Topic: In No Great Hurry - Saul Leiter

[Late Developer]

During a recent amble along London's South Bank, I popped into Tate Modern.  I'm not a fan of much of the modern art contained in there but there are a few interesting things, the turbine hall (currently undergoing some work and inaccessible) is a great space and the gallery does have a half-decent photography section in its bookshop.

Anyway, I was thumbing through the books when I stumbled across a DVD of "In No Great Hurry" a documentary about Saul Leiter, filmed whilst he was still alive.  It's split into 13 "chapters" and Saul provides his insight and opinions into the various topics.  I'd recently seen the retrospective on his work, so I bought the DVD.  Once home, I put it into my player only to find that my player didn't recognise the zone, even though it was supposedly able to be played in the UK.  Not happy.  After much sodding around, I've just tried it in my Apple Mac CD/DVD player and, although I needed to change the zone, that was a doddle.

Right; the film. If you haven't seen it and you'd like to see a charming, self-effacing and slightly eccentric photographer spend 90mins answering questions on the what, why and how of his career, it is fantastic, IMO.  If I'm telling you something you know already, then apologies - but this is a really enjoyable film.

[Francois]

If you have a PC handy, you can use a program called DVD Shrink (http://www.videohelp.com/software/DVD-Shrink) to remove the region code and make a duplicate.

Thing is, if you change the region code on your DVD drive too often, it will stay in a specific zone forever. They do this to prevent people copying disk.

With Shrink, it can put an 8gb disk on a 4gb disk, or if you have an 8gb dual layer disk, it will copy it as is minus the region code information.

Depending on you model of TV DVD player, there is possibility that there is a patched firmware update somewhere to remove region code management.

Or you can watch it on the computer using VLC Player. I think they have a mac version out. This thing will read any DVD no matter its region code without having to play in the settings. (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-macosx.html)

[Terry]

Another workaround is to get hold of a hackable DVD player (Philips is a good brand for this) and google "region code hacks" to find out what works on your model.  (Or perhaps better, do those things in reverse order!)  I have a couple of DVD players that I have converted to region code "0" which permits them to play any region.  If they're macrovision protected, you can get a cheap time-base corrector on evilbay that strips out the code that prevents copying (in the process of rewriting time code).  I have yet to find a DVD this combo didn't work on.

[Late Developer]

Thanks Guys.

My missus has, apparently, found some gizmo / remote control thing that is compatible with our model (a Pioneer something-or-other) that will disable the area coding.  Hopefully, it should arrive in the next day or two, so the fix should be sorted shortly.  Otherwise, I'll be checking out your instructions, above.

Cheers, Paul.

[astrobeck]

Happy you liked the film and are getting your player sorted soon.

I too enjoyed the rambling along with Saul.  His personality is quite charming...and the rooms in his house were quite interesting.

 

[Francois]

I'll have to get me a copy somewhere.

[Late Developer]

Happy you liked the film and are getting your player sorted soon.

I too enjoyed the rambling along with Saul.  His personality is quite charming...and the rooms in his house were quite interesting.

 

Becky,

I know it's impossible to strike up a relationship with someone like Saul Leiter from having seen a 90 minute film that has been edited, however, I really like the guy and would have loved to have met him.  Not just to do with photography but because he reminded me of a very generous and gentle soul who was my next door neighbour when I was in my early teens.  His place was also a tip and he could never find anything he knew he had.

Francois; yes, you must.  His lessons are sometimes obvious but that doesn't make them any less powerful or valuable. It's also a good watch even if you have no interest in photography.

[hookstrapped]

The movie is available online -- $5 rental for 3 days or $10 unlimited. It was nice.

[Jeff Warden]

The documentary is a wonderful, quiet look into the life of a humble photographic colorist.  I love Leiter's work, and his attitude as well.  There are a few interviews of him online too, and he is his laughing, avuncular self as always.

[gothamtomato]

I love his work and his story. He was an interesting character. I was trying to get him to speak here at the Event Space here at B&H (something here rarely did) and there was a possibility but then we (sadly) ran out of time.