Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/08/14

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Subject: [Leica] PAW from the Analog Trashheap
From: jshul at comcast.net (Jim Shulman)
Date: Mon Aug 14 11:40:25 2006

Doug,

Thanks for the clarification--you're right about prints.  However, unlike
the analog days only a tiny fraction of digital pictures are ever printed,
usually only those which are "acceptable".

For example, in this weekend's shoebox there were dozens of "acceptable"
pictures, mostly shots of family members in Easter outfits, or couples
posing stiffly in front of houses.  The shot I posted probably never would
have made it off the camera chip in today's photography; it would have been
due for a laugh and immediate deletion.  

The images we'll really treasure in twenty or fifty years are often not
those which are hits at the time of the snapshot.

Best,
Jim Shulman
Bryn Mawr, PA



-----Original Message-----
From: lug-bounces+jshul=comcast.net@leica-users.org
[mailto:lug-bounces+jshul=comcast.net@leica-users.org] On Behalf Of Douglas
Herr
Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 1:07 PM
To: Leica Users Group
Subject: Re: [Leica] PAW from the Analog Trashheap

Phil Swango wrote:

>Jim Shulman wrote:
>>My biggest complaint about digital imaging is that we will likely lose the
>>"shoebox" to the ages--no tangible receptacle, like an old shoebox, for
>>prints or negatives.  What's the likelihood that ephemeral digital images
>>will survive?  Not bloody likely, unless you're a computer expert like
>Brian
>>and copy all your work regularly.
>
>You are so right.  Last week someone in my family drug out a box of oldies
>and we passed them around over dinner.  What a great experience for my
>daughter and the rest of us.  How many stories came to mind.  How many
>memories awakened.  Copying all your files to storage won't even begin to
>fill the role of a few drugstore snaps passed around the table.  Pictures
>you can hold in your hand and whose physical condition bears witness to the
>passing of time.

A dissenting viewpoint - we don't pass negatives around, and many people are
as careless with film negative storage as with digital.  As long as prints
are made from digital negatives with reasonably good technology, i.e., RA-4
paper/chem, or archival inks, they'll hold up in a shoebox just as well as
prints from film negatives.


Doug Herr
Birdman of Sacramento
http://www.wildlightphoto.com


In reply to: Message from telyt at earthlink.net (Douglas Herr) ([Leica] PAW from the Analog Trashheap)