yeffe

"- don't act sneaky (having the attitude "I'm taking a picture, so what?" is much better than

"I wasn't doing anything.")"

Like doctors who spend their entire careers practicing, I am always only testing a new

film/developer combination. If that partially-true explanation doesn't set off an alarm bell

warning of potential conversational entanglement with a wordy time-waster, I don't know

what would. They run back to their pool cues and hot mamas.

The process fascinates me in historical terms. Bound to optical reality (as I practice

photography) it's a medium specifically tailored to the obsessions of the modern age. As I

read somewhere about those who invented the optical/mechanical means of 'fixing

nature's own aesthetic on a page': "what pictures were on their walls?"

"Its all a myth don't believe everything you read, its basically a time wasting argument."

Well, that's a real helpful response. Any of you scornful types want to point me to some

info that supports your assertions?

I sold mine, mostly because, as a glasses wearer, I frequently had to search around the

viewfinder to see the shutter speed setting. This is important to me as I frequently shoot

in low light. I can handle 1/15th sec. and get acceptable sharpness but not any slower. I

already had an M6 TTL and an M3 which I use with a Seconic L208 set on incident. My

exposures using the handheld meter are flawless as are those using the M6.

But mostly, The Bessa is not a Leica.

One of the first rules of thumb I learned at RIT was that (for B/W sheet film) you should be

able to read newspaper body type through the highlights of the negative ( I assume this

means the 'important', or Zone 7 highlights).

Is it me, or do smaller film formats have a tendency toward more tonal compression than

larger formats, all things being as equal as possible? I think so.<div></div>

"I think digital (done correctly and with knowledge) has a broader dynamic range than film.

Sorry, just my opinion."

I'd agree somewhat, with the caveat that digital might have more POTENTIAL dr.Tripod

mounted photos of still objects can be shot in two separate exposures, one for shadow

detail, one for highlights. The two can then be sandwiched in Photoshop layers and

blended for maximum information. A single exposure may be manipulated with some

success using a similar method. But, in what other way can the digital range be extended?

I'm one of those who shoots B/W exclusively in my Leicas. I'm sure I have lots of company. I expose and

develop for extended tonal ranges using compensating and two-bath developers. I get excellent

results.

Digital cameras have a dynamic range close to slower transparency films, seems to me.

So I wonder if any of you Leica fans have an opinion or info about this issue and whether Leica is going

to address it?<div></div>

I should have expected just the response I got. Except for those who chastize for taking

the good stuff into harm's way and those who see it as vanity. Mine was, after all, a dumb

question (you suuure it's cancer?). You takes yer chances and draws yer outcome.

Funny thing is, I never used the 50 on the beach; just a 90 which escaped ravagement.

Hope the pictures are worth it.

I took my Leica M gear to a windy beach yesterday. I did not realize the wind would be so strong.

Besides, how else to get beach pictures?

Bottom line, the aperture ring on my (current) 50 chron has a bit of grit in it. You can hear the sound at

the extremes of wide open and f/16. Now, this is a user lens, in good shape and I won't be selling it any

time soon. Two questions for our esteemed panel:

1. Is there any real functional harm in letting this go.

2. Can the lens be disassembled by the non-expert for cleaning?

Thanks in advance.

Why is it that life drawing from a model is very erotic but not in a prurient way. I've seen

models,men and women,on breaks chatting idly away with the artists and eating donuts;

with no pants on.

No one thinks a thing of it. Gaping, instead of a rudeness you bear in mind to avoid, at say

a nude beach or public hot tub, isn't so much a taboo as just something that never enters

anyone's mind to begin with.

"Yes, but once you've gone through this process, and identified the image that expresses

exactly what you want it too, what improvement can one talk about?"

There are all kinds of conversations that can start once we're done with the stage of

subjecting a picture to our obstacle course of critique, like artist's intentionality and

viewer's reading, for instance. We're now not looking for improvement but for

nourishment. Even the 'failures' on our film can be profitably studied this way.

"The difference in photography that there is no geometrically-defined form to which the

image can be improved upon. In photography, an improvement is always a digression in

one way or another. By polishing and oiling all you are doing is reaching one stereotype or

another."

Improvements can be enhancements, as a setting can be for a jewel. But my perusal of my

own contact sheets reveal a process by which I find (sometimes grope toward), then pare

down, the visual idea. The idea may be hackneyed or brilliant but the hits and near-misses

are clearly identifiable once on film. After that, criticism may be a matter of: "I don't like

street pictures." Or: "So and so did it much better." Tell me something I don't know.<div></div>

Sorry,folks:

Nadia Comanece got a perfect ten. What's wrong with you! Oh,yeah, you habitually tend to

cut off a little space on the bottom: one demerit. Bokeh could have been better: where's

the uncoated lens you bought six years ago? What? you CROPPED???

""The man of talent is like a marksman who can hit a target others cannot hit; a man of

genius is like a marksman who can hit a target others cannot even see" - Arthur

Schopenhauer."

Genius is the ability to create something,or make intellectual connections that have never

been seen before. Ray Charles, Einstein, Wordsworth.

Talent is the ability to stand out from your peers but not necessarily by creating a new

approach to their field. Wilson Pickett, Carl Sagan, Patti Smith.

Who's a photographic genius? Steiglitz, maybe. Weston, HCB, Arbus.

"August Sander, in my opinion one of the greatest portraitists ever, followed a project in

the time between the wars in Europe last century, where he wanted to document people in

germany as members of social classes (i.e. farmers, factory workers, secretaries,

politicians,...). He was not at all interested in the personalities of the people portraied, but

understood personality only as something inherrent to a social class. In sociological terms,

he documented a breaking point in the transformation of a traditional european society

and a modern, individualistic society."

Unfortunately, his work, in my mind, is associated with the 19th into 20th century

fascination with 'typeology.' From phrenology, to eugenics, there was a move afoot in the

sciences to class people by physical characteristics in order to predict their behavior, or in

some cases, deisreability as members of society. Unfortunately, this approach was used to

justify sterilizing the 'feeble minded.' Nazi Germany was not the only outfit to embrace this

theory. American scientists embraced it too. the breaking point you mention is that of

rejecting the importance of the individual in favor of that of the masses.

That said, Sander's work has always impressed me for its virtuosity. And, though he

discounts individual personality (a contamination of science by Marxism?) personality is

what speaks to me in his portraits.

"Um, how 'bout a Hassie or Rollei 6000 series and a 110mm f2 Planar? Or, how bout

almost any camera and...a tripod?

The nature of my work is that I've got to shoot at least four frames at these slow speeds,

not because I'm not steady but for head movement and trying to keep the focal point lined

up. Tripod wouldn't help. A Hassie or other bigger camera would be off-putting to the

subjects, noisy and obtrusive when ideally I'd like my subject to forget about the camera to

the degree he can.

"Put it at minimum focus on your subject and see how well you fare?"

Yeah, I know 'bout that. I can always bracket...up, down, right, left, forward and back. I do

a lot of cross-the-table distance shooting with the lux and really no problem with parallax

or focusing (I did have to do some nearest-distance focus testing I'm pretty much aware of

my margin of error in using the focusing patch)

I love your portrait, BTW.

Problem with digital is the lack of control over tonal scale that I can get with b/w and

compensating developers.

Yeah an SLR will do these jobs and a whole lot more. But my technical success rate with

my M rig is astounding and It allows me a smoother, more casual-seeming approach to

my subjects.

Newman was great in that, among other things, he pioneered using the properties of wide

angle lenses to suggest the energy of modernism in portraiture. I'm sure many of his

subjects were delighted to be in front of his lens rather than Karsh (god forbid) or Avedon.

I was so dissapointed when the first Photomic F came out. I loved the original Nikon finder

and was not happy to trade in my vanity for ttl meteringbut of course I did.

Why I use Leicas: Check out the attached shot: 1/15th sec @ 1.4-2 with a 75mm M Lux.

How else could you do this?<div></div>

"Sentiments consistent with the Hermes a la carte view ... just marketing hyperbole."

A Rolex watch would be so much more practical and lighter...but everybody has one of

those. Unfortunately you can't escape the drives that were set up during childhood (I'm a

big Jungian: 215lbs.) Advertisers prey on these unfortunate constantly re-playing tapes in

our heads (there are only a scant few when you boil down the particulars). They control the

show (desire/fear) unless we do.

My Leica makes me feel bigger than my 215. Maybe 300. Throw in the Mercedes and I

can't leave the house and have to use a bedpan. Good thing I still have Jung. There's lots

of reading to do.

http://www.leica-camera.com/markt/bibliothek/produktinfos/msystem/index_e.html

"Have I been able to support myself with my art alone? No."

That's an unfortunate but widely experienced situation. Sheila Jordan, a woman born to

sing jazz and 'art music' at the top of those fields had to work in a Manhattan ad agency

for years as a typist to support herself and her daughter (abandoned by the girl's father).

A good friend of mine said that art is good for half a living anyway. When your personal

interests coincide with your work however, there are lots more tax deductions to be taken.

Personally, it's been a struggle...but I've achieved a level of expertise in book jacket design

that's been analyzed by grad students in Japanese history at Stanford (silly crapola, but it

IS Stanford.) But the money still sucks. Striking Harvard clerical workers put it well during

their unionization drive in the mid-eighties: "you can't eat prestige."

Thanks for your kind words, Owen. I checked out your page and your figures remind me of

what I've always loved best about Wynn Bullock: the georgeously rendered flesh integrated

via design with surroundings. The passive nature of the models' pose and expression

contributes to a sense that one could very well be looking at a photo of mushrooms...but

what beautiful mushrooms! Your photos are less sentimental than Bullocks (a plus in my

book)...and more aggressively designed. Bullock seems quaint at times, that child nude in

the forest...reminds me a bit of Gene Smith's 'walk through paradise garden."

http://www.users.qwest.net/~jmcosloy/index.html<div></div>

Thanks, Owen. Finding a champion or mentor really is the trick. You need someone

established on your side to pick up the phone and vouch for and maybe promote you to

people you'd otherwise never have a chance to meet.

"If you find out what the difference between Art and Fine Art, let me know."

It's pretty much like watches. Timex is a watch. Rolex is a fine watch. However one rates

art, serious collectors and critics have their egos on the line as every one in their circle

knows what they've bought or written. If the art carries that far, I suppose its fine art. If

later history recognizes the heretofore unrecognized work and bids it up....it's fine art. If a

restaurant charges a 100. prix Fixe...its not no hot dog shack. All the rest falls in a catchall

category of 'the stuff humans make rather than nature."

Other than that is personal art used for therapy, documentation, self-discovery, etc.

BTW: Have you been successful Owen?<div></div>

To those who lambaste the clubby in-crowd that makes up the art world, I have two things

to say:

One is right on! The shmoozy aspects of the art game make me puke.

Two is, wasn't it ever this way in almost any field where talented strivers compete for

sunlight? Even science is affected by us/them political splits.

Better to take this bull by the horns than to cry sour grapes. After all, if the reigning

aesthetes are so superficial, there should be a way to show them the cream in the midst of

all the Coffeemate.<div></div>

By 'fine art' (a term as icky as can be) I mean the highest reaches of the market: museums,

galleries, books, etc.

I have a lifetime of personal work that, when put together, is much more than the sum of

'family snapshots and portraits. One avenue I'm thinking about is a limited edition of

hand-made books of some kind.

I don't seek to be the next Friedlander but simply to find an audience for my work.<div></div>

Thanks for your thoughtful response. I aimed for a career as a photographer with a

teaching sinecure. Alas, the photo-education boom of the 60's - 70's had just peaked

after I attended a year-long grad program with Minor White at MIT. None of my classmates

landed teaching jobs either.

I'll gladly discuss the ramifications of the fine art world as it stands today)as much as I

understand it) with anyone who's interested.

Maybe my myopia has caught up with me but I haven't found discussions of the fine art gallery and

museum 'game'. That is... getting somewhere...or not...as a fine art photographer.