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I received a wonderful letter from artist Lora Arbrador. It captures something many artists have described — the moment of dropping into a groove when they first come across the podcast. I include Lora’s letter and my response below.

“Hi John,
I just discovered your podcast… not sure how… I’m now ensconced in binge-istening to several episodes, and many are resonating.

My name is Lora Arbrador, painter, registered nurse, and now author of “Art & Love: My Life Illuminated in Egg Tempera.” It describes my struggle to master the technique, gain confidence as an artist, and find lasting love. Yes, that’s a lot, and the book has almost 300 images, 100 of which are my paintings and drawings. I also became an egg tempera history nerd so the book has a bonus chapter: “Which Came First: A Taste of Egg Tempera History.”

As a non-writer, I subscribe to over 20 podcasts about writing and self-publishing. I’ve been trying to find podcasts about art but really none have engaged me until yours…

As a classically trained painter (did four years at an atelier), I am pleased to hear your focus on craft. Yet you veer into any and everything non-traditional as well. I went into classical realism as a non-realist and came out as non-realist but gained the tools to create mysterious and powerful paintings. They are all representative and figurative but do not cleave to realist principles except when desired. 

I do not use photos and generally do not work from life (except for self-portraits). As a devoted egg tempera artist, my reference material comes mostly from Proto-Renaissance artists such as Giotto and Piero. It’s not an easy path and many of my paintings have taken years to complete, one as long as seven years! For that reason, I do not work with galleries, who need a steady stream of work to offer clients.

Some thoughts on your episodes…still in the midst of listening to older ones:

On the Patricia Watwook episode, the first one I listened to, I relaxed into hearing about her life in the Poconos and your life in County Kerry, thinking maybe that would be the entire podcast but then you dived into her art.
She seems to have gravitated toward imagery and color that highlight her female identity. My work also explores the female experience, including sexuality and unflinching portrayals of lactation and menstruation which reflect the life events that inspired them.

At first I skipped the Andrew Conru Seattle Prize episode but later listened to it, and was struck by his thought that most artists struggle the most with their subject matter as they don’t have much life experience. I have the opposite situation. As a way of funding my art, I became a registered nurse and several paintings have medical themes including colostomies, death and dying during the AIDS epidemic, and surgery-themed paintings. At the age of 76, I am still working part-time as a nurse. 
And although your pod skews traditional, I was impressed with how you segued into using AI for art and listened as Andrew talked about commissioning artists to render AI-based images. You have an open mind!

The Devin Cecil-Wishing episode got off to a slow start, but now I’m settling into your long-form podcast style. It ramped up to a fever pitch with all the call-in questions culminating in my visit to his website, where I understood what all the fuss was about – his work is truly penetrating yet within the bounds of traditional still life.

One thing that irked me was that he did not mention the name of the atelier he studied at in Oakland. Perhaps he did not have a good experience, but most likely it was David Hardy’s Atelier of Classical Realism. David Hardy passed away just months ago and influenced his students deeply, going beyond his technical knowledge to instill passion and confidence in his devoted students. One of his students will continue his teaching tradition and a group of young artists committed to Classical Realism has taken over the studio under the new name “The Underpainting Collective.” So inspirational!!

As I listened to more of your podcasts, of course, I noted that you ask the artists some of the same questions. I was blown away by your asking very granular questions about brush type (always of interest to me!) and even varnish. We egg tempera artists have great debates about varnish, many of us choosing the no varnish option. Finally an art podcast where I gain useful technical information. Parallel Palette? I went to the website to check it out.

On the Aixa Oliveras episode, I was struck by her honesty about what it takes to run an art business and her useful tips about hiring a business coach and VA. And of course I visited her website and was impressed by her virtuoso paintings.

Right now listening to and blown away by Ashley Longshore!!!! What a ball of fire. So much fun and inspiring with her in-your-face MO. So good to see you encouraging her to reveal herself in full style. Yes I was curious about her art so visited her website and it did not disappoint. I really like it!!

Well, that brings me up-to-date in my listening so far. I noticed you seem to have taken a break between Cecil-Wishing in 2023 and Patricia Watwood in 2025. You mentioned divorce? That could explain the need for a long break, although no explanation needed. You deserve it.

I was also intrigued with how your patrons are able to ask questions of the guest. Are the podcasts live-streamed? The questions added a nice aspect to the interviews. It seems you’ve created a community around your listeners and patrons. I have not yet explored that aspect as I’m just writing this introduction.

So sorry for being long-winded, that is if you’ve even read this far. I look forward to more episodes and being part of this gentle community.

With heART & Love,
Lora Arbrador
www.arbrador.com

Hi Lora,
Thank you for your kind words.
Congratulations on your book and paintings. I had a look and they are fab.

I am glad you enjoyed my chat with Patricia Watwood. She has been on the podcast many times. Below are the episodes she has appeared in.

Ep 281 – Patricia Watwood – The Fey Wild

Ep 105 – Patricia Watwood : The Spirit in Excellence

Ep 269 – Collective Catch Up

Ep 115 : Inbetweenisode Two

Ep 111 : Inbetweenisode One

I am glad you liked my chat with Ashley Longshore too. She is such an inspiration to so many, and she too has been on the podcast a number of times.

Ep 275 – Ashley Longshore Revisited

Ep 42 – Ashley Longshore : Christmas Special

Ashley Longshore interview

Ep 20 – Ashley Longshore : Global F**cking Domination

Ep 111 : Inbetweenisode One

No, the podcasts are not live-streamed, they are recorded as live, and then edited. The questions come from my patrons, but also from Instagram, both from my own Instagram account and from the Instagram account of the artist I am chatting with. We generally both make some posts in the run-up to our chat, letting our followers know we will be chatting and to send in any questions they might have.

Sending you a friendly wave from Ireland.

Yours in friendship and kindness,

John

Essay on which the forward for Alessandro Tomassetti’s book Instant Gratification was based.

The medium is fast.
The effect long lasting.
And sublime.

Painters feel time differently. They feel the weight of it. The old masters lean on them with a constant reminder of just how long art endures.

Painters are always short changed by time, giving much more time than their artworks receive. No one will ever look at a painting for even a fraction of the time it takes to paint it.

As a painter, Alessandro Tomassetti gets it, he is intimately aware of this time discrepancy.
It is his very painterly sensitivity to time, as he brings it to bear on this body of photographs, that is most electric because what he has managed to do is nothing short of a miracle. He has flipped the time imbalance on its head.

He has chosen a fast medium, instant, in fact, and managed to produce photographs that cause the viewer to pause.
To stay a little longer.
To go back a page.
To be a little haunted,
then a lot.

He could have used digital photography. It is quicker and more reliable in comparison, but the painter in him took a different route. He chose to use instant photography, which on the photography spectrum is as close to painting as you can get.

These are not the polaroids of old. The dry diskettes that issued from the camera with the self contained chemical pouch hidden behind the oversized white border at the bottom of the frame.
They were the ultimate point and shoot.
And the wait of course.
Waiting was the only participation you had with these kinds of polaroids.

The instant photography Alessandro uses is much more hands-on, much more participatory. Once the shutter is clicked there are no friendly motors to deliver your photo. You have to pull the film out of the camera yourself.
And you have to pull it in the right way because the action of pulling the film from the camera is what starts the development process.
You have to do it confidently.
You cannot dither.
Exactly like painting.
It has to be one fluid motion.
As you pull the film from the camera you are spreading the chemicals across the photo-sensitive paper because what you hold in your hands is more than a simple photograph, it is a wafer-thin dark room enclosing a photograph.

It is dark and wet and mysterious. A womb of creativity issuing forth these rich images that smolder into life fully formed. Sensual images of beauty unbounded by labels – beauty as it expresses itself in man.

What Alessandro is doing with these photographs is nudging us to broaden our bandwidth for beauty.
To see it all – the vulnerability and the power, the playful and erotic, the sorrow and the shame, the fear and the courage.

All the aspects of what it is to be a man. Not just the comfortable or familiar aspects, but the lot.
He encourages us to look at the jarring aspects that at first don’t fit, then as we look we soften, and in the softening we slowly see, then recognize, then accept – this too is man.

What it is to be a man is the central pillar of this book. All else revolves around it.

How men present themselves to the world, with all the space for toxicity there is in that presentation.
The square jaw that should never quiver.
The penetrating stare that should never be come-hither.
The hip that should never bend sensuously.
With these photographs the facades are recreated, subverted, torn down, and challenged.

Then the journey turns inward and how a man sees himself is quietly explored, tentatively shown, withdrawn, then exposed again.
The viewer is revealed in what he looks at.
The curation of images telling their own story of the curator.

The refractions of perception bounce back and forth.
We see men through another man’s eyes.
We are shown the inner landscape of a man as it is externalized in his visions of other men.

This is the sort of mind melting conflagration that is at the core of all great art. The collision of apparent opposites that should scream at each other yet exist in a beautiful harmony within the genius of the artwork.

Without knowing it we long for that moment when our mind cracks, gives up the need to label, and just receives the beauty.
Beauty it cannot understand but longs for.
Beauty that connects, and at its heart is a return home.

The powerhouse of these compelling images is the palpable bond between artist and sitter. The friendship, the trust, the love and adoration, all go to invoke beauty.

For that is what must be done, an invocation.
Real beauty can’t be manufactured.
The individual elements of a photoshoot are nothing to speak of. In and of themselves they don’t contain any beauty. They are simply the staging ground for what starts as a wispy vision in the mind of the artist.
A vision of what the finished image could be.
A tantalizing glimpse of the possibility of beauty appearing, but with no guarantee whatsoever that it will.

This amorphous vision directs the choice of elements – this model and not that, in this setting, with this apparel, arranged in this way, with this lighting, using this medium.

Whether the image is grandiose or intimate the moment eventually arrives when the elements are gathered at the appointed time and there is nothing left but to begin.

Allesandro, with no apparent support for his next step must walk forward towards his vision. With the confidence of a fool he must draw all the elements forward with him not knowing if beauty will appear.

He may get an inkling as he looks through the viewfinder but he has been led astray by those inklings before.

He will only know if beauty has appeared in time, because even though the photography is instant it takes time to get distance from the logistics of the photo shoot, to let them fade in memory so the image can reveal itself.
The image of beauty.
It is not in every photograph, only the rare few. This book is full of them.
And once seen beauty is undeniable.

These are handsome men without a doubt, their faces and body’s could adorn any international magazine cover. What elevates these photographs is Allessandro’s reluctance to shy away from beauty.

In this day and age of hair trigger sensitivity to gender issues, it is a courageous act to create images so blatantly showing that beauty has no gender. That beauty lives where it lives and reveals itself where it will.

It glows out of these photographs with such incandescence that, regardless of your orientation, the beauty is undeniable.

We receive art with our whole body so registering that beauty, whether conscious or not, is one of the miracles of these photographs.

The beauty recorded is not the beauty of these men. They are beautiful, of course, but the magic is in knowing this is beauty expressing itself through these men.

What Allesandro has done is record the moment where beauty glowed bright.
The beauty of the ages.
It is what, if we are honest with ourselves, we crave.

By the time you hold this book in your hands the men in these pages will be older. Life and time will have written new chapters on their faces.
In a hundred years these men will be gone.
But beauty will remain.
It will be expressing itself in new men
and women
and trees
and sunsets
and all the other ways beauty expresses itself.
Because that is what beauty does, it glows.
It can’t help itself.

But not for long.
It moves on.
It never stays in one place forever.
It flits through time from one thing to the next.
Always moving on, the never ending change becoming the one constant.

Then along comes Alessandro and with a click of his shutter, he plucks these passing moments of beauty from time and holds them still.
He creates the passing moment that does not pass.

Through this instant medium, he highlights the transience of beauty and in so doing the preciousness of it.

He encourages us to celebrate beauty now.
Right now.
Not when we have time.
Not to schedule it for two weeks time, but to grab it with both hands when we see it.
To drop everything for it.
To snap the internal shutter and register beauty.
Then pause and wait in reverence for what we have been so lucky to see, and more importantly, had the wherewithal to recognize.
Alessandro, like all artists, has helped us to see what is in front of us.
With these photographs, he has shown us how to lean into the value of beauty.
To pull it confidently from life.
To pause for it.
To peel back the layers of it.
To exalt in it.
To set it free to teach us and show us its hidden depths.
To allow us to breathe the lighter air of the sublime.

Alessandro’s Website
https://tomassetti.art/

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While the art world went coocoobeans over DaVinci’s $450m painting sale, current renaissance painters are selling for under $20k a painting.

In case you’ve been living under a rock, Salvator Mundi, what Christie’s billed as, “the last DaVinci,” recently sold for a record-breaking $450 million dollars.

If Leonardo was painting today his work would sell for under 20k and he would be smugly ignored by the art world because his work wouldn’t be considered, “serious.”

I know this because I’ve spent the last couple of years interviewing our current renaissance painters. They take years learning the craft – painting and drawing like the old masters – yet most of them wouldn’t sell a painting the same size as Salvator Mundi for more than twenty thousand dollars.

I’m not saying they have the genius of DaVinci, history will decide that but what stands out is the huge difference in price. This comes, in part, from the way our current renaissance artists are viewed by the broader art world. It’s folksy at best, like fashionistas talking about the inhabitants of one of those heritage villages where people dress up in old costumes and make butter and such.

“They are in a conversation with the past,” is the usual brush off.

This sounds sophisticated but doesn’t bear scrutiny. Being in a conversation with the past is how art has developed. The impressionists built on the great salon painters, the cubists built on the impressionists, abstract art built on the cubists and so on.

When the Romans were copying the bejesus out of the Greeks they were in a conversation with the past. So too were Napoleonic painters when they were obsessed with all things ancient Egypt. There are many similar examples in the history of art, so nothing new there.

Of course, all this hip prejudice started with that French, scallywag Marcel Duchamp. His innovation was to say let’s have something going on that’s more than just pleasing to the eye, let’s get the brain involved here, let’s get some ideas going.

This was a brilliant innovation and led to all the great conceptual art we have now. There would be no Jeff Koons or Damien Hirst without Duchamp.

The other old chestnut that gets trotted out is, “they’re just not part of the current conversation.” That doesn’t hold water either, especially in the last couple of months because the whole art world has been talking about nothing else but a painting in the style of the old masters.

So what’s going on?

There’s a school of thought that says the new art movement of the last 15 years hasn’t been a new style of painting, no shocking impressionists, no disruptive drippy abstracts, no soup cans causing outrage. The new art movement of the last 15 years has been the art market itself.

This is Interesting when you consider Salvator Mundi wasn’t sold in the Old Masters auction at Christie’s. Instead, it was sold in the Post-War and Contemporary Art Sale alongside a Jean-Michel Basquiat and an Andy Warhol, an approach which London art dealer Philip Mould called, “inspired.”

Arts editor for BBC, Will Gompertz, described the Salvator Mundi sale as a “masterclass in the art of selling art.”

But there’s more going on here than Andy Warhol‘s quip about good business being the best art.

In among his tirades about the Salvator Mundi sale – mostly that the painting is a fake – New York art critic Jerry Saltz, highlighted what he called a new system of authority in the art world where auction houses now have the power to direct the market.

This is encouraging for our new renaissance artists in light of Christie’s explanation for their inclusion of Salvator Mundi in the Post-War and Contemporary Art Sale. Loic Gouzer, their Post-War and Contemporary Art chairman described it like this, “The work of Leonardo is just as influential to the art that is being created today as it was in the 15th and 16th centuries.”

This is a good sign. It means that the art world has noticed the baby on the floor. The one that was thrown out with Duchamp’s bath water. It indicates a growing awareness that art that is pleasing to the eye has its place in the broader art world and has always been part of the conversation. It’s a sign that the time is coming when some new old masters will start setting auction house records.

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Left-hand image: Salvator Mundi by Leonardo Davinci. Right-hand image: Messenger in White by Maria Kreyn.
(You can hear my podcast with Maria here.)

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I never had a dog before. Animals were fine but I never really, “got,” them, at least not in the way other people seemed to.  I’d met some Scottish terriers in South Africa and thought they were great but owning one, no, not really me.
My wife  is wise.  She knew I was ready.  I didn’t.  She found some puppies not far from where we live, showed me a video online, then asked if I’d like to get two.  “Yes,” I answered, in what sounded to me like the voice of a five year old kid who was just asked if they’d like to sit on Santa’s knee.

The picture above was taken the day we brought them home.  I named them Kirk and Scotty, of course.  My eyes are half closed not because I’m sleeping or meditating, but because I’m panicking.  I hadn’t a clue.

That was nearly a year ago. Since then I’ve learned a lot from Kirk and Scotty. Here are some of the things they taught me.

1. Dogs use social media.

Whenever we go out for a quick pee in the garden, the dogs not me, there is always furious sniffing, again the dogs not me.  Not everywhere is sniffed, just specific places.  After a while I realised they were reading something from the wee messages left by other dogs.

Once the sniffing is complete, the head comes up, there’s a pause for consideration, deciding what to say, I think, then they leave their own little squirty message in response.  This is doggy twitter.  One dog tweets, another dog responds.  It’s quick and random and rarely in the same place.

Then there’s doggy facebook, this is a particular spot in the garden, it doesn’t look any different to other spots to me but for Kirk and Scotty it is compelling.  They would spend twenty minutes there if I left them to it, which is about 2 weeks in dog time.  I know it’s doggy facebook becasue they have the same vacant look that people in coffee shops or on the train have when they are caught in the thrall of facebook.  Here, but not really here.

2. When in close proximity to a large predator – don’t run.

In the wild some animals are prey and some are predators.  Scottish terriers are a hunting breed, so for Kirk and Scotty everything is fair game.  Oblivious to their own physical size they have big time hunting swagger.  Whether you’re a piece of plastic or a semi trailer, once they lock onto you,  you’re going down, in their minds at least.

Did I mention we also have two cats . I’m using the royal ‘we’ because I think of them as my wife’s cats.  She had them before we met, they’re like old boyfriends but without the resentment, me, not the cats.

Sometimes one of the cats will be outside sunning themselves when Kirk and Scotty come around the corner.  If the cat stays still nothing happens, but if they start to move or, god forbid run, the two lads are after them like the clappers.

I’ve seen the same thing happen with birds and even butterflies. Once they stay still nothing happens, but once they move, it’s on!

Without having to consult David Attenborough or anyone like him it dawned on me that it’s probably the same for tigers and lions.  Trying to run for it is a bad idea. Having said that I’m not sure if I would remember this if a lion or tiger wandered into the picnic grounds.   I suspect my instinct would kick in and I would start running.  All I could hope for then would be to run faster than the slowest person at the picnic.

3. The value of sighing.

If Kirk and Scotty get agitated about something, a sudden noise,  someone walking past the house, a new envoronment, or something like that, they will look to my wife or I for reassurance. If we pick them up they will scrumble around a bit and then take a big sigh and totally relax. That’s how we know they are over it, whatever it happens to be.  Initially I thought it was cute. “Ah look at Scotty sighing, it’s so pathetically cute.”  It took a while for me to realise that it would be good for me to sigh too.  I realised that the natural instinct to sigh had been conditioned out of me. It’s fine for cute little puppies but for a 51 year old man, a bit weird no?

Well no, not for this 51 year old man anyway, and I suspect any other man, or boy, or girl, or woman of any age.  I don’t care what it looks like from the outside but it feels good on the inside.

There’s a famous Picasso quote that says, “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” Well be that as it may Pablo I think sighing does the same thing for the  stresses we pick up like dust in the day.  A good sigh drops a lot of it, and another one the rest.

4. Lots of stimuli is overwhelming

I discovered this when we brought Kirk and Scotty with us grocery shopping for the first time. They were about two months old. It was early on a Sunday morning and we parked in the far corner of the car park of the supermarket. My wife went to do the shopping and I took Kirk and Scotty on a little walk in the empty car park.

I thought it would be great.  Not much different to walking around outside our house. I was wrong. Big time. What I didn’t factor in was, number one, the smells. There is a whole other dimension of communication that goes on for dogs when it comes to smell. I imagine it is like being plugged into the internet all the time or something like that.

The other thing was that everything was new, and I mean everything. Cars, paving stones, shrubbery, mulch, plastic wrappers, did I mention cars, because every time a car came into the car park Kirk and Scotty would lose their shit, not literally, surprisingly.  They were overwhelmed with a combination of wanting to hunt the big shiny thing, and run away from the big shiny scary thing.  And this was for a car on the far side of the car park.

My idea for a lovely little walk of discovery and adventure turned into a stop start sprint through a hostile LZ and a hasty retreat to the relative safety of our car where they promptly went comatose from overwhelm.

I saw the same pattern repeat itself with all new experiences and I realised that there was a level of stimulation they could handle, not a lot really, and above that they became overwhelmed.

I went through the, “ah isn’t that cute,” thing again and then it dawned on me that when I looked inside that was how I felt too and I always had.  I didn’t notice it because I’m “sophisticated.”  Kirk and Scotty don’t give a crap about sophistication, once they reach their threshold they have a mini doggy breakdown, they get hyper or they start shaking all over, or they run around in a circle, or start barking at nothing in particular.  And I realised that I want to do all these thing too when I feel overwhelmed but I don’t.  I keep my shit together because that’s what I’m conditioned to do.  And the spooky thing is that watching Kirk and Scotty reach their stimuli threshold I realised that for all my sophistication, my threshold wasn’t far behind theirs.

Seeing this allowed me to be a little bit more compassionate with myself and take better care of myself when I noticed I reached my overwhelm threshold.

I will add one caveat to the above, I live in the country. There is lots of space around me and not too many people.  I don’t think I would have noticed my overwhelm threshold as easily when I lived in a city.  City life is such a relentless onslaught that I never really had time to take the armour off for long enough to actually register the overwhelm.

5. I take things personally.

I’m a relatively calm person.  People have commented on it. “John’s very calm isn’t he.”  I’m quite philosophical about things too. I don’t take things personally and it takes a lot for me to get angry.
So you can understand my surprise when, about two weeks after Kirk and Scotty arrived, I realised I was running around the house swearing about how the dogs were pissing everywhere on purpose and shitting in a mischievous and premeditated way.  We had a lovely, newspaper covered, designated area for peeing and poohing but they were peeing and poohing everywhere but the designated area!

It was pure slapstick.  I would clean up one pee and while I fetched some more paper for them to pee on, which would take me less than 30 seconds, they would have peed somewhere else. I lost my mind regularly.

In my calmer moments I would remember that they were puppies and that of course they weren’t doing any of it on purpose.  The opposite in fact they wanted to please us and do the right thing, but their brains were still puppy brains and everything was new and what was I getting so worked up about.

Ten minutes later I would be running around cursing again. Another pee, another projection from me.

They’ve got better at hitting the target as they have got older and the part of me that takes it personally has eroded over time. I still lose my mind every now and then but not for long and manage to see the funny side a lot quicker.

6. Love is real

Kirk and Scotty don’t know what the word for love is. They don’t know what love is as a concept.  Yet I have watched them grow and flourish from the tiny puppies they were to the bruisers they are now.
Apart from the food we give them it seems apparent to me, and excuse me if this sounds a bit sappy, but they are thriving because of the love my wife and I have surrounded them in. And it’s not just one way, Kirk and Scotty love us back too. Prior to having dogs in my life this would have sounded like complete saccharine projection to me, but there it is, the love is tangible among the four of us.
So without the word or concept, love exists.

7. Feeling horny is natural

Now this could be just be me but initially I found Kirk and Scotty’s horniness a bit unsettling.  I would be scratching the underside of their neck, for example, in a friendly kind of way and then I would notice a little puppy erection that had just popped up in response to my touch.  Initially when this happened I would whip my hand off them as if I’d been scalded. I might even do a little chicken dance to try and shake off the creeps I’d just given myself.

As Kirk and Scotty grew they started dry humping each other and again my reaction was swift and over the top.  When I would tell them to stop they wouldn’t understand.  God! had they no decency?

Of course it got worse, there was licking and 69’ing, and dry humping each other all over the place.  In the end I finally got it. Kirk and Scotty didn’t have a problem with their sexuality because there was no problem with it, the problem was me.

I suppose because they are so obviously innocent that it took seeing them just be natural with their horniness to make me realise a layer of conditioning in me that I hadn’t realised was there.  You know the uptight repressed being-horny-is-a-bad thing layer.

Feel free to use that as a hashtag that if you want.  #beinghornyisagoodthing

8. How to be calm under stress

I have to thank Cesar Milan for this one. He’s the Mexican/American dog whisperer guy from the TV.  We used to watch his show years ago, my wife mostly.  Once we got the dogs I was right into it again, recording and watching and replaying, and trying to soak up as much of Cesar’s vibe as I could because he just seemed to intuit what was going on with dogs.

His whole approach is that if a dog is misbehaving it usually has nothing to do with the dog and everything to do with the human.  Naturally I hadn’t a clue what he was talking about. (see number 5 above)

I had to learn to be calm when I was out walking Kirk and Scotty because if I wasn’t calm they would reflect any agitation I had going on and project it back at me.

This was particularly true if I brought them into new situations.  I remember the first time we brought them to the local park.  I was a bit anxious about how they would behave so naturally they went ballistic. They were like two little black furry ping pong balls ricocheting around the park.

Now whenever we go to do anything I make sure I am calm and assertive first, and yes I got that from Cesar, and it works.  The only time it doesn’t work is when I loose it.

9. Let opposing forces work against each other or get out of the way of conflict.

In the beginning, when we went for a walk, Kirk and Scotty were on separate leashes, one dog in each hand. It wouldn’t take long before I’d start to feel like an accordion as they criss-crossed back and forth pushing and pulling me in opposite directions.  I usually ended up like a human maypole in some doggy morris dance.

One day my wife was walking them and got sick of feeling like Stretch Armstrong, so she simply attached their two leads to each other and then attached a third lead to the middle.  This was pure genius. It meant we were no longer caught between their opposing wills.  We still controlled forward, reverse, and braking, so to speak, but Kirk and Scotty had to work it out lateral movement between themselves.

We effectively removed ourselves from the conflict and without sounding like Father Ted, there’s a lesson there for us all isn’t there? If two people what to have a go at each other you’re better off to get out of the way and let them at it so you can save your energy for steering the situation in the general direction you would like it to go, which in our case was back into the house for a nice cup of tea.

This leash arrangement leaves my wife and I free to get on with being calm and assertive, but don’t tell Cesar Milan because I’m not sure he’d approve and I don’t want to know if he doesn’t because it works for us.  We only use it for around the house anyway for bigger tips to town, and the like, we have them on separate leashes again. Mainly because they are individuals and respond to new environments differently.

10. Dogs love hard and so do I

I remember the first time I noticed Kirk looking at me.  It wasn’t normal looking, it was different, and it made me uncomfortable. He was sitting on the floor looking up into my face and he radiated what I can only describe as unconditional love.  His little heart was fully open and he was loving me with a level of vulnerability that frankly made me squirm.

I realised what was making me uncomfortable was a recognition that he wasn’t protecting himself in the way I had learned to. He was loving me hard. I know about loving hard. It has caused me a lot of pain in my life. After long self analysis I had come to the conclusion that I had some serious attachment issues. The thing is I was recognising the same kind of loving hard coming from Kirk and Scotty but it would never occur to me to think they had attachment issues. That would be pretty dispassionate.  Now I can extend a little of the gentle recognition I had for their loving hard to myself too.

Those doggies just love real hard and so do I.

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I wandered lonely as a cloud . . . something, something, something…

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In praise of the half-remembered gems of poetry.

I’d like to think of myself as someone who remembers complete poems. Someone who can recite them at significant moments in life, preferably looking into the middle distance with a slight breeze in my face emphasizing my windswept and interesting look. Unfortunately, I am not that someone.

What I am is someone who remembers snippets and half lines. Triggered by circumstance, I’ll raise a finger in preparation for the full verse but it doesn’t come, instead the half line.

When about to leave I might begin . . .

I will arise and go now to the Isle of Innisfree,
And four and twenty bean pods I’ll . . . something, something, something . . .

While in a forest I might take in the trees with a sweeping gesture and intone . . .

Whose woods these are I think I know, his house is in the village lo.
My little horse must think it’s strange to stop and . . . something, something, something . . .

On hearing about the death of a celebrity who had it all, a mega-rich titan of industry, or a political powerhouse, I might recite, nodding my head knowingly . . .

Scepter and Crown
Must tumble down,
and in the dust are equal made
With the crooked scythe and spade.

If I hear someone talking about getting older and lamenting the things that were once easier, like partying hard and drinking all night, the old chestnut Desiderata will come to mind. You know the one. For some reason, people like to hang it in their bathrooms. Maybe to give you something to think about while you do your business. It starts . . .

Go placidly amid the noise and haste and . . . something, something, something….

The bit about aging that springs to mind is . . .

. . . surrender gracefully the things of youth . . .

It’s good to nod the head knowingly when reciting that one too. Trust me.

When I see trees getting bashed in a storm . . .

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May . . .

That’s from Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 which begins . . .

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.

Which, you would think, I’d associate with wooing but no, when it comes to wooing I always think of Ogden Nash’s poem, Reflections On Ice Breaking

Candy
Is dandy
But liquor
Is quicker

When summoning teenagers of all ages I nearly always yell . . .

Come on younglings foot it fleetly . . .

On hearing someone trying to keep-it-together when their heart is aching. . .

Let it crack,
let the wind blow through it,
and let a little bird make a nest in it
and let it sing.

I use these delicious little morsels of poetry whenever I get a chance, not because I want to impress people with my knowledge of poetry, let me take a second to laugh at that notion, but for the sheer joy of acknowledging the poetry of life.

I suspect I’m not alone. I think most people remember poetry this way. Tell me I’m wrong.

I’d love to hear the half lines that have stuck in your head. Add them in the comments below . . .

To read the un-slaughtered versions of my misremembered half lines see below . . .

“I wandered lonely as a cloud . . .” from the poem I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud by William Wordsworth

“I will arise and go now. . .” from the poem The Lake Isle of Innisfree by W.B. Yeats.

“Whose woods these are . . .” from the poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost

“Scepter and Crown . . “ from the poem Death the Leveller by James Shirley

“Go placidly amid the noise . . . . and  . . . surrender gracefully the things of youth . . .” from the poem Desiderata by Max Ehrmann.

“Rough winds do shake the darling buds . . . and . . . Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? from Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare.

“Candy is dandy . . .” from the poem  Reflections On Ice Breaking by Ogden Nash

“Come on younglings foot it fleetly . . .” from the poem Indoor Games near Newbury by John Betjeman.

“Let it crack, let the wind blow through it . . .” from the poem When the Heart by Michael Leunig.  You can listen to my podcast with Michael here.

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Art

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Viewing” background_layout=”dark” text_orientation=”right” header_font=”Cardo||||” header_font_size=”35px” text_font=”Roboto Light||||” text_font_size=”46px” text_line_height=”1em”]

Viewing
in the
Future

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_code admin_label=”Code”]<br><!– [et_pb_line_break_holder] –><br><!– [et_pb_line_break_holder] –><br><!– [et_pb_line_break_holder] –><br><!– [et_pb_line_break_holder] –><br>[/et_pb_code][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][et_pb_code admin_label=”Code”]<br><!– [et_pb_line_break_holder] –>[/et_pb_code][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][et_pb_code admin_label=”Code”]<br>[/et_pb_code][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Section” background_image=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/gallery.jpg” transparent_background=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” disabled=”off” disabled_on=”|off|on” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off”][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row” make_fullwidth=”off” parallax_method_1=”off” parallax_method_2=”off” parallax_method_3=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_2=”off” parallax_3=”off”][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Phone – Art” background_layout=”dark” header_font_size=”75px” header_font_size_phone=”10px” header_font_size_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Rock Salt||||” text_font_size=”50px” text_line_height=”1em” text_orientation=”left” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” text_font_size_tablet=”30px” text_font_size_last_edited=”on|tablet”]

Art

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Viewing
in the
Future

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Section” custom_padding=”37.5167px|0px|0px|0px” transparent_background=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” custom_padding_phone=”0px|0px|0px|0px” custom_padding_last_edited=”on|phone” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off” disabled=”off” disabled_on=”on|on|”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row” custom_padding=”0px|0px|19.35px|0px” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”off” custom_padding_phone=”0px|0px|0px|0px” custom_padding_last_edited=”on|phone” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_method_1=”off”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”If you’re an artist and ” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”750px” max_width_tablet=”0px” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”23px” text_line_height=”1.4em” custom_margin=”|||90px” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_phone=”|||0px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” text_line_height_phone=”1.7em” text_line_height_last_edited=”on|phone”]

If you’re an artist, do you want more people to see your work?

Do you want people to see your work even if your original paintings are in a private collection or a storage vault?

Do you want people to experience your work in the way you intended and not on a tiny smartphone screen?

Do you want people to see your work even if your original painting is accidentally destroyed?

Would you like future generations to see how you worked?

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”These questions come up time” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”655px” max_width_tablet=”0px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||120px”]

These are questions that come up a lot with the artists on my podcast. I’ve come up with what I think is a possible solution and I’d like to know what you think.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Nothing compares to standing in” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” text_line_height_last_edited=”on|tablet” custom_margin=”|||150px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet”]

There’s no question, nothing compares to standing in front of a painting. Looking at art online doesn’t hold a candle. As an artist you know this already. There’s no idea of scale. A 6ft painting looks the same as a 6inch sketch. The surface texture is lost. I can’t see the interplay of light as I move around. The visceral impact is reduced to nothing on the screen of my smart phone.

Yet, most of the art I see is on the screen of my smartphone. It’s quick and it’s easy. I think it would take me a year to actually stand in front of every painting I looked at in one week on my phone.

The Louvre had 8.5 million visitors last year. Instagram has 600 million users and counting. I’d be naive to demand that everyone had to look at my paintings in person ignoring the colossal reach of the internet.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”What to do?” max_width=”655px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||120px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop”]

So, what to do?
We need something that combines the reach of the internet with the experience of actually standing in front of a painting?

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Here’s what I’ve got so far ” text_orientation=”justified” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

Virtual and Augmented reality look the most promising to me. Not as they are now but how they will be in 10 or 20 years. The technology looks clumsy now but so did mobile phones when they came out back in the 80’s.

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Vr-headset-equals-old-phone.jpg” animation=”off” max_width=”420px” /][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Section” custom_padding=”37.5167px|0px|0px|0px” transparent_background=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” custom_padding_phone=”0px|0px|0px|0px” custom_padding_last_edited=”on|phone” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off” disabled=”off” disabled_on=”|off|on”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row” custom_padding=”0px|0px|19.35px|0px” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” use_custom_gutter=”off” custom_padding_phone=”0px|0px|0px|0px” custom_padding_last_edited=”on|phone” allow_player_pause=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” make_equal=”off” parallax_1=”off” parallax_method_1=”off”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Phone – If you’re an artist and ” text_orientation=”center” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.4em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_phone=”|||0px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” text_line_height_phone=”1.5em” text_line_height_last_edited=”on|phone”]

 
If you’re an artist, do you want more people to see your work?

Do you want people to see your work even if your original paintings are in a private collection or a storage vault?

Do you want people to experience your work in the way you intended and not on a tiny smartphone screen?

Do you want people to see your work even if your original painting is accidentally destroyed?

Would you like future generations to see how you worked?

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”These questions come up time” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin=”|||0px” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone”]

These are questions that come up a lot with the artists on my podcast. I’ve come up with what I think is a possible solution and I’d like to know what you think.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Nothing compares to standing in” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” text_line_height_last_edited=”on|tablet” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

There’s no question, nothing compares to standing in front of a painting. Looking at art online doesn’t hold a candle. As an artist you know this already. There’s no idea of scale. A 6ft painting looks the same as a 6inch sketch. The surface texture is lost. I can’t see the interplay of light as I move around. The visceral impact is reduced to nothing on the screen of my smart phone.

Yet, most of the art I see is on the screen of my smartphone. It’s quick and it’s easy. I think it would take me a year to actually stand in front of every painting I looked at in one week on my phone.

The Louvre had 8.5 million visitors last year. Instagram has 600 million users and counting. I’d be naive to demand that everyone had to look at my paintings in person ignoring the colossal reach of the internet.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”What to do?” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”center” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

So, what to do?
We need something that combines the reach of the internet with the experience of actually standing in front of a painting?

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Here’s what I’ve got so far ” text_orientation=”left” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|”]

Virtual and Augmented reality look the most promising to me. Not as they are now but how they will be in 10 or 20 years. The technology looks clumsy now but so did mobile phones when they came out back in the 80’s.

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Vr-headset-equals-old-phone.jpg” animation=”off” max_width=”420px” /][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Section” transparent_background=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” disabled=”off” disabled_on=”on||” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off”][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row” custom_padding=”0px|0px|18.75px|0px”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Recording for the future ” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”655px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||120px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop”]

Recording for the future . . .

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Rather than just taking photographs” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

Rather than just taking photographs of my paintings I want to record them in a way that will give future technology the best chance of recreating the experience of actually standing in front of them.

The best way I can see to do this at the moment is using a combination of photogrammetry and light field cameras. Obvious right? Why didn’t I just say so at the beginning?

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Photogrammetry” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

Photogrammetry is where you take multiple photographs of an object, from lots of different angles, then you feed all the photos into a piece of software and it stitches them together into a three dimensional model of the original object you photographed.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Light field cameras” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

Light field cameras do all the things normal cameras do. They also record an additional  range of computational information about the object, including distance and position in space. The main lens of a light field camera is augmented by a series of 200,000 micro lenses, each of which see the image from a slightly different perspective.

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Lauren-Processed-01.jpeg” animation=”off” max_width=”400px” custom_margin=”10px|||” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” /][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/illum-in-hand.jpeg” animation=”off” max_width=”400px” custom_margin=”80px|||” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” /][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Combining photogrammetry and light” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

So you could say one light field image contains the equivalent amount of information to 200,000 standard images. Combining photogrammetry and light field cameras will I think capture the most amount of data using existing, readily available technology. You can pick up a light field camera on amazon for about $400 USD.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”What does it mean practically?” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”655px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||120px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop”]

What does it mean practically?

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”As well as the normal photos” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

As well as the normal photos I take of my paintings I’m going to start taking a series of photogrammetry images using a light field camera to capture the three dimensional aspect of my paintings. The recommendation for photogrammetry is to take an image every 5 degrees but that seems excessive for a painting so I’m going to take images every 20 degrees.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Photogrammetry2.jpg” animation=”off” align=”center” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”And I’m going repeat” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

And then I’m going repeat that on 4 axes, right to left, top to bottom, corner to corner, and other corner to other corner, like so . . .

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Photogrammetry.jpg” animation=”off” align=”center” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”That means 45 light” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

Including a full frontal image, that will mean 45 light field images for each painting.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Is the technology alre” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”655px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||120px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop”]

Is the technology already in place to use the images?

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Sort of, but not really.” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px”]

Sort of, but not really.

There are a number of software applications that can turn the images into a reasonable 3D model. The most robust seems to be photo scan so that’s the one I will start with.

Once the 3D model is made it can then be used in a virtual or augmented reality environment. It will still be with the godawful VR headsets and pretty clumsy, but that’s just for now.

I’m not really focused on the current technology because it will change and probably a lot.

Trying to plan for what virtual and augmented reality will look like in the future is like being back in the 80’s, with the first mobile phones, and trying to plan for Instagram, Facebook, Uber, Airbnb, YouTube, Google maps, Pokemon go, and all the other ways we currently use our phones. They were all inconceivable back then.

I don’t know what the future will bring but I do know the experience I’m trying to approximate. I want to capture enough data so that a future viewer can walk up to a virtual version of a painting. Look at it from any side. Get up really close to it. Crouch at the corners and look at how the raking light reveals the brush strokes. Stand back and let the scale of the painting sink in. Feel the visceral impact of the painting on their body. Get close to the painting and, I’m imagining future technology here, run their fingers over the surface of the painting.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/John-Datlon-Dubai-1.jpg” alt=”Here I am with Syrian artist Ahmad Moualla’s giant painting, %22People and Power.%22″ title_text=”Here I am with Syrian artist Ahmad Moualla’s giant painting, %22People and Power.%22″ animation=”off” align=”center” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”Taking in Syrian artist Ah” text_orientation=”right” max_width=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”PT Sans||||” text_font_size=”14px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||NaNpx” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop”]

Taking in Syrian artist Ahmad Moualla’s giant painting, “People and Power,” in Dubai – March 2017

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Over to you . . .” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”655px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||120px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop”]

Over to you . . .

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”So that’s what I’ve got ” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”600px” max_width_tablet=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” custom_margin=”|||150px” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

So that’s what I’ve got so far. It’s far from complete or perfect. I’m sharing it publicly because I hope other artists like yourself will start to record their work in this way also.

In the future when someone hears about your work they could go to your virtual space and see your work as you intended it to be seen, or as close to as possible. You could build your process pictures into the virtual model of your painting so they could see how you achieved the finished result you did. Artist Gretchen Andres is already doing a version of this in her virtual gallery.

In the future someone listening to my podcast could walk around a virtual gallery of the artist I’m chatting with. As the conversation turns to influences and inspiration, the works of the influential artists could appear for comparison and consideration.

In the future a platform like Instagram could be more like a virtual gallery too, or with augmented reality it could be a space on the wall of your home where virtual paintings appear.

As more virtual art is recorded and shared you could curate any number of virtual galleries for your own reference and enjoyment.

And these are just a few of the possibilities off the top of my head. I’m sure you will think of a lot more once you get going.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Nothing compares to standing in” text_orientation=”justified” max_width=”655px” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”22px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||120px” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Nothing compares to standing in front of a painting. No question. As a community of artists we can take steps now to help our future viewers see our work in a better, more authentic way than fast swiping on a tiny screen.

Any suggestions or questions have please leave them in the comments section below and do share this post with your artist friends.

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Section” transparent_background=”off” allow_player_pause=”off” inner_shadow=”off” parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on” disabled=”off” disabled_on=”|on|on” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” make_equal=”off” use_custom_gutter=”off”][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row” custom_padding=”0px|0px|18.75px|0px”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Phone – Recording for the future ” text_orientation=”center” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Recording for the future . . .

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Rather than just taking photographs” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone”]

Rather than just taking photographs of my paintings I want to record them in a way that will give future technology the best chance of recreating the experience of actually standing in front of them.

The best way I can see to do this at the moment is using a combination of photogrammetry and light field cameras. Obvious right? Why didn’t I just say so at the beginning?

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Photogrammetry” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone”]

Photogrammetry is where you take multiple photographs of an object, from lots of different angles, then you feed all the photos into a piece of software and it stitches them together into a three dimensional model of the original object you photographed.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Light field cameras” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Light field cameras do all the things normal cameras do. They also record an additional  range of computational information about the object, including distance and position in space. The main lens of a light field camera is augmented by a series of 200,000 micro lenses, each of which see the image from a slightly different perspective.

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Lauren-Processed-01.jpeg” animation=”off” max_width=”400px” custom_margin=”10px|||” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” /][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/illum-in-hand.jpeg” animation=”off” max_width=”400px” custom_margin=”80px|||” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|phone” /][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][et_pb_row admin_label=”Row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Combining photogrammetry and light” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet”]

So you could say one light field image contains the equivalent amount of information to 200,000 standard images. Combining photogrammetry and light field cameras will I think capture the most amount of data using existing, readily available technology. You can pick up a light field camera on amazon for about $400 USD.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”What does it mean practically?” text_orientation=”center” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

What does it mean practically?

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”As well as the normal photos” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|”]

As well as the normal photos I take of my paintings I’m going to start taking a series of photogrammetry images using a light field camera to capture the three dimensional aspect of my paintings. The recommendation for photogrammetry is to take an image every 5 degrees but that seems excessive for a painting so I’m going to take images every 20 degrees.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Photogrammetry2.jpg” animation=”off” align=”center” show_in_lightbox=”off” url_new_window=”off” use_overlay=”off” sticky=”off” force_fullwidth=”off” always_center_on_mobile=”on” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”And I’m going repeat” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet”]

And then I’m going repeat that on 4 axes, right to left, top to bottom, corner to corner, and other corner to other corner, like so . . .

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Photogrammetry.jpg” animation=”off” align=”center” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”That means 45 light” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet”]

Including a full frontal image, that will mean 45 light field images for each painting.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Is the technology alre” text_orientation=”center” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Is the technology already in place to use the images?

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Sort of, but not really.” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|”]

Sort of, but not really.

There are a number of software applications that can turn the images into a reasonable 3D model. The most robust seems to be photo scan so that’s the one I will start with.

Once the 3D model is made it can then be used in a virtual or augmented reality environment. It will still be with the godawful VR headsets and pretty clumsy, but that’s just for now.

I’m not really focused on the current technology because it will change and probably a lot.

Trying to plan for what virtual and augmented reality will look like in the future is like being back in the 80’s, with the first mobile phones, and trying to plan for Instagram, Facebook, Uber, Airbnb, YouTube, Google maps, Pokemon go, and all the other ways we currently use our phones. They were all inconceivable back then.

I don’t know what the future will bring but I do know the experience I’m trying to approximate. I want to capture enough data so that a future viewer can walk up to a virtual version of a painting. Look at it from any side. Get up really close to it. Crouch at the corners and look at how the raking light reveals the brush strokes. Stand back and let the scale of the painting sink in. Feel the visceral impact of the painting on their body. Get close to the painting and, I’m imagining future technology here, run their fingers over the surface of the painting.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_image admin_label=”Image” src=”http://www.johndalton.me/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/John-Datlon-Dubai-1.jpg” alt=”Here I am with Syrian artist Ahmad Moualla’s giant painting, %22People and Power.%22″ title_text=”Here I am with Syrian artist Ahmad Moualla’s giant painting, %22People and Power.%22″ animation=”off” align=”center” /][et_pb_text admin_label=”Taking in Syrian artist Ah” text_orientation=”right” max_width=”NaNpx” max_width_last_edited=”on|desktop” text_font=”PT Sans||||” text_font_size=”14px” text_line_height=”1.6em” custom_margin=”|||NaNpx” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|desktop” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Taking in Syrian artist Ahmad Moualla’s giant painting, “People and Power,” in Dubai – March 2017

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Over to you . . .” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Over to you . . .

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”So that’s what I’ve got ” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font_size=”18″ text_line_height=”1.8em” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet”]

So that’s what I’ve got so far. It’s far from complete or perfect. I’m sharing it publicly because I hope other artists like yourself will start to record their work in this way also.

In the future when someone hears about your work they could go to your virtual space and see your work as you intended it to be seen, or as close to as possible. You could build your process pictures into the virtual model of your painting so they could see how you achieved the finished result you did. Artist Gretchen Andres is already doing a version of this in her virtual gallery.

In the future someone listening to my podcast could walk around a virtual gallery of the artist I’m chatting with. As the conversation turns to influences and inspiration, the works of the influential artists could appear for comparison and consideration.

In the future a platform like Instagram could be more like a virtual gallery too, or with augmented reality it could be a space on the wall of your home where virtual paintings appear.

As more virtual art is recorded and shared you could curate any number of virtual galleries for your own reference and enjoyment.

And these are just a few of the possibilities off the top of my head. I’m sure you will think of a lot more once you get going.

[/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Nothing compares to standing in” text_orientation=”left” max_width_last_edited=”on|phone” text_font=”Special Elite||||” text_font_size=”21px” text_line_height=”1.5em” custom_margin_last_edited=”on|tablet” background_layout=”light” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]

Nothing compares to standing in front of a painting. No question. As a community of artists we can take steps now to help our future viewers see our work in a better, more authentic way than fast swiping on a tiny screen.

Any suggestions or questions have please leave them in the comments section below and do share this post with your artist friends.

[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section]