i have mono

Not mononucleosis. Monochrome.

I miss film.  I miss the smell of developer.  I miss contact sheets.  I miss working in the dark, a boombox in the background playing classic rock.  I miss stumbling over my feet to change the station when Christopher Cross sings either of his two hits (Sailing and Theme from Arthur for the non-cognoscenti of Christopher’s large canon).

I miss dodging and burning.  I miss cutting out shapes from shoebox cardboard.  I miss the hum of the fan cooling the light in the enlarger.  I miss the snick of the contrast filters sliding in and out of their frames.  I miss the whisper of the paper tray sliding around on the enlarger platen to get the framing right.

I miss giant square negatives.

I miss incredibly toxic chemicals like selenium.  I miss negatives hanging from the floor joists in the basement like very ineffective fly paper. I miss hanging out with Jim while we do all this stuff.  My guess is the chemicals are all expired now since we both moved to digital for the most part.

These images you see are from contact sheets, so they’re not Photoshopped or doctored up.  They’re what we used to start with.  I miss that.  I know that many of my friends are digital and use Photoshop like I used cardboard and my hands to dodge and burn, adjust contrast with a click instead of a snick, and see exactly what you’re getting within seconds.  No test prints, no approximations.

And that is absolutely awesome.  I wish I had your skills, as 90% of what I shoot is still digital.  Maybe 98%.  Either way, let me be most emphatic — digital is the medium, and the skill is still behind the camera.  My friends who were good photographers before digital are still good.  Great ones are still great.

I’m just saying I miss the darkroom.

There is a Nikon F5 at the camera store.  They want $400.  My guess is that I could trade in my N90s and a hundred bucks and get it.  I will wait for Spring, because it will still be there, I’m sure, and it might be cheaper.  The lenses don’t get cheaper, but you can buy a good paperweight and it’ll cost more than some film camera bodies.

I have a nice Canon F1 in the basement.  It’s not getting dusty, but its bag is covered with a light dusting of drywall mud from our recent basement work.  Nice lenses too, but they’re Canon lenses.  Screws vs. bayonets, one of the great divides, like Orthodoxy vs. Reformation. Or Coke vs. Pepsi. Or Ginger vs. Mary Ann.

As for me and my house, Coke (Zero) and Mary Ann, and strange combination of orthodoxy and reformation.  Leave it to me to complicate a dichotomy.

I will shoot more Ilford Delta 400 (but shot at 320) in the coming year.  Not a resolution, just a statement of fact.

Respectfully submitted,

Canoelover