Zone VI Studios buyback???

I, for one, miss Zone VI studios. I miss Fred Picker. I miss his sumptuously illustrated catalogues that arrived in my mailbox and made one's mouth water, causing me to yearn to take up that arcane thing called large format photography.

 

I miss his chatty Newsletters; I still have them all. I miss the well-written and helpful catalogue descriptions of the many products they developed and sold. You could learn more about LF photography reading a Zone VI catalogue than you can wading through most of the hype written about LF photography these days. (Present company excepted, of course).

 

I miss Zone VI Brilliant. I miss their bottles of Benzotriazole, and the promise they held. I miss their Zone VI developer and all their other chemicals. Not because they were any better than the other stuff you could buy from Kodak, but because Picker's photographic potions had an air of magic or alchemy about them...you felt you could turn out a better print by using them. Photographer's Formulary seems to have taken up the slack, but they still don't have Fred's touch.

 

Their wood field cameras were lovely, simple, well made and reasonably priced. They worked. I had one for years, lugged it all over creation, dropped it and banged it up, made a ton of mistakes and really learned how to use a view camera. I managed to make some of my best negatives with the thing. Everywhere I set up a crowd would gather, ask questions, look at the image on the ground glass. I met a lot of interesting people using that little wooden camera. Strange thing...nobody stops to ask about my Canham.

 

I sold that Zone VI 4x5. I sold it for more money than I paid for it, and it still worked perfectly. I still regret selling it. Damn.

 

I still have their superb printwasher, their ridiculous surveyor's tripod built like a tank, their cold light head with the questionably useful dry-down controller feature, and a couple of boxes of their original Zone VI Brilliant in my freezer waiting for the perfect negative.

 

At a time when it seemed that information about large format photography was limited only to certain individuals, jealously guarded by most practitioners and not easily learned or shared, Fred Picker's Zone VI Studios taught others what they needed to know to get started. If you did not know what you wanted, they answered your questions. If you were hesitant to take the leap, confused about putting together an outfit, they put together a complete large format package with a camera/lens/tripod/film holder/meter/with case to get you started. Nobody else did this as well as Fred Picker.

 

If you had a lens question, Fred would answer it. He put me (and others) onto the wonderful G-Claron lenses instead of selling me a much more expensive Symmar-S when I needed a good, affordable 8x10 lens. I still have to laugh at the many threads on this site debating the merits of the G-Clarons: "they're only good for close-ups", "they're flat field lenses", "only process lenses", "non-Apo", "not multi-coated", ad nauseum. Fred said they were great lenses for landscape, and if you bought one and disagreed he'd take it back, no questions asked.

 

Fred picker explained the zone system better than anyone. His book was the only thing going for years. He would read your negatives on his densitometer, mark them and return them to you. He recommended a good, cheap densitometer to me when I asked. He answered all my questions about enlarging lenses, what 4x5 enlarger to buy, what to avoid, and a host of other things. And most importantly, what a decent B&W print should look like; Fred would actually sell you his B&W prints (for practically nothing) so you could have a reference print when working, to see how a B&W print should really look. Who else would do that back then? You had to be in a graduate photography program to get that kind of help; later on I was, and even then the teachers were stingy with their advice and help.

 

I miss Fred Picker because he represents that time of my life when I was just starting out in LF photography, unsure of the technical aspects of the LF craft. I was still full of enthusiasm and hope, and Fred Picker encouraged me as well as thousands of other folks. I sometimes wish I could recapture that sense of wonder and enthusiasm.

 

Sure, Fred was a salesman. He was a marketing genius, shrewd and with a great business sense. He was out to make money, but he did it doing something he loved, and he did it honestly and fairly. How many of the LF businesses out there today can say that?

 

I don't think Zone VI can be reconstituted. Fred Picker's gone; I think Zone VI died with him. I someone wants to start a new company, call it Zone VII, or whatever.

 

Good luck, Sergio.

That is really well said, Sergio. I have to take issue with one thing though. I went to a graduate photography program 23 years ago. You're wrong. They weren't stingy with their advice and help. There was no advice or help. They couldn't give out any because they didn't have any. Except for Judy H______ it was a colossal waste of time.

 

and I hope our business is honest and fair! -- Anthony

Sergio,

 

You put it so well. It felt like going through my own mind reading it. I wish, of course, you had a different ending to it.

 

It was Fred who tought me Zone System, introduced me (and few others through me) to the great many products he had to offer. My greatest regret regarding HIS Zone VI has always been that I did not participate in his workshops when I had time to do so.

 

I now begin to wonder where the difference is in the way we all feel about the buisness that Fred Picker once instilled in us. We all seem to agree there was nothing like it then, most of us seem to think there is a need to experience that again, but in a somewhat different way. As I recently indicated, I personally hope that Anthony and his FineArtPhotoSupply will succeed and have a great following in all of us.

 

When I originated this thread my Zone VI business formula was this (components are not listed in order of relevance and I may have missed a few):

 

Zone VI = knowledge + information + catalog + product + newsletter + workshops + service/warranty + personnel + Fred Picker (all should have a "great" attached to them)

 

Some of us seem to think though (as your last sentence indicates to me) the formula was actually:

 

Zone VI + knowledge + information + catalog + product + newsletter + workshops + service/warranty + personnel = Fred Picker

 

I think that's the difference. The latter cannot be replicated as Fred is not among us anymore.

 

There is no question that Zone VI without Fred would be a different experience. While I do believe most of what we missed can be recreated, Fred himself cannot. But does that mean there isn't someone else with his expertise, enthusiasm, urge to help-edcuate-and-share ?

 

If I heard of Zone VI back in business as it once was, it'd be like a relief for me. It would not mean I'd be just blindly purchasing from them, far from it. But I would not mind NOT having Fred on the other end of the line. As long as the NEW Zone VI delivers on its original values, I'd be very very happy.

Look at what remains of the Zone VI product line now one year later- the VC heads

discontinued- leaving us with heads that are totally inappropriate for the bulk of the

papers manufactured today VC papers. I may need to get out of 8x10 for lack of any

way to print enlargements from them since I can't get the VC head I'd been saving

towards. And to hear from Calumet that the 5x7 VC head was not going to be

discontinued and then to find that just two weeks later it is nearly out of stock and

discontinued is just bad business.

My Lab, Color Prints Inc, Milwaukee, has just informed me that my last order of five, 16x20 prints of Zone VI brilliant was absolutely the last. Ah, The melancholy of it all.