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Back to Basics-Searching for the Essentials
- Thread starter dave lackey
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robert blu
quiet photographer
You started a beautiful thread Dave!
I admit to be partially "batteries dependant" but I try to enjoy activities which are battery free!
Like sketching...
I admit to be partially "batteries dependant" but I try to enjoy activities which are battery free!
Like sketching...
5. Restoring older possessions for use
No Batteries Required. Also all restored to working condition.
"The Capital Gang" 1B, IIC, IIIC.
No Batteries Required. Also all restored to working condition.
"The Capital Gang" 1B, IIC, IIIC.
Coldkennels
Barnack-toting Brit.
Whenever people talk about material goods, I look at this old girl:
16 years old, and not a care in the world. As long as she's got food in her bowl, a place to rest her head during the day, and a lap to curl up on at night, she's happy.
We should all be more cat.
16 years old, and not a care in the world. As long as she's got food in her bowl, a place to rest her head during the day, and a lap to curl up on at night, she's happy.
We should all be more cat.
Pál_K
Cameras. I has it.
Watercolor painting - I’ve considered it. But the more I investigate what‘s involved, the more I realize that it, too, is another big hobby universe which is worthy of more time than I can devote to it. Best to devote quality time to one’s interests that matter and not try to do too much.
Dralowid
Michael
Taking time to improve my handwriting
(well you do talk about pens)
(well you do talk about pens)
JeffS7444
Well-known
In March of 2020, I was stunned by how clear and blue the sky had become.
JeffS7444
Well-known
Figuring that the pandemic era also represented a once-in-a-lifetime(?) Someday event, I decided to work on projects, some of which had been sitting in my queue for years. Here's a sampling of items that I built, repaired or restored in 2020-23:
The cardstock Nissan automobile was a fun, half-afternoon project. Was amazed to find that many automakers, and camera makers including Canon and Olympus were offering a wealth of free-to-download paper models.
Particularly in 2020, I also spent much time scanning my film images, and in this sense, I was traveling the world, and through time! Sometimes I'd try to pinpoint the location I had been standing in, and compare to how it looked the last time Google passed through. Lucerne, Switzerland, looked much the same, while old town Kashgar in China's Xinjiang region had morphed into something I scarcely recognized.
Television was great fun for me, because prior to pandemic, I had been too busy to take full advantage of my Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Apple TV+ accounts. But suddenly, I had all the time in the world, and much "must-see TV" which I had never seen before. Even so, I didn't do much binging, because who knew when there would be new episodes to watch?
I bought new stuff, both online and from local shops. But I really concentrated on selling stuff that I no longer needed. And 2020-21 was an amazing time to be selling stuff, almost like an extended holiday shopping season. This is a sampling of the photo-related stuff that I de-owned from 2020-23
I guess I could claim that I too am striving to get back to basics, and I've thought that if I have more gadgets leaving my life than entering it, life is bound to become simpler. Maybe.
The cardstock Nissan automobile was a fun, half-afternoon project. Was amazed to find that many automakers, and camera makers including Canon and Olympus were offering a wealth of free-to-download paper models.
Particularly in 2020, I also spent much time scanning my film images, and in this sense, I was traveling the world, and through time! Sometimes I'd try to pinpoint the location I had been standing in, and compare to how it looked the last time Google passed through. Lucerne, Switzerland, looked much the same, while old town Kashgar in China's Xinjiang region had morphed into something I scarcely recognized.
Television was great fun for me, because prior to pandemic, I had been too busy to take full advantage of my Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Apple TV+ accounts. But suddenly, I had all the time in the world, and much "must-see TV" which I had never seen before. Even so, I didn't do much binging, because who knew when there would be new episodes to watch?
I bought new stuff, both online and from local shops. But I really concentrated on selling stuff that I no longer needed. And 2020-21 was an amazing time to be selling stuff, almost like an extended holiday shopping season. This is a sampling of the photo-related stuff that I de-owned from 2020-23
I guess I could claim that I too am striving to get back to basics, and I've thought that if I have more gadgets leaving my life than entering it, life is bound to become simpler. Maybe.
Tom R
Established
... a matter of opinion, but these languages are more similar than different (imperative, opaque, procedural ...); C++ certainly isn't my idea of computational elegance. Maybe you should investigate/learn something truly different (in terms of its underlying semantics and "worldview"). Try Scheme or Lisp (my native language), Smalltalk, Haskell or ML. We used to expose undergraduates to at least one or two of these languages in relatively simple problem-solving contexts as matter of good pedagogy. Even if one never uses any of these languages to do anything in their particular workspace, having exposure to different computing paradigms often gives one additional insights to certain types of problems and just as importantly, can be rejuvenating.
I liked PHP and the HTML/Javascript interface for the ability to interface to MySQL. I have a project in mind for these.
I've written Fortran programs to parse very large CSV files, massage the data, and convert to SQL, will modify to parse XML and convert to SQL. I also generate HTML with Fortran. I use Fortran and assembly for almost everything.
Lisp- studied in school over 40 years ago.
I've written Fortran programs to parse very large CSV files, massage the data, and convert to SQL, will modify to parse XML and convert to SQL. I also generate HTML with Fortran. I use Fortran and assembly for almost everything.
Lisp- studied in school over 40 years ago.
robert blu
quiet photographer
Learning to play guitar when you are over 70 is not easy, but each small step, evcen if very small is much rewarding.
Here I'm with my Martin, which I called Martina, without much fantasy
Here I'm with my Martin, which I called Martina, without much fantasy
Henry
Well-known
Scheme, my first programming language! I don’t use it much these days, since I don’t need to do statistics work in R any longer. For ease of integrating with databases and the web, I still think Go is one of the better choices. Though I’ve mostly worked in Rust lately, with occasional annoying forays into C++ for the purpose of porting features.
Dogman
Veteran
I'm so battery dependent these days I even have batteries to use to charge batteries when there is no other place to charge them.
All my cameras require batteries. I don't mind it.
I have shelves of vinyl and CD recording I no longer listen to. I use my phone or listen at the computer. Sometimes, I might use the regular stereo system which is pretty nice but really streaming or downloads to iTunes are fine for me. I have an old Gibson guitar, acoustic. I was never very good at it and I haven't touched it in over 20 years. I really wish I had a Telecaster with pedals and amps and...time to turn off the fantasy.
We were without electric power here last month for 4-5 days. The temperature was in the high 90s (that's Fahrenheit for you metric guys--look it up) with the heat index over 110 degrees. We were not just uncomfortable, we were getting sick. Even our dog looked ill. The power outage was so widespread all hotels and motels in the area were at capacity. We suffered. Now we have a whole-house backup generator on order for installation hopefully in the next couple of weeks. But first we much get the roof replaced from damage incurred during the same storm that took out the power in the area,
I grew up poor in the 1950s. A country boy, I learned basic survival skills needed during the time. I'm proud of my heritage, but I don't want to return to that or even a vestige of that today. I like the idea of the simple life but, for me, I like the way some things have been simplified by modern improvements.
We don't watch TV much but we stream programming from a couple or ten services, mostly British and Scandi mysteries and cop shows, and we look for news on the net. We don't travel much or very far with our cars. My wife has an old Tahoe she will never get rid of because she likes it too much and I have a Toyota I like as well. We seldom buy fuel more than every two or three months. We live close to everything.
As far as photography goes, I own a number of old (by today's standards) digital camera that I use and love. I bought them all cheap. I don't need whatever the new standard is in megapixels. My favorite cameras are 12, 16 and 24mp. More than enough and not overkill for a photographer who shots for pleasure and the art. AF helped me as my eyes began to fade. Cataract surgery improved my vision and the in-camera focus confirmation systems help in iffy circumstances using manual focus. I like the aperture priority exposure mode with a handy EC dial. I like shooting in continuous mode to have duplicates and to catch fleeting moments. And I love processing my photos without chemicals or darkrooms. I return to one of Richard Benson's quotes concerning printing. Benson (who printed for Paul Strand and other great photographers) said something to the effect that it's ridiculous for someone who makes art that depends on light to work in darkness. But that's just opinion and personal methods. It's all good, you know.
All my cameras require batteries. I don't mind it.
I have shelves of vinyl and CD recording I no longer listen to. I use my phone or listen at the computer. Sometimes, I might use the regular stereo system which is pretty nice but really streaming or downloads to iTunes are fine for me. I have an old Gibson guitar, acoustic. I was never very good at it and I haven't touched it in over 20 years. I really wish I had a Telecaster with pedals and amps and...time to turn off the fantasy.
We were without electric power here last month for 4-5 days. The temperature was in the high 90s (that's Fahrenheit for you metric guys--look it up) with the heat index over 110 degrees. We were not just uncomfortable, we were getting sick. Even our dog looked ill. The power outage was so widespread all hotels and motels in the area were at capacity. We suffered. Now we have a whole-house backup generator on order for installation hopefully in the next couple of weeks. But first we much get the roof replaced from damage incurred during the same storm that took out the power in the area,
I grew up poor in the 1950s. A country boy, I learned basic survival skills needed during the time. I'm proud of my heritage, but I don't want to return to that or even a vestige of that today. I like the idea of the simple life but, for me, I like the way some things have been simplified by modern improvements.
We don't watch TV much but we stream programming from a couple or ten services, mostly British and Scandi mysteries and cop shows, and we look for news on the net. We don't travel much or very far with our cars. My wife has an old Tahoe she will never get rid of because she likes it too much and I have a Toyota I like as well. We seldom buy fuel more than every two or three months. We live close to everything.
As far as photography goes, I own a number of old (by today's standards) digital camera that I use and love. I bought them all cheap. I don't need whatever the new standard is in megapixels. My favorite cameras are 12, 16 and 24mp. More than enough and not overkill for a photographer who shots for pleasure and the art. AF helped me as my eyes began to fade. Cataract surgery improved my vision and the in-camera focus confirmation systems help in iffy circumstances using manual focus. I like the aperture priority exposure mode with a handy EC dial. I like shooting in continuous mode to have duplicates and to catch fleeting moments. And I love processing my photos without chemicals or darkrooms. I return to one of Richard Benson's quotes concerning printing. Benson (who printed for Paul Strand and other great photographers) said something to the effect that it's ridiculous for someone who makes art that depends on light to work in darkness. But that's just opinion and personal methods. It's all good, you know.
robert blu
quiet photographer
Thanks for sharing your personal experience and your view. We all have our experiences and priorities and we all make our choices. This is good I think.
agentlossing
Well-known
Like you guys, we also went through a bit of a simplification and rethink over the pandemic period. We lived in a very small town in a rural part of the pacific northwest, so we went from relatively isolated to very isolated, without the chance for many road trips to bigger towns and different landscapes which we tended to use to offset the smallness of our regular surrounds.
I don't doubt that it was partially the life of the last few years which prompted us to up stakes and move to the big city of Seattle. Moving into a smaller apartment required some simplification in its own right, and a lot of not-that-necessary possessions went to other homes. Life now is more complex: the morning commute is not a couple of minutes with no traffic to our jobs in the same town, it's getting on a bus with a lot of other morning commuters and riding into the city (my wife and I work in the tallest and fourth-tallest buildings in the city, respectively). There are many things to do all around us. Simplicity isn't exactly what you'd call this, but it requires a different kind of simplicity at home, because we want the area of a 750-square-foot apartment to not feel cramped, we want to be able to pop out for a dinner or sporting event or trip to a park or something without spending much time getting ready. After many years in the small town, we're trying to decide what it means to live simply in a metropolis.
Photography-wise, I am trying to slim down to a couple of film and a couple of digital, but they need to be differentiated well enough to each have a reason to exist. The small ones are the Ricoh GRIIIx and the Lomo LC-A, and the big ones are the Pentax K-1 II and Pentax MX. I have mount synergy with the lenses for these! I still have an Olympus EM5ii which I don't want to get rid of, we will see what happens in that area.
My wardrobe was an area that I decided to really simplify for the move, and intend to keep it as streamlined as possible. Having few options for clothing meant that I kept a lot of things which weren't exactly what I wanted/needed, but now I have much better access and plan to purchase more expensive but higher-quality, and less often. In many areas of life where possessions are required, we want to "buy once, cry once" and have heirloom-quality things. That takes patience, research, and saving sometimes.
My film development kit is about as simplified as it can be as well, and works really well for me. I'm fully accustomed to my Lab-Box now, and use Rodinal and TMax developer, have only the exact bottles and measuring items I need, and a Pacific Image XAs for scanning.
I even sold my larger Canon Pro-100 printer and now only have the Epson PM-400, which is a tiny photo printer which only goes up to 5x7", but takes up almost no space. I need a new cartridge for it, but plan on doing some prints soon.
I still need to bring simplicity into some other areas, but just the smaller amount of possessions we own now over what we owned as two people in a 1200-square-foot single family home for years, is a large relief.
I don't doubt that it was partially the life of the last few years which prompted us to up stakes and move to the big city of Seattle. Moving into a smaller apartment required some simplification in its own right, and a lot of not-that-necessary possessions went to other homes. Life now is more complex: the morning commute is not a couple of minutes with no traffic to our jobs in the same town, it's getting on a bus with a lot of other morning commuters and riding into the city (my wife and I work in the tallest and fourth-tallest buildings in the city, respectively). There are many things to do all around us. Simplicity isn't exactly what you'd call this, but it requires a different kind of simplicity at home, because we want the area of a 750-square-foot apartment to not feel cramped, we want to be able to pop out for a dinner or sporting event or trip to a park or something without spending much time getting ready. After many years in the small town, we're trying to decide what it means to live simply in a metropolis.
Photography-wise, I am trying to slim down to a couple of film and a couple of digital, but they need to be differentiated well enough to each have a reason to exist. The small ones are the Ricoh GRIIIx and the Lomo LC-A, and the big ones are the Pentax K-1 II and Pentax MX. I have mount synergy with the lenses for these! I still have an Olympus EM5ii which I don't want to get rid of, we will see what happens in that area.
My wardrobe was an area that I decided to really simplify for the move, and intend to keep it as streamlined as possible. Having few options for clothing meant that I kept a lot of things which weren't exactly what I wanted/needed, but now I have much better access and plan to purchase more expensive but higher-quality, and less often. In many areas of life where possessions are required, we want to "buy once, cry once" and have heirloom-quality things. That takes patience, research, and saving sometimes.
My film development kit is about as simplified as it can be as well, and works really well for me. I'm fully accustomed to my Lab-Box now, and use Rodinal and TMax developer, have only the exact bottles and measuring items I need, and a Pacific Image XAs for scanning.
I even sold my larger Canon Pro-100 printer and now only have the Epson PM-400, which is a tiny photo printer which only goes up to 5x7", but takes up almost no space. I need a new cartridge for it, but plan on doing some prints soon.
I still need to bring simplicity into some other areas, but just the smaller amount of possessions we own now over what we owned as two people in a 1200-square-foot single family home for years, is a large relief.
My life was both complicated and simplified by having a baby at 47 years old. It complicated my life for obvious reasons, but it really taught me how to focus and how to cut the nonsense from my life. Basically, photography and not much else survived. Yes, I use digital cameras and I use computers. Thankfully they make things easier for me and allow me to focus on making the photos I want to make in a convenient setting. I do not stress the world I live in.
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dave lackey
Veteran
Last edited:
dave lackey
Veteran
Simple living is simply living. I am having as much fun with my inexpensive Nikkormat FTN and a modest “light sucker” as I could ask for:
Godfrey
somewhat colored
Simplicity is a state of mind, not an in-built property of a camera or musical instrument. Even the simplest camera or musical instrument is, by its nature, a complex thing.
It seems to me that, as we grow older and are beset with new things that we are unfamiliar with, we dream about the simple things that were in our past ... 'simple' because we learned them, we understood them, and they seemed to do the job we wanted then: why wouldn't they do the job we want now?
I live in this tension of loving the simple but admiring its complexity. My work for the majority of my career-life was to help in the creation and development of complex things (computers and the hardware and software which they rely upon, the creation of remote sensing equipment with which to investigate the Earth and other planets that we cannot reach so easily, et cetera). I seek 'simplicity' in my own way ... simplicity being the use of tools which are learnable, rememberable, and allow my creativity and skill to master. How complex such tools might be, in and of themselves, is mostly irrelevant; the fact that they present me with their capabilities in a way that I find useful and without distracting is what's important, not whether they are actually "simple" or not. My electronic piano allows me to make music in a much more versatile way than I can do on a baby grand piano and it fits in my home; my Light L16 camera allows me to create 50 Mpixel photos with a wide range of focal lengths and post-capture adjustable DoF, and it is a 1 lb package I can carry on my bicycle without strain.
To me, it is important to understand what I'm looking for when I say "simplicity" and accept that even a bow and arrow is a remarkable balance of the complex nature of things in the world, and the simple use of that complex understructure bespeaks a great deal of development of the form, the function, and the skills required to use it well.
My Leica M4-2 is a remarkably simple camera ... a light tight box with a mechanically timed shutter, a viewfinder to image what the lens might see, a rangefinder coupled to the lens to assist in focusing it. But calling it simplicity is a bit of a lie because it took a century and a half worth of development and human endeavor to achieve just that.
Celebrate the incredible complexity of the simple things that you enjoy, and learn to use them well, without distracting over-thought. That's all that matters.
G
Light on Textured Wall - Santa Clara 2023
Leica M10-R + Summilux 35mm f/1.4 (ca 1972)
ISO 100 @ f/5.6 @ 1/180
It seems to me that, as we grow older and are beset with new things that we are unfamiliar with, we dream about the simple things that were in our past ... 'simple' because we learned them, we understood them, and they seemed to do the job we wanted then: why wouldn't they do the job we want now?
I live in this tension of loving the simple but admiring its complexity. My work for the majority of my career-life was to help in the creation and development of complex things (computers and the hardware and software which they rely upon, the creation of remote sensing equipment with which to investigate the Earth and other planets that we cannot reach so easily, et cetera). I seek 'simplicity' in my own way ... simplicity being the use of tools which are learnable, rememberable, and allow my creativity and skill to master. How complex such tools might be, in and of themselves, is mostly irrelevant; the fact that they present me with their capabilities in a way that I find useful and without distracting is what's important, not whether they are actually "simple" or not. My electronic piano allows me to make music in a much more versatile way than I can do on a baby grand piano and it fits in my home; my Light L16 camera allows me to create 50 Mpixel photos with a wide range of focal lengths and post-capture adjustable DoF, and it is a 1 lb package I can carry on my bicycle without strain.
To me, it is important to understand what I'm looking for when I say "simplicity" and accept that even a bow and arrow is a remarkable balance of the complex nature of things in the world, and the simple use of that complex understructure bespeaks a great deal of development of the form, the function, and the skills required to use it well.
My Leica M4-2 is a remarkably simple camera ... a light tight box with a mechanically timed shutter, a viewfinder to image what the lens might see, a rangefinder coupled to the lens to assist in focusing it. But calling it simplicity is a bit of a lie because it took a century and a half worth of development and human endeavor to achieve just that.
Celebrate the incredible complexity of the simple things that you enjoy, and learn to use them well, without distracting over-thought. That's all that matters.
G
Light on Textured Wall - Santa Clara 2023
Leica M10-R + Summilux 35mm f/1.4 (ca 1972)
ISO 100 @ f/5.6 @ 1/180
JeffS7444
Well-known
This is my 2023 darkroom setup sans chemistry. I am equipped to process b&w and C41 in 16 mm, 35 mm and 120, and I plan to add Minox. The storage bin doubles as a tempering bath. Perhaps someday I will consider making fiber-based prints once again, but this time, with an emphasis on smaller print sizes, 8x10" and 5x7" b&w in particular.
The inspiration for smaller prints has been in my mind for a number of years, inspired by a viewing of Edward Weston's work. Weston specialized in contact prints, and I felt the impact of his work was not lessened by their small scale.
The inspiration for smaller prints has been in my mind for a number of years, inspired by a viewing of Edward Weston's work. Weston specialized in contact prints, and I felt the impact of his work was not lessened by their small scale.