
Analog photography is dead. Long live analog photography - reisub
http://www.infinum.co/the-capsized-eight/articles/analog-photography-is-dead-long-live-analog-photography
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plg
That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen ... speaking as someone who
used to spend hours and hours as a kid in the 1980s in our garage, making
prints in our home-made darkroom.

If one is already going to go to the trouble of printing on photographic paper
in a darkroom, then why not just go out and get a real enlarger, a real film
camera and use real negative film? The quality will be so much better. Also
you can buy professional film cameras that used to cost thousands of dollars
for peanuts these days. You can send your film out to be developed if you
don't want to do that step yourself, e.g indiefilmlab.com or ilfordlab-us.com.

Slightly off topic but I hate to see another lower-quality digital
"reinvention" of a highly developed, high quality analog thing again (think
audio).

~~~
bambax
Why the hate? I too used to make my own prints, not at home since we didn't
have the equipment or a spare room that could be darken, but at school.

I still have lots of paper from that time -- certainly useless by now.

I think this is kind of cool though; the big difference with a real film
camera is that you get to do it picture by picture.

On a film camera you have to expose a whole roll of film, then process it,
then go back and see what shot you want to develop (which is not easy if you
only have the film; I used to order small prints to help me choose which
pictures I wanted to print myself).

With this, you can go ahead and print the picture you just took.

Will the quality be a little crappy? Probably. But it's a toy! What's wrong
with toys? Would you complain that your kid's toy car doesn't have a real gas-
powered engine?

~~~
ChuckMcM
Why the hate?

 _" speaking as someone who used to spend hours and hours as a kid in the
1980s in our garage, making prints in our home-made darkroom."_

That is why, the grand parent has an emotional attachment to the memories of
making prints in their garage, and someone has made a toy which will give
someone a "photography like experience" (sort of like an "Easy Bake" Oven
gives you a cooking experience) and they cry inside over the cartoon like
experience of something that was so transformative in their life. It expresses
as hate.

When they put in an escalator on Mt. Everest for the last pitch, when you "run
a marathon" in virtual reality, or when you replace all the chemicals in a
chemistry set with water. Basically if you take an experience that someone
had, and make it accessible by reducing the challenge and/or fidelity you will
invoke this reaction on people whose emotional enjoyment of their memories is
the challenge or fidelity.

That said, I don't think it will be all that successful. We were quite
successful helping folks enjoy analog photography with light sensitive paper
and pin hole cameras. Even contact prints of leaves or insects can give you a
sense of wonder. This seems like it will be much more expensive than that
without much in the way of additional depth so the value proposition is
effectively lower.

~~~
plg
what chuck said

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pmelendez
Wow, A casual reader might get confused with these comments and think that HN
means Haters News.

Here we have a product that a curious person (like myself) interested in
learning how photography used to work would buy in a heartbeat, and still the
top three comments (as I write) are " Who is this for?", "This is so goddam
stupid." and "That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen".

If these guys are doing this is because _they_ would buy it. It doesn't matter
if the size of their potential market is ridiculously small, it is still a
market and they want to test it. There is no need to verbally destroy somebody
else ideas.

Sometimes we should keep in mind that phrase : "If you don't have any positive
thing to say, don't say anything"

~~~
lttlrck
Right! If nothing else this is a couple of hours of fun mucking around with
optics and chemicals. What's not to like? This is the kind of stuff I would
have loved to try when I was a kid. Even now, if I had the ingredients lying
around I'd probably give it a shot, who cares if the results are rubbish?

------
bigdubs
Not commenting on the article, just want to comment on the title for a sec.

"The King is dead, long live the king!" is a special phrase used only when a
ruler is dead and there is an immediate and available heir to assume the
throne. It implies uninterrupted line of accession.

"Analog photography is dead, long live analog photography" is not a correct
usage of this phrase. A better way to phrase it would be : "Photography is
dead, long live photography!" Implying that the old way is dead (analog) but
the new way (digital) will immediately succeed it.

~~~
DigitalJack
I'd rather be "wrong" and have people understand me.

~~~
bigdubs
This statement seems specious. I'd rather understand the idioms I'm using,
otherwise their meaning and effectiveness becomes diluted.

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jhund
I used to own a B&W enlarger and made prints from my own negatives. I remember
the bulb in the enlarger having significantly more power (photons emitted/sec)
than a smart phone display has.

I wonder by how much this will increase exposure times, and if it works at
all...

~~~
nwh
I'm not sure that's true of all enlargers. The one I used in school was quite
dim; the brightness of my iPhone screen would definitely out power it.

------
inertia
A big part of my dislike for this is that this isn't going to teach anyone how
photography "used to work" or anything like that. It's a toy.

I work in a darkroom, I have a lot of experience processing film by hand and
making prints. I know a bit about it.

This seriously looks designed by someone who has never spent more than two
hours in a darkroom. Encouraging people to set up tiny darkrooms in closets or
wherever they can with trays of open chemistry, is a bit irresponsible.

Here's the MSDS for Ilford Multigrade, the developer they recommend:
[http://www.ilfordphoto.com/Webfiles/2007117133512849.pdf](http://www.ilfordphoto.com/Webfiles/2007117133512849.pdf)
And for the Rapid Fix:
[http://www.ilfordphoto.com/Webfiles/2012430120381541.pdf](http://www.ilfordphoto.com/Webfiles/2012430120381541.pdf)
It's not super dangerous stuff, but you still need to take some reasonable
precautions with it.

And that tray rack? Anyone who has ever worked in a darkroom would never think
of stacking trays like that. You need to pick up the print from the chemistry
and let the excess drip off before moving to the next tray--this setup is
going to be having people spilling photo chemistry all over the place, in a
room with no ventilation. Smart.

All the text on the indiegogo site just sets off my rage. Everything at Ilford
is not "vintage technology", they have been churning out new products for
years. And this? "Old school print development makes every print slightly
different, due to microscopic imperfections in the silver halide coating on
paper and the chemical reaction that turns parts of the coating black or
grey." This is just plain wrong.

This isn't preserving analogue photography. It's trying to sell the idea of
being a darkroom. The indiegogo has lots of text about red light bulbs (most
darkrooms use amber lights, but I digress), prints hanging on a line, the
smell of chemicals, but almost no examples of what the prints made with this
thing look like. Why? Because that's not the point.

------
moron4hire
Who is this for?

Any serious photographer would not want this as the results are going to be
complete crap.

Any casual photographer would not want this because it does nothing to get
their shitty photos onto Facebook.

The only people who would like this would be pseudo-intellectual hipsters who
think they are "keeping it old school". This is a scene straight out of
Portlandia. Let's open an "artisanal" cupcake shop that makes everything in an
original, 1963 Hasbro Easy-Bake Oven!

~~~
sp332
If you can't relate, that's fine. Don't buy it! But your lack of empathy
doesn't mean you get to make fun of people who feel differently from you.

------
ebbv
What a dumb idea. There is no reason to do this other than it can be done,
which is not a good reason.

This is like trying to make a gourmet sandwich out of a Hot Pocket.

~~~
HPLovecraft
lol: [http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/hot-pockets-
gourmet...](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/hot-pockets-gourmet-
makeover-foodie-fillings-article-1.1400078)

------
luscious
because your time is worth less than your money. we are fully descended into
the first level of mediocrity.

I think I must be getting time-trolled. People come up with ideas to deliver
me 5 minutes of hate on a Monday morning.

Let's put together cheap things to waste massive amounts of time in the
pursuit of crap, disposable techno-folk-art. Thank goodness the bombing starts
right after football kicks into high gear.

~~~
ctdonath
"Strange how much human progress & accomplishment comes from contemplation of
the irrelevant." \- Scott Kim

~~~
luscious
"Online quotes are vacant appeals to authority. I wish they would stop doing
it to me." \- Scott Kim

Such a quote is not a talisman. Focusing on the good coming from irrelevant
pursuits is confirmation bias and applying such a quote broadly is a slacker's
crutch. Let's look at all the semi-self-serious stoners, punks, drunks,
libertarians, etc. contemplating the irrelevant... accomplishments? Only if we
want to say "do no harm" is better than what they'd do with a bit more
ambition.

~~~
hnriot
you mean like many writers and painters of the twentieth century? Hmmm, yeah,
can't think of anything they've ever done. James Joyce, never accomplished
anything, I guess Kerouac, Faulkner and Hemingway never did anything. And as
for Dostoyevsky, Beethoven and van Gogh, total slackers, not a single
accomplishment between them.

------
BashiBazouk
Seems like the fun part of developing prints is taken out of the process. It
would be at least educational to have a guide where you make the adjustments
to the photo on screen then the app gives you the choice to make those
adjustments before exposing the film or give instructions on how to dodge and
burn during exposure to get the same results.

One big problem I see is photo chemical disposal. We have gotten to the point
in understanding the chemistry of photo chemicals and it's effects down the
line that you really shouldn't pour most of it down the drain any more. The
stop bath is usually equivalent of vinegar but the developer and fix have some
mildly toxic stuff in them as well as trace amounts of silver. I would think
the hobbyist with a dedicated darkroom would have a better chance of knowing
this as opposed to something like this meant for a more causal user.

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harrytuttle
Pretty cool idea but unless you knock the focus off on the enlarger, it's
going to look like shit. If you consider photo paper to be around 300dpi then
your 400x480 cheap ass smartphone display is going to be pretty obvious.

So blurry or pixelated. Your choice :)

N.B this might be desirable from an artistic point of view though.

~~~
MarkNederhoed
Is it really that bad? Web designers have been taking pictures of their
screens for years. You still have the original 'negative' if you need the
extra image quality.

Edit: There should really be a couple sample images on the project page.

~~~
BashiBazouk
Yes it's really that bad. Us print people have been holding our noses with web
screen shots for years. They really look bad when printed at 300dpi on paper.
I would have to see the results with the even finer chemical grain of photo
paper, but I would expect it to look even worse.

------
throwaway1979
What is the source of "X is dead. Love live X" posts? I know about the
historical chant where X=the king. But who started the first blogpost with
such a title? IMHO it is now a cliche. I get a twang of pain when I reach such
titles on HN.

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BetaCygni
It does look like fun! Someone should put some designs online to build your
own. I would only be using it once or twice so buying it seems wasteful, but
it would be a nice project to put together on a rainy day.

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privong
The next logical step is to create a mount for the back of a holga to replace
the film plane with a smartphone camera. Or, to create a holga look-alike that
interfaces with a smartphone's camera.

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kawera
Devere has been selling digital enlargers for at least 10 years[1]. Results on
fiber based papers are very very good.

[1] [http://www.de-vere.com/products.htm](http://www.de-vere.com/products.htm)

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spiritplumber
I gotta wonder -- is a photograph that was on physical support end-to-end a
more reliable witness than a digital photo? It's harder to edit.

~~~
moron4hire
It is not hard to edit.

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decasteve
Analog vs Digital:

A photo sensor in a digital camera is an analog device. The "digital" camera
requires an ADC (Analog to digital Converter).

Camera film records information digitally, the light sensitive film (silver
halide) either lets light through, or it doesn't. Basically the silver halide
crystal is either "on" or "off".

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
>A photo sensor in a digital camera is an analog device. The "digital" camera
requires an ADC (Analog to digital Converter).

Correct!

>Camera film records information digitally, the light sensitive film (silver
halide) either lets light through, or it doesn't. Basically the silver halide
crystal is either "on" or "off".

Uh, no. There is a continuous range of the amount of light that is blocked by
the film negative (for each layer). What you're describing would be something
like 1bit color depth RGB.

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JulianMorrison
That is not dead which can hipster lie.

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nakedrobot2
This is so goddam stupid.

"Because you can" does not mean "you should ever" create, sell, or buy such a
thing.

Maybe if the iPhone screen had an 8K screen, it could be interesting. But come
on.

Why don't we photocopy ourselves, take a picture of that, and fax it instead?

