Originally Posted by
jim kitchen
Dear bobwysiwyg,
Thank you for you comments, and such a provocative question... :)
I do not publish my camera information, my lens, my f-stop and, or my developing information, because I forget to do so. Experience taught me that if I publish the information along with the completed image, and although I capture each negative's detailed exposure information down in my photographic log book, the straight technical information could mislead anyone to believe that my printed image happens to be a pure unaltered print from the negative, whether it is a darkroom image, or not. My images are coerced and, or extracted for lack of better words from the information I captured on the negative, where the final image mimics what I saw in my mind through the viewing card, after I set the exposure for the important shadows and, or the highlights that I deemed important enough to capture with detail.
As a side note, I was taught to either expose for the shadows, and control the highlights during development, which is my primary process, or I expose for the highlights and let the shadows fall where they may, where this decision happens to be different for each scene that I view. This exposure process and development process allow me the opportunity to print the image that I saw when I initially looked through my viewing card, and that decision is made the moment I see an image through the viewing card that I believe may be worth capturing, or has the potential to be worth capturing.
This step is so personal, and sometimes underestimated by many technical individuals, that you should gather several excellent interpretations from several good sources within this forum, regarding this initial thought process to capture an image. What lens, what f-stop, et al? Capturing information properly within the negative is only one half of the equation, where a person's learned talent within the darkroom is the other half of the equation. The latter requires more practice time, wisdom, and continuous mentoring.
Several years ago, I was fortunate enough to take a few workshops with several different gifted image makers that taught me how to translate captured information within the negative to a final image in the darkroom. The darkroom workshops, which I deemed to be more important, were the key to a few successful images in my own mind, and when I learned how to extract that information properly from the negative and place that information properly onto the final darkroom print, and although I made strenuous repeated attempts, I was ecstatic. I still seek guidance today from my former instructors, because I feel that I need to qualify certain methods or techniques that present themselves within my finished images, and more importantly I see spectacular effects within other image makers finished work, which drives me to seek additional answers. The learning curve is continuous.
There are several gifted image makers that shed important information upon their students during a workshop, whether it is inadvertently stated during a sidebar discussion, or poignantly deliberate to gather your attention. A few students may take that information as gospel, and try to mechanically create a perfect image without understanding what the instructor actually said, and then again, there are a few creative forward thinking individuals that can take that statement, comment, or bit of technical data, and translate that information into an applied practical interpretation. The key word happens to be "applied."
Photographic imaging happens to be a passion that many of us share, and a passion that I would compare to a musician that happens to love the music and the instrument they are playing, compared to a musician that is too mechanical, too stoic, too methodic, and is not interested in the music's delicate interpretation. Pianists, such as David Lanz; for example, playing Cristofori's Dream, demonstrate a musician's passion with the musical notes and the musician's natural talent within the musical presentation, compared to not.
You should receive several excellent suggestions from other talented members within this forum, and probably say it with more brevity than I.
jim k
