid of furniture and equipment;
• Shoot too long after construction and you may find that high-traffic areas are already beginning to look worn.
• Also, once the space is open for use, the shoot can prove to be an unmanageable inconvenience to a 24/7 operation.

Sitting Area, Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ

There is no steadfast hard rule, and no one-size-fits-all answer. The best time for photography will be different for every project. Previous planning and discussions between the client, the occupants, and photographer are critical to getting the best interior photographs.

For example, photographing a restaurant requires scheduling a time not during service, but after the tables have all been dressed and the cleaning staff has had a chance to tend to the floors, windows, etc.

NICU Patient Room, Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ

When Greg photographed a series of new additions to the Morristown Memorial Hospital for Buckl Architects, we had the benefit of working within a perfect time window for each phase. For this project, the ideal time to schedule the photo shoot was after construction had completed, furniture had been moved in, and most of the equipment and computers had been installed – but before those portions of the hospital opened their doors to patients.

Intensive Care Unit, Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ

The last aspect is probably the most important. People are usually glad to be accommodating during a photo shoot, but it might be inconvenient for an ICU patient to leave their room just so the photographer can set up his shot.

Nurses' Station, Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ

On all the projects we have worked on for Buckl Architects they have always been actively involved in the process, and have done a great job providing and styling plants for each of the spaces. Lee Tamaccio at Buckl is a kick-ass stylist.

Nurses's Station and Hallway, Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ

This project was featured in the Architectural Showcase of Healthcare Design Magazine.

This weekend I am attending ASMP’s Strictly Business 3 series of talks and seminars for professional photographers. In this time of immense change in technology and in the economics of the photography industry, these events have been a positive catalyst for me. It is clear that the world needs images.  While there are forces at work that are reducing prices at the low end of the photography market (think micro stock and cell phone news photos), there is still a need for experienced commercial image makers.

Greg Benson, tagged.

This weekend I have met many other photographers, both younger and older. I’m 52. While it has been fun to engage in nostalgic reminiscences with photographers my age, I am energized by the enthusiasm of many of the younger photographers. It is encouraging to see people in their twenties starting their photo businesses. It has always been a leap of faith to start a photography business–I started my full time business in 1982.

Yesterday one of the four workshops I ended up in was called the Artist Lost and Found taught by Sean Kernan. I entered the wrong hotel meeting room and ended up in Sean’s session by accident. The previous sessions during the day on licensing, web sites and marketing were helpful and informative, but by after lunch my brain was filled to the top with prescriptive things I should start doing. Sean focused  on having working commercial photographers re-connect with the wonder and thrill with photography that animated them when they were new photographers.

Sean had the group of about sixteen people do group exercises to open up perception and let go of inhibition. I felt like I was in a theater class.

We stood in a circle and Sean tossed an imaginary potato to someone across the circle. That person mimed tossing to another person and then the imaginary potato became a basketball and then an orange. While doing a child like game the brain had to move into another sphere of imagining and reacting instead of rational thinking. We played another circle game with changing music. One person would move across the circle to touch the next player. Each person had to move to the type of music being played. A formal minuet, hip hop, monks chanting, tribal drum music followed in quick succession as each person improvised movement to that music.

What’s the connection with photography? Every creative endeavor needs to tap into intuition and gut decision making. Being open to the new is a crucial part of being creative.

ASMP members getting *their* photo taken by Sean Henry.

If I had a dollar for every time someone said to me, “I hate having my picture taken,” I could take an extra week’s vacation each year. As a portrait photographer I strive to calm subjects’ anxieties. Nervousness about having one’s photograph taken is not a new worry.

I was paging through a book of Ogden Nash poems recently and ran across this poem written in the 1930s.

Waiting for the Birdie
by Ogden Nash

Some hate broccoli, some hate bacon,
I hate having my picture taken.
How can your family claim to love you
And then demand a picture of you?
The electric chair is a comfortless chair,
But I know an equally comfortless pair;
One is the dentist’s, my good sirs,
And the other is the photographer’s.
Oh, the fly in all domestic ointments
Is affectionate people who make appointments
To have your teeth filled left and right.
Or you face reproduced in black and white.
You open the door and you enter the studio,
And you feel less cheerio than nudio.
The hard light shines like seventy suns,
And you know your features are foolish ones.
The photographer says, Natural, please,
And you cross your knees and uncross your knees.
Like a duke in a high society chronicle
The camera glares at you through its monocle
And you feel ashamed of your best attire,
Your nose itches, your palms perspire,
Your muscles stiffen, and all the while
You smile and smile and smile and smile.
It’s over; you weakly grope for the door;
It’s not; the photographer wants one more.
And if this experience you survive,
Wait, just wait till the proofs arrive.
You look like a drawing by Thurber or Bab,
Or a gangster stretched on a marble slab.
And all your dear ones, including your wife,
Say There he is, that’s him to the life!
Some hate broccoli, some hate bacon,
But I hate having my picture taken.

Penn students observe birds at Morris Arboretum

For a location photographer it is always exciting when assignments take you to unusual places. Making environmental portraits inside a birdcage the size of a tennis court was a unique experience.

University of Pennsylvania animal behaviorist Dr. David White leads a course called Research Experience in Animal Behavior. He supervises students as they do hands-on research.

In the photo above, Greg posed the students to show them engaged in their research.

Dr. White speaks with students at the aviary in Morris Arboretum

In a past issue of the Penn Arts & Sciences magazine the publication ran an article focused on one of Dr. White’s student groups who observed the behavior of cowbirds. Greg was asked to visit the research group and their professor at their aviary in the Morris Arboretum just outside of Philadelphia.

Cowbirds in Dr. White's aviary at Morris Arboretum

The location for these environmental portraits of Dr. White and his students gives the photos a rich sense of place.

Dr. White and research students in the aviary at Morris Arboretum

Backlit by the sun, taken with an iPhone.

Sitting at breakfast I noticed the backlit bottles on our window sill, seen through the window blind. The sun is the supreme light source. As a pinpoint spotlight it’s unrivaled. Sunlight moves quickly. Five minutes later this light had moved on.

photo by Vivian Maier

Fame and recognition can depend on dumb luck. When John Maloof purchased the contents of an abandoned storage locker he never expected to find a treasure trove of photographs by a completely unknown artist. In spite of her talent, during her own lifetime, Vivian Maier’s work was likely unknown to anyone but the people closest to her.

Her work from the 1950s anticipates work by Diane Arbus and Lee Friedlander. There is an affinity to Robert Frank’s work.  Similar to Arbus, Maier used a square format camera and captured photos of real people on the street. I have always been a sucker for good street photography. It’s a delight to look through her images.

photo by Vivian Maier

This shot reminds me of Robert Frank’s work. There is an air of glamour and mystery immersed in an ordinary night. Who is this woman with a while stole and puffy dress walking towards a 1957 Chevy? Why is she alone?

photo by Vivian Maier

I love how the balloon blocks the face of the man sitting with the baby. Just as the baby yearns to touch the balloon, I yearn to see his face, yet I know I never will.

photo by Vivian Maier

Maier shot many details of hands and textures. They are visually intriguing and tell a story of a person without showing the person’s face. The geometry of the triangular blanket and the itsy bitsy circle of the watch face play against the circles and rectangles on the woman’s dress.

photo by Vivian Maier

Maier’s shot of the Sphinx and pyramid interrupted by a horse’s ass is hilarious and ahead of its time. It shows the messiness and absurdity of the real world at a big tourist site. I speculate that she was a nanny on a family trip to Egypt.

She was an on-the-street spy who created surreal images with a camera. Given that the world almost missed Maier’s work, I wonder how many other artistic treasures sit undiscovered amidst the tons of work created by unsung artists.

Dining Room Overlooking the Kitchen, The Capital Grille, King of Prussia, PA

We were chosen by JJ DeLuca, the construction company, to showcase their work at The Capital Grille in King of Prussia, PA. An oversized archway to the kitchen is the focal feature of the dining room. Capturing both the open feel and the lushness of the spaces’ wood paneling, the amber glow of the light fixtures, and crisp table linens was the goal in the above photograph.

Dining Room in the Bar Area, The Capital Grille, King of Prussia, PA

The restaurant has many cozy corners fully wrapped in ceiling to floor dark woods and leather.

Wine Cellar, The Capital Grille, King of Prussia, PA

An impressive wine cellar adjoining the dining room is stocked with many choices, and can literally be viewed through through the windows, and not just on the wine list.

Dining Room, The Capital Grille, King of Prussia, PA

I am experimenting with a low cost time lapse camera. I want to document the sky above my studio, every day for an entire year. Here are the first four days, showing frames each shot at noon.

Sky above studio 1/1/11, noon.

Sky above studio 1/2/11, noon.

Sky above studio 1/3/11, noon.

Sky above studio 1/4/11, noon.

Here is a composite of images from 12/27/10, each taken an hour apart. It is amazing how quickly the sky changes, and how much variation happens in one day.

Sky above my studio, December 27, 2010, each hour

Leslie Neilsen speaking at Penn Law School about Clarence Darrow in 1999 © Greg Benson

Actor Leslie Nielsen died at age 84, on November 28, 2010,  of complications from pneumonia. He was a late bloomer. His comedic roles in the movies, Airplane and the Naked Gun series gave him fame and fortune in his later years.

In 1999, I had an opportunity to photograph him when he spoke at the Penn Law School. Nielsen had a serious side and used his Hollywood earnings to present a one man show on the early twentieth century lawyer, Clarence Darrow. Darrow is famous for defending a teacher on trial for teaching evolution in the 1920s Scopes Monkey trial in Tennessee. Darrow was also against the death penalty and defended many people in capital cases including Leopold and Loeb, wealthy Chicago teenagers who kidnapped and killed a younger boy.

Retrieving the 1999 image of Nielsen from my archive is illustrative of how much the technology of image making has changed in eleven years. The original is a color negative that was in a job jacket in my studio attic. Once I found the negative, I scanned it, a process that took me around fifteen minutes. A digital original would have been much quicker to find, view and post.

At the end of the day, technology only matters so much, Nielsen’s deadpan comedic delivery brings laughs or groans, whether on film, DVD or youtube.

Neilsen in spoof of Vanity Fair photo of Demi Moore