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Back to Featured Interviews >> MEET BARRY ROTHSTEIN (7/2011)
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| Barry Rothstein |
I took a high school darkroom photography class, and over the years took plenty of color shapshots, too. I built and enjoyed working in a small darkroom in my garage. My life took a dramatic turn in the winter of 2002-03 when I saw a stereoscope at an antique store. I didn't know what it was, but once I understood how it worked, I was amazed at the clarity of old 3-D images and the cultures they portrayed. I was also startled at my near total ignorance of stereo (3-D) photography. My wife bought it for me as a gift, a purchase she's no doubt wondered about ever since. For a little over a year I produced hundreds of 3-D cards for my stereoscope, coercing my friends and family members to look at them.
You specialize in photographic "phantograms". How did you get started with them?
In 2004 after an internet search I learned of and attended the National Stereoscopic Association's annual 3-D convention in Portland, Oregon. There I saw my first photographic phantograms by stereographers Steve Hughes and Terry Wilson. Better yet, Steve Hughes was teaching a workshop there on how to make them. Within a few month I'd produced a considerable number of "tabletop phantograms" of all sorts of household items and art pieces, and began to experiment and create techniques to produce phantograms of natural outdoor scenes.
What is a phantogram, and how is it different from other 3-D photography?
Phantograms are a style of 3-D imagery. A phantogram is a nice mix of art and science. The goal in presenting one is to make it seem that the people, plants, objects, etc. in the images are real, so that the viewer will want to reach out and touch them. In producing one I'm imitating normal vision, trying to provide the viewer's eyes with the same information they would get in real life. A "traditional" 3-D image shows depth. Objects in a phantogram seems as if they're truly there.
Aside from just entertainment, what value do you see in 3-D and phantograms?
We've grown accustomed to "normal" photography as a two-dimensional medium. 3-D adds a richness of information that can't be obtained with 2-D pictures. It's for this reason that we're currently experiencing a 3-D rennaisance, with applications popping up not just in children's books, movies and video games, but toward medical diagnostics, surgery, weather modeling, architecture, product design, and for many other uses. We organically see the world in 3-D, but in relying on 2-D pictures we're voluntarily giving up on a lot of extremely useful information.
What books have you produced to date?
My first book in print was PHANTOGRAMS FROM NATURE, WESTERN USA, self published (3dDigitalPhoto.com) in 2005. It was a coffee-table book of nature photography. Next was POP-UP 3D in 2007, a book for children ages 3-99. It contained a number of my best and earliest phantograms and explains 3-D. I produced a CROSSVIEW 3-D in 2009, showcasing cross-eyed freeviewing, a technique for seeing 3-D with no glasses. Also in 2009 was EYE-POPPING 3-D PETS, with Chronicle Books, written and researched by my wife Betsy. We did a second book with Chronicle, EYE=POPPING 3-D BUGS. It will be out in Fall 2011.
How would you like to see your books used toward education?
POP-UP 3D was designed as a supplementary science text, explaining the basic XYZ's of 3-D. My thoughts run to an elementary (grade 5-6) or middle school having enough copies of it for each or every other student in a science class. It could be used for a one week unit on optics and 3-D, including getting students to shoot and produce some 3-D images themselves. The books would be rotated from class to class. The fun factor of it makes it a strong motivational learning tool. My books with Chronicle are fun and informative on pets and bugs. I envision many such books on subjects of animals, plants, sculpture, etc.What do you think of the trend away from paper books to e-Books?
The book industry will need to adapt, but I'm excited by what I see. e-Book distribution is faster and less expensive. The best device I've seen so far is the iPad, and many other tablet computers are coming out. Because they display work in red-green-blue (RGB), in the same way the images were created, my images look very good on them. Also seeing them this way eliminates some of the problems that occur when going to four-color printing (CMYK) printing presses. POP-UP 3D is already available for the iPad, as will be an extended version of PHANTOGRAMS FROM NATURE and other e-Books and themes of my imagery.
What do you see toward your future in 3-D?
I truly love producing 3-D imagery in general and specifically phantograms. My greatest hope is to produce many wonderful 3-D images over as broad a range of subjects as possible. I hope to leave behind a significant body of work for people to use and enjoy.