The Whole Of The Moon

Morning folks - I've been thinking lately about what happens when we reach, say £10 for a 120 roll of FP4+. It's a frightening prospect isn't it? 

Though in reality we've been on £10 rolls of film for a while now, and I have started to ask myself what sort of justification both Kodak and Harman can make for, for instance:

TMY 400 - 120 Roll - on average £11

Ilford SFX 120 - on average £14.

You see, I understand costs have gone up - everything from energy to raw materials to wages - I do understand. 

However when you are pricing your main products (duh . . film) beyond the reach of a lot of people, then I think you need to sit down and have a rethink.

Frozen Out
Manufacturers Beware

I have recently been described as a "luxury photographer" in that I use film exclusively.

Well, I do.  

I get no enjoyment from digital, so I use film and I print it in my own darkroom. 

I'm also VERY fortunate, in that last year I was gifted a lot of outdated film and paper and I worked my way around its losses in speed and grade to produce very decent prints. 

I've printed more recently than I have ever printed purely because of that . . . and trying to produce 20x16" prints in a darkroom not much wider than the average understairs cupboard has been as much a challenge as it has been total fun. 

However, I haven't had to pay for this stuff - I have operated on a freebie basis all through the cost of living crisis - thanks to the extreme generosity of a friend.

The thing is though, now, rather than spending my pocket money on a nice new (old) camera or some useful filters, I am starting to think:

STOCK UP.

The one big thing the film I was gifted has shown me, is that despite all the online claims of being able to squeeze out something useful for ever, film will eventually 'go off'. 

I had some Tri-X that was so old that it was in a paper wrapper. It was fogged to feckery. 

Weirdly, TMY 400 which expired in 2009 was (and is) fine, but TMX 100 which expired in 1990 was pretty gubbed. 

Agfapan 25 from some very distant point in time was really fine, whereas Pan F, 10 years out, was fairly dull. 

When I am describing their states, I don't mean they're unusable, just that you couldn't use them for mission critical work. 

Stuff that is a few years out of date seems to be OK unless it is Ilford and then you might be struck by the dreaded mottle, which seems to strike completely randomly, even on film which expired in 2022! My own stock (roughly 100 sheets) of 2006 expired Kodak TXP320 which has been kept cool, is fine, but in the end I know entropy will get it.

A small part of it!

As for paper - Multigrade from over 10 or even 20 years ago, drops a couple of grades - yes, you can compensate, but I find myself regularly printing on Grade 3.5 or 4.5 and I'll tell you truthfully - it can be a complete fecker to deal with! 

Graded (such as Ilfospeed) seems to last a very long time indeed, as does a lot of old Agfa paper.

So why stock up?

Well, it ain't getting any cheaper. 

That's my entire argument. 

Nothing ever reduces in price. 

I remember when a roll of SFX was about £4 and it seemed extortionate then . . add on an extra tenner and I am glad I bought 20 rolls for £30 from the late-lamented Silverprint! It's all frozen too. 

There's a lot to be said for pleading with your partner for freezer space and filling a couple of clip-top hermetic boxes with film.

Paper though is a different matter, unless you can afford to run a small chest freezer, but even then, you can mitigate entropy in buying say Graded paper (if you can find it - Ilfospeed is being discontinued as we speak) and storing it as cool as you can. 

In the giftings I received last year, was a box of 12x16" Grade 2 Ilfospeed, "at least 10 years old" (actually, probably nearer to 20!) and it prints like a champ. 

Any loss of speed on a graded paper can be mitigrated by brewing your own Dr. Beers developer - that'll grab you at least another grade if you're careful.

So I think that is what I am going to do - take the defensive position. 

I really don't want to, but once I've retired I've got on average, what? about 20 years whist I can still be bothered to do any of this.

There's other casualties in the defensive mode too - I'm sorry for Kodak, because as a life-long Kodak user, I stopped using their film after the Alaris revamp simply because of their need to make money on the investment that buying a bankrupt company entails.

As you'll no doubt know Kodak film became almost entirely unaffordable overnight. And I now find myself driven the same way with their chemicals (indeed, if you can get them - Selenium seems to have been out of stock for a long time and the same with Polymax developer) they're pricing a loyal customer (and very regular user) out of the park! 

And I am not the only one.

I'm now finding myself in a similar situation with re-stocking photographic paper when this lot runs out. My dream of printing an archive of my 6x6 negatives at an image size of 8" x 8" on 9.5 x 12" FIBRE paper (it looks great) is fast disappearing down the swanny at a current cost for 50 sheets of somewhere in the mid-90 pounds (that's £95 for 50 sheets - yes you did read that right.)

If I wanted to do the same on Ilford's premium RC paper (Portfolio - it really IS lovely stuff and easy to use, but at the end of the day it is only a resin coated paper) then I would be exactly the same price. 

Portfolio in postcard size (10x15cm) is nearing £70 for 100 sheets!

Even a box of 100 sheets of bog standard 10x8" MG Fibre is around £130. 

You really DO NOT want to make any mistakes (surely the way that ALL beginnners learn) at £1.30 a sheet. 

Align that with:

"I have just cut a sheet of paper that cost £1.30 into quite a number of bits for test strips . . . GROAAAN!". 

And when you start thinking like that, you start (EVEN AS A PASSIONATE, EXPERIENCED AND COMMITTED DARKROOM WORKER) to think:

What the fuck is the point?

Trust me, the major producers are running a very tight line of:

Affordability vs. Fckck it, it's too expensive.

I would warrant that a lot of consistent Ilford (et al) shooters are of the, how shall we say, old git variety. 

You know, Mesdames et Messieurs like us. 

You started in 1970's or '80's and you still enjoy it. 

Maybe you have a darkroom, maybe you don't, but no matter what, the process of taking photographs is as much a part of you as breathing and no matter how advanced digital photography has come along, there's still nothing better than that release of the shutter, with some, but in reality little, idea of exactly how something is going to come out. 

You still buy film because you always have and you think you will, for as long as you can see clearly, and even then (like Bruce from T.O.D.) an autofocus Nikkor can help things along nicely.

In other words you are a KEY Ilford (et al) customer.

Yes, there's always the younger photographer . . the "Analog Revolution" (sic), but even then, factor in the cost of film against say, housing costs or trying to keep a young family above the tide line . . . well . . . see what I mean. 

The term Luxury Photographer has never been more apt.

For my own generation, despite what people think, we're really not all well off. 

Not by any means. 

A large chunk of us boomers are either on pensions or heading towards that phase of our lives on a lick and a promise - no tasty personal pension in place; maybe cut adrift from your work above the age of 60 and little chance of finding more because of the endemic ageism in society (it is there - trust me on that one too); on benefits or slipped between the cracks.

Yet there's one thing we want to do.

What's that Simpkins? C'mon lad, spit it out . . louder, so the whole class can hear you!

 

We want to take more pictures! 

And more importantly:

WE WANT TO BE ABLE TO AFFORD TO TAKE MORE PICTURES.

I want to make more prints and I want to be able to afford that for as long as I am able to lift a Beard Easel, so it is really hard coming smack up against the profitability vs. affordability thing.

Mark my words, I reckon when we get to the £10 roll of FP4+ some people will throw in the towel. 

£100 for 10 rolls of film - CAN YOU IMAGINE????

Yes there is of course Foma and numerous fly-by-night names out there (operating at a price slightly below, but in reality not that much different from the big ones) and good luck to them, but the thing I have found, certainly with Foma film (not the chemicals or paper) is a bit of a lack of Quality Control. I remember walking for many miles, taking a 5x4 camera with me and DDS's with Foma 100, taking some pictures, developing them, only to discover the emulsion was scored and pock-marked. 

GREAT QC is why I like Ilford and why I liked Kodak. Although, then again look at the mottle issue.

Kentmere as an Ilford brand is top-notch stuff btw.

What I would say to all manufacturers of film and paper and chemicals is this:

PLEASE - YOU NEED US JUST LIKE WE NEED YOU. 

We your customers understand the costs, but you also have to understand our costs - the current inflationary position of the world hits both sides of the coin. 

If we can't afford to buy your products, then YOU DIE. 

It really is as simple as that. 

I would never have bothered normally
 but it was 'free' so why not?!

I have found myself perusing my old archives recently, chucking out tons of shitty prints and thinking, actually, is there any point to this other than I enjoy doing it? 

Will anything ever be left, or discovered down the line? 

I doubt it. 

So if that is the case, is there actually any point in me spending a VERY large part of my disposable income on something that is akin to a dead end? 

If it were cheaper, I'd think feck it and keep on!

But when you sit down and factor in a lovely 8x8" image on fibre 9.5 x 12" paper all toned and everything, and then add in the pre-parts of that:

Camera; film; time; chemicals for processing; storage; enlarger; lens and darkroom equipment; paper chemicals; and finally archival storage, I think you must be heading towards at the very least £6 a print! 

And when you get to that . . well. why not just go digital? It's a shitload cheaper!

But like I said I don't like digital, so when I get to the point where this is getting financially crippling I might start to think:

God that's a massive wall of unaffordability I am heading down this hill towards . . I'm going to put on the brakes now, jump out of this vehicle and head uphill to where the sun is shining and I can enjoy a bottle of wine without thinking, gosh, that was around the price of ONE print.

It is a sobering thought (or it should be if you're a consumables manufacturer) that even someone like me (a core customer) with two really great enlargers (a DeVere 504 and a Meopta Magnifax) a decent selection of great lenses and all the gear and the passion to use it, is starting to think twice,

Thinking that the financial viability of what is really just a hobby; certainly a pastime that I love, but a pastime all the same, is headed towards the shitter. 

I chanced upon a chat with the illustrator Keith Walker today - you'll not know him, but if you read Commando comic from around the number 500, you'll definitely know his work; he said:

"What could be cheaper than a pencil and a bit of paper?"

and he's absolutely right. 

When I was small my hobbies were drawing and calligraphy - they cost peanuts . . . I'd hate to say I can feel them coming on again, but being a creative person I have to do something. 

If this continues I can see that happening. 

Really!

Anyway, I know nobody "up top" will read this, but I think, as a community, we REALLY need to talk about it. 

It's simple - if people stop using film because it becomes too expensive and manufacturers find themselves in a vicious circle of lower production and higher prices, what happens to the value of say your M6, or your collection of working Barnacks, or your Hasselblads, or your superb (but dead-ended) specialist cameras like a Fuji or Linhof 6x17 pano? 

Even the plain-Jane K1000s or Nikon Fs? 

They'll just become worthless lumps of metal and glass consigned to display cabinets.

You're talking about the collapse of a (albeit small) part of a profound, life-changing art-form. Yeah the digital stuff will continue, but it ain't the same . . well it's not to me.

This is serious stuff.

It's worse than that though, because I think the traditional 'wet' darkroom will kick the bucket first. 

Darkroom-based photographic print-making is heading the same way as the Dodo. 

I can see it almost gone in 10 years time.

Who do you know that prints?

I go to a Photography Forum every month, and of the average of 20-25 regulars, there's about two of us. And if I can't afford to . . . . well, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work that one out . . .

I learned my craft on Ilfobrom and Kentmere Bromide (they were as cheap as chips) before heading up to the heady delights of Galerie. 

But even then with the incredible tutelage of Joe McKenzie I made a lot of mistakes. 

We all did. 

It was part of the learning curve, but the mistakes were affordable, not eye-watering. 

I was able to hone my craft at an early age on a student grant! 

It's been a gift that has repaid me in spades over the years, but I was only able to do it because the stuff was relatively cheap . . though still a (small) luxury!

Things have got to change before it really is too late.

Over and oot . . . you ain't seen me . . . right?

H xx

On The B(l)each

Morning folks, and a very Happy New Year to you - jings, one wonders where things are going though, eh!

Anyway, those of you of a certain age will possibly remember the cold war film 'On The Beach' in which, despite mankind's last desperate hopes, the entire population of the world is annihilated by nuclear war. 

It was grim, but honest (for the time) film making, as well as being a staple of my younger watching days, but I wonder why it is no longer shown on TV? 

Oh wait a minute, that's right, everybody dies. 

Much like Graham Briggs' 'When The Wind Blows', I think the truth is just too much for people to bear; maybe it's because there's no living kittens and puppies or celebs with nuclear-white teeth in either of them . . 

Ho hum, or maybe it's just because the latter has music by Roger Waters . . .

On the other hand, who can forget Sir Cliff Richard's stonking, post-holocaust toe-tapper 'On The Beach' - a rip-snortin' song of love, fun and dancing! 

Oh yes, none of that pesky eyeball-melting stuff there, oh no.

Who could even forget young Sheephouse's accident with a bottle of Sun-In. A WHOLE bottle too.

Well, those were the metal days and I probably out-bleached the Crüe by a year or so!

Anyway, this wouldn't be FB with some discourse on the Art and Craft of Photography, so here goes.

The late Barry Thornton published two books as far as I know - 'Elements' and 'Edge Of Darkness' - the former is relatively findeable - I've seen it quite a number of times in s/h bookshops and charity places, to the extent that I now have two copies! 

The latter though is more of a rockinghorse jobbie - never seen any other copy than mine in any shops. Last time I looked online it was a small fortune. 

It's a good read, though be careful with his home-brew, two-bath developer (good though it is) is all I can say . . you have been warned.

Anyway, here's an interesting snippet from the latter; it has been given a précis by me, because I couldn't be arsed typing it out in full. 

Basically he takes a selenium-toned print and immerses it in a semi-weak Potassium Ferrycyanide solution. 

He uses Potasium Bromide (as a restrainer/anti-fog) too, but I had none, so it was chuck some Pot Ferry in a dish, let it dissolve, then chuck a washed selenium-toned print in for a couple of minutes, watch it change colour, whip it out, thoroughly wash, refix and then do your hypo-clear and main wash. 

It gives the prints almost a goldy-chocolate colour which I find quite appealing. 

He calls it Drag Bleaching for some reason - I've never found that term used by anyone else (as far as I can remember).

I've tried it before, but it was never as dramatic as this - I think that is partly down to using a stronger solution of PF. Can you afford to wait around for the recommended 4 or 5 minutes bleaching time when you have 10 prints to deal with? Hmmm? Eh? Sweety??

The reason I did it is another matter - it is a bit complex. 

Basically the paper I am using is Ilford MG - not 'fresh' though, it is probably at least 10 years old (you could buy a box of 9.5 x 12" for £24.99, I know because that's what the price sticker says!) and was a gift from a friend having a clear-out - I have to say it has been wonderful using it, because it has allowed me to print without a thought to the burgeoning cost per print.

It has also taught me, that Graded paper lasts better than MG - as seems to be the way with ancient MG paper it loses speed and contrast at a rate of knots, so I am having to print at roughly Grade 4 (albeit a bit either side depending on the negative). 

A box of Grade 2 Ilfospeed from the same era is absolutely fine.

With the MG, I am still getting a bit of sparkle in the print, but obviously printing at a harder Grade does have its impact on shadow areas. 

As such, the prints were a bit iffy so I thought, why not.

Anyway, post-Christmas I was desperate to get out and photograph, however two things came together at once:

One - shite weather (grey, dreich, shite, whichever term you fancy).

Two - I ran out of light! Twilight was coming on at about 3PM with the cloud cover.

Allied to this I decided I needed to get out and do something, so chose to use Berggrrrrrs Panchro 400 Super-Curl . . . not really ideal. 

But the object of the exercise wasn't to create jaw-dropping photographic snippets from the table of the Gods - no, it was to use my brain and listen to a shutter in the open. 

Which is exactly what happened.

I think I've nailed the best way to develop BrGGGrrrrrr for me too - rate it at EI200 and overdevelop in Kodak HC110 - Dilution B. It helps it along in the shadows, which generally with this film, no matter how properly you've metered them, are often erring on the side of ghostly. 

I would also emphasise again, despite having a 'anti-curl layer' this is the curliest film I have ever encountered - when chopped it forms 3 tight spirals of four frames a piece, which, when sleeved and weighted, do not ever really straighten. 

It's a shame as it has quite a nice look to it.

Anyway, here's the results:

Lovely Eh!

Bike Shed With Mouse

Lonely Planet's 'Good Guano' Award.

Toning Wise, The Best One

Always Liked These Trees

And that's it really - camera was the 500 C/M with the 40mm CF FLE Distagon - it's  great lens - maybe not as epic as the 38mm Biogon, but certainly easier to use and compose with.

As I said, they'll not win any awards, but as an exercise, they're fine; at the end of the day I often think that half of the photographic process is being able to get out somewhere and have some concentration time, which I think is always FUN, and goodness knows we need some of that these days.

So without further ado I shall bid you adieu! 

And remember, the aliens are the ones wearing suits.

H xx

Two Men In A Room

Morning folks - in a nod to the mighty WIRE and their cracking tune 'Two People In A Room', this is another tale of countryside adventures and one way roads.

As he has been wont to do recently, Sir Bruce Of Robbinsestershire duly picked me up and whipped me away to somewhere I had never even heard of, but curiously, had passed once:

HMS Peewit. 

It is a motley collection of hangars now used as farm buildings, outside the famous Angus golfing town of Carnoustie. 

The hangars are easily mistaken for those massive farm barns you often see these days, but in reality, look a little further, and they're obviously hangars; there's remnants of runway and tumbledown collections of typical RAF base buildings scattered about too.

Sir Bruce (knowing no fear) sidles Der Linsenwagen up all sorts of roadways I would never even dream of looking at. 

And that's just what we did. 

"Isn't this . . . ?"

"Nah, we'll be alright."

It's a bit like being with your Dad actually and in a good way!

He also went and asked permission from the landowner, and we unpacked our gear and went and Stared The Camel In The Eye.

I was using the Hasselblad SWC/M, on a tripod, loaded with FP4+ rated at EI 80. 

I went with this combo because of the tight quarters expected in the buildings and the forgiving nature of FP4+.

And I really did need it. 

The lovely thing about the SW is that if you obey the bubble, you're fine. Anything that looks squint will be squint, though fortunately most builders do use spirit levels! Its only caveat is that YOU are entirely the judge of focus (as it is a VF-only viewing camera) - this can get quite complex close up. 

I always recommend carrying a small tape measure with you, and also always recommend that you MUST realise that the really strange bendy image you see in the VF looks nothing like what is captured by the lens. In other words - TRUST THE MACHINE!

When you learn to do that, everything should fall into place.

The other thing I love about the SW is that it is a superb architectural camera. OK it doesn't have rise and fall and other movements, but get your viewing position right and the camera level and it will render an interior beautifully. I love it and am very aware that I am lucky to own one.

Anyway, without further ado, HMS Peewit.

Peewit 1

Peewit 2

Peewit 3

Peewit 4

Peewit 5

Peewit 6
(That's Bruce btw)

As you can see, she's mostly used as a gardener's shed these days (though actually it has probably been so for a long time) - you can find more about her real history from reading four articles on Bruce's blog. 

I prefer his photos to mine, so stick that in yer pipe and smoke it.

You can find them if you click - -> HERE

The film was developed in Pyrocat-HD. I did that because of the very obvious disparity between those deep interior shadows and the windows. 

Some of the shadow readings were around EV 1!

Not only was the day quite gloomy, but the light indoors was pretty shocking too. 

You're talking exposures (taking into account reciprocity) of 145 seconds at times:

"STAND BACK FROM THE TRIPOD! Now put that cable release on the ground . . ."

Yes, not the easiest, but fortunately the tripod was sturdy and there was no wind.

It's possible that the Peewit will very slowly slide into the ground - as you can see the exterior brickwork is in need of some TLC, however the interior concrete is pretty damn fine - when you think about it, the brickwork is just camouflage - what it disguises are concrete bunkers. 

How long do they last? 

Even the heavily-exposed-to-the-elements ones around these parts are still doing fine, so you never know . . hundreds of years?

It all depends on how long the windows can carry on for I suppose - some of them are boarded up . . . 

We both commented on what a fine photographer's studio it would make with a little jimmying-up.

The above are all scans of prints - sadly they don't do the prints justice. 

There's levels of detail in there which I think goes above and beyond 5x4.

The prints are also not as 'grey' as they appear to be above, but hey ho, that's what happens when you use a cheap scanner and can't be bothered with all the curvy stuff. 

Admittedly, they're not the most exciting photographs in the world, but if I've managed to convey some of the atmosphere of the place to you, then I am happy.

And that's about it really.

Normally at this festive time of year I do a yearly round-up, but I'm not sure if I can be bothered this time (even though [actually] it has been a very productive year photographically.) 

So, if you don't get another clarion call from MailChimp to your inbox, you'll know why!

All that remains is for me to wish you all the best for the Festive Season, and, in an increasingly chaotic and angry world, peace and happiness for the New Year.

Take care, have a good one and remember to get the sprouts on around about now.

H xx

Auld (R)Age

Morning folks - hope everyone is well.

The Winter is starting to draw in with a great rapidity that I never like, though this year I am determined to embrace it more and not be so bothered that it is getting dark at 3.30PM!

Anyway, without further ado, I have recently been using a couple of truly old . . well, older than me . . . photographic devices - it's been fun and is the pure antithesis of today's 'do everything' cameras. 

No, they're not LF cameras either, nor is it the Mamiya Press (which is kind of like using a LF camera, but with a handle - you go through similar processes and checklists before every exposure . . and after too!) No these were different from the point of view of snapability.

Take a bow please, a Canon L2/35mm f3.5 Nikkor and a Rollei Old Standard. The former from 1958/1951 and the latter from 1934/35.

They've been fun to use and like anything older, required a wee bit of tweaking from me to get results I was happy with.

In the Canon/Nikkor case, that was fitting a lens hood (I ended up using my 5cm FISON - you would think it would vignette, but it doesn't, and it clamps like a champ!) and not being too radical with my choice of shutter speeds. Whether it is because of all the gripping and scraping I have been doing as DIY or an age thing, or possibly even the weight of the camera - it is very light - I found that it is quite sensible, where possible, to decide on 1/30th as my slowest shutter speed.

It does rather limit your choices, but what can you do . . if you want to explore fun in an ancient style, then maximise your potential.

The Old Standard was a bit different, in that you can sort of use your body and a wall as a tripod whilst gently pulling down on the neck strap - it is a surprisingly stable way of doing things, even with a camera as light as the Rollei. 

And it is a light Rollei - certainly lighter than my T. 

It makes the likes of a Mamiya C330 look and feel like a house brick from a black hole!

The Tessar is also of a different quality to the Tessar on my T. 

Bruce would call this UB (Unsubstantiated Bollocks) but to my eyes it is true. 

The T's Tessar is a single coated lens; the early Tessar on the Standard is uncoated and therein lies its magic - in much the same way that early Leitz Elmars have that glowy look to them (more UB?) the same can be said of the Old Standard. 

I can only imagine what it would be like with its proper hood.

Anyway, here's some photies . . . oh and I forgot to say that using such ancient machinery may well result in the likes of the following comment (which I loved):

"That's an affie auld camera!"

Probably my favourite carpark picture - everything fell into place and, despite the sun falling on the plexiglass window, the dark splendours of the concrete cathedral have been revealed. The 35mm f3.5 Nikkor is a fine lens - I feel very priviledged to be able to use it.

This is printed on Ilford MGRC at Grade 4. Film was HP5 at EI 200 developed in HC110 (Dilution B) for a total of 8 minutes (I stood it from 6) - a nice combo and the inherent mild contrastiness of HC helped to contribute to the lack of contrast in the scene.

Sadly the 'waterfall' has since gone.

These are the Old Standard - I like them both.

The first was printed at Grade 4.5 on some very old MGRC - I can go no higher using the DeVere's colour wheels! The photograph, is pretty much exactly how I saw it, and the Tessar has rendered the scene beautifully softly.

The second was printed at Grade 4'5 too. 

One wonders how it is possible to go, in a print, from really soft (the building with the Paper (white) Sun behind it to incredibly hard (the woman's feet and the bright pavement). 

There was no split grading involved and I can only assume the camera has contributed. 

There's an enormous amount of detail in there too - not too shabby for a nearly 90 year old lens.

Film was the combo of out of date (2009!) Pan F and Fomadon R09 at 1+50. 

VERY GENTLE agitation to 10 minutes and then let it stand to 12.

I'm not normally a 'street' person, but I like this a great deal - it looks old despite the modern bus shelter.

The older I get the more I realise that Rodinal can be used almost universally for most subjects - a wonderful developer and if I only had to have one, then it would probably be it.

And that's it - short and sweet.

The two old 'uns are currently having a natter about the state of the world over a cup of Darjeeling and a couple of hobnobs.

Until the next time, over and oot and keep taking the pills.

H xx

The Great Dissolve

Morning folks - I hope you are well. 

It is an interesting title isn't it, and you're probably wondering:

"Oh JEEEEZ, what is the olde fart on about now."

I will say, you might well be raging by the end, but don't let that stop you either way; be warned, it's quite long; a tad opinionated and as such a thing is as valid as any other argument . . . 

So put your feet up, get someone to loosen the straightjacket and let's begin.

Top Photo - Modern 'Photography'
Bottom Photo - Photography As I Knew It

Firstly, let me explain myself. 

I photograph. 

I love photographing and I love printing. 

I love the smell of fixer and stopbath. 

I love my darkroom.

And I love the sheer difficulty/easiness of being able to punt out into the world an image that is not only of some worth to myself, but also (possibly) has some longevity by nature of its actual PHYSICAL PRESENCE. 

That being, a bog standard negative and a darkroom print.

I regard them as little boats of time being shoved upstream into an unknown future . . quite often made with a mechanical marvel constructed when I was much younger or, in some cases, not even a glint in my father's eye. 

In other words, you've got it, I love photography.

It holds gravitas for me. 

It is an important and often surprising part of my life.

But here's the rub. I increasingly find myself looking around at a lot of the stuff currently classed as 'photography' and then reaching into a cupboard for my ruffled shirt, slightly baggy-at-the-knees boating pants, white socks, a very cool pair of aviators and just possibly (if I am wearing one) I might even roll up the sleeves on my jacket.

Then I'll drag out the ghettoblaster and stick on a cassette with fab hits from A Flock Of Seagulls, OMD, Human League and many other forward thinking 'futuristic' pop combos; heck I might even have a boogie to 'Magic Fly' by Space.

Then I say to myself: 

'Great, let's do it!'

Isn't that just the best photographic advice you've ever had?

You see, is it just me, or has the 'photographic' community been transported back a few decades to the era of shoulder pads and big money? 

Stick with me on that, all will be explained.

I was brought up short recently by a link to an esteemed Photographic Societies competition winners website (try saying that sentence when you are drunk).

A lot of what I saw, NOW IN 2023, reminded me a hell of a lot of what I had seen in the 1980's.

It shocked me enough to write this post.

To illustrate the point, if you've got it, a worthy tome from 1981 - Michael Langford's superb "Darkroom Handbook" - page 292. 

Got it? - Bob Carlos Clarke's montage of the man with dry earth for his mouth and some sort of electrody brain machine on his head. 

Colourise it, and then stick it in as an entrant here

Och, stuff it, here y'go!

How about page 250 - some 'Advanced Posterization' . . yep - same too.

Or page 229 - 'Multiple Printing':

Or Bob C-C again in 'Montage':

You've got to remember the age of these, yet they'd all work in an exhibition 42 years too late. 

Failing that, pick up pretty much any photographic book published on the 80's and 90's where the photographer is having a go at something 'arty' . . . is it just me, or does it all look 'current'.

Back to THE NOW - you have to believe me when I say I am not having a go at any of the competing 'photographers' (everyone can do a Fleetwood Mac; one person's 'art' is another person's dirty bed etc etc) because in said competition there are some pictures which you would obviously call photographs.

But the composites? 

The obvious set-ups and chewed over stuff? 

Well . . .

To be honest I never thought that much of that sort of stuff was relevant back in the 1980's (though, I know manipulation has been going on since the dawn of photography, but that's not the point.)

Back then they always seemed like exercises that served as a 'see what I can do' amusement, rather than carrying any real photographic gravitas. 

And I know you'll think I am walking on thin ice with that statement, but like I say, it is just my opinion. 

I also know you'll say:

"Surely that's what you do in a darkroom - you manipulate a negative"

Yep, spot on, but again, not my point.

With the montaging, multiple printing, colourising etc back then, sure some people made a good living from it. Some people were even brilliant at it.

I can draw your eyes to say any number of (as an example, say) musical instrument adverts from the 1980's; they all looked so modern with the delay units (sic) floating through space like cast-off Star Wars models; or a battle plain on a distant world, lined with pedals all ready to to fight the good fight for RAWK . . .

But it was just advertising.

It might well have been made using traditional photographic techniques and great darkroom skills, but it wasn't what I would call photography - it was image making and there is a distinct difference. 

It used 'photography' to illustrate the product; to pursuade you (yes you, potential RAWK GOD) that if you would only purchase said product, you too could be creating futuristic music on a distant planet.

OK - I know this was from 1992, but you get the idea.

In fact, I am not going to spare you the pain . . . get a load of this:

UGH!

Image making has always been a distinctive aside (in my opinion  - I always thought it went hand-in-hand with graphic design) and certainly there has been a lot of great image making that could also also be classed as great photography; but the bounds are very fluid. 

 

To give some background, I come at image making, graphic design and illustration from an era when everything was done manually. 

As an example, we used to have to trace text from Letraset catalogues (the actual product was far too expensive for an impoverished student) on a large DeVere copy camera. This tracing was the actual typography you wanted to use - your slogan, if you like. When you'd got it all laid out, you'd reverse the tracing paper, overlay 2B pencil on the back, take it to your illustration board, carefully tape it down, then trace over your original Letraset lettering thus transferring it to the board and then, you'd go over the lettering on the board with a rapidograph. 

Does it sound complex and time consuming? 

Damn right it was!

Nowadays though, rather than days and weeks spent trying to get something like that out, it is now available at a simple command. 

Jeez, it was even easy with all sorts of Adobe stuff, but now, I can just describe it and accomplish something remarkably 'real'.

Be warned - everyone that can string two words together has the ability to produce something as just as cheesey as the above adverts!

Be warned - everyone that can string two words together now has the ability to produce a 'photograph'.

And that's not even my point - technology changes, you either run with it and try to catch up all the time, or you entrench yourself - rather in the way I have.

How many of the competition winners are text-based? No idea.

But it isn't even the execution - shit happens, times change, people move onto 'better' things.. 

No, it is the CONTENT.

Here's something I knocked up from Freepik.com.

My Words: "An old man in a room with a candle" - Style: Vintage (cos I am)

"An old man in a room with a candle"

Sure it is overly contrasty and looks a bit computer generated, but on the whole, if you'd told me that was taken on a digital camera, I wouldn't question it. 

If however you said it was taken on a Jupiter lens with Rollei Retro I would disagree, initially, because the look is very similar. 

Unlike the latter though, it does not exist in anything I would call useful to me - it is just a low-res png.

Here's another - same description:

"An old man in a room with a candle"

And another - my description a bit more detailed: "a man in a room with a large dog and christian imagery on the walls"

"A man in a room with a large dog and christian imagery on the walls"

And again:

"A man in a room with a large dog and christian imagery on the walls"

If I were to tell you I had set both of them up and used a Hasselblad with a 60mm Distagon, you might well be convinced. 

But I didn't!

OK - they're not perfect, but sign up and pay your money for a high resolution download, open your Lightroom and get tweaking . . SEE WHAT I MEAN?

I didn't even put any thought or effort into those save the typing.

Anyway, back to our competition:

An Orangutan with a fecking dandelion seed head? 🙄

A Bison that looks like it has half of a Hollywood lighting team off to the right?

The person with the brainy-thing and the bird? 

The people with the brollies that look like a Jack Vettriano painting?

The bloke with the big dog that looks like an exercise in painting a dog?

Every single colour portrait that looks like a hypereal illustration?

Landscapes that look like no landscape has ever looked in the entire lifetime of this planet?

They could all have been generated by Freepik (sic)

What we are seeing folks, is The Dissolve. 

Photography as we know it (well, as I knew it) doesn't really exist anymore, except in niches that are as anachronistic as shoving children up chimneys to sweep them.

Sure, a lot of the competition's entries will have been 'captured' (God I hate that word) on things resembling cameras/might well be called cameras. but a lot of the assembled images have more in common with Father Ted's car, than they do with photography. 

You've never seen Father Ted's car? 

Well, you can find the clip here.

Do you see what I mean? 

Everything has been so worked and reworked and perfected and tweaked and reworked again and added to and subtracted from, that the end result looks nothing like a photograph. 

Folks, we have entered the world of illustration.

And photographers, don't think you're an illustrator, because you're not.

These are illustrators operating in 'Hyperealism':

© Alyssa Monks

© Dirk Dzimirsky

© Luiz Escañuela

© Paul Cadden

Yep, they're NOT photographs. 

They're all achieved with oil, pencil, pen, acrylic, gouache, and skill.

One does wonder what the point is though!

So the question I am going to throw out there is:

Which do you prefer:

The photographs trying to look like illustrations?

OR

The illustrations trying to look like photographs?

Again, I am knocking no one - the skill levels involved in the latter are extraordinary - I think I come down on the illustrator's side.

Oh, it's time for a nice cup of Mrs Doyle's tea.

Aaaah!
That's better!!

You've made it so far, hang on in there old bud, there's more to come . . . 

As a weird aside, the popular prog-metal band Dream Theater have a long history of illustratively photographic (is that a thing?) album covers going back to the late 1980's.

As they were/are a 'thinking man's' band, why not have some 'thinking man' style covers?

There's been a slew of illustrations from this train of album cover thought - you might even own some.

© Dream Theater

© Dream Theater

© Dream Theater

© Dream Theater

Initially, they were done 'photographically' and illustratively; then Photoshop and mixed media took a hand, and I've no doubt they'll soon be (maybe even are) Ai.

 

One can link that lineage back to Hugh Syme and his conceptathons, and even further back to Roger Dean, Jim Fitzpatrick, Bob Haberfield, Patrick Woodroofe (and all the great conceptual illustrators of book jackets over the years, but especially the 1960's and 70's). 

Also, I would be completely remiss if I never mentioned Hipgnosis with Aubrey Powell, Storm Thorgerson and George Hardie (great little article here.)

Probably more than any other, they're at the root of what is happening today.

As an aside, I loved Hipgnosis. 

Still do. 

But it was album cover design. 

It was part of a concept. 

It fulfilled the brief to bring an artist's music to an adoring public in a complete package that made you think.

There were many companies operating in that field, producing sleeves that were every bit a work of art as anything hanging in a gallery. 

I can point a finger at 4AD, with Grierson and Oliver producing a distinctive mesh of graphics and photography which would define the look of the label (as well as being superlative pieces of Graphic Design). 

Or ECM where Manfred Eicher's vision for the label incorporated tremendous photography, which stood as just as an important part of the album's presence as what was held within their gorgeous heavyweight sleeves.

Hipgnosis

ECM

4AD

Influential wouldn't you say? 

And when you start swimming the dark seas of album covers you uncover much more of what today is award winning 'photography'.

In other words, there's a lot of it out there; it has been done better already and more importantly:

IT HAD PURPOSE.

Anyway, like a weird dump of happenstance (and another causal effect on all this 'ere typing) was my great pleasure in reading a post from long-time FB reader Omar Özenir (Hi Omar!) on his blog OMOZFOT, called "The Game" - you can find it here.

I don't know about you, but to me, these are photographs, and I really love them all.

They're moments captured in time - y'know, the way all those photographs you looked at years back looked.. 

Sure, he has used his mastery as a printer to extract maximum quality from the negatives, but it's his eye that instigates everything. 

There's no Gorillas on the monkey bars.

There's no Clowns on the bench.

That isn't a Polish person on the pole.

The people disappearing from the frame are so fleet and intransigent and so perfectly timed that you question everything about the image, especially the timing.

Sure, he could have done it in the ways I have written about, i.e. assemble the multifarious parts; tried some tricky juxtaposed bits, etc. etc. or even just typed it. 

But the thing is there are no parts. 

There's no directors. 

No creative influencer.

No Ai lurking in the background. 

It is just a human with a camera and some FILM. 

The latter being the key word in all this.

I know you'll throw your toys out of the pram now, but, I've been thinking, if I were entirely digital, I would be getting worried. Because, apart from my files stored on a HD or in the cloud somewhere (and the HD is in your house and the cloud has your log-in details) I would have nothing else (apart from metadata - and even then) to prove that any of what I call my 'photography' was actually done by me. 

I didn't even necessarily have to have been there, such is the power of digital manipulation. 

I saw a 'new' thing recently whereby a chap was out walking in the Highlands, took two different photos in different lighting conditions around a half a mile apart and then used Ai to seamlessly blend them into a single image, that looked like a piece of actual landscape . . to which I thought . . WHY?

The 'truth' which is largely believed to be the whole thing about a photograph (and photography in general) is now no longer true. 

A picture might be worth a thousand words, but who wrote those words?

I was going to say, it is back to that whole thing: CONTENT (Sorry esteemed photographic society, but it is sorely lacking in that contest - goodness knows what the judges were on. To have the power and control which digital undoubtedly has, and to squander it in an unimaginative, or indeed unrealistic looking way . . . how sad.)

But if that content only exists as a file which can be created/manipulated, where does that leave the photographer?

We are, all of us 'photographers', standing on an abyss where we don't quite know where things are going; we also don't know whether we're going to jump or be pushed, nor do we have any idea whether there's a nice soft landing at the bottom, or a horrible, splatty death. 

Nothing is as it seems.

I can entrench myself in my darkroom and produce the old stuff - the physical object proves I was 'there'. But can you prove your files are anything other than concepts?

Bear in mind that what I illustrated with Freepik above, is just the beginning.

Frightening . . . 

And (again!) sorry to harp on about the competition winners, but most of it is not photography.

It isn't.

No matter how much you argue with me, it has lost its essence, namely the ability to freeze all the weirdness of the world, not just as an actual artefact of that period of time, but also (because of the wonderful interaction of time and film) as something other. 

Some thing that might not even have occurred to the photographer when they pressed the shutter. 

Of course, some (or even a fair amount) of digital photography IS like this - people work with the media they choose and that is the predominant method of working for the vast majority of people who like 'photography'. These self-same people are approaching it in a 'traditional' way, i.e. they're just taking some photos. But what they're not seeing is the lumbering behemoth which is catching up rapidly and which will, ultimately, cause viewers of their photos to ask: 

"Was it real?" 

or 

"Is it real?"

or 

"Were you there?"

Think about it.

Remember the adverts from the 1970's and '80's?

Is it live, or is it Memorex?

I know this is a loose and possibly ill-conceived argument, but I had to get something down.

You're probably furious with me, and possibly rightly so, but if just one person has a conversation with a photographic friend about this and it spreads and causes discussions, then that is a positive thing.

Thanks for bearing with it.

Maybe one day I'll convert and 'see the light', but for the moment no. 

Give me a film camera and a darkroom.

Give me f8 and a sixtieth of a second.

"A Penguin On A Hill With Telecomms Equipment In The Background"
Leica M2, 35mm Summaron, Ilford HP5+

Over and oot.

Hxx