Résumé and Portfolio
This is my Photographer résumé. Photographer is just one of several jobs that I am well qualified for. You may also wish to take a look at my other résumés.
Top of Las Trampas Peak.
© 1993 Ben Hubbell. |
Rocky Ridge at Dusk
© 1995 Ben Hubbell. |
This page includes eight photographs from my portfolio. These are the same photographs that accompany my Color Corrector résumé, but the comments that appear next to the photographs are different. The above two photographs were taken during the spring in the Las Trampas Wilderness, which is located in the hills west of Danville, California. Click on the Photography link above to see more photographs of the East Bay Hills and the
Berkeley, CA 94710
510-540-7214
Job Objective
Photographer
Highlights of Qualifications
- Highly productive, both as a team member and while working alone. Followed and gave instructions. Formulated solutions
to problems. - Photographer since 1992. Used spot meter to get good exposures with difficult lighting. Specialized in working with available light. Carried full size tripod on
backpacking trips. - Composed photographs according to many different rules. In addition to working with the rule of thirds, I have composed according to rhythms of fifths, sevenths,
and ninths.
Relevant Skills and Experience
- Took photographs outdoors in inclement weather and under dim light, with good results. Consistently got good exposure values with back
lit subjects. - Owner of Nikon Super Coolscan 5000 ED film scanner. Extraordinary talent for color correction with scanner software and Photoshop. Made digital prints that resembled classical paintings in terms of idealized
tonal values. - Applied Photoshop’s Curves tool to individual channels. Made appropriate use of Unsharp Mask and Smart Sharpen filters where a heavy hand would have harmed
image quality.
Education
| 2001–Date | Multimedia Major | Vista Community College— |
| Pursuing a double AA in Web Design and Digital Imaging. Planning to transfer to CSU Hayward | ||
| 1980 | Nurse’s Aide School | Olsten Healthcare— |
| Trained in a special program that focused on Medical-Surgical and Orthopedics rather than the customary Nursing | ||
Work History
| 1994–1999 | Home Attendant | In-Home Support Services— |
| Used skills developed in hospitals to meet the needs of a quadriplegic gentleman. Catered to the preferences of an individual client. Worked with the same client for | ||
| 1992–1994 | Inventory Control Clerk | Saint Luke’s Hospital— |
| Managed flow of materials from storeroom to nurses’ stations. Anticipated patterns of materials use. Completed requisition paperwork in a timely manner. Tracked inventory on a computer. Took orders | ||
| 1990–1994 | Hospital Orderly | Saint Luke’s Hospital— |
| Made rounds of the hospital and carried a pager. Interacted with patients. Performed medical procedures. Participated in procedures involving more than | ||
| 1986–1991 | Nurse’s Aide | Sunrise Nurses— |
| Provided nursing services at almost a dozen Bay Area hospitals. Quickly adapted to different paperwork and organizational systems. Worked primarily in Medical-Surgical and | ||
Personal Interests
- Cooked and baked gourmet food since 8 years old. Especially talented at preparing dishes from India
and Thailand . - Planned nutritionally balanced meals for group backpacking trips. Took into account food allergies of group members. Dehydrated own food. Used Excel spreadsheets to
track nutrients. - Sought to reproduce the emotional sense of being there with my landscape photography. Motivated friends to visit the wilderness in a way I never could with
words alone.
Backside of Half Dome at Sunset.
© 1993 Ben Hubbell. |
Sunshine Arrives at Bishop Lake.
© 2003 Ben Hubbell. |
The photograph on the left was taken upstream from Yosemite Valley, at an altitude 3200 feet higher than the valley floor. This photograph was composed according to a rule of ninths. The two trees in the foreground are each two ninths of the way across the frame from the nearest edge.
The photograph on the right was taken in the John Muir Wilderness in the eastern Sierras. In the original slide the sunlit background is overexposed and the shadowed foreground is underexposed. I used NikonScan 4.0’s DEE tool to restore detail to the highlights
UC Berkeley in the Mist.
© 1992 |
The photograph to the left was taken in 1992 near Grizzly Peak Boulevard, above Strawberry Canyon in the Berkeley Hills. The color of the sky is due to the June 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines. This eruption spewed a large amount of ash into the atmosphere, which brought this color to the late afternoon skies for years This photograph was sharpened with Photoshop’s Unsharp Mask filter rather than the usually preferable Smart Sharpen filter. In this case the latter filter made the mist too transparent. The less powerful Unsharp Mask filter was definitely the tool for the |
Oak Circle, March.
© 1992 |
Oak Circle in the Las Trampas Wilderness is one of my favorite picnic spots. It is just off the crest of Las Trampas Ridge. Part of the trail from Bollinger Canyon to Oak Circle follows a section of the ridge that drops off steeply on either side of the solid trail, presenting marvelous views and creating a feeling The brilliant green grass is composed of invasive species introduced from Europe hundreds of years ago. The native bunch grasses are far more palatable to cattle than the European grasses, which has led to them becoming very rare. Unlike the native grasses, the European grasses die after going to seed. This makes them more adaptable to the dry California summers than the perennial |
Valley Oak near Rose Peak.
© 1992 Ben Hubbell. |
Forest Floor Ringtail Creek.
© 1993 Ben Hubbell. |
The photograph on the left was taken during August in the Ohlone Wilderness, in the mountains south of Livermore, California. If you were to look at a print of this photograph you would see a beautiful texture in the bark of the tree. This photograph was taken with a 28 mm lens. I no longer carry this lens because I usually prefer a 24 mm. However, I couldn’t have gotten the same composition with a wider
The photograph on the right was taken in the Las Trampas Wilderness. Even though this photograph was shot on professional film the color balance of the original slide had excess red. I used Photoshop’s Curves tool to make separate adjustments to the red, green, and blue channels. This made the photograph look more three dimensional and revealed textures not discernable before
Message from Ben Hubbell
Hello,
My artistic expression involves many different talents. Composing pictures, measuring for exposure, color correction, printmaking, the written word, web design, and even computer programming.
I compose my photographs mainly in the camera viewfinder and rarely crop more than the edges of slide frames in Photoshop. I always try to create a sense of pleasing rhythm within my compositions.
I shoot on film and scan my images with a 21 megapixel Nikon film scanner. After just enough cropping to remove the edges of the slide frame all my images are at least 18 megapixels. This is much higher resolution than one could hope to find in even a professional digital camera.
NikonScan software has a tool for extracting detail from shadows and highlights. I set the controls of this tool very carefully. I also use histogram readings to assure that my color correction settings result in scanned images that span the full tonal range from darkest black to brightest white.
After setting the black point and white point of my images I adjust tonal transitions with Photoshop’s Curves tool. I fine tune the curves separately for the red, green, and blue channels in all cases, even when no color balance problems present themselves. I currently shoot on Fuji Astia, because it has better shadow detail than Velvia. Images shot on this film tend to benefit from a 1–2 point cut to the green channel in the highlights and a similar degree of boost to the same channel in the shadows.
When I color correct a photograph I strive for the most three dimensional looking tonal transitions possible. Lifelike tonal transitions are more important to me than preconceptions about what the color balance should look like. When the red, green, and blue curves are separately adjusted to maximize the illusion of three dimensions, the correct color balance just falls into place.
I carefully apply sharpening to all of my images. Too heavy of a hand with either the Unsharp Mask or Smart Sharpen filters will make tonal transitions less subtle and less lifelike. However, just the right amount of sharpening brings out the textures of surfaces as well as making edges more distinct.
As previously mentioned, I am also well studied in computer programming for the Web. I wrote the HTML for this entire web site in a text editor. I wrote PHP code that identifies the browser you are viewing this page with as unrecognized browser. If you would like to know if a more recent version of unrecognized browser is available, go to my home page. If your browser is out of date, my home page will display a link to the unrecognized browser web site for a free download of the latest version.
Due to the fact that I have many job skills, there are several versions of my Résumé, each tailored to a different job objective. If you follow the text links to my other Résumés and proceed to follow the button links on the destination page, the Résumé button links throughout this web site will direct you to the most recently viewed Résumé.
Cheers,
Ben Hubbell
This has been my Photographer résumé. Photographer is just one of several jobs that I am well qualified for. You may also wish to take a look at my other résumés.