[LRflex] Re: Leica books - A Tribute to Ted's 82 Great Years - from the "incredible" century for advances in science, mathematics and technology
- From: "Nevin B. Greninger" <greninnb@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <leicareflex@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 28 Dec 2010 14:12:29 -0500
New Year's Greetings to Everyone - from Nevin Greninger who was born in 1936 on
a chicken farm in Central Pennsylvania
Jeff and Ted's visit down through the pages of history were a delight to see.
Ted, you have accomplished a lot in your prior 60 years.
Jeff you have stirred the mind to think about delightful things in photography.
As I reflect back to the the year Ted was born, I am reminded that 1928 was the
year that Paul Adrian Maurice Dirac from Cambridge University obtained by his
equation the fourth quantum number for the electron in the hydrogen atom. As
some of you know Dirac, along with Pauli and a few others, laid the proper
basis for explaining the structure of the hyrogen atom and also the electronic
structure of the other atoms from which modern or theoretical chemistry
evolved. [Today our books in high school and freshman chemistry make much ado
over the four quantum numbers of the electron.]
Within a short period of time after the creation of quantum mechanics, Linus
Pauling went on to explain the nature of the chemical bond. His explanation was
based on quantum mechanics. He gave us the electronegativites for the elements
in the Periodic Table of Chemistry from which some bond energies can be
calculated. Mendeleev gave us the periodic table based on weights, Mosley
shifted it over to atomic numbers, others shifted the base from Oxygen 16 to
Carbon 6, and a little earlier Pauling super-imposed electronegativies onto the
"dining table" for chemists, biologists, and physicsts. So with Pauling's
elucidation of G. N. Lewis' 1916 covalent bond description and great
experimental equipment, scientists can now explain the structure of many
molecules and especially those of biochemistry and the drugs used in medicine.
If we go back some years befote Ted's birth - say four (?) to be precise
[1924] a great event took place in photography - Oskar Barnack gave us the
Leitz 35 mm camera.
Although many of you know a lot more about Leica cameras than I do, I thought
for memory's sake I would copy in Wikipedia's brief biography of Oskar Barnack.
It is as follows:
"Oskar Barnack (November 1, 1879 - January 16, 1936) was a German optical
engineer, precision mechanic, industrial designer and the father of 35mm
photography.
In 1911, he was in charge of microscope research for Ernst Leitz at Wetzlar. He
was an enthusiastic photographer, but the heavy equipment of the day was
difficult for him to handle due to his poor health. In 1912, he constructed a
35mm movie camera.
Between 1913 and 1914 he was head of development of the camera company Leitz in
Wetzlar, Hesse, Germany. He was the driving force behind the making of the
first mass-marketed 35mm camera. Barnack suffered from asthma, and sought to
reduce the size and weight of cameras and supporting equipment used for outdoor
photography. His 35mm design helped introduce the concept of exposing a small
area of film to create a negative, then enlarging the image in a darkroom.
The onset of World War I kept the first Leica from being manufactured until
1924, and it was not introduced to the public until 1925, when Leica's chief,
the optician Ernst Leitz, took a gamble and authorized the production of 1,000
cameras.
Leica stood for Leitz Camera. Instead of the exposure plates used in past Leitz
cameras, the Leica used a standardized film strip, adapted from 35mm Edison
roll-film.
Lynow, Oskar Barnack's birthplace, and currently a municipality of Brandenburg,
Germany, has a museum to Oskar Barnack. Barnack's dog, Hektor, was the name
adopted to a series of Leica lenses."
[Well, one notes that Oskar was born in 1879 the same year that Albert Einstein
was born - on "math" day - March 14.]
In 1928 Dirac realized that the lone electron flying around the proton
(nucleus) - the hydrogen atom was traveling near the speed of light. So he
incorporated Einstein's 1905 "special theory of relativity" into his equation.
This gave the science world four wave functions and all four glorious numbers
for the electron - the principal, azimuthal, magnetic, and spin numbers.
Now what is the significance of all this work. Well, it gave birth to modern or
theoretical chemistry which is the form that now appears in the high school
chemistry textbooks - displacing unfortunately the important practical things
of chemistry known as descriptive chemistry. Dirac's four-wave equation
predicted the existence of the positon that Anderson detected in 1932 and is
now used in Positron Emission Tomography by hospitals dealing with the thyroid
and other biological things. That one could predict the existence of a
particle of great benefit in medicine from pure mathematics is no small
accomplishment. Dirac's equation led him to obtain two energies - one positive
and one negative.
Now there were amazing things that happened between 1924 and 1928.
In 1925 Werner Heisenberg using matrix algebra computed three classes of
Eigenvalues for infinite dimensional matrices giving us the first three of four
quantum numbers for the electron, thus creating quantum mechanics.
Count Loius de Broglie from France (either in 1923 or 24 - cannot recall as I'm
getting a little "senile") using Planck's Law and Einstein's famous equation
and the relationship between frequency, wavelength and the speed of light
obtained the relationship between mass and wavelength for a photon (light
particle and electron) from which Erwin Schrodinger (an Austrian working in
Germany) used as the basis for of his famous partial differential calculus
equation of the second order kind that also yielded the first three quantum
numbers.
These quantum things are studied in an arm waving ["crude"] manner in freshman
chemistry where students lack an understanding of partial differential
calculus. They are treated to considerable depth in junior-senior
undergraduate physical chemistry.
In 1926 two engineers from Scotland demonstrated the first TV in London - the
same year that Queen Elizabeth the II was born and of course also Marilyn
Monroe and the unmentionable one - Fidel Castro - who recently had eventually a
remarkable recovery from a colon operation.
[Some might ask what does this have to do with photography? Well, both film and
digital photography involve light interacting with matter: chemicals (silver
halide) or solid state optical sensors.
Anyone interested in the science associated with photography might be
fascinated with examining the development of quantum theory - something plants
utilize in the photosynthesis process to help feed the world.]
Now around 1930 - maybe someone can correct me about the exact time - the flash
bulb from Europe migrated to the USA making the American 4 by 5 press cameras
most versatile for the news media. [It was around 1957 that I received my
introduction to the press camera and the taking of pictures through the
microscope using 4-inch by 5-inch Panatomic-X sheet film in my second course in
chemical microscopy at Penn State.]
Let us return to around 1944 when Schrodinger in Dublin at Trinity gave his
lectures on "What is Life?" which were subsequently published in book form to
delight many. It was Schrodinger a physicist who helped found molecular
biology a field that now drives molecular medicine - the great hope in
conquering many "horrible" diseases.
It was Charles DeGaulle who around 1957 had the vision to strengthen French
science by greatly enhancing the funding research in molecular biology. This
resulted in 1965 in the Nobel Prize in Medicine going to Francois Jacob and two
others from France for their work on the lac-operon model relating to E. Coli.
The efforts by Crick and Watson (and the x-ray diffraction data of Rosaland
Franklin) to unravel the double helix structure of DNA finally brought great
attention to molecular biology and revolutionized the writing of high school
textbooks on biology. [The Nobel Prize in 1962 for Medicine forgot about Ms.
Franklin's work that made it all possible for Crick and Watson to beat Linus
Pauling to the punch in figuring out the structure of DNA.]
For those with a chemistry or biology bent or curiosity - here is the Random
House Unabridged Dictionary treatment of DNA that some consider the most
important organic molecule.
"DNA, deoxyribonucleic acid: an extremely long macromolecule that is the main
component of chromosomes and is the material that transfers genetic
characteristics in all life forms, constructed of two nucleotide strands coiled
around each other in a ladderlike arrangement with the sidepieces composed of
alternating phosphate and deoxyribose units and the rungs composed of the
purine and pyrimidine bases adenine, guanine, cytosine, and thymine: the
genetic information of DNA is encoded in the sequence of the bases and is
transcribed as the strands unwind and replicate."
Now what about mathematics in the 1920 era? A Polish mathematician Stefan
Banach gave us Banach Spaces in algebra relating to analysis and also to
Hilbert Spaces the latter of which Von Neuman (in Germany) prior to joining
Princeton University used to examine the mathematical foundation for quantum
mechanics.
Some poke fun at mathematics and mathematicians but not Enrico Fermi whose
undergraduate lecture notes in quantum mechanics published by the University of
Chicago Press underscore the importance of Hilbert spaces.
Fermi received the Nobel Prize for explaining a portion of the radioactive
decay processes. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Fermi, he carried
out the first controlled uranium fission process. Earlier on it was Albert
Einstein who wrote to FDR about the work of Fermi and a few others that led to
the creation of the Manhattan Project which was overseen by Leslie Groves from
the US Army Corps of Engineers. Fermi was America's only physicist that
excelled in three areas: teaching, theoretical physics, and experimental
physics. His handwritten brief notes were passed out at the end of each class
to prepare the minds of the student for the message they were about to receive
- so you can easily see why Fermi was a great teacher.
Even Charles Darwin had his "go" at mathematicians. He defined a mathematician
"as a blind man who enters a dark room looking for a black hat that isn't
there."
So all you guys and gals interested in what constitutes the physics and
chemistry of photography might like to take a look at a small portion of the
quantum world that also explains how lasers work, how MRI units work, and most
importantly how the microwave oven makes popcorn and heats our water for tea.
The chemistry of film and paper - including that for ink jets - and the physics
of the film and digital cameras interests some but not everyone.
The aromatic (benzene ring) organic chemistry of film developers and dyes for
prints is an interesting area - even Linus Pauling in his third edition of
"that great textbook" -"College Chemistry" for freshman students mentions the
photographic color process and includes a color illustration.
However, one can still take great pictures and enjoy photography without having
to understand the mathematics of square matrices, "high school" calculus;
freshman chemistry; and sophomore physics.
[For those of you have studied some calculus and infinite series, it ought to
be noted that Isaac Newton at Cambridge in England in 1676 - eleven years after
co-creating modern calculus with Liebnitz from Germany - first used the
infinite series approach to solve ordinary differential equations - the very
same approach Schrodinger used in 1926 to obtain his three quantum numbers for
the electron in the hydrogen atom.]
In closing, Ted's sixty adult years truly reflect a period of great advances in
science and medicine especially the evolution of molecular biology.
And also Ted's birth year is of special significance in science and photography.
Thanks Jeff for orienting our thoughts to great pieces of photographic
literature.
Everyone have a "great" photographic new year.
Nevin a retired chemical engineer who had great teachers at Penn State and at
Cornell University in the mathematics and the sciences many decades ago and who
still enjoys reading and his Nikon F100.
PS: Pardon me for getting on my "soap" box and rambling down through the
roadways of history. I hope this long narrative does not create e-mail
processing problems.
----- Original Message -----
From: ""Dr. Jeffrey L. T. von Glück"" <jgluckphoto66@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <leicareflex@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 1:37 AM
Subject: [LRflex] Re: Leica books
Ted Grant wrote:
From: <tedgrant@xxxxxxx>
Subject: [LRflex] Re: Leica books
Date: Sun, 26 Dec 2010 22:54:14 -0800
Dr. Jeffrey L. T. von Glück offered:
Subject: [LRflex] Leica books
While sitting out the blizzard, I found two other books that were
favourites of my late grandfather: Basic Leica Technique, by R.H.
Bomback (1954), and Die Leica in Beruf und Wissenschaft, by H. Stöckler
(1941). It's great to read through them 50-60 years later and see how
much is still relevant today to a film user. I'm sure neither author
could have ever fathomed the digital revolution.<<<
Hi Dr. Glück,
How about someone who's first picture was published 17 September 1951 and
published every year since? Along with three medical books and a bunch of
other stuff and how I feel about the incredible advances during those 60
years?
And about to be published in a new feature series beginning next month in
the local newspaper weekend feature section. :-) Well I'm only in my 82nd
year so why not? ;-).
It is interesting what was written way back then, but let me assure you it
truly is an amazing experience to have lived through it and learning to
learn and live with it today and still advancing. :-)
Cheers,
Dr ted. :-)
tedgrantphoto.com
Ted,
You are a legend. I love your DVD, Ted Grant: The Art of Observation,
and just viewed it again about 6 months ago. I loaned it out but never
got it back, I think it is making the 'rounds'.
You are 82 years young! My beloved grandfather lived to 87, both
grandmothers to 97. He introduced me to the Leica over 40 years ago.
When he could no longer take pictures, he gave me his cherished 'kit' of
an M3 and the three Summicrons, 35/50/90. The M3 has given up the ghost,
but I still use those lenses everyday on my M5 and M7. I was out and
about this afternoon after the blizzard photographing the aftermath with
my Tri-X-loaded M7 and 35/2 Summicron.
Please post a link to the new feature article coming out next month.
Ciao,
Jeff Glück
------
Unsubscribe or change to/from Digest Mode at:
http://www.lrflex.furnfeather.net/
Archives are at:
//www.freelists.org/archives/leicareflex/
------
Unsubscribe or change to/from Digest Mode at:
http://www.lrflex.furnfeather.net/
Archives are at:
//www.freelists.org/archives/leicareflex/
Other related posts:
