savannah photographic workshop

People who know me know I like to travel, and, often, off the beaten path. To paraphrase Hank Williams, Jr., “I like to see places I’ve never seen.” But that didn’t start until I was around 40. Before that, growing up in Savannah, when we took a family vacation it was to visit other family in Florida. When I left home for the Army, I only got as far as Washington, DC. For college on the GI Bill, I went to UGA in Athens, where this photo was made, at the start of what might be the most consequential trip I’ve ever made.

The dude on the left with the “antlers” is yours truly, known then and now to the others here as bd. Continuing L-R are Lynn, Bob, Nancy, Miriam, and TR. On the Thursday before Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) Nancy, Miriam, and I had walked to lunch at a small place in downtown Athens, and there was a guy with a backpack sitting near us telling someone he was on his way to New Orleans for Mardi Gras.

We looked at each other and said why not? We went back to the Red & Black office (daily student newspaper) and asked if anyone else wanted to go; got three more. I had a little Triumph two seater, and Miriam had a car that she knew wouldn’t make it. So a friend, Rick (a saint), who wanted to go but couldn’t, offered up his Firebird convertible.

Six of us piled in on Friday morning intending to drive straight through, but had car trouble soon after starting. Made the repair and kept going. Six in a convertible with bucket seats in the front, all of us poor and tight on cash. We carried a cooler with a big jar of peanut butter to eat and save money. We strapped a tent on the luggage rack so we could sleep under an overpass if moved to do so. At one point we put the car top down and managed to jam the mechanism with the (now broken) jar of peanut butter.

Driving into NOLA Friday evening I had an accident, turning left into an oncoming car that crushed Rick’s driver side door, requiring all in/out for the car through the passenger door for the rest of the trip. Because I had an out of state license the police had to arrest me and take me to the jail, so I rode around in the back of a squad car on the Friday night of what may be their wildest weekend annually. Then they took me into the jail through the holding area. You can imagine the weirdness of that show.

By then my friends had made it to the station and once I paid a $10 bond I was free to go. We were so tired, Miriam had a Shell card that could be used at Howard Johnson’s. We got a room and encouraged the desk clerk to look the other way while we all piled in with sleeping bags.

The next day we hit the Quarter, watching lots of parades, fighting in the gutter with ten year olds for cheap plastic beads, and then later in the evening, dancing and drinking until early Sunday morning, at which point our designated driver Nancy loaded us up and headed home.

We got back in time for the Sunday night staff meeting for The Red & Black, and were totally obnoxious about our impromptu adventure. For me, personally, something changed, an internal dam started breaking, and like Jimmy Buffett said in “Migration”-‘…figured it’s time to have a little fun.’

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index/G0000LwBdd2qMK.g

HAPPY SOLSTICE!

And best wishes for a bright New Year!

“Now he walks in quiet solitude, the forests and the streams
Seeking grace in every step he takes
His sight has turned inside himself to try and understand
The serenity of a clear blue mountain lake” “Rocky Mountain High” John Denver

Sunday I was sitting in my deck garden, enjoying it for a few more minutes before having to wrap it in plastic for our first hard freeze. This is an annual event for me because I have too many tropical plants, courtesy of my mother who was from south Florida. She managed to keep a lot of plants she was used to from home through the Savannah winters, and I can’t bring myself to let these few left go. So I stand on ladders on a second floor deck to create a shelter for them. For safety’s sake Barbara now stands there and holds onto my waistband, which probably means if I start to go over the railing, we’ll both go. I try to avoid making her want to push me.

But I digress. I was sitting there, listening to some music, and this verse from “Rocky Mountain High” caught my attention. It reminded me of making this photograph.

After reading the headlines this morning, if this had been 2500 miles closer, I would have been in the car.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“Walking the Dog”

It’s easy to think of old Savannah as a 19th century city, architecturally, but there are some very modern structures scattered throughout downtown. The first time I noticed this window on the left, I wondered about the v-shaped notch below it, but, and this is pure speculation, it’s a reflector to bounce light into a perpetually shaded portion of that window. I just love clever solutions.

In making the photograph, I was concentrating on arranging shapes, patterns, colors into a balanced tension. Looking at the picture, I see a couple of neighbors having a conversation over the back fence.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“Walking the Dog”

The first time I saw this I thought, “What? Are strangers just opening this door and walking in? Wouldn’t locking the door solve the problem?”

I assume the resident would not have gone to the trouble to install this sign if there were no problem, so who are these people? Is it misguided tourists thinking Savannah is like Williamsburg, static displays to wander in and out? Many of these cottages have been converted to professional offices for attorneys or accountants; maybe the intruder thinks they are taking a meeting.

Some micro neighborhoods in downtown Savannah are like mine, with close knit neighbors, where we share keys for emergencies. Maybe there’s that one nosy neighbor with boundary issues, or a mother-in-law.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

“Walking the Dog”

One of the things that makes the Landmark Historic District of Savannah interesting is the eclectic mix of residential architecture, from cottages like this, having some difficulty with right angles, to large, elaborate mansions.

In last week’s post I mentioned accumulating a series of photographic vignettes from my mid day walks with the dog. I think of many of my photographs as short stories, so these might be more like blurbs–just a blip of information. What draws my attention first is some aspect of the quality of light and how it describes the subject/scene. The subject might be color, pattern, or a hint of a story you fill in with imagination.

The thing is, whatever artistic intent or motivation, and regardless of how well that might be accomplished through careful seeing and composing, the pictures also maintain a documentary character, recording a particular moment in an ever evolving landscape.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

A couple of years ago Barbara told me that our dog was getting older and that in addition to her morning and evening walks, she was going to need an extended mid day walk, and that I had been selected as the “walker.” What she knew but didn’t say was I also needed the mid day break/exercise.

I’ve been photographing Savannah since 1965, but having a constant repetition of time and place over a long period gives a more intimate perspective. I’ve learned something I was never very conscious of before, and that is how open the shadows are under the tree canopy that is Savannah’s urban forest, during mid day, the time budding photographers are usually told to not photograph because the overhead light is too harsh.

I almost always have my phone with me when walking the dog and have gotten an extensive series of little vignettes of my neighborhood. Playing with the phone camera feels like it used to when I was playing with Polaroid, back in my film days; you can be free to experiment with technical and aesthetic considerations because you don’t have to “be serious” since you aren’t using a “real” camera. When you are just having fun, playing, you learn so much.

With this note on how pretty the light is in Savannah, I’d like to make a shameless plug for my friend and old Nikon School teaching colleague Reed Hoffmann. Reed is continuing to lead small group photo trips (max 6 people) and a couple of years ago he added Savannah and Charleston in the spring to his catalog, with the added benefit that I come out of retirement once a year to assist him, and drive the second vehicle. The program for 2026 is March 10-15, and details can be found here, https://reedhoffmann.com/2026SavannahInfo.pdf. If you feel particularly hardy, you could stay over for a couple of days and experience Saint Patrick’s Day here.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Outtake from “Go West Old Man” tour

On a barren stretch of highway on the way to Monument Valley there was a minimalist structure of poles. It looked like it was a kind of “pop up” shop for Navajo crafts when traffic warranted. Not this day. Beyond the empty stalls was a stylish amenity, and necessary since there are no bushes large enough to discreetly step behind.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Last week was the annual 8 day SCAD Savannah Film Festival, an opportunity to spend hours every day sitting in a dark theater, and the reason I did not post last week. For years Barbara and I have been buying passes and seeing as much as we could manage. There are some professional panels, and other education efforts, but the main thing is films–features, shorts, documentaries, animation–morning, afternoon, and evening, in three screening rooms. It’s a perk that our home is about a five minute walk to two of the theaters.

I enjoy the feature films, and I recommend several of the ones we saw: “Eternity,” “One Battle After Another,” “Nuremberg,” “Highest 2 Lowest,” “Hamnet,” “Rental Family,” “Song Sung Blue.” What I really like is getting to the “Shorts” and “Animation” viewings.

As a still photographer, I’ve spent years learning how to tell a story in 1/250th of a second, so I’m impressed with film makers who can tell a complex, emotional story in 5-10 minutes. As an image editor, I’ve spent years in chemical and digital darkrooms in a never ending struggle to get just the right feel of tones and colors, so I am in awe of animators who can create sophisticated worlds of dimension defining tones and colors, whether realistic or fantastic, from a blank slate.

I am less drawn to documentaries; I usually watch movies to escape reality, but I did see “My Mom Jayne” by Mariska Hargitay. It was impressive, and a reminder that there is so much more to people than their public persona.

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index

Outtake from “Go West Old Man” tour

Abstract–“…the term comes from the Latin for “drawn away” or “pulled away,” signifying that the summary is a distilled version detached from the original, longer work.” Google AI

Fifty plus years ago, in an Art History class, I learned that the artwork I had always referred to as “abstract” would more accurately be called “non-objective,” literally, not about an object.

By the above definition, every photograph could be considered “abstract.” In a medium so inherently documentary as photography it is a real challenge to create non-objective images. How do you frame a very real thing in such a way that the viewer doesn’t see subject but has a sensory experience of one or more design elements–point, line, shape, form, tone, color, texture, pattern?

For more of Bill’s photographs, go to https://www.billdurrence.com/index