Topic: Light Leaks

[MrclSchprs]

What happened to Light Leaks? The magazine. I thought it had a brilliant concept. It did not aim for the technical perfect picture. I thought it was a great magazine. Obviously it stopped, but why?

[charles binns]

Died years ago.  A sore point with me.  I paid for a subscription and didn't receive half the copies I paid for.  It was a great magazine though.

[Francois]

Light Leaks went under despite the subscriptions. Mike Barnes wanted to do everything his way, but I guess his toycamera empire brought everything down with it. I know that he sunk in an incredible amount of money when he had the new website custom made. He was banking on having people move over and pay a premium to get in. As he found out, his view of things was not shared by that many members.

I know Filmwasters started after a... how could I put this softly... a small but unpleasant exchange between Barnes and the founders of Filmwasters.
I know Moominsean put in a lot of time on Lightleaks but never got much credit for it.
Once Mike was stuck with a nonworking advertisement page for the magazine that didn't work and he was stuck on a short delay. He offered a free copy of the magazine to the first person who could fix the file and send him a working copy. I did fix the thing first but then had to hassle him a bit to get my only copy of the magazine.
I know he had a good job working for the federal government in Ottawa designing paperwork for them.
So far, after it all came crumbling down, we never heard anything from him. I don't know if he's still into photography, still trying to sell his prints, still own a Diana... nothing but silence.

You might want to check those out
http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=4532.0
And here's where he's at right now if you want to get the rest of your subscription
https://99designs.ca/blog/portraits/mike-barnes-web-design-interview/

Edit num. 1346
I'm really surprised to see that the toyscamera website is still online!
Well... nothing has happened on it since 2008 but he's still paying for hosting...

[Flippy]

I thought the toycamera site was taken over by the guy who runs the four corner store?

I was involved in a completely different magazine, people bought subscriptions, but only half of the issues went to print. I still get asked about it every now and then, but I have to tell them I honestly don't know what happened, they haven't talked to me for two years and I have no idea if they're going to print the last issues. It's frustrating and sad, but at this point I think it's just going to have to be water under the bridge.

[Francois]

Yeah, toycamera was bought by Nic Nichols from fourcornersdark...

[John Robison]

It must be breathtakingly expensive to print and distribute a physical magazine. The rise of the internet has conditioned us (I'm just as guilty) to expect content to be free online and we know deep down there ain't no such thing as free, someone will spend time and resources on our 'free' content. Filmwasters is a wonderful venue to share ideas and images, information and instruction, and I'm sometimes ashamed that I benefit from the generosity of members without really contributing much, if anything, of value. I always resolve to contribute more but somehow I haven't done so yet.

Kind of a overcast low contrast day here, sorry for the dark brooding post. 

[Francois]

Well, facts are just that.
From what I see, while the quality of the print was incredibly good, Mike did a few mistakes.
First, he opted to use a square format. These usually cost more to ship because they can't be handled by machines.
Second, he had batches printed at a local printer using a good offset machine which he then had to put in envelopes with labels and such.
Third, he had to maintain the subscription list... this takes time, especially when managing the renewals and the new subscribers that come in in the middle of the year.
Fourth, the magazine always stayed a bit obscure... this is not good for sales

In reality, he should have made the magazine regular sized and used a print on demand service. This means that he would have benefited from a wider audience by being showcased on the printer's website. Shipping would have been cheaper. Printing would have been cheaper. And he could have had the magazine produce revenue from all the back issues for years to come without sinking a lot of time managing subscribers.

[moominsean]

Mike was doing a couple other Canadian magazines as well, Photosho and some other Canadian life thing, I think. Last I heard from him was probably 2013. He basically paid me in magazines and I think like $35 each for the last couple I did. He really wanted to do it all himself and not have to pay anyone else (which doesn't work well with all the things listed above by Francois) and he kind of pissed off the few people working with him. No idea what happened to him. I think he was in real estate as well. I'm sure tc.com wasn't cheap to run but he definitely ran that into the ground, to the point where google actually blocked it because of spam. Lightleaks (which he changed to Light Leaks) was fun while it lasted. He did ask me to do one more magazine, the Polaroid issue, but I just opted to write one article on Type 80 films. You can still buy them on Lulu, so I'm sure he's still around doing something.

[This-is-damion]

Can we talk about the Calenders yet?

[Francois]

I don't have much to do with those, so I  can't say

[astrobeck]

It's sad what all happened.
But, we are all here now and it's a much better place!

[MrclSchprs]

... it's a much better place! ...

As much as I love internet, it killed nearly all the magazine fun. A downloaded PDF does not give you the anticipated waiting for it, finding it at your doorstep and holding and, yes even, smelling it. And browsing a PDF is a complete joke as well. I want my magazines back 

[This-is-damion]

And the handbook!

[Kai-san]

... it's a much better place! ...

As much as I love internet, it killed nearly all the magazine fun. A downloaded PDF does not give you the anticipated waiting for it, finding it at your doorstep and holding and, yes even, smelling it. And browsing a PDF is a complete joke as well. I want my magazines back 

I totally agree, nothing on the internet can compete with the real thing. But I realize that it must be hard to keep a magazine afloat when more and more people turn to the net. I keep buying some magazines still, but there are not many good ones left. I quite like the British Black+White Photography and sometimes I pick up Aperture despite the stiff price. I would have liked to see a magazine with a much more informal approach like some of the Japanese ones, I think that would have appealed to a younger generation as well.