Category: the fora

all that stuff people say online

delta Delta100

Posted on Posted in A Symbol Life, minimum daily requirement, the fora, the meta

three thoughts. one thing. A film and answers vs my own impulses.

How we get to something else has been a recurring part of my self-questions- those things we pick at between picking apart other things. Forums have strongly structured layouts, they are software impositions upon interaction. Questions seem to have a pattern of responses without regard to the forum goal or forum topic. All self supporting respondents seem to follow a similar pattern.

An instance (from 2017):

an experienced photographer asks: What developer / dilution gives the longest straight line curve on Ilford Delta 100? They have three developers available (TMAX RS, HC-110, D-76)

the response pattern: first response suggests a change in film. Follow-up is ask what the goal of the photographer is. Next, response to follow-ups. Finally, a proposed answer as they use the product.

Reading this 5 year old thread, I had an initial answer; it wasn’t any of the ones given. Why? Probably because I bring the topic a different reason for using the film: I use it as a separation negative component. Separation negatives don’t like compensating effects. No compression, please.

My answer would have been the TMAX RS. That developer isn’t available. The better developer for separations would be DK-50. If you don’t want to work from skratch then use an Ilford ready compound: Microphen.

He seems to have moved onto other matters. his website has a supporting techniques piece as well as a one month blog (2016)

“ that said, most of my contemporaries find this degree of technical application an extraneous exercise, but I find it essential in the process of making art. The accolades once betrothed to the silver saviors of modernism have long-since faded.” [chriswalkerphoto.com/vitae/supporting-techniques/ ]

These found topics hold interest because they may lead to work I would otherwise miss. It also gives me a chance to question my own response system. To monitor my own need to speak up. Save it. If it means enough: write it.

If it really means something: Do that something.

Read Before Burning

Posted on Posted in minimum daily requirement, the fora, visual mind

most people respond with an opinion before reading the question. Even those who consider themselves polymaths, successes in another field than this hobby.

How does the visual mind grow if it falters at words, the marks of words.

Those instructions/ request seem simple enough. Don’t know why the forum founder chose to post at this time since he is rare poster. Also, why that so specifically. Maybe he is getting a ratings list. How many of which. QTL’s request reads like instruction to business vendors. So, can this loyal group follow the request of their founder; the person they thank so often for his generosity.

Nope!

First, let’s make corrections to the question.

that seems easier than answering it.

then, we expand on the reason we can’t answer… of course we make certain to bring in another doubter.

…so it continues… They have clarification upon clarification, but no direct answer. I know they don’t see their own failure. Few of us ever do. QT didn’t ask for a ranking, just a reflective selection. He didn’t get to the harder questions, such as: is there a photography — are there artists making photographs —

Photography has moved beyond these doubters. It was pulled there by artists, just as in the beginning: photography was used as an artists tool, first. Like all art/craft systems it becomes a matter of commerce. And there, it lives, or dies.

QTL’s Large Forum is the hangout for those on a handout — the iceberg has long ago sailed.