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Buddy, Can Ya Spare A Sensor Swab?
July 14th, 2008
I was stunned to see Olivier Follmi’s new website today. I’m teaching students in Hawaii and when I brought up Follmi’s new site my jaw dropped. I don’t know if Follmi, whose work I generally like a great deal, has his ear to the ground on a new trend, but if the “crappy, I’ve never cleaned my sensor” look is the next big thing then I’m trading in my spot removal tool for a brand new bag of dust. Amazing. Amateurs, consider this a cautionary tale. The rest of you, look at the image on the splash page, recoil in horror, then go clean your sensor. Link to Follmi’s site HERE. (You’re looking for the larger image of the one shown above, and you’re looking at the dust spots.)
Link to Visible Dust products HERE. Unless you’ve got dust like Follmi, in which case go to Home Depot and get a Dust Buster.
I keep hoping this is some horrible error or prank, but this is not what marketing folks call “your best foot forward.” Don’t let it happen to you.
Enjoying Hawaii, loving my students. Wish you were here.
*This post sent alot of traffic to Follmi’s site and I’m a little embarassed. I agree with all the comments, his site is tough (ok, impossible) to navigate, and the sensor dust is truly unbelievable. It’s hard to post something like this without feeling a little guilty. So in the interest of re-stating things more clearly, the reason I was initially going to his site was to show my students examples of some excellent images that have resonated with me. The presentation on this new site is what threw me, and all I’m saying is “don’t do it like this.” You may now return to gawking at the hideous dust spots, but don’t forget to appreciate Follmi’s images for what they are.
Wish I was there, too.
I like your photos better.
After the initial impact of the dust spots, that’s a seriously pretentious website.
Holy smokes, and from someone who should know better. I wonder how many people will contact him and ask “just what were you thinking?”
sensor dust aside, that’s some pretty frustrating site navigation.
Wow, that’s awful…
I’m with Stephen on this .. for what looks at first glance like a really interesting site, that is quite possibly the worst designed site I have ever come across o_0
took me 30 seconds to see 1 photograph… Cmd + W
Another comment of that has to be the worst website I have ever tried to navigate. If he thinks clients want to listen to classical music and watch the butterfly flit around while trying to find an actual picture to look at he is sadly out of touch.
Horrid website structure and amazingly poor quality of photo rendering (spots in the pic, artifacts in the Flash portions). It is worth looking at his other sites (done in collaboration with his wife) to see the type of pictures Olivier is capable of – http://www.follmispirit.com/
I am stunned. I have to agree with everyone on this. If your images can stand alone as his have been able to do, why do all the fluff? It makes no sense. His current site makes it almost impossible to get to the meat. I never did get to the images. What a website nightmare. I may have to take his link off my site unless this changes, soon.
Maybe someone should direct him here? He could follow the butterfly.
Here on my work PC (using Firefox) I can’t even enter the site. If I hover over or click “enter” the word changes color–that’s it!
I think the spots are intentional, perhaps to add to the image’s surrealistic qualities…like the spots that might swim before your eyes when you are lightheaded or dazed. Is there not a long history of valuing quirks and imperfections of particular photographic processes for their stylistic contributions to an image?
What causes the “bulls eye” rings with a dot in the middle? I’ve never seen that effect from sensor dust before.
Well, while I agree about the dust spots, the rest of the comments here struck me as missing the point… I thought the images were quite moving, which, of course, is the whole point with photography. I suspect Follmi must have been trying to extend the emotional impact with his stylized presentation (the music, the butterfly, etc). I give him high marks for creativity and emotional punch. Yeah, the navigation is a little funky, but there is a logic to it. Bottom line… A great presentation. But hey, fix the dust spots.
Ron, you’re right about his images, and I think most of the commenters – the ones that got through the clunky website navigation – think highly of Follmi’s talent. But I was trying to show students this site and it took forever to figure out the navigation, so clearly there’s an issue. In fact there’re two different issues here, separate from the obvious quality of his images – one is the dust spots – which are just so glaring I’m still in shock. The other is the website. Follmi is a great photographer and from what he’s written I deduce he’s a really decent human being. But this blog aims to educate and inspire on presentation and marketing issues related to photography, as well as the actual images. And like a bad framing job detracts from a good image, so does a bad website – or worse, one that is so difficult to navigate that people give up and never give the images a chance to speak for themselves.
Mr. Follmi, if you’re out there reading, know that we love your work. We’re just not sure about the website or the dust spots.
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