Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/10/26

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Subject: [Leica] Developer for Neopan 1600/TMax 3200
From: marcsmall at comcast.net (Marc James Small)
Date: Fri Oct 26 06:24:58 2007
References: <5A2FDA19-A911-4125-951F-7279DB23176E@charter.net> <C346FECE.71E02%mark@rabinergroup.com>

At 02:17 AM 10/26/2007, Mark Rabiner wrote:


 >I agree where Slobodan is coming from  I think but to avoid ongoing purely
 >philosophical pointless verbal points when talking about a visual art form
 >why not have a URL at the end of your emails, Marty like most of us do now
 >in this day and age (of walk the walk as well as talk the talk), pointing 
 >to
 >website gallery stuff. Uploads. Texas Tea. Swimming pools, movie stars.
 >  Stuff we can look at other than Times new roman to see if the writer 
 > knows
 >what a properly balanced image looks like? I'm sure Marty does but I'd just
 >like to see so I have a ground of reference while reading emails. Something
 >to click on when the words get thick.

Dear heavens, Mark!  How deeply I disagree.  Allow me to point out some 
things.

First, I haven't the foggiest idea of how to set 
up a website and I really doubt that I'd be 
interested in doing so if I knew.  I might, but, 
then, I probably would not.  I spent a half hour 
n the telephone this evening with my son trying 
to convince me to use Craig's List to sell a 
sofa, as he had done.  He probably could tell me 
how to set up a website but to what end?  That 
would just cut into the time I am now going to 
have to spend on Craig's List, and this after I 
have finally managed to quit paying attention to 
eBay.  Gimme a break:  I may be retired but I am 
trying to apply some more "Times New Roman" 
script to a few books I am back at writing.

Second, I just do not see photography as some 
sort of gushing display of perfection intended 
for public consumption.  I take pictures for my 
own pleasure not for the delectation of complete 
strangers.  This is my work.  It is not a public 
art form.  My wife paints but she does not put on 
shows and she does not do murals on large public 
buildings.  She paints and she shows her 
paintings to a select group of friends and 
family.  And that is it.  She is happy.  I take 
pictures.  Over the past twenty years, I have 
taken a lot of pictures.  This is my work, and I 
really do not care if anyone else feels that I 
have achieved some sort of mystical "properly 
balanced image".  My only critics on this work 
are a very select number and that number is often 
just me:  some of the shots I have made which my 
wife or my son dislike are ones I like, and so be 
it.  I am a majority of one.  I shall never win 
the Pulitzer Prize but that is my choice.

Third, I have taken very few pictures over the 
past six or seven years and almost all of those 
shot within that time are documentary shots of 
camera details for researchers or of items for 
sale or the like.  For that matter, I have about 
ten or fifteen rolls of film stacked up to get 
processed someday, and I've just not had the urge 
to take care of this.  At the same time, I have a 
huge archive of shots taken before this, most 
during the 1990's.  Many are on slides, and more 
are in black and white or C-41 prints.  Going 
through these is an unholy bitch:  it took me 
until five in the AM the other night to go 
through the first box I opened, one of twenty 
boxes or so of chromes.  (Almost all are happy 
snaps of family affairs -- my son must have grown 
up thinking that I had a camera lens instead of 
eyes.)  It took me a LONG time and I didn't find 
a shot there that I see as having anything save 
transient value to those involved -- I have a 
shot of Ron Salmons working a Roanoke camera 
show, and a picture of Pati Timmermann swimming 
at Cave Mountain Lake and the like, but why would 
you folks give a hoot?  I have box after box 
beyond this to investigate but almost all will be 
the same.  How many of you really want to see my 
son bobbing about with his mask and fins on at 
age 12?  He is 25 now possibly would want the 
shot destroyed.  It has no artistic value.

I do a very small number of shots beyond this but 
almost all are of camera gear for researchers -- 
as I have suggested before, those who are REALLY 
interested in reviewing those parts of my 
photographic work which I find most satisfactory 
should buy my books, as I took most of the 
pictures in THE ZEISS COMPENDIUM and all but a 
very few in A 39mm DIVERSITY.  Or come and visit 
me:  if I like you, I may dig out some framed 
shots of which I am especially happy.  Mark, I 
know you and like you, and so, when you come, I 
certainly will share a few shots with you.  Hell, 
you can see them all, if you want to spend five 
or six days prowling through boxes of slides or 
unprinted negatives.  Just do not expect me to go 
to the effort of scanning this archive of shots 
meaningless to those outside my circle and then 
sharing them with those to whom they must just be so much boring tripe..

Fourth, it has been said that only close friends 
really know how to eat their own dead.  A lot of 
you do this and in spades.  Someone posts a shot 
to some site.  One of two things happens.  Either 
we get 49 gushy, "great shot, George" responses 
or we get 174 messages tearing the picture down 
without providing a lot of helpful 
commentary.  The helpful level of either set of 
responses is generally pretty low.

Fifth, I am one of those you deride for talking 
through "Times New Roman" instead of by showing 
you my pictures.  Shucks, would you be happier if 
I used some other font?  I have hundreds from 
which to choose, but I just happen to like Times 
New Roman.  In the end, I am a word person 
interested in photography and its processes and 
history and quirks.  That fits me and those like 
me into this List, whether or not we choose to 
share our pictures to the rest of the 
world.  And, yes, Times New Roman is the font 
with which I am writing my future books ... and, 
if I get around to finishing my book on the 
history of the Leica M, I will probably take a 
lot of the pictures myself and will thus share 
this small part of my photo heritage with a 
broader world, those few who would buy the book.

Marc


msmall@aya.yale.edu
Cha robh b?s fir gun ghr?s fir!



Replies: Reply from philippe.orlent at pandora.be (Philippe Orlent) ([Leica] Developer for Neopan 1600/TMax 3200)
Reply from ricc at mindspring.com (Ric Carter) ([Leica] Developer for Neopan 1600/TMax 3200)
Reply from 54moggie at embarqmail.com (Robert Lilley) ([Leica] Developer for Neopan 1600/TMax 3200)
In reply to: Message from s.dimitrov at charter.net (slobodan dimitrov) ([Leica] Developer for Neopan 1600/TMax 3200)
Message from mark at rabinergroup.com (Mark Rabiner) ([Leica] Developer for Neopan 1600/TMax 3200)