A picture of Robert Frank

Beniliam

Beniliam

Out of the limelight
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Mar 23, 2005
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Maybe a less-know picture of him for someone.

Robert Frank at the old Metropolitan Opera, New York, 1955.




This picture was taken by the great Czech photographer Bedrich Grunzweig.


I think that the most curious detail of this picture is see a bow tie in the throat of Robert Frank!! ... :) He seems left eye too!
 

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Nothing at all unusual about it. He was dressed for the occasion, wearing a tux to attend the opera. Notice the sheen on the satin lapels? At least he wasn't trying to impress anybody with black paint Leicas. I never realized that he was left eyed! He shot all of his verticals upside down. That must have driven the editors crazy when they looked over his contact sheets.
 
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Al Kaplan, thanks for your comment.

I have always this image in my mind about Robert Frank among the crowd. :) Its funny the contrast between the two pictures!
 
Nice shot by Grunzweig, all my trips to Prague, and still missed his work. ;-)

Thanks for the wake up. ;-)

Regards, John
 
Good photo of Robert Frank with cameras.

I like to play guess the lenses on the cameras.
 
Can anyone identify the lenses? They look like fast 50mms, which makes sense. The cameras look like Leicas.
I just showed "Pull My Daisy" to my painting students and they loved it.
 
Melvin said:
Can anyone identify the lenses? They look like fast 50mms, which makes sense. The cameras look like Leicas.
I just showed "Pull My Daisy" to my painting students and they loved it.
Click to expand...

I wish it was a higher quality photo, but my guess would be an 85mm f2 Nikkor and a 50mm f1.4 Nikkor.

maybe the cameras are Tower type 3s ;-))

he got all the gear at Sears !!
 
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My thought was 85/2 Nikkor and 50mm Summarit but it might be a 50/1.4 Nikkor, probably on black dial III-f bodies. At the time nobody in the U.S. thought that the Niccas were quality cameras. In the mid 1960's you could still buy used Nicca bodies for $15, and the Tower was a rebranded Nicca.
 
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Since the camera to his eye has the vulcanite going around the upper part of the lens mount, it looks to be a Leica III, IIIa, IIIb type, not the IIIc/IIIf.

The Tower/Nicca type 3 was an outright copy of the Leica III.
 
Pickett Wilson said:
So what film is he using? :angel:
Click to expand...

the proof sheet of the shots he took in Britain, before he came to the states, say Ilford.

Kodak Super XX would be my guess in the states, Tri X was out on the market for a year in 1955.

Note: some of the negs from the Americans show Kodak Plus X
 
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frank_contactbook.jpg
 
That book cover shows "blacks riding in the back of the bus". A half a century sure made a big difference. Kerouac's book "The Town And The City" was a literary breakthrough at the time.
 
I remember using Ilford HPS in the early 1960's. It was extremely grainy, but not quite as bad as the competition, Agfa Isopan Record. Today they'd be rated ISO 800 for HPS and ISO 1,000 for Record, but Kodak made a still faster film, Royal-X Pan Recording. I think it was about ISO 1,200 and only available in bulk. Using the brand new Acufine developer you could get a decent, but very grainy, negative up to about ISO 3,200.

I have a Royal-X Pan print hanging in my living room of a girl, Karina, of perhaps 18 or 19 playing guitar. She's sitting inside of a big tent made out of a white cargo parachute illuminated by a small campfire. It's printed full frame on 8x10 paper and dated 1962. I was probably using a Canon II-S with a 35/1.8 Canon lens. I couldn't afford Leicas yet.
 
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That's not upside down! That's the "correct" way to shoot a vertical, or @ least that's the way I learned to shoot a vertical. And the fact that Robert Frank held his Leicas that way must mean it's the right way. ;)

But seriously, I think it's a more stable hold than having the right hand on top, because as a righty (& right-eyed, too), I prefer to have the camera rest on the stronger hand. I use my right thumb to release the shutter about 1/2 the time. In Zeiss Ikon Contax manuals, this was the recommended vertical hold & it's also shown as an alternative in Leica & other manufacturers's manuals. For extra stability, this hold also lets you press the camera to your forehead.

Al Kaplan said:
I never realized that he was left eyed! He shot all of his verticals upside down. That must have driven the editors crazy when they looked over his contact sheets.
Click to expand...
 
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furcafe, with lever wind rangefinder cameras I often shoot and wind one handed. Sometimes it's because I'm holding a flash off camera with one hand, sometimes I'm holding the camera over my head to shoot over a crowd. The past few years I've been shooting with a 15mm holding the camera off to the side so I'm in the picture too.

When I am shooting the "normal" way I prefer having the camera alongside my nose just like Frank does, but I'm right eyed, hence the cameras is turned the opposite way because it's on the other side of my nose.
 
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