Recently I scanned 2700 35mm slides from an archive of more than 5000. In the process, I became reacquainted with the lovely tactile qualities of that medium: the feel of the mounts in my hand, the rapid way I could go from a wide view of many images to a close inspection of one, the… [Read More]
Grace Under Pressure
Merle Travis wrote two songs in his career that overshadowed all his others. He wrote them in the same evening, under intense pressure. With an album contract in hand, a recording session the next day, and an order from his producer to write some “…songs that [sound] folky” Travis recalled his mining-country upbringing, and turned… [Read More]
Film Prices
Fifty years ago, I was buying a lot of film. In 1957 I was working for both my high school newspaper and yearbook, and going through 8 or 9 rolls of 35mm Tri-X a week. Even though it was the school’s money, I remember exactly what it cost. Twenty exposures were 85 cents, and a… [Read More]
How Many Exposures, Again
When I was eight, our family went on a two week driving vacation from Indiana to the Black Hills, Yellowstone, and the Colorado Rockies. I’d been taking black and white photographs with my Brownie Hawkeye and making contact prints in a darkened bathroom. For the trip, I wanted to try color film, which cost a… [Read More]
How many exposures?
When I was exposing film, I noticed that, regardless of the format, I’d expose about the same number of square inches of film for a given type of subject. Said another way, after a day’s work, I’d have the same number of contact sheets to deal with, no matter which camera I used. I once… [Read More]