on the road Getting To Know You

Taken with a Leica IIIF and a Summitar 50mm lens. Tri-x.

I find this both an intriguing and flawed picture. The grouping and tones are excellent throughout with the exception of the seated lady in the lower left. I think the glaring whiteness of her jacket is just too strong for the composition and in particular lessens the softly modulated effect of the artists panel which, along with his hand, should serve as the natural focus of the picture. The right side of the composition is so good that I actually dowmloaded this photo and played with it, cropping it in different ways but I found that it was just too tight when our lady of the glowing raiments was eliminated. Alas.

Jack, you are right. Fortunately, the neg for this has enough information on it to allow me to bring down the jacket. I have to get a good scan of it first. I have a few older photos in my portfolio that I need to scan. I need a scanner. I use a cheap flat bed scanner and only scan prints. You caught me out for the lazy rascal that I truly am.

trust reality to get in the way of making a perfect photo, instead you got a good one....

Very amusing image. I'd like to see more of the face of the fellow immediately to the artist's right. But still, a very creative idea well executed. (Now I'm afraid I'll steal it...) About the scanner: You are completely right that the neg can be scanned to yield a perfectly exposed image. I find myself regularly scanning negs twice with my Nikon 5000 ED, once for the highlights (equivalent to burning a traditional print) and once for the shadows (equivalent to dodging), and then merging the two scans.

I rescanned this image with the Nikon Coolscan V and the exposure is much better now.