Category Archives: The Week in Links

The Week in Links, belated April 30th 2010 edition

Pinhole photography is something I think I’ve mentioned before, but here’s another cool DIY pinhole setup presented at Damn Cool Pics: how to make a pinhole camera from a matchbox. It uses 35mm film with a 24x24mm frame size. The film transport is especially clever, I think, using a piece of plastic to make a noise every time a sprocket hole passes – wind the film and count sprocket clicks to get to the next frame with some accuracy.

One of the great things about film is its archival qualities, especially traditional silver-based black and white film. How does developing some film exposed 31 years earlier and getting great results sound? Can you be sure that if, in 2041, you were to find an old SD card with a bunch of proprietary RAW files on it, you’d be able to even find something the card would fit into, let alone read the contents? It’s not like you can hold it up in front of a light source and just look at the photos, after all. Would the data even be intact after 31 years? For the record here, I’m an IT guy, I’ve been around computers since 1984 and have done the data obsolescence dance far too many times to ever use the words “archival” and “digital” together without the word “NOT” involved somewhere.

Cearta.ie has a good article debunking Ten Copyright Myths. They should make everyone read and understand this before they’re allowed to use the “Save Image As…” menu option in their web browser.

The week in links, April 23rd 2010

Via Reuters: “Nokia exec: phones to make system cameras obsolete“. I checked, it wasn’t posted on April 1st. Call me crazy, but I really can’t see this happening. On the other hand, if I ran a company which depended on sales of compact point and shoot digital cameras, I’d be looking at cellphones and the lower end of the mirrorless interchangeable lens segment with much fear and loathing right about now as their outflanking maneuver unfolded around me.

The Discerning Photographer has an article up explaining why it’s important to do at least some of your own printing. I’m in agreement here: sure, it’s convenient to be able to present work online, but a printed photo just has something about it which viewing on a screen lacks.

The Week in Links: April 9th 2010

I don’t know why, but there’s something about old, abandoned places which fascinates me. So of course I was captivated by this series of photos taken on a tour of the Chernobyl power plant grounds and neighboring abandoned city of Pripyat. Be aware there are a LOT of images on the one page, it will take a Very Long Time Indeed to load if you’re on a slow connection.

Just found out about a new creative teaching site which has gone live. creativeLIVE will stream lessons on various creative pursuits. For free. Photography will be one of the subjects covered. Only the live stream will be free; to watch later, or download for your iWhatever, will cost a small sum per download. Sounds pretty good to me!

Artinfo talks about the photo by Richard Misrach used as the Apple iPad’s wallpaper. Somewhat ironically for the current most-talked-about digital gadget, the photo in question was not shot digitally, but on 8×10 large format film. Lovely photograph either way though.

Lightroom Killer Tips has 3 tips for smart collections in Lightroom, well worth a look if you’re an LR user.

The Week In Links: April 2nd, 2010

David duChemin had a crazy idea this week. Become a better photographer by not buying loads of gear. Thom Hogan is riffing on the same subject and the tendency to “blame the equipment“. Lord knows I’ve been guilty of that in the past, complaining to anyone who would listen about the limitations of my old digital camera, the inadequacies of its control interface, its lack of speed, and so on. Yet I used that very camera for a week in Costa Rica and never once considered the problems I’d been whining about just days earlier. I spent the time shooting great pictures of incredible scenery and enjoyed doing it.

Are you as forgetful as I am? This week I finished up my first trial roll of Ektar 100, switched it out for my first trial roll of Portra 400NC and was lucky to take only one shot before I remembered that I had to set the film speed manually on the F-1. I’ll pretend I was testing the overexposure latitude. Yeah. If I was following a checklist as suggested by DIYPhotography, even for something as simple as loading a roll of film, I might not have missed that glaring omission. Linked from a comment on the DIYP article, Scott Bourne seems to be on the same line of thought here, too.

I like where this is heading. Buy less gear. Enjoy what you have and quit worrying about what you don’t. Remember to reset it to sane defaults. Remember to bring it. Be ready to use it. Wise words.

On a different note, The Online Photographer has a new article entitled “Facebook: Ripoff and Appropriation?“. It does seem as though the folks at Facebook have comprehension difficulties when it comes to issues of privacy and copyright. Not the first time they’ve tried for a rights grab, probably not the last either given their track record on these things.

The Week in Links: March 26th 2010

Note: all links open in a new tab or window, unless I forgot to set that when I added one of them!

First up is not photography-related, but is someone who I’ve known for a long time and who is at last going to be reaping the rewards for his effort and commitment to his dream of becoming a published writer. Col Buchanan’s first book, “Farlander“, has just been published in the UK through Tor Books. Check out his author site and excerpts from the book at ColBuchanan.com

Back to photography, specifically film, and the Film Photography Podcast. It’s released in the middle of the month and is on its 6th episode so far. It manages to be informative yet entertaining and funny; not an easy combo to pull off. If my favorite computer magazine of all time had a podcast (yes, yes, I know podcasts didn’t exist in 1988, work with me here) it would probably have sounded a lot like these guys!

For stronger photographic results, Ken Rockwell recommends FARTing at all times. Pass the beans and some Ektar 100! And you, uhh, might not want to go in there for a few minutes.

The Figital Revolution has a test of Ektar 100 in 4×5 large format sheets. I’m not a large format shooter (well, maybe if someone gave me a Speed Graphic and a darkroom to call my own…) but Kodak even releasing this product is meaningful for film folk. Now they just need a good quality film scanner to go with it, maybe around the $500 price-point!

Many years ago, I had a brief interest in pinhole photography. I never did follow through on it, but I recall buying a book about it at some point when I was maybe 10 years old and thinking how cool it all sounded. Well DIYPhotography.net just posted a link to a Make magazine article describing a printable 35mm pinhole camera. Only one small problem: it prints on A4 paper, which we don’t have here in the Land Which Metric Forgot. I’ll just have to buy a Canon FD body cap and make it into a pinhole lens, then, won’t I?

Finally, I would be entirely remiss if I failed to use this inaugural “Week in Links” to give a shout out to my employer – Lakelubbers.com: Lakes for Vacation and Recreation – Lake Lovers Love Lakelubbers. This isn’t just a shameless plug though, it has photo-relevancy as we have extensive and growing galleries of lake-related pictures on the site.

OK, that’s all for now, have a great weekend!