Wallace Koopmans Artlog

The automatic part of this camera no longer works so I thought I would find out why.  It turns out that the selenium cell that is around the lens is no longer generating any voltage.  It’s a very simple system where the voltage from the selenium cell deflects a needle connected to a small coil “galvanometer”.   As the shutter is pressed there are two plates that move upward, on the top of these plates are steps that determine how far the plates slide based on where they intersect the needles horizo

Just another odd find.  I’m not sure what this means and to whom.

In this image I have used several visual tools to draw the viewers attention to one specific area of the frame.  To begin with the manner that the lines of the wire converge at the point of interest leads the eye inward.  This is reinforced by the contrast of focus at the center verses at the edges.  This differential in sharpness was achieved by selecting a large aperture which provides a shallow depth of field.  This visual cue mimics one way in which we perceive depth in the real world.  The last thing I have done was during processing I increased the brightness contrast between the center of the image and the area surrounding it.  Whether this is a good image or not isn’t crucial, but it does achieve the intended outcome.

When you have film cameras you need film.  Having film on hand makes it a lot easier to overcome the barrier that using film costs more than digital.  Very fortuitous timing occurred with this film.  I walked up to the counter just as the photo manager was cleaning out a drawer and placed these on the counter.  My first words where I will take a box of that film.  I think he though I meant one roll.  Once we cleared that up and he scanned in the price I modified my request to OK I will take it all.  Well twenty rolls was all that they had but at 49 cents a roll that isn’t bad at all.  So 20 rolls times 24 exposures is 480 that should keep me going for awhile.  All told when developing is included (I scan my own film) it comes to about 15 cents per exposure.  For me it’s well worth that cost to be able to use some of my old cameras.

I’m often reminded how much fun photography can be, not because of the images but the people I meet.  Yesterday I went up to the Bradner area to try and get some daffodil shots.  This year the flowers have bloomed  early, too early.  There just isn’t the market for them yet and so they are being left in the fields.  There is only so much that can be held in cold storage.  The fields that I wanted to go to were clearly not accessible from the road so I stopped at a local house and asked who’s fields they were and how I might get to them.  And that is when my daffodil growing lessons began.  My guide Rick took my across his property and out to the neighboring fields and explained to me such things as how the bulbs were dug up every two years and sorted, how the fields were rotated and rested.  Did you know it takes seven years to create a new variety.  I spent less time than I normally would taking photo’s, more like taking snap shots as we walked, but it was well worth it.

I think I love the deep greens of spring more than anything else, well that and the yellows.

I don’t know what is so appealing about paint flaking off a sign but it does embody the passage of time.  OK two plays on words in one sentence that must be a record for me.

Sometimes something just grabs your eye as you are walking by.  So as I was getting a coffee the other day and was walking back to my vehical I noticed how the space between the trees mimicked the shape of the arrow on the ground.  Fortunately no one ran me over as I crouched down to get this shot.  The great thing about cameras is the ability to share your vision of the world with others.  It would be easy to assume that we all see things the same but pictures can be as much about the viewer as the creator.

I wonder where he parked his DeLorean.

I was reminded of that remark one of my college painting instructors made when I found myself scrubbing a brush nearly devoid of paint across a canvas.  I really should have thanked him at the time.  My dutiful response then was to make my next painting look like it was sculped from butter.  Now I don’t care so much, but I do love thick creamy paint, more placed on the canvas than painted, mmmm butter.