A Trip Down Memory Lane

Nantucket Island, Massachusetts (2002).  From a mediocre JPEG scan of a Kodachrome slide. (click to enlarge)
Leica M6; 35mm f/2 Summicron Asph.

This past week I spent several hours pulling out boxes of old negatives, slides and prints.  This wasn't really an exercise of traveling down memory lane but a practical exercise in going through my old film photographic archives, culling out and disposing of what no longer has value nor meaning to me (and my family) and keeping and storing those items that do have meaning.  At some point in time, you just have to get rid of "stuff."

As many of you know I started seriously photographing in the Spring of 1970.  That constitutes an awful lot of negatives, slides and prints.  I've photographed with large format, medium format and 35mm film cameras over those years.  I did most of my black and white work and a fair amount of color negative work with large and medium format cameras.  The Pentax 6X7 cameras that I used, and still own, are on my list of all time favorites.  However, that means big negatives, lots of negative sleeves and more space needed when using those larger format film cameras.  I literally have thousands and thousands of negatives.  Most of my slides are 35mm Kodachromes.  Add to that hundreds of prints I've made in my darkroom, most of them black and white medium format and I have one heck of a task.  However, I discovered something interesting while going through all of my photographic past.

I discovered that my best prints from medium format film cameras, archivally processed and printed, don't measure up technically to even the prints I have from my micro4/3 gear.  They are not as crisp, don't resolve as much fine detail, have less dynamic range and, unfortunately when compared to what we all routinely get from digital photography, don't seem as satisfying, in a way.  "Way" being defined as pure technical quality.  The bar has moved significantly.  However...

My "analog" silver gelatin prints have a different, pleasing and very nice quality.  As I like to say, somewhat organic rather than super sharp, super detailed and with perfect contrast.  I think analog prints have somewhat of a personality where the digital prints are somewhat "sterile"—too perfect.  I find it rather easy to pick out a silver gelatin print versus a digital ink jet print.  I'm not saying one is better than the other, just different.

Another difference that I find with analog prints is that I'm not drawn into them.  By that I mean I have no desire nor tendency to "pixel peep," using a term we often use today when we get deep, "up close and personal" with an image and look intensely at it.   I like to look at my silver gelatin prints as photographs should be looked at, as a whole entity.  With digital, most of us, myself included, have a tendency to look at them extremely closely and see what fine detail we can pick out or even what defects we can find.  Silver gelatin prints will have none of that.  They demand that you hold the print at a proper viewing distance and enjoy the photograph s it was meant to be seen—in its entirety.

As much as I like my old film work, I can't see myself ever going back to film, for several reasons.  For years, I derived my satisfaction in photography with the entire process—seeing something worthy of photographing, composing, setting exposure, developing my film, printing my prints, matting and framing for my wall.  The entire process, start to finish, brought much satisfaction.  I know I'll never have another darkroom so a return to film is very unlikely.

Another interesting thing of which I was reminded is that examining my negatives and slides, almost always I had only one exposure of any particular subject.  Now that is really different from my digital habits.  I now make several exposures routinely.  I don't worry about the cost of film or processing.  In fact, I routinely set my camera for continuous advance, low and make about 3 exposures of any one subject.  That allows me to, dare I say it, "pixel peep," to determine which one of the three is the absolute sharpest.  Wow!  Have my habits changed over the years.

I have many, many more hours to go before I complete this task.  Hopefully, I will complete it.  It is daunting and easy to walk away and say I'll do it some other time.  I'm now strategizing as to whether to send my negatives and slides I pick out for digitizing to a service or pick up a used Nikon D850 and a used 60mm f/2.8 micro lens, couple it with the Nikon ES-2 film digitizing accessories and do it myself.  The D850 has a built-in feature that automatically inverts and neutralizes the orange mask for negatives.  That would be convenient.  I have already picked out close to 1000 negatives and slides and it may be more expedient to do it myself.  When I have my task completed, I could sell the camera, lens and digitaizing accessories and recoup much of my money.  I just don't yet know.

Hopefully, I will have some negatives and slides that I will have had digitized to share with all of you at a later date.

Join me over at Instagram @dennisamook or my website, www.dennismook.com. 

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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