Sandy Welch

Thank you, Mosab @MosabHasanYOSEF, for being my hero these past few months.

Under the Milk Way Most people have heard this song of theirs. They have a lot of good ones, but another I like is, "Reptile." Music credit: The Church (1988) youtu.be/pWxJEIz7sSA?si…

This was The Church, at the Belasco, in 2023. treblezine.com/the-church-ann…

A few thoughts on using AI in photography... After playing around with AI to upscale blurry photos, am I for or against it? When AI first came out, a few years ago, people like @levelsio were encouraging the rest of us to use artificial intelligence to improve our photos. I'm sure he's gloating/smug right now as I say this. Because I was against using AI in my photography, even though I was not against AI in general or others using it. I refused to use AI in my pictures, until now/this month, while testing it out. I love it and think it's great. I can't say I'll be using it on every picture I create. However, it makes me very happy to see old blurry photos I took with an iPhone 12 Pro/12 megapixels, in the dark with their resolution fixed. An example of this is the image on the right below, which was the original iPhone 12 Pro picture I took. The photo on the left, is what it looks like after AI fixed the resolution on it and no other changes. Pieter started his AI Photo company, back in 2023 I think, using this basic idea. It probably uses other things too. The only thing I didn't really like about AI is that a lot of the images people were creating with it, felt a bit fake, which is why I didn't want to use it. However, this kind of AI is now already used in a lot of everyday tools that we don't think about below: CHAT GPT: "On your phone (most common, often invisible) 1. Built-in camera processing (iPhone, Samsung, etc.) When you zoom (especially beyond optical zoom), your phone is using AI super-resolution Night mode and low-light shots often use multi-frame AI merging + upscaling Apple calls parts of this Deep Fusion / Smart HDR (not labeled as “AI upscaling,” but it is) 2. Default photo editor apps iPhone Photos app → “Sharpen” and “Definition” sliders use AI-style enhancement Google Photos → “Enhance,” “Sharpen,” and “Super Res Zoom” Samsung Gallery → “Remaster picture” button (this is AI upscaling + denoise) Most people think they’re just “making it clearer,” but the app is literally inventing detail. Popular apps people use casually 3. Social media apps Instagram automatically resizes + sharpens + compresses → includes AI-based reconstruction TikTok enhances video frames (faces especially) Snapchat filters often include subtle AI sharpening People assume quality loss, but there’s also AI rebuilding happening. 4. Free editing apps (very common) Remini → pure AI upscaling (faces especially) CapCut → “Enhance quality” / “HD” buttons = AI upscale Photoshop Express → clarity + sharpening = AI-assisted Snapseed → “Details” tool uses structure enhancement (AI-like edge reconstruction) Users think: “I just sharpened it” Reality: the app is hallucinating texture and detail Desktop software (even more hidden) 5. Adobe Lightroom / Photoshop “Super Resolution” = explicit AI upscale (but many don’t use it intentionally) Even basic sliders like:Texture Clarity Sharpening → now partially AI-driven in newer versions 6. Topaz Labs (a big one) Topaz Gigapixel AI Topaz Photo AI People who use it know it’s AI—but viewers of the final image usually don’t." So, I think if people like celebrities who rely on images looking good for their PR want to use it for business or their everyday iPhone images they post, then it's great for that. If the rest of us want to use it for everyday posting on social media, then I think it's fine too. If photographers want to use it for their professional photography I'm not against it either. I think it depends on what the client wants. Besides, most professional photographers use some of it in their Photoshop, Lightroom and other programs anyway. I think it's a personal preference. I also feel that as cell phone cameras get better, we have to worry less about blurriness. The reason why a lot of cell phone pictures I have were slightly blurry, was because I wasn't taking a picture of something still. Most of my subjects were moving. If you look at my website strangei.com a majority of my photos have subjects that are moving. So, I'm naturally going to get some kind of blur and AI helps with that. I don't really take a lot of pictures of still things. But if you are taking a photo of something still, then the resolution will probably be better/it will be less blurry and you won't need AI to fix it in the first place. So using AI to upscale or your photos should be a personal preference. For myself, it helps with my moving photography and it's blurriness. It's very difficult to take action shots with a cell phone that are spontaneous and not staged, which is what I've always focused on in my photography. I don't stage things. I like taking pictures of the moment or what is real. I also enjoy being able to preserve older photos, the way that they do with old 35mm film, historical and/or Holocaust photos to preserve history. Sharing this for perspective only. Also, I'm not a technical person and know very little about AI photo technology....I feel everyone should use AI/not use AI based on what they want to create with their own photography or art.

Real moments versus forced moments that don't last... This seems to happen a lot. Whenever I create a experience, sometimes people are opportunists. For example today, when wild animals get close to humans it's unusual. Animals usually don't go around chaotic energy and if they come near you, it means you're calm and not threatening to them. I wanted to check on the wild baby geese, to make sure they were all alive. Thankfully they were. The adult geese were letting me take some pictures of them, before a few people came over and broke the bond/dynamic the geese and I had by throwing their sandwich bread at them. The adult geese started hissing at them/second image, and within 3-4 minutes got back into the water and left. See last image. So that moment didn't last very long. This happens with people too that I encounter where I'm just enjoying the moment as something quiet and relational. But then others try to insert themselves between us, like they did with the geese and I, and see the experience as an opportunity instead. Sometimes people with either wild animals or humans have zero awareness of the concept of trust that is between me and the animal or other human being. They don't get how fragile those moments are. I spent 10 minutes building calm and trust between me and the geese. Just a mutual quiet moment. Then these other impatient people came along, expecting reactions from the geese as they fed them bread and within 3 minutes, despite being given food, the got back into the water and left. After the novelty of the moment was gone, it seemed like the wild geese were saying "This is chaotic, it's not worth it for the bread, we're done here..." So, what I had and what they had were two completely different interactions. I got close to the geese without trying and they were trying to force getting close to them with food. Even then, it didn't last for them. So it's kind of a metaphor for people. If you interrupt a bond between wild animals or humans that is real, then try to act like you owned the moment, you'll eventually fail to sustain that moment too. Because, it's not built on anything real or realistic. The geese, like some people, didn't stay for others...they stayed for me. When that energy shifted, both the wild animals and sometimes people leave.

Los Angeles, CA. 2026.

Los Angeles, CA. 2026.

I’ve mentioned Mitsuwa Marketplace before. Their food is more affordable, than $18.00-$24.00 restaurant take-out prices. I also like the Japanese put extra effort into making meals, no matter what their price is. Sushi is about the same as Whole Foods or a little less.