Project “Y” Hollywood Light – Continued from Jan. 2020

Photography

Recycled and added the original fresnel reflector to fit a Paul C Buff monolight (instead of using a Buff Umbrella Reflector which got used on Project Z). That means I cut a hole in it with a Dremel tool!

Here’s the bare mono light without the reflector in Spot and Flood positions.

Here’s the reflector added, in Spot and Flood positions.

Here’s what it looks like in use, Full Spot and Full Flood. Getting a little bit of flash tube shape in Spot since the Buff Digibee doesn’t have a diffuser like the Buff Einstein but it’s smaller so I get full travel.  I’ll probably fix with a piece of Tuff Frost.

I think the light dates from the 1960’s. Mole Richardson moved a few years ago and a lot of old paper records got tossed.  The “Ren Mar” stencil on the barn doors means it was at the original DesiLu Studios. Probably used on set for Golden Girls, I Spy and bunch of others.   Last week, I used it in studio in two different setups with a dancer as a fill and a key. I’ll post some of those when I get client approval.  Meanwhile here are two images made with this as a key light.  In the B&W image, it was the only light

Below is my original post from January of 2020

Finished bracket today to swap out the original 2K lamp for a Paul C Buff Einstein in a Mole Richardson 412.

Idea from Mark Kitaoka

Using this 10″ Fresnel will be a new ball game compared to a half dozen 3″ Mole Midgets & Minis for portraits.

Project “Z”- Part 1…

Photography

Today, UPS brought my eBay purchase of an Altman Shakespeare Zoom ellipsoidal.  Shutters work fine, need to buy a pattern holder for gobos and an iris. 

This is partly disassembled with the halogen lamp assembly removed.  I’ll cut off the casting above the gray tape to mount a strobe.  That will be exponentially brighter than the original lamp, for a 1/1000th of second, which is all I need.  Bringing a little bit of Theater to the Studio. Maybe even a little Hollywood.

Winter Reverie – Anniversaire de l’amour

Clayton, North Carolina, Remembrance

Today, it’s cold ashes from a lot of months ago. Flanked by windows that frame dull copper winter Beech leaves against a pale twilight. But twenty nine years ago…

If you’re home life is hopelessly miserable and you’re avoiding it after work on a Friday by heading into a neighborhood saloon and the parking lot is blocked by a green Buick stuck in snow due to a trunk full of firewood that eventually has to hand carried to a third floor apartment … it could happen.

And it lasted forever. As much as anyone has forever.

The Last Time I Saw Paris – La Vie En Rose

Remembrance, Travel

Place Sainte-Catherine, Paris – 24 September 2016

Flâner is a French word with no accurate English translation.  It roughly means to wander without direction but be part of a place. To discover what you didn’t know you were looking for. The place to do it is Paris. And Le Marais, where our apartment was, is heaven.  We’d explored Place des Vosges and the part of Musee Carnavalet still open before renovation began. And planned to attend the free concert there the following afternoon. After walking for hours, Place Sainte-Catherine on a perfect late September afternoon was our resting place. Lunch was a proper two hour, Parisian dejeuener. 

There were Moms and Dads with kids and tourists and a very good busker playing violin.   And lovers, both young and like us, old.  It was perfect.  It was our “La Vie En Rose”.

The Last Time I Saw Paris – Opera House

Photography, Remembrance, Travel

There are two now, a much newer one at the Bastille and this, designed by Charles Garnier and completed in 1875. It provided the story line and myth for “The Phantom of The Opera”, including his reserved box.  There is a lake beneath, created to drain wet land during construction. And a woman was killed in her seat by a fallen piece of chandelier. Before Ballet Russe resurrected ballet here, the balconies were places to be seen.  Today, the Paris Ballet is extraordinary.  It is the only ballet I have seen as an audience and with my sweet heart.  That and a dinner afterward, overlooking a Parisian boulevard, was the last memory we shared.