2006 view camera conference?

[michael Allen]

Did I read correctly in the new VC mag, the 2006 VC conference will be held in Rockford Illinois? Does anyone have anymore info on this?
Mike A

[Kirk Gittings]

You are right. Steve is out of town right now at the big Expo in new York. I'm sure he will chime in when he gets back.

[RJ Hicks]

This is good news, close enough that I can be sure to be there.

[Ron Marshall]

What is the date of next years conference?

[Bruce Barlow]

The Illinois Railway Museum is within spitting distance of Rockford - 1 mile square of big metal barns full of old engines, cars, cabooses, etc. I know that this is a draw for Steve, and it is an LF photographer's dream, if he or she has an inkling towards that subject matter. They also have 8 miles of track and take trains out on it. A photographer could easily spend days there. I used to take my little boy when we lived in Chicago. We had a great time together looking at old steam engines with drive wheels taller than Daddy and riding at the back of real cabooses.

Rockford is, well, Rockford. About 1 1/2 hours northwest of O'Hare Airport in your rented car. I suspect Steve went out there rather than closer to Chicago to gain access to less expensive Conference facilities, and less expensive rooms for all of us who might be there.

If you go slightly west there are Amish communities (don't like to be photographed, but interesting to see). North takes you into the Kettle Moraine area, which while not Yosemite is interesting geologically, and has some snaps to be made, too.

Well, he wanted it in the Midwest...

[Brett Deacon]

I was born and raised in Rockford and am excited but more than a little surprised to see the VC conference coming there. According to the recent issue of View Camera, the dates are June 9-11. For landscape shooters like myself there isn't much in the way of inspiring scenery in the vicinity other than forests of the typical Midwestern variety. The nearest scenic vistas are close to an hour-and-a-half away near Galena and in Starved Rock State Park. Rockford does have a nice airport which will be much less of a headache than commuting from Chicago, provided you live near an area served by Hooters Air.

[John_4185]

http://elearning.winona.edu/staff_o/jjs/al.jpg

West of Rockford is an interesting part of the Mississippi Rivery Valley; from Dubuque, Iowa and then North and for about 100 miles the valley is embraced in Bluffs and Coulees on both sides of the river, with a lot of lookouts. The better view is from the Iowa and Minnesota side.

[jim Ryder]

This will open our eyes. Flatness, bounty, the land of milk and honey. The corn will be almost as high as an elephant's eye and endless. I can smell pigs. Some of us will get permission from the, is it Cargill, mills in Decatur where the overpass cuts through a huge mill, that will look like a microsoft pipes screen saver in our ground glasses. This is a great opportunity for us to make some different photographs of a different type of heartland. There really are a lot of Chevy's. Look up David Plowden. Grant Wood. This is the part of the country where the roads run straight, perpendicular, and make checkerboard patterns. Where the weather makes itself known even still far away. Farther west it is flat barren brown in the near midwest green against black earth. Fertility. This part of the country has not had its portrait well made.

[John_4185]

How romantic and incorrect, jimryder.

Fertility

Not Iowa. The farmlands are fertilized by refined petrol. (Fertilizer is made of petrol.) The land went out tens of years ago. The checkerboard aerial view is due to roads built on section lines, simple pragmatics. The corn is for the beef industry, unfit for human consumption. Pig farming, not milk and not honey is the other product of Iowa. Cargill owns the Mississippi. See the levees, the Army Corps of Engineers, the dredging, the Tow Boats, watch the Mississippi flow too quickly from from upstream because the floodplains have been filled for industy. See the flooding from Decatur on down. Don't drink the Mississippi water, and don't eat the fish.

See the truth and make pictures of it.

[steve simmons]

The 2006 View Camera Conference will be in Rockford, IL June 9-11 at the Best Western Clocktower Resort. We will try and arrange a group field trip to the Ill. State RR Museum on Thursday the 8th. By bus the Clocktower is 1 hour from O'Hare but you can drive as well. We may try and arrange some studio sessions as well either on Thursday sometime - either at the Clocktower or in Chicago at a studio. Rooms will be approx 99/night for the three nights. Call ahead to make your reservations.

We are looking for seminar ideas so feel free to make suggestions.

Thanks

steve simmons

[JW]

(Fertilizer is made of petrol.)

Tell that to the cows in our feedlot. We use the cow manure to fertilize our cornfields. Not much petroleum in the stuff that I have ever seen. Maybe midwest cows are different?