impossible project

In January of 2009, I posted a blog about the demise of Polaroid film. Briefly, Polaroid had decided to discontinue its entire line of film to pursue the burgeoning digital imagery market. While I suppose they cannot be faulted for attempting to remain financially viable, this decision deprived photographers of a wonderful medium that offered many creative possibilities. Visit my January 2009 post to see some examples

Needless to say, when Polaroid announced the discontinuance of its film line (complete with a detailed product-specific timeline), many photographers purchased large batches of Polaroid film. Today, it is still possible to find certain types of Polaroid film on eBay and through other outlets on the internet, but I suspect their inventories will soon be depleted.

Enter Impossible Project. Impossible Project began (the story goes) when its founder, Florian Kaps, was drinking beer with a manager of a Polaroid factory that had just been shut down. The factory's inventory of $130 million in Polaroid film production machines was scheduled for destruction in two days. Kaps, an admirer of Polaroid film, sought to do what seemed impossible -- "rally a group of disgruntled factory workers to re-invent a nearly destroyed technology and bring Polaroid's instant film business back from the grave. To this end, Kaps and his Impossible Project have been improbably successful." (quoting from an article from Dailyfinance.com by Sarah Gilbert) This was an almost impossible project. When you consider all that goes into such an undertaking - the negotiations with Polaroid, finding sources of funding for such an improbable venture, re-engineering the film production (not to mention a re-design of the film technology itself), etc. - it is quite a remarkable achievement. Sale of the first new product PX100 commences today (March 25th). The film is designed for Polaroid SX-70 cameras of which sources claim, millions still exit. (Actually, the number was 300 million, but it seems so high I truly wonder if this could be right). I, myself, have three of these cameras.

The images I've seen taken with this new film are breathtaking. Although PX100 is a black-and-white film, the resulting images are rendered in slightly cream to sepia tones. Several factors can affect the results: temperature (the colder temps "bleach" the images making them whiter, the hotter temps increase contrast and change the tonality to a dark orange-brown color), exposure to light during the development process and its senstivity to pressure (which imparts a texture). Undoubtedly, photographers will explore all of these to their creative best.

A gallery of images can be seen at: http://www.the-impossible project.com/projects/collection/px100

As you can imagine, I'm excited at getting my hands on some of this film stock shortly. Again, stay tuned, I hope to have some examples available soon.

frogs' legs

An article about the delicacy of frogs' legs appeared in one of my "foodie" magazines this month. I must admit I've NEVER consumed frogs' legs in my life (as the opportunities at even some of the most expensive restaurants I've visited seem limited in this regard). However, after reading the article, I'm prepared to order it any time the opportunity now presents itself.

I remember my first experience with escargots when I was in college. It was at a little, now defunct, French restaurant known as Le Parisienne. This was a very well-established restaurant here in Salt Lake City and helped introduce me to a number of culinary delights that up-to-that point in my life, I hadn't sampled. My first chocolate mousse was devoured with delight there as was my first Dover Sole. The Dover Sole was and continues to be one of my most vivid memories of a dish that utterly overwhelmed me. As you may recall from the film "Julie and Julia," this was the dish that awakened Julia Child's world to the possibilities of French cuisine. The escargot, incidentally, was a revelation. So, it does not surprise me that frogs' legs (which I now seem to recall were offered at Le Parisienne) have been a favored dish for thousands of years spanning the globe.

Archaeologically, fossils from the Neolithic Age suggest we've been eating frogs for more than 5,000 years. They are ingredients in stews, soups, stir-fried with lemongrass, deep-fried, and simmered with chilies, cilantro and garlic ranging from Indonesia to Mexico to the United States (where you can evidently buy them deep-fried at Nathan's hot dog stand on Coney Island).

But, nowhere in the world have frogs' legs been so revered and appreciated as they have been in France. This predominant cuisine was so widespread, it earned the French the nickname of "Frogs" back in the 16th century. The frogs of France belong to the species Rana esculenta. They are spotted green frogs that populate Europe's fenlands. Today, not only does France supply frogs' legs to the world, but other countries have joined in including, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Indonesia and China. These frogs belong to the species Rana tigrina and are essentially known as the Indian Bullfrog. The Asian suppliers farm-raise their bullfrogs, feeding them a diet of fly meal (Yum!). Arguably, the United States is better than both varieties and is much larger. Weighing in at as much as one-and-half pounds, the American Bullfrog can reach a length of eight inches. They devour bugs, fish, snakes and even small birds! (USA! USA!).

The author of the article begins by relating a bullfrog hunting expedition he joins in New Orleans with one of his chef friends. They embark on there camouflaged pontoons, armed with nets, flashlights and coolers of beer at sunset. Ultimately, they bag their prey, a "croaker sack" they call their spoils, the hunters wet and caked with river mud. The chef starts a fire and then coats the frogs' legs with buttermilk, dusts them with a cayenne-seasoned flour and throws them into a vat of boiling peanut oil. The author reports that "the meat was a little chewy, and closer in taste to fish than fowl, with a subtly pungent note that called mind the frogs' marshy home."

Bon appetit!

rangefinder cameras - a brief history

I need to forewarn those of you who are not photography afficienados you need not read any further. I hope to spare you the tedium of investing your time in something that only dedicated photographer geeks would relish. And so I begin.

I just ordered myself a new Panasonic GF1 camera. My recently departed aunt left me some inheritance money. As I've mentioned in an earlier post, we were estranged. As a gesture of reconciliation, I let her buy me a nice gift post mortem (which probably reveals much more of my character flaws than any past "wrongs" inflicted upon me by my aunt. But, as always, I digress . . .)

Technology is the blessing and curse of today's consumer. No matter what and when you buy you can be sure that something better and (most likely) less expensive is just around the corner. I recently visited Pictureline, the camera store, to assess potential further purchases and asked Marcus, one of the salesmen there, which storage device he'd recommend to back up my Mac hard drive. He recommended a LaCie 500 Gig unit which he lamented he had purchased for $200 not long ago but that now goes for $139. This is typical of all things electronic. In essence such a purchase decision should be based upon what level of technology you are willing to settle for at any particular point in time and the immediate (and long-term) prospect of living with it for a while before the next "best thing" and subsequent dissatisfaction sets in. That said, I determined I was ready to leap into the Panasonic purchase.

Here's where I get into the geeky part. If you've persisted in reading beyond my initial warning, this would be another good point for you to depart dear reader. There are many reasons why I chose my latest purchase, but the overriding one is that the GF1 hearkens back to the classic rangefinder cameras. Rangefinder cameras gained widespread popularity during the 1940s and 50s when Leica began manufacturing their M series. The main reason for their success at this point was their capability of accepting interchangeable lenses The popularity of these cameras were somewhat diminished by the advent of the single-lens-reflex camera.

The new SLRs offered a primary advantage over the rangefinder cameras by allowing the photographer the ability to compose through the actual lens that was taking the picture.

A rangefinder only offered a "window" viewfinder built into the body. Although you focused through a rangefinder's viewfinder (through clever engineering) and could determine the angle of view of the different lenses (often through etched lines in the viewfinder glass), you were still not seeing exactly what would be recorded on film.

While both types of cameras offered their own advantages, the primary advantages of the rangefinder cameras were their compact size and their quiet operation. They were embraced largely for their discrete ability to go unnoticed when shooting candids or shooting in a quiet environment. This is because they did not incorporate a mirror that needed to move up and down (and thus the characteristic "slapping" sound, which is amusingly replicated in digital cameras that do not incorporate such mirrors) during an exposure like the SLRs. Surprisingly, rangefinder fans LIKED the fact that you did not see the exact scene that was recorded on film. The viewfinder was likened to a window, where you could see outside the periphery of the film frame. Thus you could see your subject approaching the center of the frame or monitor action that was not necessarily "targeted" for your final shot. Additionally, at the crucial moment of exposure, you did not experience the blackout of an SLR as the mirror flipped up to allow the film to be exposed.

After I owned a number of different SLRs, Contax developed a wonderful rangefinder camera, the G1. It differed from past rangefinder cameras by offering autofocus capabilities. Also, the Contax was elegantly designed, made of titanium with superbly placed controls and a wonderful integrated handgrip. If you know me, a product not only has to perform well, it must be aesthetically pleasing as well. This camera fit the bill. It is one of my all time favorites, and believe me, I have owned (and still do) a large number of cameras.

Interestingly, with the advent of digital cameras, in a sense, all digital cameras have become SLRs in that they offer a through-the-lens look via their digital screens. Technically, true SLRs offer a real-time, non-electronic view through the lens, but this distinction becomes blurred when the truly important factor is being able to record EXACTLY what you see. Digital SLRs up until recently, allowed photographers to see through the lens in the traditional way utilizing a mirror pentaprism like their film predecessors. Now, for those photographers who have become accustomed to viewing through a display screen on the back, a new technology called Live View has been incorporated to give them this capability. The reason point-and-shoots began with this capability and it was only recently developed in DSLRs is due primarily to the engineering architecture and sensors utilized in these cameras. I'll spare you further details about this point, but thought it important to at least mention there is a distinction. Didn't I promise you more than you wanted to know?

The latest development in digital photography is a new micro four-thirds standard developed by a small consortium of camera manufacturers, primarily Olympus and Panasonic. This standard is placed squarely between the DSLR cameras and the digital point-and-shoots. The most important factor about micro 4/3rds is that the image sensor utilized, falls in between the two aforementioned formats. The final quality of a digital image is totally dependent upon the image sensor utilized. Briefly, the larger the sensor, the better the quality of the image. A direct comparison of a 12-megapixel image shot by a DSLR versus a 12-megapixel image shot by a digital point-and-shoot is very revealing. The primary difference is the "noise" generated in a point-and-shoot.

Noise appears as multi-colored dots in large blocks of solid colors on a digital image. It becomes readily apparent in low-light situations when you crank up your ISO (translated: light sensitivity) to shoot photos without flash. It is roughly equivalent to "grain" with traditional film. The higher the light sensitivity of film, the more "grain" you will see in your final print. Since the image sensor in a digital point-and-shoot is so much smaller than that of a DSLR, the individual photo-diodes on a sensor have to be packed more tightly. Packing these photo-diodes together in this manner hinders the light reflected off of a subject from being seen or "absorbed." Larger sensors (and thus larger photo diodes) can see the light more readily, reducing the "noise" of a low-light digital image. If you've been following the specifications of digital cameras (and if you have, congratulations, you ARE a geek), you've probably noticed that at one-time the number of megapixels seemed to increase with each new model year. This trend has recently reversed as camera manufacturers have re-thought their strategy on delivering higher quality images in their cameras. Now, many are scaling back their megapixel count and developing larger sensors. Thus the advent of the micro 4/3rds standard. (Now I'm starting to bore even myself.)

So, to return to my purchase choice, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1.
It is actually, a very high end digital point-and-shoot with a full array of features found on DSLRs. The technology is a synthesis of DSLRs and digital point-and-shoots. It does not incorporate the mirror mechanism of DSLRs (and thus it's resemblance to a rangefinder camera) but attempts to provide the quality of the DSLRs with its larger sensor. Unlike the point-and-shoots, it is designed to accept interchangeable lenses. And like the rangefinder cameras of old, the GF1 is more compact than its DSLR counterparts. It even accepts Leica lenses with the use of an adapter! So why this long explanation? I suppose as in any purchase, it helps to process through the factors involved in a buying decision. More importantly though, the prospect of utilizing a camera that is a new incarnation of the rangefinder design (in reality in its appearance and compact size more than in its function), has me excited to capture photographic images once more. In reading all of the reviews, a large number of reviewers actually ended up purchasing the GF1, something that is atypical of a group of people who assess many, many cameras each year. This in itself, is quite a testimonial about the camera. It was evidently so impressive and so much fun to shoot with, the critics shelled out their own hard-earned money to possess one.

I remember some years ago, Dennis Hopper (yes, the Easy Rider star), a passionate photographer himself, re-invigorated his photography when he purchased a Nikon 35Ti (a small, but very high quality fixed-lens rangefinder camera).

Like Dennis Hopper, I'm counting on the GF1 to re-invigorate my abandoned pursuit of creativity in this venue. Hopefully, I'll have some worthwhile images to share shortly.

a reconciliation of sorts between first cousins

A few months ago, I lost two aunts, one the younger sister of my mother, the other the older sister. They both died within 6 days of each other. The younger aunt divided her assets between my cousin and me. It was Alan, my cousin, who called me while I was on a trip to Kansas City to inform me of our aunt's passing. (Shockingly, he did not call me when his own mother died. I found this out on my own, upon my return to Salt Lake as I looked in the paper for my younger aunt's obituary)

Here's where it gets a little more interesting: Alan's father was my father's older brother. And, as mentioned, Alan's mother was my mother's older sister. In other words, two brothers married two sisters and both married couples had only one son apiece, born within 8 months of one another. I'm the older cousin.

You'd think we'd be very close and as children, we saw each other frequently and spent a lot of time together. Both sets of parents would borrow the other cousin to bring along on family trips, many of which I remember fondly. I got the better end of the deal since Alan's parents were far more lucrative than mine. And we WERE relatively close. At some point though things changed. I attribute this to our mothers playing us against each other in such a way as to instill competitiveness or resentment. "Well, you know, Alan cleans up his room every day." or "Stephen won an award in his math class." (Actually, I'm not sure what really happened. I think we just got older and developed our own sets of friends from our respective schools, but I do think a certain amount of competitiveness existed.)

But again, I digress. Our aunt charged Alan as executor of her will. I had been estranged from that aunt for a number of years, just as I was estranged from Alan's mother and Alan himself (although not as consciously as with my aunts). As a result of our shared estate, I have been more in contact with my cousin in the last few weeks than I have been since elementary school.

I kind of like it. He's really my only living relative (other than my wife and daughter of course). He calls at least once or twice a week to discuss matters of our aunt's estate. The last time he called, I happened to remember it was his birthday that day and wished him a happy birthday. He shrugged it off but I was rather proud of myself for remembering. I suspect sometimes he likes the contact too although he never betrays this sentiment during our conversations. At least we have an excuse to talk to each other. Interestingly, I've noticed subtle cues about our similarities as we talk.

For instance, I've gleaned over the years that Alan has many friends. He is very loyal and devoted to them. I always sought friendship. I thought I had many friends, but the truth of the matter is that many have moved to distant locations and really, I can count on one hand the people I can now truly classify as friends. Alan, however, has a much larger contingent. (There's my innate competitiveness kicking in again!) In any event, I believe that as only children we were highly motivated to connect with others to a larger extent than people who were raised with siblings.

Also, he's a complainer. I think it's very amusing. His mother was a complainer. My mother was a complainer. I'm a complainer. I'm gaining some insights into my own character as I observe him and the things that bother him or please him. His responses are similar to mine. Through all of the years, both of us remain products of our upbringing, which after all, is not all that different. His father was my father's brother. His mother was my mother's sister. We share DNA in a way most cousins don't. And, as mentioned earlier, we are the only family we have left.

My wife has suggested I invite Alan to have lunch with me once in a while. I'm not sure either of us are really ready for that, but I haven't discounted it totally. I'm not sure what direction our conversations would take without the necessary interactions regarding the execution of the estate, but I'm sure it would be awkward. It's been so many years.

So, for the time being, I await his next call and the opportunity to talk for a brief moment even if it is only to decide what to do with the studded snow tires in storage.