Snippage involved:
"Marvin The Paranoid Android" <marvin@galaxy.com> wrote in message
news:1119656638.a02d69b43bae8d398136a02f8c870c89@teranews...
John F Lemke wrote:
I think what it may come to is just doing black and white for some
special
situation then having the lab do an old fashioned wet system print.
Still
takes most of the creativity out of my hands but this is a pretty
special
lab from what I've heard.
I hear ya ... that's why I went with my own darkroom ( dorkroom? ).
NEVER a dorkroom. Hallowed ground where man enters a mystical wrestling
match with the gods of light. :-)
Sorry, I've had too much rest this week.
I'll more than likely never set foot in a working darkroom but would hate to
see that art become lost art.
Black and white is fairly forgiving with the processing. The fun starts
when you do your own films. If you need high shutter speed, you can
underexpose the full roll then extend development time ... and it also
works the other way too, over-expose then under-develop.
I've done just a little bit of reading about it. It really sounds
intriguing.
Black and white has a real charm to it ... you're working with only
light and shape. I loved it, but marriage, kids and such robbed me of
time and space.
Ah but the love you have for it shows itself quickly, Master. :-)
I admire you guys for that experience and hope that the old wet darkroom
techniques are never lost.
My neice has all of my hardware ... she used for a year or so. I've
toyed with the idea of getting it back and setting it up again.
I'll bet we won't have to talk long before you talk yourself right into it.
At the risk of turning completely into Ann Landers tonight: I've got an
acquaintance that shoots large format. He's a bit older than I am. He's
kind of from the old school it seems where you know and stick with quality
equipment but try really hard to spend as little as possible. He told me he
wants very badly to get a macro lens for his 4 X 5 but it would cost as much
as his entire kit. Next time the subject comes up I'm going to ask him if
he knows exactly how much longer he's going to live. :-) Ah, more
profundity.
... find this book....
'The Complete Guide To Photography' by Michael Langford.
It's on the list. Next time I go to Barnes and Noble I'll get a copy.
My sister lent this book to me ... it covers absolutely *everything*.
The book isn't much more then 200 pages. It will grab your interest
immediately. With this book, I learnt everything I needed to know about
photography and darkroom work. I never had to reference another book.
Them's the best kind to have. Thanks.
Al, the retired client, has been an amateur photographer for more than
50
years. He's switched over to a digital darkroom. Other shooters I've
talked to haven't been in their wet darkroom for months on end now.
Seems
like going the digital route is the best way to go in general, altho
black
and white is meant to be done the old fashioned way.
Absolutely. Digital's amazing and convenient, but it hasn't come
anywhere near reproducing black and white darkroom prints.
And being able to do something like your own b+w work is pretty special.
Waiting for the digital camera technology to mature a bit more before I
buy
one. I seem to be spending too much time now scanning negs. So there
ya
go.
Scanning sucks ... :-)
Haha!!! Yeah, no kidding. I'm having issues with my scanner right now.
I shot a wedding last summer digitally ... a first. You still freak out
worrying 'something' is going to go wrong and you'll have to convince
everyone to go back into the church and repeat the whole ceremony over
... but ... nothing went wrong. I had an Olympus 2.0 Megapixal camera
with 10X stabilized optical zoom. A little Photoshopping and the bride
and groom where thrilled. The whole series of shots in the church were
close and tight and very intimate. One of my better 'wedding episodes'.
I've heard you can get some great results with "smaller" digital cameras.
The technology changes so quickly it's amazing.
Lotta stress with weddings. For everyone. I'm going to one tomorrow. I
guess the bride's face has broken out and all from the stress.
I'll be staying out of the pro photographer's way taking some background
shots I guess you'd call it. This is the second (church) wedding for this
couple. I took pictures of their civil wedding 18 months ago. It was tense
for me and I'm glad they weren't expecting professional results.
You can sink an awful lot of money into it all, for sure. So far I've
been
pretty successful at holding the budget in check.
You know what tho? It's hard to put a price tag on something like that
... my Mom passed away from breast cancer when I was but a whee lad of
three. All I ever had to remember her by was a few black and white
photos. I knew the houses, the steps everything about every shot ...
photography freezes an instant of time, it captures something *exactly*
as it was, without interpretation. I absolutely love it.
It reflects how a moment in time can affect a heart.
So a tragedy for a child and the memories from photographs produced an
artist, Marv.
And you get pleasure from making newlyweds smile when they get their proofs
back.
One big thrill I got came when I gave my boy an enlargement, a snap
portrait, of him and his dog (my grandson again) on their couch. Big open
smile when he pulled it out of the envelope. He loves his boy. :-)
Photography is art for Everyman. That's why it's "art" for me. :-)
It's
like playing duffer golf (that's me too). If you get one or two good
shots
per round you can get hooked and love it.
We should play golf sometime ... I don't play often, mostly because
everyone I know can golf half decently. Not that I'm saying anything
'bad' about your game .... 9_9
That's all I need to do is get beat by a Canadian. Thanks. We're supposed
to have longer summers here and be better golfers. I'd better get out on
the course again quick.
I'm really not all that competitive when it comes to golf. The pleasure for
me can be in the quality of just one shot. I hit a 3 wood straight as an
arrow about 200 yards on #10 today and put it on the green about 8 feet from
the pin. Salvaged the whole freakin' day. :-)
.
