David Mendelsohn: Signatures
His photographs are instantly recognizable—bold, graphic and colorful, they are marked by imaginative and unexpected treatment of the subject matter.
For commercial assignments for clients like Motorola, Xerox, IBM, Nikon, Time and Fortune, and for his personal work, stock and promotion, David Mendelsohn's images bear those unmistakable signatures no matter what the subject happens to be—a wall, a window, a face... a radiator?
"First I made a sketch," David says of that particular image, the second one you see here. "Then I had to find a radiator. Then I built a set for it." But why a radiator? Because the design—"the sculpture" of it—intrigued him. “I see something, or I think about something and wonder, what can I do with it?"
None of what he does is spur of the moment. The idea may be spontaneous, but all the rest—from working out the concept to sorting through alternatives to setting up the shot—is deliberate, measured and considered.
"The most important thing is to slow down and look," David says. "And the second most important thing might be a can of spray paint." He's not kidding. All of David's tools—from his cameras to his computer, are used to do one thing: make the image as perfect as his conception of it. "Nothing exists that can't be improved," David says, and there are ways to improve everything. If he can't spray it or move it or build a set for it, the improvement will come from his lighting, his composition or simply from his choice of lens.
"First I see the larger picture," David says, "and then I start eliminating all the extraneous stuff, so there are no elements that detract from the central element." His eye, he says, sees in "macro detail."
"I started out as a graphic designer," David has said, "and I've never stopped being a graphic designer. I simply design behind the viewfinder now."
And his designs have to be clean, clear and direct right from the start. David is not a "we'll fix it in Photoshop" photographer. "If there's a branch in the way, I'll choose a different angle." His Photoshop work is limited to selective enhancement of colors or the elimination of small details; it's not for heavy lifting.
For David, every aspect of the process is, in a sense, image manipulation, from the film he chooses to the lens he selects to the place he stands and the time of day he shoots.
In the commercial world, the best client is, of course, the one who hires David for his vision and then lets him interpret a concept. "If it's a smokestack they want, that smokestack is going to get done my way. That's what they hired me for—for the way I see." And the way he sees is consistent. "I avoid following trends," he has said. "With both personal and commercial work, the parameters are the same: To produce an image that you are pleased with, that taught you something, that you haven't quite done before."
David has ideas for many such images, probably more of them than he has time to photograph. "I write them all down—I have notebooks full of ideas. Some may work for clients someday; some I simply want to shoot for myself."
Time, in fact, is an element in David's style, but it's an element that's never seen. "I have to spend the time to really look at something. I can't just point and shoot.
"Someone once said that the most valuable portion of photography was to sit on the camera case and stare for a while. Often that luxury isn't afforded to me when I'm on location—then I have to be able to sum it up pretty quickly, and I'm lucky to be able to do that. But when I have the luxury of time, or the pressure of a commercial job isn't there, I can sit and think about the possibilities."
Often it's the subject that suggests—or reveals—those possibilities to him. "Every item has its own essence," David says, "and that essence makes it fun to play with.
"Take a stapler. I'm dying to shoot a stapler."
In the Bag
David is carrying a D1X and an F5 these days. His favorite lenses tend to be the wide-angles—"I like pushing the perspective, so I love the wides." They include the 24mm f/2.8D AF, 28mm f/1.4D AF and 35mm f/2D AF Nikkors. His telephoto lenses range up to the 500mm f/4D IF-ED AF-S II, and he carries the TC-20E II 2x teleconverter as well.
In his camera bag you'll also find the usual pro shooter's assortment of helpful gear—gaffer's tape, Swiss Army knife, compass and one thing we haven't heard about before: a 25-foot telephone cord, "to swap for the motel's six-footer, so I can get to the desk and take notes comfortably while I'm on the phone."
