BH Neely's Photography

Aphrodite (Stella), Studio, Athens, Greece

I found Stella the old-fashioned way - I joined a Facebook group called Most Beautiful Woman Face of Greece and sent messages to about 10 of the 300+ women who have posted. Three responded positively, and so far Stella has posed.
She was a lot of fun to work with. She arrived at my apartment/studio, we had some coffee, talked a little, shot for about 45 minutes, talked some more, shot for a while longer, talked some more, began to shoot again when one of the lights popped and half the apartment lost power. That can't be good. I flipped the breaker switch, turned the light back on and POP, it went again. So I unplugged that light, turned on the other one and shot about 5 more frames before it popped too. Crap. What is up with that? A couple minutes passed, and I heard the neighbor's vacuum.
Now, theoretically, we're on separate circuits. Hell, the electric panel in our hallway has about 25 switches, however, we've learned that if the clothes dryer (kitchen) is running and you turn on a hair dryer (hallway/bathroom), when the power goes down you'll lose the internet router (office), along with the entire back half of the apartment. If you vacuum the living room with the TV, & 4 lights on, the entire front half will go down. If you vacuum the living with the dryer running, you may lose the entire apartment. Yeah, it's fun like that. By the way, this is not considered a "developing" nation. It's a "fully-developed" nation.

But enough about that. Go to http://bhneely.imagekind.com and buy photographs or cards. I'm gradually adding to the inventory there.

More red-haired Aphrodite, Studio, Athens, Greece

As promised, this was one of Angela's ideas. There's something utterly frank and a little intimidating in her gaze here, which is how I imagine I would feel if I were confronted with Aphrodite herself.

Red-haired Aphrodite, Studio, Athens, Greece

I really can't believe I get to do this sometimes. Angela's not Greek, but then Aphrodite has been claimed by every Mediterranean people from the Etruscans around to the Egyptians. We had a great shoot, and some of the ideas she had worked out better than my own ideas. This one is mine, tomorrow's will be hers.

Temple of Olympian Zeus, Athens, Greece

In the 500's BCE, construction began on a massive temple to Zeus. Over the next 400 years, construction started and stopped and restarted. Then, over the next 1000 years or so, it was left to languish and be dismantled by people taking stones for their houses and such. Then it was left alone more or less for a few hundred more years. In the mid-1800's CE, a massive storm knocked over one of the columns. Imagine, wind strong enough to push over that which has stood in place for 2300 years.

Plaka & Beyond, Athens, Greece

In case you were wondering how 5 million people could live in an area a little more than double the size of Seattle (which has about 600,000 people in the city limits), this is how.

Empty Acropolis, Athens, Greece

This is the most amazing thing I've seen. There's virtually nobody on the Acropolis. If you've never seen it, ordinarily there are thousands of people in this space. Most of my pictures are about the Acropolis as tourist destination or about details, or with a lot of sky and no ground. So if you want to visit Athens and not bounce off hundreds of people, winter is the time.

Country Road, Ancient Mycenae, Greece

No words for this one. Just a sinuously curved broken macadam road.

From Ancient Mycenae, Greece

I looked up from the rock I was shooting and saw this. This is a pretty good preliminary treatment of of the photo, but I think I want to do a little more work. Darken the sky a bit, lighten the clouds & snow - make it just a little more dramatic than it already is.

By the way, you woke up this morning in a brand new USA (assuming you're that's where you are). Make it great.

Stone, Ancient Mycenae, Greece

We took a weekend trip that included a visit to Ancient Mycenae, where Agamemnon was probably buried. It was a nicely laid out site with surprisingly good signage. Well, it had signage, which is itself pretty surprising.
I saw this boulder/wall stone sitting beside the path and decided to put my new 50mm f/1.4 lens to work. It turns out that the ridiculously shallow depth of field at f/1.4 is hard to control when your camera's not on a tripod. You breathe, and you change the focal point (seriously). I got a few that I like, but for the number I shot, I would have preferred a higher success rate. But that's why I shoot a lot - practice and learn and practice and learn and practice and learn.

Up the hill, Athens, Greece

We live at the top of a hill (well, as far up the hill as the road goes in our neighborhood), so my running course starts out with a downhill. Then it goes downhill some more. Then a little more. Which is all very nice, until it's time to turn around. Then I run up a mild incline for several blocks before turning uphill to climb this one. It's six blocks, each block progressively steeper than the last, until it's so steep that there are stairs for the last stretch. You can't see the stairs, because your viewpoint is from them in this photo, but they're there.
I'm getting better at uphill, which is good. The Athens Classic Marathon is alleged to be the only marathon in the world with a net elevation increase (not difficult to do, since it starts at sea level in Marathon), and the first 20 miles is almost continuously uphill. Most of it not as bad as this hill, but there's not a lot of flat and no downhill until the final 6 miles, which is all flat or downhill. Only 8 months left to get myself ready for that.

Lemons, Kolonaki Laiki, Athens, Greece

The citrus fruits are coming into season now, so the oranges are sweet, the lemons are full of flavor, and when the sun hits them they almost glow from within.

Bibb Lettuce, Kolonaki Laiki, Athens, Greece

I took my camera to the market yesterday. It was a bit of a challenge managing my cart, my money, my camera and loading a kilo of potatoes or oranges into a bag. But it was worth it. The water droplets you see aren't from a hose. It rained pretty good for a few hours in the morning.

Olives, Athens, Greece

To paraphrase Tom Hanks, "Look what I have made! I have made OLIVES!" This is the third batch I've cured, and I don't get tired of the sense of accomplishment. I realize that I'm not really doing very much to achieve this, but have you ever soaked raw olives in a salty brine for up to six weeks, thus achieving the ultimate Mediterranean treat?

Gulls, Hanover, USA

Pops & Jeffrey decided to throw bread into the lake. I had my camera handy. This was one of those times when I didn't know what I was looking for, but as soon as I saw it, I knew I had some photography to do.

Similar photos are available for purchase at my newly minted store at http://bhneely.imagekind.com. It's a small shop as I test Imagekind's systems out, but you are very welcome to purchase any of the cards or prints I have available. Don't worry, it'll grow, and I'll keep you updated as it does.

Lena, Aphrodite Project, Studio, Athens, Greece

Lena and I only shot for about 45 minutes, but I got 70 frames, 6 or 7 of which I like quite a bit. It was somewhat awkward, as my Greek isn't spectacular, but I speak more Greek than she does English. A lot of my instructions came out, "Now to turning your brain around to the right. Now looking at me, only with eyes...your eyes...to look away...slow look on me." Even so, it was a good shoot. Her curly hair and expressive eyes really made it all work.

New Monastiraki Square, Athens, Greece

While we were in the States for xmas, work was completed on the restoration of Monastiraki. There's a new church, which is behind me as I'm shooting this, and I didn't get a good shot of it, so you'll have to wait to see it. The front of the Metro station looks incredible, and there's this window into part of the station, showing an ancient diversion of what I understand to be the only perennial river in Athens. It's only a trickle, but it's running water.

The great thing about the work is that it completely changes the geography of the area. I've always been turned around and lost when around Monastiraki, and I was suddenly able to see and understand the layout. That was a great feeling.

Chestnuts & Corn, Athens, Greece

Y'know how sometimes street food can be sublime? The combination of your mood and the surprising quality of the food transcends your preconceptions? This wasn't one of those times. "Yeah, it's pretty bad," was the description of the corn. I'm torn between protecting the vendor (by hiding his face) and protecting the customers (by showing the vendor's face). I think I'll go with consumer advocacy.

Cold, Hanover, USA

Yeah, sometimes I go for the ridiculously obvious. Much appreciation to my brother-in-law and his wife for playing along.

I'm shooting a Portraits of Aphrodite session today with Lena, who has bright blue eyes and light brown hair that don't quite go with her Greek features. Her English isn't as good as my Greek, which might introduce an interesting level of complexity and tension to the work. The combination of all these factors could be awesome. When I have some shots ready, you can bet they'll be here.

Guitar Hero, Ermou, Athens, Greece

This guy wasn't too bad. A couple of our friends sang Stand By Me with him, drawing a fairly impressive crowd.

New Year's Eve, Plaka, Athens, Greece

It was very odd to walk around Athens and see it so empty at 9 pm. It turns out that for a serious percentage of Greeks, NYE is much like Xmas Eve is for Americans - you spend it with family rather than partying in the streets.

Henna Girl, Lake Accotink, USA

Several years ago, I worked with a beautiful hippie-athlete-poet girl. She got henna tattoos as part of a Pakistani wedding she was participating in, and I thought they'd be perfect for some portraiture in the woods. Of the two rolls I shot, this is the frame that I've always liked. There were some other shots that would have been very good as well, but for photographer error (gross overexposure combined with inexperience with my film/developer combo, mostly).
The combo, for those to whom such things border on porn, was Delta 100 in 1+50 Rodinal. It quickly become a less-than-favorite combination for me, because the ultramodern qualities of the Delta 100 were completely overwhelmed by the ancient character of the 100-year-old Rodinal recipe. When I want to develop with Rodinal now, I use old-fashioned films such as Fomapan or Bergger, and when I'm shooting with Delta 100, I develop in D-76 or Tetinal's Ultrafin.
However, this post is really about digital work. After getting a huge scan (5512x5512), I got to work with layers and layers of fill, selectively erased. This achieves something akin to work I like to do in the darkroom, wherein I do layers of burning & dodging and re-exposing. It's part of what makes me finally like doing digital work as much as wet work.
I posted this for my friend, Hosie, who wanted to see the digital technique I was talking about.

New Year's Eve, Athens, Greece

What a great view to end the year with

Blocks, Hanover, USA

The nephew says, "Uncle Brian, play blocks with me!" What that means, "Uncle Brian, watch my every move and don't look away and don't act bored while I play with the blocks." So I did what any sane uncle would do, got out my new 50mm f/1.4 lens and took pictures of the blocks. Happy Solstice.

Seattle, USA

  It was a cold, cold, windy afternoon on Dec. 12 at 4:30. But, brave photographer that I am, I spent about 20 minutes at the Admiral Way overlook to capture the shot for you.