Arthur Lubow Writes about Jeff Wall, Photographer
Arthur Lubow writes in The New York Times Magazine about Jeff Wall who creates photographs as art. It’s a long piece, but worth your time.
Rediscovering Film Photography and My 4×5 View Camera
Yesterday I bought a box of 4 x 5 inch sheet film (Kodak T-Max 400) and a film changing bag. It’s time to dust off my view camera and have fun making pictures the way we did before digital imaging existed.
Film is expensive. The smallest box of 4×5 film I could find was 50 sheets, and cost about $70.
My darkroom is jammed with lifeless hulks of old PCs and other gadget effluvia. I’ll clean it out, and set up tanks for developing sheet film.
It’s been a lot of years, but “back in the day” I was an avid still photographer, first as a hobby, then as my full-time job in the U.S. Air Force.
After leaving the Air force (eight years later), for some reason I put all my camera toys away. In the past few years I casually played with digital photography, but nothing serious.
Now I’m returning to my roots, using black and white sheet film. I’ll set up an enlarger and do some printing to show my grandkids the magic of analog (chemical) photography.
For my soon-to-be exposed 4×5 film, after I develop and then make (same size) “contact” prints, I’ll scan the negatives at very high resolution. Then I can play with my digital images using The Gimp (similar to Photoshop) on Linux, and print them on a high-end ink jet or similar printer.
I can’t wait to mix up chemicals and get busy.