Radio came and then was supplanted by TV. Newspapers had to endure conversions from Ben Franklin at this hand-set manual press to the linotype to off-set. These all required huge adjustments. I go back to the hot-press days and have a grand respect for the technology and the art that went into using it. But commercially, there was more money in TV than in radio and more profit in off-set than in linotype, so the industries chased the easy bucks over the hard ones.
When off-set came up, it had a hard time breaking into the printing field in the US. Part of this was resistance by the unions. Part of it was resistance by the reporters, who enjoyed the luxury of yelling, "copy!" and then being able to take their text down to the nearest dive and reading over and finding three typos and an unintended obscenity -- the delay in typesetting gave them time to phone in corrections.
Digital made its break the same way. It moved into the fringe areas where quality did not count. Then it moved into the newspapers, where marginal quality was acceptable. But, over twenty years, the quality of digital improved and the availability of gear increased dramatically. So, now, digital owns the professional and consumer ends of things, and chemical films have become very much a fringe arena.
There is one sad element in this. In the old day, an amateur photographer could establish just where he or she wanted to be, and could buy gear commensurate with that wish. Today, that really is not possible: you really only have three levels, basic digital p&s, with a total investment (camera, software, printer, paper) of $200 or so, medium digital, with a total investment of around $2,000, and advanced, with a total investment of $20,000 or so and a need for an annual infusion of around $5,000. I just can't afford that -- I own a Leica M6 and a fine set of Leica lenses, but I cannot afford an M8.2. And my M6, even when the meter dies, will be good to go for decades, where that M8.2 will be occupying some landfill a decade hence as a dead puppy.
I would like to ask one of our Resident Pro's, Mark Rabiner, to share with us his annual expenses for the last year in which he used only chemistry and this past year. Mark, no reason to adjust for inflation: give me the years, and I will do the maths.
So, digital has effectively moved photography back to where it was in, say, 1930, with the advanced amateur being found only in the upper middle class.
Marc msmall@xxxxxxxxxxxx Cha robh bàs fir gun ghràs fir! --- Rollei List - Post to rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx - Subscribe at rollei_list-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'subscribe' in the subject field OR by logging into www.freelists.org - Unsubscribe at rollei_list-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the subject field OR by logging into www.freelists.org - Online, searchable archives are available at //www.freelists.org/archives/rollei_list
