Arthur Fellig. Ouija. WEEGEE.

From my notes over the summer:

Police reporter.
a lot of things happened at night .
he was the first one on the scene.
he loved the nightlife and he loved the crime.
        Crime is my oyster... it is full of black pearls.

Time of great warfare between organized crime.
       They liked him-- giving them an image...

Gunsmith's Sign


flash overexposes
out of focus
=
oppressive.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Weegee= Ouija

He had a police scanner and a working darkroom in the trunk of his car.
Because he was usually the first photographer on the scene of a crime, he was awarded the name Ouija because it was as if he predicted these happenings.
 He would process the images right then and there and then send them off to the newspapers of which he was working.
After a while of printing through the newspapers, his images became classics (almost cult classic-like) and then he started having shows and the style of his crime photos have inspired cinema.

 

Video:

Weegee Tells How.

I love when the title of a work either changes everything or reaffirms everything you thought about it in the first place. 

I love being surprised by an art work but also realizing that I understood a work just as the artist intended-- and often titles make this possible.

Other times it's an artist statement. 

Simply Add Boiling Water, 1937

Fire fighting. 

 

 Later in his career he distorts the image.

 He sold pamphlets.

HOW TO MAKE PHOTO CARICATURES
By Weegee (The Famous!)
WANT to accent a prominent feature such as the eyes or jaw in a photo caricature? Using distorted sheet plastic as a supplementary camera lens will do it. Take a clear sheet 1/16 to 1/2-inch thick, heat it in an aluminum foil pan, twist it with gloved hands and dunk it in cold water. Then turn it before the subject, looking through for the desired effect. Repeat the heating and twisting if necessary. Once you have the effect, take the photo through the plastic. Some remarkable results are illustrated. 

 

Weegee began to produce a series of distorted photographs, based on the lens he had devised for his 1948 film Weegee's New York, and from his experiments begun in the Acme darkrooms.

There were three basic methods Weegee used to create these distortions. Weegee's first experiments were made by placing a textured or curved glass or other translucent material between the enlarger lends and the photographic paper. This effect would alter the image of the negative to varying degrees depending on the density pattern, or texture of the material he used. He also tried manipulating or mutilating copy negatives by placing them in boiling water, or melting them with an open flame. The third method he employed involved making multiple exposures from the same or various negatives. Given his darkroom talent, he sometimes combined these techniques. Weegee later added a system by which he would affix a kaleidoscope to the end of the camera lens, or use it to replace the camera lens, letting the refractive designs multiply what the camera would have recorded as a single image. From this period until his death, Weegee concentrated on what he alternately called his "distortions," "caricatures," "creative photography," or most often, his "art."

 Marilyn Monroe, Plastic lens, c.1960

Picasso Distortion, c.1956.

 

 Inspires:

also anyone with a Mac. 

This is my friend Kara.

This is my twin, Jessi and her boyfriend Will. 

Me and Kara! :]

Oh, and this is the funniest video ever of someone laughing at themselves using the distortion tool.