Red River Paper Blog

                By Arthur H. Bleich– Kiyoshi Togashi knew by the time he was ten that as the second son of the largest landholder in the Yamagata Prefecture of Japan, he was not going to inherit the family farm. By tradition, it would go to his older brother. Far from being disappointed,...read more

by Ron Wolfe and Will Keener– Maine earns its title as the “Lighthouse State,” with more than 60 historic lighthouses, many of which are still active, spread out along 5,000 miles of coastline, inlets and islands. As lighthouses became less essential to navigation in the late 20th Century, these historic structures faced demolition. The National...read more

By Christine Pentecost– Digitally restoring old and damaged photos and bringing them back to life has been a very rewarding and challenging hobby for me over the past 15 years. I have restored photos from the late 1800s that were mounted on cardboard, to Polaroids from the 70s, and to photos ravaged by Hurricane Katrina’s...read more

by Vivienne Gucwa– I wish I could say that there was one photo that started it all. It would be the one photo that somehow ignited my passion for snow photography in New York City. The one that people could look at to understand why I might walk up to eight miles through snowstorms at...read more

by Arthur H. Bleich– Kaitlin Walsh is a biomedical artist– a rarity in the art world. Her beautifully crafted, abstract anatomy watercolor paintings celebrate the wonders of the human body in ways so imaginative it’s sometimes hard not to fall in love with her deadly cancer cells or even mundane parts of the human body,...read more

By Suzanne D. Williams– We’ve all done it, taken that endless stream of holiday photographs with the same people doing something, only we can’t exactly tell what. Then there’s the familiar, “Oh look at the tree!” only it’s slightly blurry and the top is missing. Sound familiar? Who doesn’t have similar Christmas and other holiday pictures...read more

By Arthur H. Bleich– The Christmas card-giving tradition began in London in 1843, when Sir Henry Cole commissioned an artist friend, John Horsley, to design a card that could be mailed to his friends. Some say Sir Henry thought up the idea to avoid writing long letters in reply to those sent by friends and...read more

This is the third of an ongoing series about Red River Pro Andrew Slaton and his wife Ellen who, along with two dogs, Islay and Skye and Colonel Bubba, the cat, left the comforts of Dallas to hit the road full time in a travel trailer, with the goal of photographing all 59 U. S....read more

This is the second part of an ongoing series about Red River Pro Andrew Slaton and his wife Ellen who, along with their two dogs and a cat, have hit the road full time in a travel trailer to seek adventure and photograph all the National Parks. There have also been some side trips, some...read more

By Jim Nickelson– I’m often asked from friends, family, and even other photographers about why I bother printing my work when the whole world seems to be moving digital. For me, the reason is simple: creating a fine art print is my primary purpose in making photographs. As is likely becoming obvious, I am a...read more

By Suzanne D. Williams– My daughter’s graduation from high school some years ago prompted me to comb through files filled with old photographs. She’ll always be my baby and I had several of those “mom moments,” wishing to re-enter my now rosy past. But I was also forced to revisit some really bad photographs. Why...read more

By Arthur H. Bleich– When Frank Hamrick was ten he traded his sister an old hat for a plastic 35mm camera she’d gotten from a kid on the school bus who’d gotten it from his father who’d gotten it from an auto dealer as a premium for test driving a car. And so began an...read more

By Kenn Jacobs– My first published photo in a book was a pub sign–The Old Red Lion–shot in a now-forgotten English village. It wasn’t until many years later, though, that I had an epiphany when I came face to face with the sculpture of the Lion of Lucerne in Switzerland. Carved in 1820 as a...read more

By Arthur H. Bleich– In the 1966 movie Fantastic Voyage, a team of scientists and their submarine are reduced to microscopic size and inserted into the bloodstream of a colleague to remove a blood clot in his brain; a procedure too risky to do surgically. Science fiction? Of course­– but a thriller all the same....read more

By Michael Freeman– There is now a significant and growing reverse flow in photography, towards the new black and white. It’s new because it’s created from colour with processing software that makes the experience a delight, which means that you don’t even need to decide at the start that it’s a black-and-white image you’re after....read more

By Suzanne D. Williams– Lately, I find myself pulled into two halves. The logical side of me writes photography articles, historical facts, and how-tos. This is my dominant side. However, there is also my creative side. This side surrounds itself with fictional characters, romantic verses, and colorful images. This side learned how to say “I...read more

By Christine Pentecost– I have a beautiful, scenic image in my collection that begged to be displayed larger than could be output by my desktop printer– which only can use letter-sized paper. Surely, I thought, there must be some way to solve this problem and, as it turns out, there is. Image Splitter is a...read more

       By Peter E. Randall– For most photographers, the chance to have a one-person exhibit is an exciting opportunity. Then reality sets in and it’s apparent that having an exhibit is more stressful and difficult than making the photographs in the first place. The most ideal opportunity is to be invited to show...read more