questions begin conversations on lists. they also limit the list.

we are each limited by the questions we ask, but more significantly, by the questions we are willing to ask. To illustrate, I turn to this recent example from a list serve dedicated to “alt photographic processes.” Oddly this group is very distant, and different from my “alt” of the big photo revolution. We weren’t trying to duplicate Kodak, not even mimicing the cameras of Weston, Steichen, or Mortensen. Our goals were for easy assembly. Strong first impressions. Overthrowing the meanings of meaning. Taking the street from those inside buildings towering over the street.

Alt meant making. Alt meant the autographic element brought to photography. It wasn’t about chemistry, not at all. It was the hand of man over the handle of the machine.

the edited question concerns tri-color gum. the author wants to know how to achieve a green in the table cloth of the scene. The answers he recieves are generally correct. they lineup between pigment choices, and photoshop alterations, going as far as suggesting spot channels or even to just wait longer, doing more coatings. these answers reveal a process, both group wide and conventional. That process is to coat a surface, not a section, but a surface. They seem to me as though there was a need for large scale mechanical production of the image.
Though they coat by hand, they operate with an automatic approach. They produce hand works mechanically.

He who competes with the machine, becomes the machine. (after KV, Player Piano)

From my vantage I see that “a la poupee” could solve the problem. Even more, that this solution may open his aesthetic with very little change in technical skill.