Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/04/23
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]The old gray goose just ain't what she used to be. I'd say that the magazine has become so mass-market (the last time I checked, which was about ten years ago, they were charging about $175,000 for a four-color full page ad) that the content has definitely suffered. Seems a bit thin. It's fast-produced, mass-produced. Used to be you could not buy the NG on newsstands. It was just not possible. Now they're in Safeway and everywhere else. It's a nice magazine, but it's not the same publication it used to be, not a journal of the National Geographic Society, which meant something quite different from what it means now. There is still good work in it, but it just doesn't have the same feel it once had, at least not when I was a youngin' lusting to be the "other" woman in its ranks. Every month I would grab the new issue as soon as it arrived, and look in the credits to see if the lone female--whose name I can't remember anymore--had been joined by any other. I can't remember if, in my days of rabid NG fandom, if there was ever more than one woman on staff. Now I see they've come out with a book called "Women Photographers of National Geographic." I must have been doing something else while they added enough women to qualify for a coffee-table book featuring female shooters. Kit - -----Original Message----- From: owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us [mailto:owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us]On Behalf Of Rolfe Tessem Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2003 12:26 PM To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us Subject: RE: [Leica] OT - National Geographic film usage - --On Wednesday, April 23, 2003 12:06:39 PM -0400 bdcolen <bdcolen@earthlink.net> wrote: > In the days of the real LIFE magazine it used to be said that one should > expect to get about two 'keepers' per 36 exposure roll - two frames that > meant something special to the photographer. > > I've always heard that the NatGeo photographers consume tons of > film...But don't forget that they are often involved in assignments that > extend for months, and involve travel to difficult and distant places, > places where you can't easily return - or can't return at all - to get > the one shot you missed. I would assume that if you are doing a piece > on, say, endangered gorillas in the mist, you are going to shoot all the > film you can get your hands on. > > B.D. B.D., You are talking about the National Geo of the "old days". I think very few, if any, assignments are that long anymore. In fact, I think plenty of stuff in the magazine is shot in just a three or four days. At least it looks that way, which is why I cancelled my subscription. Is there anybody who doesn't think that the photographic quality of the magazine has gone way, way downhill? Rolfe - -- Rolfe Tessem Lucky Duck Productions, Inc. rolfe@ldp.com - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html