Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/07/26

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Subject: [Leica] digital quality
From: Donal Philby <donalphilby@earthlink.net>
Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 08:57:09 +0000
References: <200007261523.IAA10498@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>

Lugnuts,
After reading Erwin's typically erudite posts (I've lost the first one,
Erwin, and would love a copy), I called my friend and world class
printer Gene Nocon who has the "In House Lab" here in San Diego in, of
all places,  a cute little white house.

Not only has he printed for years in London for all the greats in Europe
(Don McCullum, Norman Parkinson, Sieff, etc.) and written a book on
printing, but has become heavily involved in B/W digital since returning
here to his boyhood home.  

He essentially stated that Erwin is dead right.  

Gene, however, loves some of the digital process and result--as long as
you don't try to make it look like traditional print photography.   It
is the sharpness, mostly, he says.  There is no grain to create that
sense of sharpness, just the bleeding dots.  But he says it is wonderful
for creating things that have more of the art, rather than documentary,
feel.

His traditional printing is incredible, and what he is doing with
digital (he also shoots, mostly women and nudes) is also wonderful,
tapping into digital's lack of sharpness to do dreamy, arty stuff.  

Would he print Salgado digitally?  No way.

And if you want to contact him, ya gotta use analog mail or telephone. 
He eliminated his internet connection because it was taking too much
time.  

donal
- -- 
__________
Donal Philby
San Diego
www.donalphilby.com