Dense paths through Colorado mountain trails.
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Follow-Up on VSCO vs. Film Manufacturers
@davelawrence8 well @Kodak just recovered from bankruptcy and we’re liking the direction we’re going. @vsco is doing beautiful job.
— Fujifilmusa (@fujifilmusa) September 12, 2013
Fuji responded to my call for film makers (like themselves and Kodak) to run, not walk, into the digital film emulation and mobile photography business.
They’re right – and I said as much: Fuji is jumping into digital photography with both feet, and they should be commended. They’re making great stuff.
But in film emulation? Mobile apps? Not so much.
And Kodak? For crying out loud, they’re not even in the photography business any more.
So my point still stands: who better to do film emulations than the original film manufacturers?
And now with Totally Rad jumping into the game, the original film stock companies are getting further and further behind in the mobile/software arena.
Again, for Fuji, that’s fine. They’re doing a great business with the X-series of cameras.
For everyone else? Lots of luck.
UPDATE 9-13-13: Kodak responded on Twitter as well, suggesting that they’re still in the film business. However, my digging online found that while film stocks may have the Kodak name, they may not come from the original source. So what: film is film and it has Kodak on the box. For most people, that’s all that matters.
But again – whoever makes the film should be making the digital equivalent.
Also, kudos to Fuji for having some fun in this conversation.
Nothing Stops Detroit
I get lots of stuff from Chicago. In fact, walking around downtown Detroit this summer, I felt like I knew the Windy City better than I know my local big city.
So in early August I had the chance to explore a bit while at a training seminar for work.
Sticking to mainly Woodward Ave., it was a fun stroll through the heart of the Motor City: starting at Hart Plaza (above), passed Campus Martius, and on down to the filming set for ‘Transformers 4.’
I’ve had Detroit on my photo list for a long time – to take a day or an afternoon and just explore. And shoot.
So it was nice to finally do that.
And it’s not like I saw a whole lot. Detroit is a giant city, geographically, and there’s no way a visiting tourist like me could do it justice.
What I did see, though, was a quiet city at sundown, with lots of graffiti.
There’s that whole Abandoned Detroit thing, and as much as I love the abandoned stuff I didn’t want to go there just yet. That’s like making out with someone on the first date.
(what?)
Instead, Detroit and I shook hands on a warm summer evening.
(Photos processed with VSCO Film Fuji FP-100c Negative +++. See the rest of the set on Flickr.)
My photos featured on #iso50: http://blog.iso50.com/32179/alexander-kopatz/
Thank you @circa_1983 @iso50
Perfect. Absolutely perfect. And a helluva story behind the guy.
Paintings by Samantha Keely Smith
Title: Dante Alighieri, The Inferno, Canto XII, line 87
The first book I read as a college freshman, just for pleasure, was The Inferno. These paintings by Samantah Keely Smith are even more beautiful than what I pictured in my mind.
(via Necessity brings him here, not pleasure – but does it float)
8/25/13 – Allis-Chalmers
I knew my dad went “country” when he bought an old John Deere farm tractor and drove it in the Memorial Day parade (and when he started listening to country music, and when he bought two cows for slaughter).
My grandpa had an agricultural museum in his barn filled with mysterious tools and gadgets from his Depression-era farming life. He’d always ask, “Do you know what this used to do?” Of course I didn’t.
So my rural roots don’t run deep, per se, but they’re there. I do like to keep my garden, and I do think old guys in suspenders and unironic trucker hats performing in a tractor pull is pretty fun.
Today ends the month-long On Taking Pictures photography challenge. One month of images, one per day, every day of the month.
We almost never buy the item we buy because it excels at a certain announced metric. Almost no one drives the fastest car or chooses the most efficient credit card. No, we buy a story.
Seth’s Blog: Q&A: Where is the free prize inside?
It’s why I’m an Apple, Canon, and Warby Parker fan. They make things other people make. But the one thing they make that no one else makes is themselves.
Get it?
8/23/13 – Sunrise Through the Willows
Another great on-my-way-to-work shot.
It was move-in day at the college on Friday, so I went in a bit early. And boy, am I glad I did. The sun was a bit lower on the horizon. Hence: this.
8/22/13 – Yard Sale
Thinking this may be my next project: a collection of yard and garage sale signs.
Just the good ones, though. This one seems particularly haphazard, with the tape and the arrow in pen.
8/20/13 – Foggy Sunrise
I don’t do many landscape-type shots, but the morning light and the fog in the field made this one a must-grab.
Shave and a Haircut
Turns out Jordan grew up in the town next to mine growing up, attending a rival high school at about the same time.
But it was his alma mater, his wife’s job, and his own first job in the financial world that brought him up to Harbor Springs, Mich. Now? He’s a barber.
In a tourist town like Harbor Springs, about 10 minutes around the bay from Petoskey, Jordan says his Harbor Barber shop does good business. Fifteen customers a day during the winter, and upwards of 40 during the summer.
He says it’s tiring, being on his feet all day, looking down at customers. But the money is good.
“You can still make a good living doing this,” he said.
Just do the math: $15 for a shave and a haircut. Forty customers a day in the summer.
Jordan says the old straight razors could nick a customer, and then transfer some of the blood onto the leather strap. Cross-contamination. So he uses the disposal razors, but treats them in the old-timey way.
The whole old-timey shave is a novelty, he says. Customers, though, enjoy the ritual: the warm towel, putting your feet up, the patient pace of the job.
Some of the guys felt like they could’ve gone to sleep after The Towel Treatment. Especially after a long night of drinking.
The bench comes from the southern part of the state. The stool comes from Georgia, but the metal was manufactured in St. Louis.
One room. One stool. One sink. One customer after the other.
8/19/13 – Locally Grown
Nothing beats a good farmer’s market – especially when it’s jam-packed with good stuff.
There’s a part of me that could sit down and eat every peach and red raspberry in the joint, at least mentally. Physically…well…
The color. The smell. The craving. It’s all there, man.
8/15/13 – Captain Jackson
Our own local super hero.
I remember almost wrecking my car the first time I saw him, walking down Michigan Ave. in downtown Jackson.
“This can’t be real,” I thought.
But there he was.
Now, he makes appearances and public events, parades, and almost every Chamber of Commerce event in town, promoting safety and self defense.
Captain Jackson tends to be a local shame point. The oh-my-gosh-he’s-here-again kind of reaction. He’s pretty harmless though.
I really encourage you to print some of your photos and if you have the space, decorate your home with it. There’s no reason why a lot of the photographic work we’re proud of should live only in our hard drive or online. People still appreciated printed material and it’ll demonstrate you take pride in what you do because you chose to have it hung rather than tucked away in dusty albums.
The anti Santa
Did you know there’s an evil Santa in some Germanic countries? Via Krampus.com:
Krampus is the dark counterpart of Saint Nicholas, the traditional European gift-bringer who visits on his holy day of December 6th, a few weeks earlier than his offshoot Mr. Claus. Like his American descendant, the bishop-garbed St. Nicholas rewards good kids with gifts and treats; unlike the archetypal Santa, however, St. Nicholas never punishes naughty children, parceling out this task to a ghastly helper from below.
I mean, Jesus, think about that. Santa’s tag-along buddy is a tongue-waving demon who puts kids in his basket and drags them to hell.
How cool is that?
It all makes sense, of course. It’s not enough that Santa have an anti-Santa – like some Bizzarro version of Superman – but that the anti-Santa would balance him out. Think of it more like the Batman and Joker combo: order and chaos. Reward and punishment.
No, to the Deutsch, it’s not enough that kids get a lump of coal or, worse, nothing at all for Christmas when they misbehave. No, they have to be dragged screaming to the fires of Hell, lashed at with whips, and looked after by some clawed demonic exile.
Why isn’t there a horror movie about Krampus? Or, hell, a Rammstein song?