> Next: I deal with every negative I make before I make any more. I
either print it or discard it. In this way I learn from my work. And
since I know what I have done I do not repeat myself. At least it is
easier not to repeat myself when I know what I have done. A major
problem that many photographers have is that they do not deal with
their negatives. Ansel Adams had 40,000 unprinted negatives when he
died, which is why, I contend, that after awhile he just repeated
himself. Edward Weston, on the other hand, printed every negative, or
he discarded it. He kept growing as a photographer.
I wish I could print every negative before I make another one. But
this isn't practical for me: I shoot in TN during the summer, and then
go back to my darkroom in Houston in the fall and spring and print
them. So, I don't really know what I've got till I get there and
develop the film.
I think that you, Michael, go on fairly long photo shoots too. And
Weston was gone for a long time on his Guggenheim trip. So I think you
don't mean literally that you print every negative before you make
another one, although that would be ideal for learning. I think you
mean you don't keep a huge backlog of unprinted negatives. Right?
--shannon
Frankly I don't think that it would even add that much to my learning.
I don't think that a single negative with a problem would have had the
same "Houston We have a problem" type of moment that we have all had
when we find a whole roll of film suffers from a mistake.
As far as negatives, I keep almost all of them. Only the very worst
where it is so totally out of focus or some other problem is found that
it makes the college file. Prints I toss often, but not negatives.
A show on the Ovation TV network has a show on it that plays every so
often is about Ed Weston's wife Charis and interviews her about many of
Ed's photos including the Gugenhiem trip. One thing I always wondered
is why they didn't take a changing bag and at least develop the
negatives from time to time. I suspect the main reason that if you
drive 5 hours or so a day and take pictures another 8, the main thing
you are interested in then is to eat and rest.
Now the latent image is the most prone to damage. I try to at least
develop the negatives if its going to be a while before I can print.
Prints can wait till I get to them or I am ready to do them. Wait with
the negs and adverse conditions may make printing unnecessary. If I
were in Tn all summer, Id try to find a darkroom or make another temp
one. grin On that Shannon you are now an expert.
Mark
To unsubscribe from this list, go to www.freelists.org and logon to
your account (the same e-mail address and password you set-up when
you subscribed,) and unsubscribe from there.