Photographers are forever, not just for Christmas

A couple of nights ago my four year old daughter and I were browsing Vogue together in our lilac scented bubble bath (because girls just wanna smell yummy) and we decided that we would ask her father for a nice big diamond each for Christmas (couriered via Father-Christmas-Express, naturally.) After all, girls love sparkly things, and what better way to demonstrate a guy’s lurve for his favourite laydeez than by buying them the ultimate symbol of love and devotion?

Rich was surprisingly vocal regarding the reasons why Father Christmas would not be supplying our present of choice. As I recall the words “money,” “broke” and “unrealistic” were used a lot. The Fluffy laydeez went to bed mightily disappointed that night.

Because I’ve always been spoilt and I invariably get what I want (even if I have to wait for it) I did not give up so easily. I really wanted that diamond, and it had to be real and pretty sizeable too because only anything over two carats would signify “forever.” I mean there’s just no point if it’s not genuinely hewn from real diamond rock by impoverished and exploited slaves in Sierra Leone, smuggled via the illegal black market and purchased lovingly off Ebay for $999. Only the bottomless corruption of the conflict diamond trade can equate to true love as your stunning jewel sparkles merrily on your finger. You are wearing not only a symbol of ultimate devotion, but a slice of suffering and exploitation. What girl could possibly resist?

Hmm. After reading about the horrors of the diamond trade, I don’t think that even I could ask for real diamonds, which is really saying something considering I’m a accountant/ex-lawyer and thus by definition I have no discernable morals at all.

Not one to admit defeat so easily, after much internet research I’ve subsequently hatched a cunning plan.

The solution?

Artificial diamonds.

Yes, yes I know what you’re thinking. Tacky, tacky, tacky.

Not so my dear friends because...behold…the latest artificial diamond technology will tenderly gather up the sacred ashes of your dearly departed and transform them into a rock the size of your choice.

Ooh, what a fabulous idea! And as we all know when you’re talking about men, size is everything. The bigger the size of your dearly departed, the bigger the rock. Portly men clearly offer the greatest potential when considering your future art-piece. Worried about ethical issues ladies? No problem I assure you. It’s merely the recycling of your loved one into a unique work of art. Surely the ultimate in green ethics? Preserve your husband, save the planet.

And think of the potential to honour your beloved hubby. Imagine how your best yummy mummy friend will congratulate you on your latest stunning rock which you are proudly showing off at the Saturday night dinner party. “Where did you get that fantastic ring, Meryl? It’s huge!”

“Well, funny you should ask that, Alice. Actually it’s Bert. You know he died recently. Very sad. He looks more beautiful than ever in the afterlife, don’t you think? And just look at his size! He’s at least two and a half carats now, you know. Jeez, I really loved that man ‘o’ mine and now we’re together again for all eternity. Guess that’s what marriage is all about.”

The moral of this story? Watch what you eat, and whatever you do, don’t upset the wife. You never know, she might decide that you’re worth more dead than alive and realise that diamonds can indeed be forever.

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A tempting Christmas pressie for all you laydeez out there? (Click to enlarge)

Censorship Rules!

A few housekeeping points today, in no particular order:

There appears to be a new trend whereby nude photographic blogs are being reported to Google for adult content, with the result that a content warning is slapped on their sites. Our friends Jimmy D and D. Brian Nelson are the latest to fall foul of zealous cyber-prudes who are on a mission to clean up Blogger. Not nice, but a symptom of the new wave of morality sweeping the bloggie world. If you host your blog on the Blogger servers, beware. This could happen to you sooner than you think.

Talking of nasty people, there are increasing numbers of bloggie trolls around at the moment. Some unidentified folks out there think they have a right to be offensive and personally attack an artist’s work. Whilst we’re in favour of freedom of speech, and Lord knows everyone is entitled to their own opinion and to express constructive criticism (which should be helpful rather than rude), I’m getting so bloody tired of nasty anonymous commentors that I’m declaring a New Totalitarian State over this blog.

Call it censorship, call it restricting your freedom of speech, call it Refusal of Service, call it living in the UK too long, I don’t care. Just as you have a right to form your own opinions, it’s our blog and we have a right not to read emails or publish comments which are aggressive and mean. I can’t stand impoliteness, especially from unidentified people who are too cowardly to identify their own work. Life’s too short (mine is anyway.) We don’t need this spiteful crap, and Lord knows there’s been too much of it around recently.
Bloggie trolls, begone!

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Mr Tiddles the Troll spent rather far too much time browsing nekkid chix online

Lastly, it’s roughly ten days until my kids go back to school. I have three completely new school uniforms to adjust, name-tag and get ready, which means I have 102 items to sew and glue. Cue large amounts of liquid refreshment and loud rock music (I can’t sew without them) and (alas) no internet at all until it’s done. I’m going under and I’m not coming out until the fat lady sings. Or something along those lines. Oh the joys of motherhood :-)

Gone for tea. Back soon.

Reality, Fiction and Different Ways Of Seeing

“Photography is the inventory of mortality... photographs show people as being so irrefutably there.”

Susan Sontag, On Photography

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Ifat

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Our latest model shows off her impressive Blowfish lip job

Have a look at the above two photographs. Similar pose, similar lighting, but very different art-forms. Or are they? Without doubt photographers will prefer the photograph, and the CGI artists will prefer the render. But what’s the difference?

Well, I’m entirely new to this CGI thingy, but I’ll have a bash at analysing the two.

The photograph captured the mood and expression of the model in a split second in time. Click. Instant art. On the other hand, the CGI image took three days to get the pose and lighting right and for Rich to create the base image, and then an additional day to render the whole thing, and it’s not even rendered to the highest resolution either. To render this to the best quality that Rich could do it, it would take about forty hours on a quad processor server. At this point, photographers would say, “Why bother? Just take the damn photo instead.”

Because I’ve lived and breathed photography for a couple of years now, my natural bias is towards a photograph being superior to a render. No matter how good the CGI image is, I can always tell the difference. Reality triumphs fiction every time. To me, photographs are real, alive, exact, they record the moment and they capture the mood and emotion of the model in a way that a render never could. The reality of a photograph is, IMO, what makes it such a powerful art-form compared to CGI. However that’s just my uneducated opinion. Rich would just say that the reasons for looking at both are different. They have different objectives. Just because I prefer a photograph doesn’t make it superior, it just means that both types of art communicate a different message and in a different way. Each requires a different way to see.

With a photograph the viewer can imagine himself in the same room as a gorgeous nekkid chick. She’s a real woman, tangible, mortal, he can fantasise about her, admire her as a person rather than an inanimate object. She is shown in the best possible light, the photograph emphasises her beauty and form, and most importantly the image is very personal. In the case of a portrait nude, a photograph would convey emotion, and it would create an emotional response from the viewer. This emphasis on capturing reality is why photography is so darn powerful. A photograph goes way beyond a simple recording device – it communicates both emotion and truth captured in a single moment in time.

None of that reality happens with CGI. The model is quite obviously a work of fiction. It’s more like a painting, a surreal representation that conveys an entirely different message. You don’t fantasise about being with a CGI chick. Instead you might note that the image resembles a real photograph (apart from the lips - clearly they are not of this world), but it is still always “close but not quite.” That doesn’t mean you can’t be moved by a nude render of course. Believe me I’ve seen some CGI erotica that has made me incredibly horny, but I wouldn’t fantasise about being with a character in a render because it’s not real. Instead I would fantasise about being in that scenario myself. My imagination extrapolates and creates the story. How would I feel if it were me doing that?

CGI is in its infancy at the moment. But what happens in the future? I’ve seen how fast this technology is developing, and I’m telling you that after a couple of years (probably less) of Rich practising and developing CGI erotica, the skill, technology and genre will develop to such an extent that you, the viewer, simply won’t be able to tell if the model is real or virtual. Already there are talented photographic artists who use both photographs and rendering to create powerful artistic images, which don’t classify as either photographs or CGI, but a combination of both art-forms. Photoshop was just the start. Every month new software is being developed which will allow artists to further blur the lines between the two. One day, not too far from now, your brain simply won’t recognise that it isn’t a real person in the image, and you will respond to it as you would to a photograph. This bending of reality has major implications for the future of both photography and painting, as well as movies and other mixed media.

Because Rich is such a mischievous soul, it’s his aim to practise both photography and CGI, but to confuse the two. He intends to continue with his photography for the next few years (hurrah! I’m happy again!) but he also wants to become so darn good at CGI that you fantasise about the render as you would a real woman. With time, (a lot of) effort and technology, he believes that her features will eventually be so realistic that you will barely be able to tell the difference. He wants to blur reality and fiction, combine the two and use both camera and computer as tools to manipulate reality.

A bold claim of course, and he has a long way to go. Let’s see if he can pull it off. Knowing Rich I wouldn’t be at all surprised.

In the meantime, we hope you enjoy the experiment as much as we’re going to.

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Images are of Ifat. One and Three are real (just checking.)

An obscure body in the S-K system

Part One: Lin

Zogi: Do you, Ming the Merciless, Ruler of the Universe, take this Earthling Dale Arden, to be your Empress of the Hour?
Emperor Ming: Of the hour, yes.
Zogi: Do you promise to use her as you will?
Ming: Certainly!
Zogi: Not to blast her into space? [Ming glares at Zogi]
Zogi: Uh, until such time as you grow weary of her.
Ming: I do.
Dale: I do NOT!

Flash Gordon (1980)

Lin: I’m upset. Rich and I have had a row. Like all couples we have our moments, but this must mark as one of the weirdest rows that a normal, average, everyday couple has had. Why am I blogging about this publically? Well, this blog is supposed to chart our photographic journey together, the downs as well as the ups. I’ve always felt that others might be able to benefit from the story, others might simply find it entertaining, plus it’s a record for us when we look back in a year’s time and mark a turning point in Fluffytek.

So what’s this all about? Well, Rich is fed up with shooting studio nudes. He tells me that if he continues to shoot studio nudes, it will just be for me and the blog, not for him. He’s says that he’s finishing off his current commitments (two more shoots in the next month or so) but after that he’s going to photograph other stuff, you know…non-naked stuff. If nudes pop along occasionally, he says he won’t turn them away, but from now on things will be different. He wants to create images of other things (he’s not sure what exactly) but he says he’s done with photographing nekkid chix for a while.

I’ve been racking my brains to try and figure out if I’m responsible for this? O.K. My Darth shot was pretty bad, yes, but I don’t think it’s enough to put any photographer off the entire genre! And just because I personally wanted to model some non-explicit stuff for a while, that wouldn’t be enough to do it surely? It’s not as if I want to stop him shooting nekkid chix…quite the opposite. I always encourage him to shoot more, more, more, not less. I love and support his erotica. It totally rocks. And he’s just starting to get published, to get the recognition in the genre that he deserves. Why quit now just when he’s getting really good?

Weird. Scary. I don’t like change.

Just when you think you know someone and you think they’re blissfully happy, they go and turn everything upside down again. That’s artists for you, I guess.

To my knowledge I’m the only woman I’ve ever known who had a blue fit because her partner doesn’t want to photograph nekkid chix any more. It should be the other way round, surely?

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Cheeky Lee

Part Two: Rich

The Emperor Ming the Merciless: Klytus, I'm bored. What play thing can you offer me today?

Flash Gordon (1980)

Rich: Lin is upset. I’ve decided to cut back on nude photography for a while. Truth be told, I’m not particularly fed up with photography or with photographing gorgeous nude women, it’s just that I want to separate the two for a bit.

I never started nude photography for the social aspect, and I certainly didn’t do it because I wanted to be in the same room as a naked woman. I decided on studio photography not only as a way of studying lighting, but also as a way of realising the pictures in my head (I hesitate to use the term creative vision, but you know what I mean.) I have a pretty vivid imagination, and the camera was an excellent way of making those pictures as real as I could get.

I will admit that I’m a bit jaded with studio photography. Once upon a time, not so long ago, only a few UK photographers did the studio nude genre with this type of lighting. Now this style has been dissected, studied, reverse-engineered and everyone’s doing it. It is no longer unique because every man and his mother does it. Look on Deviant Art and you’ll see hundreds of these every week. They’re all the same.

But it’s much more than the inevitable matter of it’s all been done before. Whereas some photographers live for the process of photographing a subject, the camera has always been just a tool for me. I don’t live for the process I’m afraid. I live for the image, the end result. To me it doesn’t matter if the picture in my head is painted with a brush, shot on camera or generated on a computer, as long as the finished image is what I feel it should be.

Just recently I’ve found that the camera can’t accurately express what’s in my imagination. The tool isn’t right and I’m left with a half-finished picture. Don’t get me wrong, photography has taught me exactly what I wanted it to: lighting, composition, form. I can do the above type of shots with my eyes closed, but I’ve learned to do the basics well and now I need more. It’s time to move on, and the only way I can really create the finished image that I want to create is via CGI. I’ve been experimenting with this relatively new tool for a while now, but last year the technology simply wasn’t advanced enough for what I wanted to do. However in the last few months there have been several new tools released which are the next generation in rendering, and they’re pretty cool, almost photographic quality, and the flexibility is now there such that I can finally do what I want to do.

But why CGI? Well, because I’ve always been a computer geek, it’s probably inevitable that I return to using the computer as my paintbrush. Not only is it a heck of a lot of fun learning something new, but it’s the only way I can create the images that really reflect my imagination. Lin needn’t worry. In due course there will still be lots of nekkid chix on the blog, but eventually some of them might be the cyber-chix rather than real ones. I’m not giving up photography, but I need to step back a little and wait for photography to tell me what it wants me to do. In the meantime, CGI is my new toy, and I’m looking forward to playing with it.

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It's a nude Jim, but not as we know it

WIP No 1

No I'm not whipping people. It's a WIP, Work In Progress. I thought I'd share some of the progress I've made in CGI.

Now a CGI scene can look very much like a photograph, but that's as far as the similarity goes. When I take a photograph I get to select location, lighting, model, focal length, composition and then I take the picture. You can simplify this to simply picking up a camera and taking a shot. The photographic equivalent of CGI would be building the house, decorating the rooms, building the furniture, installing the lighting, obtaining or making a model (or growing your own), painting the models skin, arranging the furniture.... and so on.

It's a big job and there is a ton of stuff to learn but I'm making steady progress and I thought I'd share with you the progress I've made since November when I first decided to do this.

Two heads:



Another View:



Getting the skin to render correctly is very hard indeed. The algorithm that generates the way something looks is called a shader, and the skin shader that is used to generate realistic skin has multiple inputs. Each input is a texture map that contains the data for that layer. We have a bump map that describes surface texture, an overall colour, epidermis, dermis, subsurface scattering, specular reflection levels and a whole bunch more. They also have relative weights and adjustments that make for a tricky balancing act even when the texture you have is correct, and it not easy to make the textures either.

Full Body:
This one is shot in a virtual studio with a grey backdrop. The head is not textured in this shot.



Portrait:

This is another virtual studio. The head is now textured and I converted it to black and white as a reference against the other BW shots in my portfolio. The interesting thing is that I'm adding moles and spots to the CGI models body. Its kind of ironic that as a photographer I spend time in photoshop removing spots from models to make them look more perfect and spend time in CGI adding them in to make them look more real.



When I'm happy with the skin I'll move on to creating eyes, hair and then finally animating the whole thing. Then it will be time to pose and shoot.

The Art of Bullshit

Long term readers will recall that my oldest son is studying for an art scholarship at the esteemed Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. This is only awarded if they can detect that he is “truly gifted” (whatever that means) and that he “spends the majority of his leisure time creating art.”

Please note that photography doesn’t count as art, according to the Hogwarts examiners (don’t get me started!), although <10% of his portfolio as computer graphic design is apparently acceptable. Considering he spends 90% of his free time doing graphic art, at least some of his play-time can be used. He really shines at CGI stuff, that’s where his talent lies, but he needs this scholarship to prove to himself he can do it, and he quite rightly thinks that formal art training will help him on his future quest to be the world’s greatest graphic artist. (He’s only twelve. I bet you had big aspirations at twelve, if you remember that long ago.)

Anyhoo, next week is the week it all happens. He has an exam of course, comprising drawing still-life art under time constraint, and then he has to explain and critique a random painting which is given to by the examiners. In addition, he has to present his portfolio next week to the external examination board, and after they have judged it, he has to spend fifteen minutes speaking about his own work and critiquing five of his best images. According to his art teacher, the tea-addicted-and-very-vague Professor Trelawney, whether or not he succeeds in his quest for ultimate glory depends largely on how many times he uses the word “inspired” in his speech. Big help. Thanks for that, Professor.

If he gets the scholarship, he will of course get major kudos within the school, plus a special red cloak and presentation ceremony in the magnificent city cathedral, the award of “a scholar,” adoration from practically every female in his year (chix dig the scholars, and the red cloak, AND especially they dig blond-haired-blue-eyed-teenage artists…this, I suspect, presents strong motivation in his quest for ultimate glory.) Oh and I’ve promised him a new graphics card for his computer too, if he gets it. (Bribery works wonders - we get a not-insignificant discount on his astronomical school fees if he succeeds.)

The poor lad is completely terrified, to be honest. He’s only twelve, and this is the scariest thing he’s ever done in his entire life. He’s worked his little ass off for the last six months, producing some very fine art for his age (all things considered) and I am praying he gets this, not for the money (which in the end, is unimportant), but because he wants this so badly that he can taste it. Can you remember how fragile your ego was at twelve?

His work is pretty good for his age, I think. His technique is excellent, but his oral presentation needs a miracle.

We have one solitary weekend left to prepare for the big speech on his port on Monday.

"What are you going to say?" I asked him tonight.
“Mum,” he said, “I’ve got nothing. Is it too late to quit?”

So this weekend appears to be a crash course in the Art of Artistic Bullshit. He needs to learn how to analyse his own work. They want to know why he produces the surrealist-style art he does. He hasn’t got a clue to be honest. When I’ve asked him he says, “It just spurts out of me. I don’t know why. I just sit down with a pencil, and two hours later I have a picture.”

“Well, say that then,” I said.

But according to Hogwarts, honesty will not get him the prize. He needs self-awareness, psychoanalysis, arty-speak. He needs to fake inspiration from somewhere. When asked how he feels about his art, he looks like a startled rabbit. Complete blank. No clue at all. Nada.

How do you learn how to pimp your art in a weekend? How can a twelve year-old learn to sell himself to a big, scary examination board?

Can you fake a description of inspiration? Why isn’t the truth enough? Why can’t he stand up and say “I have no idea why I draw this stuff. Judge me on my results, not what I say?”

Why does bullshit matter more than the art itself?

All advice and tips, gratefully received. We need help, folks.

Panicking, we definitely are.

The Santa Nun

Apparently I'm well over due for doing a post and I've been threatened with death , or at least no supper, if I don’t do a post today. I have also been instructed that it must be a serious photographic post. Ho Hum.

Well in the last few weeks I’ve been playing around with my CGI packages, learning what they do and how they do it. I'm also finding out that’s it’s all too easy to crash these things. I don’t know who writes these but it’s really not acceptable for an app to lock and crash after several hours losing all the work you've done. So now I know to save everything very often.

But I have made some achievements. I know most of the methods used to create skin and make it look good. I'm not at the 100% photorealistic stage yet but I'm getting a book from Santa on how to make photorealistic faces. The techniques should then be applicable to the whole body.

I've been learning about rigging models, sounds kinky doesn’t it! Unfortunately it’s not the process of tying them up and dangling them from the ceiling but the technique of taking the models skin envelope and attaching it to a bone structure so that you can animate the body. This is really tricky to do well as human joints are a pig to get right, and don’t get me started about having your hand go right through your tummy when you move your shoulder!

Hair has also been fun. Hair simulation is getting pretty good and I'm slowly getting better at it. The main problem I have at the moment is with the computer I'm running it on, well one of them anyways. I tried to render some fur and accidently set the number of hair instances too high. I was greeted with a nice error message as the app crashed telling me it had failed to allocate 7GB of ram. Whoops. Maybe I should run it on the XP64 machine I have.

So anyways I spent this morning putting together a piccy for you to show you what I have acheived so far. Today’s WIP. Lin took one look at this and described it as a nun in a Santa hat, so she is now and always shall be the Santa Nun.

I present to you the Santa Nun in all her glory, or at least her head, as I didn’t model the rest.



You'll notice that the Santa Nun doesn’t have real eyes, I could say that this is because she’s really possessed by the devil and thus we should rename this TSNPD - "The Santa Nun Possessed by the Devil", but in reality I just I ran out of time and didn’t have time to add more realistic eyes. I think it’s kind of cool anyway.

The whole poly count of the model needs to go up and I need to add some actual details to the skin beyond colouring and reflection models. But I'm still working on that.

You can also see the fur that caused the problems. As one of my fluffies she was supposed to be fluffier and the fur whiter but at 20mins to render I wasn’t going to spend too long playing around.

The real Christmas fluffy for this post is Clayre McKinnen

Cyber-modelling

After a rather exhausting but satisfactory discussion session with at least six oncologists on Friday, followed by mother-in-law yesterday, I’m a bit of a basket case this morning. However I do have a shoot today where I am modelling for Rich’s first CGI virtual model.

Alas I’m not going to be the main virtual model, at least not yet, but negotiations re my alter-ego are ongoing. I want the virtual-me to have humongous big bazookas…whereas Rich is thinking of something a little more representative of the real me. I never thought I’d see the day where I spend an entire afternoon arguing about the size and pertness of my virtual breasts.

Plus I want my own virtual model to be…how shall I put it …anatomically accurate in other areas. She’s going to be a higher model. She’s going to be young, hot and juicy. Heck…she’s gonna be porn-personified. Basically everything I’m not. I mean, what’s the point of having a "virtual-you" if it doesn’t fulfill your completely unrealistic fantasy of the model you’d like to be? Plus, for the first time, a cyber-me wouldn’t make me nervous about modelling. I could show my resulting images with pride and confidence, rather than constantly worrying about viewers potentially blowing chunks (yes I do, you know.)

So, as Cyber-L-von-B isn’t ready yet, Rich’s first virtual model is going to be called Zuki.

Currently Zuki has a really naff hairstyle, a shiny Amazonian body, truly gorgeous breasts (selected by yours truly and based on the most stunning boobs I have ever seen - I’ll be roasted if I say who), and an ass with too many polygons. Sheesh. That ass needs to be smaller. And without the angles. And the horns.

Also Zuki currently lacks permanent toes. Every time Rich tries to move her, he keeps leaving her toes behind. This is really gross. Virtual toenails are a real problem in our studio this week. Ick!



Anyhoo, the reason I am modelling today is that Zuki lacks skin and nether regions. O.K. so I’m ancient, but my skin is bloody marvelous (all that veggie porn pays off), so Rich will be able to overlay and wrap my skin onto Zuki, as well as my …Oh boy, I really do need a LOT of alcohol before this shoot.

So what is Rich actually learning at the moment?

Well, basically he is creating a 3-D model that matches the physical body of the model. He then wraps it in a high resolution photograph of the same model.

Voila! Zuki is born, albeit with no toenails.

Sounds simple, huh? But this process will probably take weeks and it looks horrendously difficult, believe me, and I have NO CLUE AT ALL what he is doing.

But is it photography? This is the acid question.

Is a heavily photoshopped image classified as photography?
And if such a photo- montage is in fact photography, is a three dimensional image created from photographs then also considered photography?

Where does photography stop and CGI begin?



As Zuki will not be ready for a considerable time yet, here’s an image from Rich’s latest shoot with the lovely Lou-Lou. No Photoshop. Perfect toes.

(And, as an aside, if you want to see some really pretty veggie porn, may I recommend you feast your starving eyes on Iksodas’s latest. Now that’s what I call seriously naked vegetables.)