As I write
this I have a dilemma. The weather is so changeable, I cannot see how the
Water Authority is short of water when we are in the middle of the most
torrential rain storm that I have seen for a long time, or why the farmers
are complaining that they want more sun when yesterday was a real
scorcher.
Can I
really write a bit about encouraging us all to go out with our cameras in
the summer? Perhaps a compromise would be to suggest we all go out in the
summer wearing a rain coat to take advantage of the sun! I can solve my
dilemma however by looking at chemical sales, wearing my other hat. I have
not sold any chemicals for some weeks, then four orders in as many days.
Yes, perhaps you have made up your minds and picture taking is under way,
I certainly hope it is.
The
British are famous for their obsession with the weather and of course
photography is seasonal, at least the holiday photography is seasonal. It
is fair to say that we take more photographs when on holiday if it is
sunny than if it is hurtling it down with rain, but are people such as us,
not just holiday photographers, a little bit different.
In
particular the members of the CRC go just that little bit further, we
actually process the films ourselves, even some of us mix our own
chemicals. I would suggest that we should not be so concerned with the
weather, we should be looking for subjects that are that little bit
different. I made this point with the first AV which we did, pointing out
that it is all too easy to take the type of photograph that has all been
done before, it just turns into a mechanical exercise. The problem is, to
take something just that little bit different takes a bit more effort. It
is no excuse however to say that it has all been done before, or nearly
all been done so therefore finding something different
is
becoming harder and harder. If we lived in a digital world then perhaps it
may be possible to put forward this argument, but nature is an analogue
world, it is not black and white (or cyan and red) but an infinite number
of subtle shades and events. Thus there are an infinite number of
different photographs for the taking. The human race, and certainly the
photographic human race, has only been around a minute amount of time to
take a minute amount of photographs to only just scratch the surface of
the infinite amount of subject matter which is presented too us. So next
time you want to go out, let us say on a sunny day, to take some
photographs and the weather turns out to be totally
wrong, you
took along a wide angle instead of a telephoto, you have 1600 ASA film
loaded instead of 200 - stand back for a moment. Take a drink of orange
squash (which should have been beer) and really open your eyes. Look at
really what is there, not what the first glance is that you see, and
CREATE something. The variation for us however does not stop in the
camera. We process our own films so we have the capabilities to vary the
processing or once processed to act on the image in many ways to achieve
that slightly different creation. Even in the final act of presentation we
can be creative. The CRC has for some time had an interest in prints from
slides, after all the Kodak method of direct prints from slides is in fact
a colour reversal process, also interest has been shown in Cibachrome or
whatever it is called now. Just changing the mount can add another
dimension. Slide presentations give yet another dimension and with this we
can introduce another factor, music or narration.
No, it has
not all been done before and there is still plenty of scope to mix and
match the various stages which we go through to finally arrive at the
result which we are looking for (or perhaps never even dreamed of when we
first started out).
How does
all this fall into a column in the CRC News which I like to write about
general things within the CRC? It was seeing some of the creations of
other members which spurred me on to product the electronics to control
slide projectors so I to could create. The bug bit and now I am at last
getting near to finishing my next creation, yet mor electronics, so that I
can create more creations. Thus, bring these creations along to the AGM
or, if it continues ( which I hope it does) to Didcot so we can all see
and hopefully spur yet more people on...............