Picture in the Feb 2006 NSS News

[claustrophobe]

1) I apologize for using the word "dammit" in a previous post. Not everyone finds it humorous or appropriate.
2) As a parent of two 20 year old+ boys, I can attest that if you can think it, your kids have probably already done it, or at least seriously considered it. I worry more about car wrecks, drugs and violence; those things that can shorten their lives and cut off the promise. With so many threats, you've got to prioritize, but I don't see the artful portrayal of the feminine figure as a threat. Most women are a whole lot more wholesome than drugs.
3) I finally got my NSS News in the mail today. It was not in a plain brown wrapper, and sure as heck didn't need to be. Mr. Bunnell is doing a great job.
4) I don't have time for any more of this discussion, I'm going caving.

[AstroTurtle]

Teresa sez: "IMO, if more people saw unprettified death, war casualties, natural disaster victims, and so forth, instead of them being 'hidden', more would be moved to improve conditions on behalf of the living..."

To respectfully disagree opens room for mindful debate and I am always for thoughtful discussion. We will never agree and that's okay. We come from different mindsets and backgrounds, and that's what makes the world wonderful!

I was asked to pose for Dave's book and after much thought, declined. I did so not because of moral issues, but because I didn't want the photos to possibly affect my career. Dave's book is going to be wonderful and once for sale, on our coffee table!

I'm interested to read Sabrina thoughts about being in the NSS News vs. the book she posed for.

Safe caving everyone- go get muddy!
Astroturtle

[Dave Bunnell]

I was asked to pose for Dave's book and after much thought, declined. I did so not because of moral issues, but because I didn't want the photos to possibly affect my career. Dave's book is going to be wonderful and once for sale, on our coffee table!

I'm interested to read Sabrina thoughts about being in the NSS News vs. the book she posed for.

Donna,

Just a note regarding the above post, those cavers whose photos were taken for the book were asked specifically if entering their shots in the Photo Salon was OK. I currently use a model release with cavers that states their photos are for use only in the Erotic Underground and that any other use is subject to their granting specific permission. Sabrina is a model and alas, not a caver, so was covered under a general model release.

[batrotter]

Just a question here, didn't want to start a new thread. We were out over the last weekend in the Hoosier National Forest ridgewalking for caves. We found a new one and debated a name. Since Sabrina was on everybody's mind, we named it Sabrina's Hole. Couldn't help ourselves. I wonder how many new caves this month will be named in honor of Sabrina?

[Wayne Harrison]

I was thinking of "Hoosier Daddy?" myself.

[batrotter]

I was thinking of "Hoosier Daddy?" myself.

I don't think we have one named that yet!

[Squirrel Girl]

Since Sabrina was on everybody's mind

Yeah, boy. Today I stumbled across this while looking for an article on super resolution:

Sabrina is used to visualize 3-dimensional geometries in which MCNP and other codes simulate the transport of radiation. Ray tracing is the primary method for generating images. The user can trade off resolution of the ray traced image for speed of rendering. Sabrina can perform geometry error checking, display the tracks of Monte Carlo simulated particles, and translate solid body geometry descriptions to MCNP surface geometry.

http://www.whiterockscience.com/sabrina/sabrina.html

Who knew a hottie was also a geek?!?!?!?!

And here's a "Gallery of Sabrina Pictures":
http://www.whiterockscience.com/sabrina/gallery.html

[AstroTurtle]

Dave,

I guess that answers my question- as a model she'd probably like being published in the News! Thanks for your response!

I read the release when considering posing for the book. I may be many things, but a model is certainly not one of themjavascript:emoticon (':rofl:')
ROFL You were very gracious & professional. I'd still love to pose, but not for public consumption.

When do you expect the book to be ready?
How many complaints vs. we loved it have you recieved since the News?
Did you have complaints about the nude photos at the salon too?

Guess I'm the only one offended by the burials. Oh well.

The turtley girlie javascript:emoticon (':kaver:')
Crawling caver:kaver:

[Teresa]

We had a slump of entrants in the past 5 years, with an uptick ONLY after we chose to accept digital images.

Cady Soukup

After attending Salons since 1992, and seeing the same names over and over again as winners, I wonder if photography shouldn't follow the suit of cartography and define levels of competition, or after X number of wins, a photographer be declared a Grand Master or something, and be able to participate for show, but not for awards.

I know it has been quite discouraging for several people I know who are professionally published and paid photographers in the real world but never get anything accepted for the NSS Salon, and they have simply given up submitting. One of my grottos has awards, and after you win in a certain category multiple times (say you are a decent writer, and win the best article award two or three times) you generally disqualify yourself from further awards. After all, everybody *knows* you are good by then.

Just a thought.

[Dave Bunnell]

We had a slump of entrants in the past 5 years, with an uptick ONLY after we chose to accept digital images.

Cady Soukup

After attending Salons since 1992, and seeing the same names over and over again as winners, I wonder if photography shouldn't follow the suit of cartography and define levels of competition, or after X number of wins, a photographer be declared a Grand Master or something, and be able to participate for show, but not for awards.

I know it has been quite discouraging for several people I know who are professionally published and paid photographers in the real world but never get anything accepted for the NSS Salon, and they have simply given up submitting. One of my grottos has awards, and after you win in a certain category multiple times (say you are a decent writer, and win the best article award two or three times) you generally disqualify yourself from further awards. After all, everybody *knows* you are good by then.

Just a thought.

Well now that the thread is taking some new directions,I guess I'll chime in again as I may be one of the few "over and over" names that has probably been following the thread (although there are many participants who don't give their real name in their profile, so I can't be certain of that).

I do see some some logic in what you are suggesting but not sure it would address the problems you think it would. No matter how stiff the competition is, I think all good work probably gets at least accepted. Just because someone is a professional photographer doesn't mean they will necessarily do well underground. They might have great composition and concepts but poor lighting, which we all know is the crux of good cave photography. You control everything (except maybe for photo assistants that want to get on with some more mudane pursuit such as survey!) to get the outcome you want. In my experience with various media photographers I've been with underground, they are counting on a big whomping flash to go off near the camera and light the room up. Most aren't even likely to have a second flash, much less 3 or 4 smaller, battery-powed strobes and slaves for the rest of what they shoot.

BTW, if anyone feels they have had good work passed over by the salon judges, you're welcome to submit a couple dozen of your best for consideration in the sporadic Photographer Spotlight series. That also goes for folks that have just not gotten around to entering. Over the years I have seen tons of good work that never goes through our Salons but which photographers are usually happy to submit for the News following a request. I figure that's always what we want shown in the News, is all the best stuff out there.

As to awards, I think the various categories in the Cart Salon still have ribbons, and then one overall medal is given across categories. But it does serve the purpose of putting judges in a different mindset and not having to be compared to other's stuff that likely contains a fairly high proportion of potential ribbon winners. So I could easily see having a system like the cart salon with say 3 separate groups be judged as batches for ribbons (but not for acceptance). This could result in more spirited competition. Of course then you are imparting a new sense of competition among the top players, which keeps them on their toes.
I would probably first decide on accept/not accept for the Salon blind to category, so at least we decide whether something is worth showing to 800 people, and we keep a high standard. But by then awarding the ribbons in categories you could give the new players a better chance perhaps.
I think we actually have been seeing several new people entering and doing well the last few years, I won't name names for fear of leaving someone out. But I think Cady's point is lots of people were doing digital and the salon had to change to include them. So that's a step in the right direction of bringing in more new blood.

And I personally think the medal winner should still come from the overall crop. Often the selection seems to have surprised the audience (it rarely seems to be the image that got the most applause, for instance) and is often not a well-known photographer but a new entrant that may have had little else awarded.

Regardless of what changes we make, the NSS News committee likes getting a nice crop of good photos to run in the Salon Galleries and on covers each year, so wouldn't want to see any changes implemented that result in even fewer ribbons, or less good stuff to show on Salon night.

Enough said for one post, but see what you think of my take on your plan. Now maybe we should move this thread to the photo forum....

[Dave Bunnell]

Dave,


When do you expect the book to be ready?
How many complaints vs. we loved it have you recieved since the News?
Did you have complaints about the nude photos at the salon too?

Let's see, when is the book ready? Well it actually has been laid out, has 140+ pages for 20 models so far, but I figure another year of shooting this year and it might go to a printer near the end of the year. There's still a few folks interested that I just haven't connected with yet...and then there's the fetish section which needs fleshing out (still nothing more than R-rated though)...and I have to decide how to finance and distribute it, etc.

As for the registered complaints:
about Printing in the news: 2 e-mails and whatever you see here; About nudes in the salon: one letter to Cady afterward. And one of those two e-mails didn't like the burials, so one e-mail on that.

Other numbers:
Number of new caves named after Sabrina: one
Number of people who called the NSS office to reinstate membership after reading this thread, because they had missed their February issue: "several" aka the office staff.

Enuff fun for now. I have an April issue to get out, Conservation part 2. Don't miss my april fools article on "extraordinary measures needed to prevent lint deposits in caves."

[cadyasoukup]

A few quick notes here -

The switch to digital images for the salon in 2005 put an enormous load onto everyone who volunteered for the slide salon this year due to unforeseen and endless logistical details. We hope to do better in 2006.

The BEST way to see the images is in a darkened auditorium. We encourage you to attend the NSS convention this year, and the salon program night! We promise to have better digital projection for 2006 and in the years to come. (Film Slides will _still_ project better for a few years to come due to the current limits of digital projection technology combined with the NSS budget & existing equipment. Insert here a small grimace of deep embarrassment for 2005's digital projection quality.)

The salon is open to all photographers. There are 4 categories (if the photographer doesn't assign an entry, I will):
A. Story Series (maximum of 20 slides, include a caption for each slide in the series);
B-Scenes from Nature (this category increasingly has obviously 'photoshopped' images where, for example, color or contrast has been enhanced or changed);
C-Enhanced & Surreal Imagery (non-standard lighting, film processing, gels, computer enhancement, unusual subjects for a cave setting such as models in atypical attire, etc);
D-Humor

The salon awards one medal, and more than one green and blue ribbon to entrants (one photographer may get more than one ribbon and the medal). The number of ribbons varies each year. The judges vary each year (we have a small group of professional photographers, gold-medal-winning cave photographers, and cavers who are 'on call' - generally we have 3 judges to make scoring easy).

CHANGES TO ENTRIES & FEE STRUCTURE FOR 2006: Due to last year's logistical problems, we are limiting the number of entries for the slide salon this year to 50 slides or images per photographer (i.e. enter your BEST please). The fee structure will be $1 for every 5 images, up to the limit of 50 slides or images (a cap of $10 total). There is no longer a break for 'donated' slides, as most digital images can be considered to be duplicated. Entry fees go to the NSS to be used for the salon ribbons & medals & to be used for return postage if the photographer wants their slides returned to them.

Please consider entering your photographs in the slide salon this year. The deadline is April 15th. The more fabulous images of non-prurient subjects, the more difficult will be the competition for the images with prurient subjects.

This announcement brought to you by a volunteer - as in a weed slipping through the cracks of a sidewalk.

Cady Soukup
Co-Chair NSS Slide Salon

[Hatch]

What's wrong with a naked woman?

http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/Movies/ ... index.html

[Squirrel Girl]

What's wrong with a naked woman?

http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/Movies/ ... index.html

I liked the quote:
Husni calls the current VF cover the "Playboy" issue, because "you can call it art as much as you want -- it's still naked women."

[paulmoser]

I like the pic! My wife likes the pic! I do not find it offensive at all. Actually as far as the nudity goes it was extremely conservative. Why is nudity deemed offensive anyway? There is a big difference in displaying the naked body and pornography. Poses and/or situations which sole purpose is to sexually stimulate is pornography, nudity with no intention of sexual stimulation should not be looked at as offensive. This is to say that this is all a matter of perception. Some cultures idea of explicit exposure would be the showing of ones ankles. Our culture (if you can call it that) varies greatly due to a diverse mixture of religions and backgrounds. This is why some of you find nudity repulsive and others do not mind at all. Now as far as the topic of this being in the NSS News that is a matter to be decided by the editors of the News. So if you do not like their content then write a letter to them explaning your distaste. Hopefully we can all anticipate the next issue and it's beautiful pictures as I will.