Why merely take pictures, when you can build them?

My pictures usually begin with “How would it look if…?” and take shape as I experiment with anything from old tools to odd forms of light. My approach comes from a childhood in a do-it-yourself household. These days, ideas for photos come to me as I walk through the garage or basement and imagine new ways of putting familiar materials to work.

The idea behind “Circle with Matches” (at left) was to create a geometric subject that’s its own light source. Noticing how a match head is wider than its base, I figured that if I laid enough matches together, I’d end up with a circle-similar to the way wedges or voussoirs come together in an arch.

First, I laid down several hundred 11-inch matches (the type used for lighting fireplaces) that I’d cut down to about 4 inches to keep the circle manageable.

But after building the ring, I realized that the image needed something more. So I added three inner rings of common household matches. The smallest are paper one that I tore from matchbooks.

While there are four rings of matches, there are five layers of light, because on the innermost circle I used a pattern of three match heads facing out alternating with one head facing in.

YOU CAN DO IT

Building the circles took a few days. I did this in my garage, where at least the concrete floor wouldn’t go up in flamers. As with all of my images, I took safety very seriously. Fire extinguishers, protective glasses, and working a safe distance away are just the beginning. Flammables? Far, far away. Anything less would be foolish.

When it came to shooting, theere could be no mistakes. I had only once chance to capture the image, since I use 4×5-inch black-and-white film. My camera is a tripod-mounted Calumet 4×5 monorail model with a Schneider 90mm f/8 lens and cable release.

I covered the garage windows with black plastic to block unwanted light, and thought hard about how to ignite the matches, since I didn’t want my hand to be visible. I decided to use a soldering iron, and touched its heated tip to a match head, quickly pulling away as the matches took off.

As with many of my images, it isn’t a single exposure: Each ring is a seperate exposure on the same sheet of film. In the darkened garage, I opened the shutter, set to “I”, and then ignited a circle of matches. Once the circle burned itself out, I repeated the process until all five rings had been exposed.

Matches produce a lot of light. As a result, I had to underdevelop (or “pull”) the Kodak Tri-X film to prevent the highlights from losing detail.

Want to try this with digital? It might be easier, because you could set up and expose each ring separately, and then produce a digital composite in software. My advice? Set your DSLR to its lowest contrast setting, adn to be sure that you capture all the detail, shoot RAW.

For more of his work, visit here

If your travel photos aren’t as good as they could be, I can help. According to this 29 year old French born, U.S. based photographer, you could be too reticent to approach strangers, too bogged down with gear or too determinated to it all yourself.

Alpeyrie conquered these problems, and moved on to a whole other level of travel photography where he deals with the bullets and bombs hurled in conflicts around the world. He is a war photographer.

So just before he took off for China on a series of assignments, he offered these tips for taking pictures in places that aren’t much like home:

• BE LOW KEY. “I don’t like to be seen as a photographer,” he says, “I don’t want to arrract attention.” Avoid such give a ways as a field vest. “In some places, it’s like you’re a walking dollar sign,” with people demanding money every time you take a picture anywhere near them.
• SAY HELLO. “I usually just go up to people and ask if I can take their picture, “he says, flashing a smile. “Average people are agree.
• TRAVEL LIGHT. The nimble photographer gets the shots. “When the troops are on the move, you don’t want to be carrying so much stuff that you slow them down. “The next time you’re tempted to stuff an overflowing camera bag, consider that for a few weeks in the backcountry with a band guerrillas, Alpeyrie brings just a daypack with little more than extra T-shirt and a tiny laptop computer to back up the files from his well-worn Nikon D100-“It’s a really good machine.” His lenses a 28-200mm f/3.5-5.6 Nikkor and a 12-24mm f/4 Tokina.
• GET HELP. Self-reliance ain’t what it’s cracked up to be. Hire a guide. Or as they’re called in Alpeyrie’s business, “fixers.” Before a trip, he e-mails local journalists for recommendations, or gets names from hotel managers. “The fixer knows where to go, where not to go, how to get things dine, and serves as a translator.” He says. “It’s an investment you need to make.” If you don’t want to hire a guide go along with rebel armies, you don’t need to hire anyone. You just go with them. They feed you.