Amazing photographs from Thomas Weinberger. Using a large-format camera, the film is exposed once during the day and once at night, creating an unnatural lighting effect that is eerily beautiful.
(Via conscientious)

I greatly admire the photography of alec soth. Turns out he is also an excellent and thoughtful writer. Check out his new blog, in which he writes about other photographer’s work and answers questions about his work and techniques.

Magnum, the amazing photography co-operative, now has video podcasts of their Magnum in Motion series. These multimedia photo essays weave brilliant photographs with engaging audio commentary, music and other graphics. I watched the Alec Soth Niagara video and found it to be very intriguing and inspiring. (So good it gave me chills!) I’m definitely signing up for the video podcast – such a great way to stay connected with the latest documentary photography.

(via the cool hunter)

If your travels this summer include a trip to Berlin, then check out the Żak Gallery, which focuses on Eastern European photography (or see the online gallery). The gallery opens with it’s first exhibit, “Alien Sky,” on June 1st. The exhibit presents seven artists’ “version of the giant surface above us, the secrets that lay hidden behind – or what we expect from there to come. With different approaches, ranging from conceptual experiments to classic b/w photography, all displayed works play with the aesthetics and the attraction of the sky. How do aliens perceive Earth? What remains when a pin-hole camera observes the sky for over a month? Shouldn’t we all become sky watchers?”

A series of photos by Marcin Przybyłko depicts the subject’s perspective of the sliver of sky viewable from the shelter of buildings, highlighting just how “alien” the sky often seems to us. Another series titled “Waiting for the UFO,” plays on our fears of the unknown and alien in an almost whimsical fashion, with toylike objects appearing in the distant sky.

Top photos: Marcin Przybyłko| Untitled | Untitled | from the series: Windows
Bottom photos: Barbora Kuklíková | Untitled #1 | Untitled #2 | from the series: Waiting for the UFO

If you live near Charlotte, NC, Boston or San Francisco, take your mom out for a portrait on mother’s day weekend. These fund-raising events provide the opportunity to have your portrait taken by some amazing local commercial and fine art photographers and support your local photography organizations.

The light factory’s shoot out portrait session($150) raises money to support their mission:

• Help a child learning English use photography to express herself when words are challenging
• Support the exhibition of innovative photography from around the country and the world
• Assist in building Charlotte’s burgeoning film community

Closer to home (for me) is Boston’s mother’s day portrait extravaganza sponsored by the photographic resource center. The PRC is a non-profit organization dedicated to photographic education and presentation and they are very supportive of emerging photographers in the northeast. Portrait sessions are $95 for groups less than three and $145 for larger groups.

Finally, we have SF Camerawork’s portrait party. This is a much pricier option (starts at $450!), but the portraits are taken (and signed) by a nationally recognized fine art photographer (see their site for the full list of photographers).

Know of some other mother’s day portrait events like these? Post ‘em here in the comments so everyone can have a look!

I spent this sunday at one of my favorite places to spend a rainy afternoon, the lady killigrew cafe at the bookmill (both are must stops if you’re ever in western mass). I was admiring the huge polaroid mosaic of the cafe on the wall, made up of 90 individual polaroids! The mosaic was created by star drooker, and I just got around to looking at the artist’s other polaroid mosaics. I love the unconventional wedding polaroids; probably not how you would want your whole wedding photographed, but definitely pictures I would want to hang up on my wall. There are also several intriguing portraits, like this batman child.