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December 15, 2006
CLICK!
A hundred and twenty fifth of a second. Not long, really in the grand scheme of things. Though it is, possibly, to our lifetime as we are to the history of the planet.
Photography - been interested in it since Uncle Wally gave me an old Voigtlander bellows camera, nearly 35 years ago:
the first camera
I summoned the family to sit for me, this is probably from my first roll of film:
my father
A tripod would be essential in those days but for this, if I remember, I just sat the camera on a table and hoped. There were two backs to the camera, one was the viewfinder - a ground glass screen upon which you could see the image, upside-down. Then, when you were happy with the composition and the focus, achieved by sliding the bellows in and out:
You took the viewer-back off and slid the film-back on, with its roll of Ilford 120, 12 exposure, film. Then you set the aperture and the shutter speed, closed the shutter, slid out the front of the back, primed the shutter and CLICK! Instamatic it wasn't, but it was sophisticated. There are little knurled knobs to move the lens up and down or side to side, respective to the film-plane, to adjust the parallax. There is even a little spirit level to make sure everything is, well, level.
I’ve always been more interested in photographing people than objects, just as I prefer to paint people not still-lifes.
I think a photograph should be something else than just a record of a time and place. Though if the time and place is significant then that will suffice:
Tenzing Norgay, on the summit of Everest, Photo: Sir Edmund Hilary
and now, to span the time, twixt the first and the last, here’s one of my most recent photographs:
Emily
The photographs of the Voigtlander were taken with a Nikon D200, I must get a roll of 120 film and take some pictures of the Nikon with the Voigtlander.
Posted by john at December 15, 2006 11:28 AM