In Celebration of Briar

About the Calendar:

In Celebration of Briar - 2011 is printed on demand and distributed by Lulu Press. It is printed on heavy-weight, coated stock, and is 13.5" x 19", spiral bound at the top. Interior photos are high resolution, 13.5" x 9.5", and show amazing detail. This is as close as you can get to individually custom printed images.

Lulu ships internationally, so the calendar is available world-wide. The price is $45. Click the button above to purchase a copy. Previous editions are also still available, and will be shown on the Lulu page, for those who want to collect the set.

The Back Story:

Here is a preview of photos from the 2010 and 2009 editions of the Calendar, “In Celebration of Briar.” This is the fourth year of the calendar, again, in colour, but with a complete redesign.

I really love B&W photography, and have always been far more comfortable working in that mode, having been doing it for about 42 of my 51 years. Adding the more literal nature of colour created some different and interesting challenges for me. I still wanted to present the pipes in dramatic light, but also wanted their wonderful hues to be shown. In some cases, like Adam Davidson's remarkable Witch's Finger from 2009, at least at first glance, there's almost the sense of a monochrome photo, but then, the more subtle colours reveal themselves. In others, the colours are vibrant, as with the beautiful synthetic amber mouthpiece of Peter Heeschen's signature pipe and the copper acrylic on the Castello 55. In every case, I strive to have the photos reflect something of the p ersonalities of the pipes they depict.

Every pipe is unique, and so must be every photograph. Some of the pieces lent themselves to more conservative rendering; others asked for a more interpretive approach. The setup and lighting alone can take anywhere from a few minutes to a couple hours. Most are lit with a single medium soft-box, with the rest of the light supplied by countless reflectors, little pieces of silver foil, small strips of white card, or black cards to "subtract" light. I don't rely on photoshop tricks to do this, prefering to work they way I did when film was my medium of choice for tabletop work. It's all done with light. Some habits are just slow to die.

It's been a great joy and a fascinating journey bringing another year's calendar together. The ovreall body of work has taken some interesting twists and turns since I started working on it in 2005. I'm looking forward to see where the project leads in coming years.

As before, the calendar is available printed-on-demand from Lulu Press. Here's a button to order the 2010 Edition. From my home page, you'll find links in the sidebar for ordering the previous years, all still available.