Topic: John Stanmeyer and his Holga

[astrobeck]

You just gotta love a guy that hangs prints on a clothesline in his backyard!
From Film to book....a great read!

http://stanmeyer.com/blog/category/photography/

[sapata]

That's cool...
I only wish my workflow was 10% like his...

[Darnley]

I find the part about spending six months removing dust and scratches somewhat interesting.
I understand the need for large scans for exhibition prints, but if you fluid mount rather than dry mount
your film with a drum scan, the dust and scratches mostly all go away. Of course, wet mount drum scans
also suppresses the film grain and perhaps the grain was important to him.
Or maybe they just ran out of mounting fluid.

[moominsean]

i guess i still don't think that an "archival print" has the same value as a true darkroom print.

not sure how it took six months to "tone" digital scans...i'm a bit confused about his process overall. and while it's nice that he is talking about film, he kind of goes overboard with the whole "oh my gosh look at this magical remnant from the past called film!" speak. he writes like a lomography email ad.

though maybe this is what film is to this new world of professional digital photography. wow! look! film! who the heck uses that?! gee you sure are an eccentric and special photographer!

[Jeff Warden]

Well one thing's for sure, it's good to be a professional photographer in Bali.  The office he's set up is lovely.  And as much as I appreciate film I think Bali is the perfect place for digital.   

As for his process, wow that's a lot of process.  I don't know how it could possibly take that long to spot negatives but perhaps they were in very poor condition from the processor or camera.  Or maybe things just move a bit slower in Bali.  At any rate the images look good to me. 

Holgas are deceptively simple cameras that take real skill to use.  I sure haven't mastered mine.  :-)

Jeff

[Francois]

I must admit the office kinda makes me envious...
Nice yard, fresh air, dual screen setup...

Still, I'm going to settle for my messy office and "vintage" hardware
Bali must be too warm for me in summer...

[Mojave]

Holgas are deceptively simple cameras that take real skill to use.  I sure haven't mastered mine.  :-)

Jeff

Couldnt agree more.

Wonderful article Becky, thanks for sharing!!!

[Suzi Livingstone]

I WANT THIS BOOK.

[calbisu]

Yep, wonderful article and shots!! I also kind of confused for the level of perfectionism intended when scanning and toning the pictures, which, I know its a puerile remark, I think it contradicts the spirit of a toy camera...

[rolo]

Great overview of his process. Took me a while as well to figure out that his use of "toning" meant adjusting levels and curves. Do they call that "tone control" in Aperture?  I also don't know if Aperture has a tool as powerful as the Healing Brush in Photoshop. If not, that could really slow down fixing dust and scratches, though I do still find that process tedious in PS.


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- Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Francois]

Dust removal is a tedious process... though I think he would be happy with an older scanner from Minolta that does medium format and has Digital ICE. Since he's using t-max cn, he would have no problem getting a very good scan in just a few minutes and save hours dusting.