Republished from yesteryear on James Higham's Nourishing Obscurity before its great technocrash:
Modern digital cameras are wonderful machines with their whirring and beeping and flashing lights and auto-everything but their reign was short lived as it seems everyone now has a camera built into their 'smart'phones (I wonder what the next fad will be.)
.......but sometimes I get all nostalgic for the days when all you needed was a roll of Tri-X and a camera that didn’t need batteries. Oh and there was also the quiet joy of messing about with chemicals to develop the films and to print the photographs, watching the image slowly emerge on the paper.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be; all of these photos are about fifty years old. Where did the time go and why and how did it pass so quickly?
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| Somewhere in Keilder forest |
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| Horse Guards Parade |
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| ... closing time |
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| St Nicholas’ Cathedral |
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| The cat in his favourite place – asleep on top of the central heating boiler |
2 comments:
Film and plate cameras produced good pictures but only if you used large format film and an expensive camera. Preferably on a.tripod. A light meter and range finder helped.
From when I could first afford a camera, a good half- frame, which still works I realised that size mattered. A small film format only gives good pictures with fast monochrome film.
Followed by two good 35 mms slrs. Better.
Waited until DSLRs with high resolution came along and that, combined with computer digital processing has been perfect for me. I can even do moody monochrome.
The main snag with phone cameras is the delay between tapping on the uncertain button and image being captured. The moment is lost.
Having a digital camera also revealed to me why many film photographers were revered.
Be able to afford a good camera and shoot off spools and spools of film, and a few of them will be classics.
The advantage of monochrome film was/is that the prints and negatives do not deteriorate with age. 100 year old black and white negatives are as good as the day they were developed. Colour, it all goes weird during a few decades.
I love Horse Guards Parade and the steps to St Nicholas Cathedral.
Atmospheric :-)
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