Jack Shares Things

It’s not you, it’s me.

I’ve been following just short of 600 people on Twitter. That’s too many. Signal to Noise failure happened at somewhere around 200 I think. Time to cull some of the folks with, shall we say, less signal.

I started by scanning my follower list and deciding one by one who to unfollow. That was torture. I’d never get anywhere because I want to follow everyone. In the end I just blanket unfollowed everyone. What a relief!

Now I’ll just add back those I miss one at a time, up to a personal limit of 200. You should unfollow me too - it feels good.

I gave in to a crazy bout of gear lust this past year and picked up a lovely Hasselblad 500C/M kit. One touch and I was in love. And just look at it. To me, the camera itself is a work of art. Its looks and heritage combined with the stellar reputation of the Zeiss lenses and how could one go wrong?

I hated it. Nothing about the way it handled was easy. It’s impossible to focus using the standard focusing screen and waist-level finder. The Internet told me I should use the newer Acute-Matte D screen instead. Fine, bought that too. While the image on the new screen was much brighter, I still couldn’t focus the thing. Making it worse is that the focus throw on the lens is nearly an entire revolution. This makes for a very fine-grained focusing action, but it gave me wrist cramps spinning the thing so far one way and the other. On top of that, every photo I shot was crooked. Of course having the image reversed, left to right, makes framing a moving subject impossible. “Get a 45 degree prism,” said The Internet. Got that too. The prism fixed the reverse issue, and made it easier to shoot level, but the magnification was lower, actually making it harder to focus. I tried a portrait shoot with the new prism — not one photo in focus. Oops, didn’t notice the prism had a diopter. Dialing that in helped.

I’d decided to sell the whole kit and get something easier to handle. Maybe a Mamiya 7 or Contax 645. Trouble was, those aren’t 6x6. I love the square format of the Hasselblad. Also, the shots that I didn’t screw up were awesome. They were right about the “Zeiss glass.” And again, just look at it.

As a way to practice, I’ve been shooting some studio portraits at my house. By “studio” I mean a muslin backdrop and a single Alien Bees strobe in my living room. This, to my surprise, has been fun. Also, my hands have been getting used to the awkward controls and my brain has been adjusting to the ground glass and camera’s crazy viewfinder.

Now I’m beginning to get it. This might just be a terrific studio camera. When there’s time to slow down and be deliberate it works pretty well. I may be coming around and thinking that we’ll get along okay after all.

I’m keeping it.

It’s a shame people don’t print more photographs. Handling a nice big glossy print is just way better than viewing a photo uploaded to Flickr at, what, 800px wide a computer screen. Those of us who still shoot film have 2 basic choices for getting our negatives printed. First is by scanning them into the computer and printing them on an inkjet printer. The second is using a darkroom. Nearly everyone has given up darkroom (“wet”) printing because it’s either too hard or it takes too much time. An all-digital printing workflow is just so much more convenient. I spent this past weekend printing both by scanning and in my darkroom. Conclusion? Scanning and printing via computer is convenient, but I’m starting to think traditional printing is actually easier.

Scanning

Scanning film sucks. Everything about it sucks. Trying to get even slightly curled negatives into any sort of film holder is an exercise in futility. Then there’s the scanning software. All scanning software sucks, and sucks hard. I use Vuescan, SilverFast Ai Studio, and Epson’s own software for the V750. I’m convinced they’re just competing to see which can be voted the most user-hostile.

Printing

Assuming you’ve successfully wrestled the scanner to the ground, it’s time to print the file. Hope you’re into monitor calibration, color management, drivers, and ridiculous ink prices. I became so frustrated trying to get a handful of prints made via scanner that I just gave up, went into my basement and printed them the old fashioned way. It took a little longer, but was actually easier. Working in the darkroom is quiet, deliberate, nothing crashes, and when I’m finished I have something “hand-made” to show for it.

I’m still getting the hang of this wet printing thing, but I’m finding that basically all it requires is fresh chemicals and a light bulb. Easy enough.

I guess it’s okay for a decent prog-rock band to go for a hit single or two.

Thoughts about the iPad? I don’t have any thoughts about the iPad — at least none worth sharing. I’ve never seen one in real life, let alone used one. What value could I possibly add by pretending I know anything at all about it?

That’s right, none.

(And please ignore all speculative Twitter messages I may have accidentally posted yesterday - that was probably not even me.)