Ben Rains

First anarchist on the moon

2012-01-16T15:06:00.000-05:00

Gerd Dembowski at Tin Ring Studios. July 8th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Ground control

2011-11-19T15:14:00.001-05:00

Sometime in June 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Jimmi and Micah

2011-11-13T13:21:00.001-05:00

Jimmi and Micah. Anthony Fest @ Rhino's. July 23rd, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Fairly epic hair

2011-11-10T00:03:00.001-05:00

David McGrath of Beaker @ Club Cool. April 17th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Will and Izzy

2011-11-08T19:38:00.003-05:00

Will and Izzy behind some lemon bars and cookies at the bake sale table. Anthony Fest @ Rhino's. July 23rd, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Sarah walks by

2011-11-08T19:37:00.000-05:00

Sarah walks by. Anthony Fest @ Rhino's. July 23rd, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Jeff and Erin

2011-11-07T21:37:00.000-05:00

Erin and Jeff after their wedding ceremony. October 15th, 2011. Nashville, Indiana.
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O'Hare airport

2011-11-07T19:53:00.000-05:00

O'Hare Airport. September 6th, 2011. Chicago, Illinois.
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High Dive

2011-11-06T22:00:00.000-05:00

High Dive performing at the Bishop. October 19th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
http://high-dive.bandcamp.com/

Two men

2011-11-06T19:35:00.001-05:00

Two men standing in a field at Erin and Jeff's wedding reception. October 15th, 2011. Nashville, Indiana.
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Busman's Holiday

2011-11-05T12:31:00.001-04:00

Busman's Holiday at the Bishop. June 23rd, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.
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Bestie beasties

2011-11-05T12:25:00.000-04:00

Street art seen in the city centre of Limerick. September 11th, 2011. Limerick, Ireland.
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Sleeping Bag alternate

2011-08-25T21:38:00.001-04:00

An alternate shot for Sleeping Bag at Tin Ring Studios. May 27th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana. They were recently interviewed in The Village Voice and a they've got a video for their song Slime.

Meghan at the old studio

2011-08-15T22:52:00.001-04:00

While working on a recent exhibition, I realized I'd never uploaded the film scan of this image. I'd only ever uploaded the cyanotype. I shot this with my one-of-a-kind cobbled together lens on the old Century Studio 10A. July 2009. Bloomington, Indiana.
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The garden

2011-08-15T01:37:00.003-04:00

Views of the garden at dawn. August 14, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Screen print

2011-07-30T21:43:00.000-04:00

A slightly different take on an older photograph of mine. This a two-color screen printed version I made today at Collective Press.

Siblings

2011-07-18T17:54:00.001-04:00

My friend's nephew and niece. June 26th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Gerd

2011-07-12T22:28:00.004-04:00

Portraits of my friend Gerd Dembowski, German author, storyteller, and activist.
July 8th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Aunt and niece

2011-07-12T22:26:00.001-04:00

Cheyenne and her niece. June 26th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Wild growth

2011-06-19T12:56:00.001-04:00

Two views of my garden at dawn today. June 19th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Sweet as honey

2011-06-09T22:18:00.000-04:00

Cheyenne and Sarah at Tin Ring Studios. June 3rd, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Shady corner at the golden hour

2011-06-09T22:16:00.002-04:00

The shady corner of my back yard at sunset with wood stacked on a limestone bench. June 9th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Sleeping Bag

2011-06-09T22:14:00.000-04:00

Sleeping Bag at Tin Ring Studios. May 27th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Epic heights

2011-06-09T22:12:00.001-04:00

View from the firetower at Ferdinand State Forest. May 22nd, 2011. Ferdinand, Indiana.

Lewis

2011-05-28T11:36:00.002-04:00

Lewis at Tin Ring Studios. May 27th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana. I was shooting press and album artwork photos for the band Sleeping Bag, which Lewis is a member of, yesterday. At the end of the shoot I'd one sheet of 8x10 film remaining so I asked Lewis to sit for a portrait.

Studio

2011-05-13T18:24:00.004-04:00

A view of the main Tin Ring Studios daylight photography space.

Cheyenne

2011-05-11T19:19:00.001-04:00

A recently printed cyanotype of "The Accidental Sitter".

Erin and Jeff

2011-05-09T23:18:00.003-04:00

My friends Erin and Jeff are getting married in October. They asked me to make some wedding announcement photographs for them, so I built a "paper moon" set. I shot this using my old Century Studio 10A camera.

Bluemington

2011-05-05T22:56:00.001-04:00

The most determined dreamer

2011-05-03T21:21:00.001-04:00

Unconventional and underestimated.

The accidental sitter

2011-04-26T23:05:00.003-04:00

Cheyenne at Tin Ring Studios. April 17th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

It's an accident, or I guess a coincidence, that this even was taken. I'd originally had some friends scheduled for a portrait sitting this day. I invited Cheyenne to drop by the studio at the same time because she'd an interest in my old camera, and I thought it'd be a good opportunity to show her how it worked. On the day of the shoot my scheduled sitters cancelled shortly before the shoot was to happen. I'd already brought over a box of loaded film holders and my portrait lenses to the studio, so I figured I could at least show Cheyenne how it all worked. After about 15 mins worth of vintage large format photography basics I asked her if she'd be ok with sitting for a couple of portraits since I had everything with me. She agreed and this incredible image came from the handful we made.

Medicine cabinet

2011-04-26T22:21:00.000-04:00

A personal commentary. Early April, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

First 16x20 camera images

2011-04-16T21:31:00.004-04:00

These are the first images from the 16x20 camera I've been repairing (off and on) for the past several months. I used sheets of RC photo paper to create paper negatives. I haven't printed from them yet, but instead taped negatives up on my fridge, photographed them with a digital camera and inverted the images in Photoshop to get a positive. There's a light leak along the edge of the plate holder where the dark slide fits in, but other than that, everything is looking good.

Retouching

2011-04-14T21:19:00.003-04:00

An early 1900s retouching easel for working on glass plate negatives.

      Retouching has been and is much condemned both by those who practice it and by those of artistic feeling. It is the tendency toward extremes in many things, which generally finds its source in a lack of knowledge of what is truly wanted. In the case of retouching, the extreme over-doing has given the public just grounds. For truly, nothing mars the beauty or strength of the picture more than over-doing.
      Some claim the public wishes over-doing, no doubt that the greater portion of the public desires lines and wrinkles subdued or even eradicated altogether, but this can be done and yet not destroy the modeling or life-likeness of the individual. A likeness may be improved and yet not have the appearance of being over-done.
            -Clara Weisman, A Complete Treatise on Artistic Retouching, 1903.

Nothing can be more annoying than to produce a faultless negative (chemically and artistically) and have it ruined by the retoucher, who without any regard to expression, drawing or anatomy, aims simply at making the negative perfectly smooth and fine. He succeeds in this manner in effacing all traces of character, and as a rule treats faces of either sex, and all ages, in precisely the same way, instead of which he should have striven to retain the peculiarities he has removed, and not work the face of a man of sixty as delicately as a schoolboy's.
-Burrows & Colton, The Art of Retouching, 1880.

Whenever I find myself waiting in the checkout line at the grocery store I can't help but cringe at all the horribly over-retouched images of celebrities that grace the covers of the magazines and trashy pop-gossip periodicals. They were always bad, but it seems like in the last half-decade or so the Photoshop work on them has gotten to the point where it's gone from being bad, to ridiculous, to creepily alien. The flesh and features of people are no longer identifiable as such, but instead are rendered as if molded from smooth plastic.

As evidenced by the quoted text above, it's not a new problem, or one specific to the use of digital image editing tools like Photoshop. Ever since the dawn of photographic portraiture and the earliest retouching work, there've been those who take it too far. You can remove blemishes, lessen wrinkles and lines, and fix unsightly shadows without turning someone into an android.

Moderation, moderation, moderation.

Meghan

2011-04-14T21:16:00.000-04:00

Meghan at Tin Ring Studios. April 1st, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

More of the moon

2011-04-13T22:26:00.000-04:00

Meghan on the moon. Tin Ring Studios. April 1st, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Demon

2011-04-13T22:25:00.000-04:00

Stone cold

2011-04-11T00:04:00.002-04:00

Rachael at Tin Ring Studios. March 27th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

La grande boîte, mk1

2011-04-08T21:21:00.002-04:00

Phase one of an ongoing project to turn an old Soldak 16x20 enlarging camera into a more general purpose camera for making photographs with paper negatives, lithographic film, and wet plate processes. The large rectangular frame on the chair is the plate/film holder for the camera.

For now there's a 45cm f/9 Zeiss APO-Tessar fixed to the front of the camera (which surprisingly illuminates the whole 16x20 sized ground-glass focusing screen.)

Meghan in profile

2011-04-07T00:10:00.000-04:00

Meghan at Tin Ring Studios. April 1st, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Props

2011-04-05T23:54:00.000-04:00

Unconventional, but always epic, Rachael comes with her own props. Tin Ring Studios. March 27th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Shayla

2011-04-05T23:51:00.000-04:00

Shayla at Tin Ring Studios with kind of a Margot Tenenbaum vibe. March 27th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Clasp

2011-04-05T23:47:00.001-04:00

Meghan at Tin Ring Studios. April 1st, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Only a paper moon

2011-04-03T19:54:00.001-04:00

Meghan on the moon. Tin Ring Studios. Bloomington, Indiana.

Los Gatos Negros

2011-03-26T14:12:00.000-04:00

Los Gatos Negros at the FWYH House. February 4th, 2005. Bloomington, Indiana.

St. Zanna, variation 2

2011-03-21T00:00:00.000-04:00

Zanna. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Headshot

2011-03-04T21:09:00.000-05:00

Rachael. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Rachael's dress

2011-03-01T20:24:00.001-05:00

Rachael. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Corseted Zanna

2011-02-27T11:10:00.001-05:00

Zanna. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Rachael in profile

2011-02-25T01:43:00.001-05:00

Rachael. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Zanna

2011-02-24T02:20:00.000-05:00

Zanna. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

Just another Sunday

2011-02-20T23:18:00.000-05:00

Zanna. February 20th, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

The last day of summer

2011-02-19T18:39:00.001-05:00

Kinsey. September 21st, 2008. Bloomington, Indiana.

Defiance, Ohio

2011-02-19T12:08:00.001-05:00

Defiance, Ohio at Guilty Pleasures. June 2007. Bloomington, Indiana.

Singing + dancing

2011-02-19T00:09:00.001-05:00

Singing and dancing. February 2008. Yellow Springs, Ohio.

The catwalk

2011-02-18T23:10:00.002-05:00

Dance Pants Revolution DIY fashion show at Second Story. August 14th, 2004. Bloomington, Indiana.

The Blow

2011-02-17T21:21:00.002-05:00

The Blow. November 3rd, 2004. Bloomington, Indiana.

Chris + Hannah

2011-02-17T21:01:00.001-05:00

Ghost Mice at the Crafty Records punk BBQ. July 2007. City Island, New York City.

Hey pineapple

2011-02-17T20:45:00.001-05:00

Pineapple milkshakes. April 6th, 2008. Troy, Ohio.

Soapbox derby

2011-02-17T20:30:00.001-05:00

Soapbox derby. June 15th, 2005. Bloomington, Indiana.

Wade

2011-02-17T17:58:00.003-05:00

Asia wades in Eastchester Bay. July 2007. City Island, New York City.

Gonzo

2011-02-17T00:47:00.000-05:00

A drunken bonfire night in memory of Hunter S. Thompson. February 21st, 2005. Bloomington, Indiana.

Bedhead

2011-02-16T22:00:00.004-05:00

Bedhead. April 2005. Bloomington, Indiana.

Red

2011-02-16T18:59:00.002-05:00

Red. December 19th, 2007. Bloomington, Indiana.

St. Carlos

2011-02-15T19:42:00.002-05:00

Dorey and Carlos at Plan-It-X Fest 2005. July 2005. Bloomington, Indiana.

Legs #7

2011-02-15T01:02:00.002-05:00

Legs #7 from a continuation of the Nice Legs series. July 2006.

DREKKA

2011-02-14T17:54:00.002-05:00

DREKKA performing at the WIUS station house. October 17th, 2004. Bloomington, Indiana.

Trickle-down economics at work

2011-02-13T21:07:00.001-05:00

A view of the financial district. July 2007. New York City.

Mr. Head

2011-02-12T22:43:00.002-05:00

At Corinna's 21st birthday party. October 16th, 2004. Bloomington, Indiana.

Channel 7

2011-02-12T09:55:00.002-05:00

Channel 7 from the Tube Fed series. December 2006.

Grace

2011-02-10T21:13:00.003-05:00

Grace. February 10th, 2008. Yellow Springs, Ohio.

What a large iced chai you have

2011-02-07T19:38:00.001-05:00

Hanging out with Jaci Sue. April 6th, 2008. Troy, Ohio.

No angel, no devil

2011-02-06T16:35:00.008-05:00

Nettie. December 30th, 2008.

Pink lady

2011-02-06T05:16:00.000-05:00

Grit

2011-02-06T01:14:00.002-05:00

Dance Pants Revolution DIY fashion show at Second Story. August 14th, 2004. Bloomington, Indiana.

Adrift

2011-02-04T23:13:00.001-05:00

Gizmatic

2011-01-29T23:45:00.000-05:00

Giz photographing me photographing him. Getting ready to head out for the summer Imperial Can tour. August 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.

Metered

2011-01-29T23:42:00.000-05:00

A scene in an alley. March 7th, 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.

Toby Foster

2011-01-22T09:56:00.001-05:00

Toby Foster at the Clark St house. October 23rd, 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.
http://www.myspace.com/tobyfoster

Up the Puppets

2011-01-22T09:54:00.001-05:00

Up the Puppets performance at the 909 9th St house. August 10th, 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.

Jenna and Janelle

2011-01-21T18:39:00.000-05:00

"Goth Night" at Club Cool. November 18, 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.

Kam Kama

2011-01-21T18:37:00.001-05:00

Kam Kama at the Clark St house. October 29th, 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.

New Studio

2011-01-20T20:33:00.000-05:00

Heroic Dos

2011-01-20T20:32:00.003-05:00

Heroic Dos at 502 S Highland Ave, September 4th, 2010. Bloomington, Indiana.

The Vallures at the Bishop

2011-01-18T20:57:00.003-05:00

The Vallures at the Bishop on January 1st, 2011. Bloomington, Indiana.

The Vallures

2011-01-18T20:56:00.001-05:00

Molly

2011-01-16T13:10:00.001-05:00

Gut feeling

2011-01-15T19:17:00.002-05:00

Velvet

2010-11-27T20:42:00.000-05:00

On matters of international trade

2010-11-20T09:50:00.000-05:00

The veil

2010-11-19T23:14:00.001-05:00

Sarah

2010-11-19T21:49:00.002-05:00

Soak

2010-11-13T10:49:00.002-05:00

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Sarah and Izzy Redux

2010-11-02T10:04:00.001-04:00

Sarah

2010-10-26T10:23:00.001-04:00

Griffy Lake

2010-10-25T20:21:00.001-04:00

Secret cabin

2010-10-25T20:12:00.001-04:00

Fuzzy Izzy

2010-10-23T18:09:00.004-04:00

A portrait from the first shoot where I used my 1920s era soft-focus lens.

Sarah and Izzy

2010-10-21T19:58:00.002-04:00

Sara

2010-10-18T22:26:00.000-04:00

My co-conspirator.