Hegemonically monotonous

I did get out today (Thursday, May 1) and did walk downtown with my Lumix GM1 + 12-32mm lens, and I got a good batch of (what I consider) decent shots. Back at home I worked on a few in Lightroom. Everything with me is on a photo-by-photo basis, I guess you could say. I’m don’t feel like I have a consistent “style” or “look.”

I crop a lot, recomposing the original and/or changing the aspect ratio (4x3 to 3x2 or 5x4 or 16x9 or whatever). I also feel like some images look better in black & white, which can involve a) simply desaturating all the color out, and b) playing with the color sliders, which lets me make each color darker or lighter.

Adjusting the color sliders for a monochrome image (in Lightroom) has practical uses as well as creative ones; e.g., green and red look very similar when converted to grayscale, so making one lighter and one darker helps give the brain useful information about an image (red flowers vs. green leaves… you often want them to look different). Black & white film photographers can achieve similar results using color filters on their lenses, but that’s a subject I know next to nothing about.

I also sometimes like to saturate and exaggerate colors (hues, tints, tones) and play with contrast in different ways while processing photos in Lightroom. But just as often I like to leave images looking “natural.” It just depends on the photo and how it hits me. (Note: I have my cameras set to shoot RAW image files—not JPGs—and that gives me great leeway in adjusting all aspects of my photographs.)

So much for “developing” my photos in Lightroom. Now, on to a mini rant of sorts…. 

Today my prime destination was the May Day anti-Trump/Musk/Etc protest at the Park Blocks (8th & Oak) in downtown Eugene. To be honest, I didn’t get any good shots of protesters. Or, more accurately, I didn’t like the shots I got of protesters. To be quite blunt, they bored me. Weird, huh. The cops, reflections and shadows, a street performer I walked past, a burned out house, and a trashed old storefront were more interesting to me.

Why do I find protests boring? Maybe for me they are played out. They don’t excite me. Eugene has a big Old Left and 1960s Hippie vibe, which has perpetuated itself for decades into younger generations, and I personally don’t find it photogenic in general anymore. Certain isolated scenes, people, or situations might grab me, sure, but I didn’t feel grabbed today.

I felt much better about my shots at Saturday Market a couple weeks ago, possibly because there was a better mix of energies, purposes, and perspectives: protesters, booth vendors, shoppers, God Squaders, cops, bystanders, and people walking through on their way somewhere else. The energy was more interesting, and I found lots of scenes to photograph.

Today’s protest (a bunch of people with signs lined up along the street occasionally chanting or shouting slogans, with cars honking back in support) just felt hegemonically monotonous and boringly linear. So, there you go: my lukewarm take on today downtown. I hope you enjoy the following images from my May Day walkabout.

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