panochrome.com goes online

I dedicated a new website to classic monochrome panoramas. Finally, after hovering on several months beta, it went online with 2 basic galleries. When times allow I will add more selected panoramas there. Christmas is always a time of work out some hangover stuff, ain't ? Now heading to Malaysia, I bring nothing but the xpan and 4 rolls of film ! Happy Holiday to all of my readers !

Expired Film

There are 2 type of expired film:

a) In the box
The film is as you bought it lying in your drawer for the last x years while you always thought "I should use this one next time I go out". The next time happens and you think "hmm, if this film doesnt work anymore... maybe keep it for some experiments" (which never gonna happen). The problem, this expired stock grows if you were to greedy while buying stock last time !
b) In the camera
This effect happened always to my grandma or auntie which kept the film in her point-and-shoot camera from Christmas to Easter and the 60th birthday of uncle Jim 3 years later. But it happens to me because I have this collection of cameras (and I only collect camera that I can use). Luckily I have a little brown notebook where I take note of all films, date and locations. Close to the end of 2007 now, I do some inventory and found 5 film in various cameras. Think gonna go out today, if it ever stops to rain, and shoot them !

Christmas Time

Ain't ? Time for presents and toys. After 2 weeks moving with house and office I indulge myself with a new toy: This lovely Mamiya AFD and a couple of lenses (55,80,120,150). Oh I love it ! Lucky I still have big stocks of film in the fridge. Now waiting for the rain to stop ! Early next year will start hunting the ZD back, maybe for easter ;-) Isn't ebay a wonderful thing ?

Winter Panorama

Based in Singapore for 5 years I lost wintertime and even seasons. Yes, I miss the cold time of the year with occasionally snow and short battery runtime in the camera, condensing lenses coming back to the house and all the stuff. I dont miss ice on the roads, getting dark at 5pm.
This Noblex shots are a couple of years old, but they accompany me in this romantic moment.

Vertical Grain

I woke up this morning and thought: Film really gonna disappear ? (after reading yesterdays news that Kodak stop producing 3 more films by end of the year). Will my collection of cameras, which I used all (at least once) render useless exhibition artifacts ? I am thinking about digi back in medium format. Nuts, aint? Some verticals as remedy for the sensitive reader. Streets of Singapore.

Krasnogorsk FT2 Panorama Camera

Finally, found one on 1-2-3- ! Always missing in my collection of panoramic cameras. The FT-2 was manufactured from 1958-1965 by KMZ – Krasnogorsky Mekhanichesky Zavod (Krasnogorsk Mechanical Plant). It exposes an unique 120 degree on 24x112mm using a 50mm lens. Its now on the way, might take a while before reaching Singapore. I will update you.

Book Printing

I worked out the layout and content of the first coffeetable book in pretty short time as part of the presentation I was doing. The quality did not meet my expectation, the paper is ok, the tone matches (almost) the colors of my reference prints. But in some images are stripes, which are not in the original. The paper of the embedded cover image is curling. I will find out what printer they use.
I must say I am very happy yo hit such a steep learning curve again ! Last wedensday I attended a presentation by HP about their Indigo digital press (link). Thanks to Andrew Ng for the professional presentation. They invited people to bring along image files for on-the-spot print out, and I am pretty impressed by the quality of the results (without touching up or adjusting the images before printing). The Indigo printer is nothing for home-use due to the $-tag but you should look for a company using it. I am preparing now the next batch for another local printing company using HP Indigo press. I will update you and upload a before-after comparison.

Daily dose of panoramic grain

Why is grain so attractive in some images, the same time we are pushing the limits of digital photography in terms of resolution ?

Recap P.I.X. Singapore 2007

Finally its done. I did my presentation about Panorama Photography. I enjoyed both preparation and doing the presentation. The auditorium was half full and the participants were looking interested. My problem: I tried to pack too much into the presentation. The organizers problem: they gave 50min and there was no break between the sessions, so people needed to run out and join the next session, that might have started already because you extended a couple of minutes. Never mind, it was a good start and I am looking forward to next years event (I hope there will be one!).

To all attendants: If you like to have the slides or any panorama related questions, dont hesitate to drop me an email.

All the best !
and now back to my new upcoming pano projects and backlog of stuff !

Principles

2 Principles in my photography:
1) I follow very strictly the approach to create the panoramic image on the spot ! I never created panos by cropping a regular picture trying to get something out of it. Maybe for reviewing purpose and to find out if a subject deserves a revisit with the panorama camera. Save your time to discuss this with me ;-)
2) I try to shoot fullframe as much as possible, I avoid any cropping. It teaches you to shoot, not to snap around !

One more principle, but I am not so strict about it: If I shoot color, I occasionally convert it into bw, even I feel like cheating ! This happens very often to color images I shoot during the day, in case the result just lacks of color impact. Shouldnt shoot during mid-day, right ? But you cannot always return on a road-trip to a specific spot at late afternoon because you are already 500km away from it.
And if you loaded color into the cam, you cant change it (without lots of waste).

I share a converted sample with you:

6x17 with Agfa RSX II, but I am not happy with color version.

panochrome book

Always carrying around ideas, but it takes ages before they manifest themselves. This is the first copy of my panochrome book.
PANOCHROME [PANO]rama-mono[CHROME]. I want to use as presentation material at next weeks P.I.X Singapore (link) when I talk about presentation of panoramic work (online, prints, frames, book,..). Please be inspired !

Heading West 3

More selected images from the series and exhibition.

Panorama Presentation

I am in the middle of the preparation for the presentation about Panorama Photography I will do at the P.I.X. Photo Imaging X-Change Singapore event on November 4th (link). The research about this topic reveals lots of interesting stories and information, which I didn't know before. I am "doing" Panoramas, I don't have Ph.D. on the history of it. One of the websites I re-visited is the collection of Panoramic Photographs (Taking the Long View, 1851-1991) showing a big number of very old images available in high resolution, as early as 1850. Amazing what these pioneers created with simple and bulky cameras. Thanks to the Library of Congress for maintaining this collection and making it so easy accessible.

Even only 1 participant might show up the presentation, it was worth the preparation and the research. If you join, I will tell you a bit about the history of panorama photography, its origins, todays available cameras and techniques, will talk about styles and tools, show some images as appetizer and give some advice how to start your journey into the panoramic world.

(c) Panoramic photographs (Library of Congress) pan 6a26071

Apple iPhone Crack

Oh no..... the site has been hacked. Just kidding. Just want to mention, you wont find any stories, executables, patches, installers or links about Apple products here, not the iphone, not the ipod or whatever product. This is about classic (panorama) photography only. I have regular visitors to this blog and after updating it, new topics show up quickly in the search engine. I just want to find out if this topic changes the visitor stream. So, bear with me and sorry for make you read this rubbish. I am already preparing the next serious entry.
Update 30.10.2007
20 days later, there is not a single hit because of these hot words ! So, dont waste your time trying to bring up the visitor numbers of you r blog or page with odd keywords. Be a serious blogger !

Heading West Part 2

I continue my journey through these old negatives. I just realized how much I like them and almost missed this pictures, didnt look at them for along time.

Contact Sheet

Isn't the good old-fashioned contactsheet a wonderful thing ? I was used to create them in the darkroom by putting the negatives under glas on a sheet of photo paper, later keeping them in a folder for browsing. It helped me to decide which negative finally to print. Moving to digital I stopped doing that (using the digital contactsheet in PS oder any image browser). And Why ? Because in the digital age you do 100's of image on a single CF, ending up with 5mm by 5mm sized thumbnails on a contactsheet (and most of the images might be even meaningless). While returning to film in a hybrid way (shoot film, scan and print digital) I am also back to my favorite contactsheets. I scan and print one for each film, put them in a folder and enjoy browsing through it to gather ideas or decide which one to print. Give it a try ! Is much more fun than "page-downing" through hundred of images in fornt of the screen !
Remark: A contactsheet is a very "personal" thing which I would not share normally.

Heading West

Blog entry No. 100 ! Thanks to all readers and re-visitors.
I use the occasion to delight you with a selection of images of an exhibition I did in 2002 in Germany. Took me five years to finally scan the negatives, even I am not convinced yet, what will survive on the long term, files or negatives (files on DVD will def. loose based on current studies).
All images from this series (Exhibition was titled "Heading West") are shot with a Bronica ETRs and a pano back or 6x4.5 back, the locations are in Nevada and California.

Creative Time and Space

Some reflection about creative output or value-time. Do you realize, the more you are distracted, the less you get done or the less creative ideas you have ? Some observations:

• The more equipment I bring along, the less focused I am. Always thinking which camera should I use now.
• I sit in my room/lab/photo office (whatever you call it) and I get distracted by the various books I want to read/look through or finish, by the stack of negatives I need to scan, the number of images I want to print and frame, the untouched book project, surfing the web for inspiration, writing these blog.
• The best creative ideas (for books, projects, experiments) I get while traveling in airplanes or lonely hotel rooms on office trips (assuming its a dark, cold and less-interesting environment around the hotel).
• It seems there are creative time corridors during the day, you should find out about yours.
  
• The more GB's of images you try to produce on a trip the less you create, you get stuck with sorting out the images. Rather shoot less.
• I feel not satisfied when I dont get anything done during a whole day, but also very happy when I finish only one thing.
  

Conclusion: You can do only one real creative thing at a time. Try to focus and let it flow, anyway you cant force the ideas to come. Whatever we do, we wont be able to visit all places we want to see and explore, work out all ideas and so on. Maybe thats not the point anyway, just enjoy doing what you like.

I write these lines, while scanning 5 year old negatives, sorting other image files on my harddrives, cleaning the clogged printerhead for the 5th time in 4 weeks and thinking of the next entry in my blog, which will be number 100.
My 2 cents for today.

Vertical = Panorama ?

The question might be technical or rather philosophical. What defines a panorama ?
[pan- + Greek horma, sight (from horn, to see; see)] or
An unbroken view of an entire surrounding area. (link)
From this prospective a vertical would not be panorama, but you can bend it by lying on your side and seeing a scene (90 degree). The vertical is shot with a panorama camera, so does this fact make a vertical equal a panorama ?
To be honest, I dont care. I love both and sometimes I feel like turning my 6x17 by 90 degree and shoot !
Some subjects really ask for the vertical format, sometime you need to think out of the box (or lets say out of the panorama) to see it (bot as photographer and as viewer!).
I will do a little presentation about Panorama Photography during Photo Imaging X-change 2007 (held in conjunction with Imaging Expo Singapore 2007, November 1-4). So if you happen to be in Singapore, feel free to drop by. There a lots of other interesting workshops and presentations as well. More info @ www.pix-singapore.com

I share some verticals with you (also from my last Australia trip through Queensland).

Queensland Panorama

I still want to share some panoramic work that I made during the recent Australia trip. I have been off to Germany for the last 2 weeks, so while being really offline, I didnt update this page, your bear with me. Some more thoughts about panoramic Australia: So much I appreciate the panoramas by Ken Duncan or Peter Lik for their craftsmanship, experience, strong colors and so on, I sometimes dont feel like following their style and do another similar shot. Of course there are only limited ways to do landscape photography, no doubt. A panorama is special, on recent trips I occasionally didnt make a panoramic shot because its already there, nothing new, or I didnt find that angle, that view, which is new. With this attitude you wont find any leftover landscapes which has not been shot 100.000 times before, you might say, just think of the 12 (10?) Apostles in Australia or the famous black tree in the red Namibia desert. But at the end of the day you shoot for yourself ! So I share some different black and white views, which are not necessary typical for Queensland or Australia, but for me they are ! Cheers.