Keepers?

[DMG]

it's all down to how I'm feeling at the time, a keeper just now may not be a keeper in two weeks time...very subjective and my bi-polarness doesn't help 🙂

 

[sepiareverb]

I'm pretty picky- just getting ready to print my final prints from the last year and a couple months. I have six frames for sure, with another four to try at 1620 before I commit.

I do print 810's of 2-8 frames per roll, and 1114's of about a quarter of those.

 

[Anupam]

(To Anupam Basu: Liked your Chicago street stuff. The big blurry bicycle girl's a real cracker.)

Thanks. Now that I mainly use RFs and with mirror slap out of the way, I am trying out really slow shuter speeds handheld with slow film. This set was TMX at EI 50.

-Anupam

 

[dazedgonebye]

If keeper means I'm going to print and hang it...1 per 20 rolls perhaps.

If keeper means I like it well enough to scan it, PS it and share it...4-6 per roll.

 

[Ash]

How many keepers do you usually get per roll?

Depends on the roll! Now and then I'll have a short roll and hate every photo.

If I'm photographing someone I may get 1/5 of the photo's that I would show off. Of the 1/5 maybe 0-3 in total that I'd call keepers.

 

[iml]

I've just finished scanning a roll and got 12 out of 36. That's very unusual though, usually it's anything from 1 one 5.

Ian

 

[shadowfox]

Another dimension, especially for someone who is prone to GAS attacks like me is the test-rolls. Everytime I run a test roll on a new (old) camera, it's a brand new experience and/or twist.

Sometimes I'm driven into taking extra shots just to finish the roll, although with really cheap, expired films, I now don't even see the need to finish the last 2 or 3 frames.

Another aspect comes when I edit my photos for scan and "keep", a lot of my pictures are "interesting" when put in a context with what camera/lens I took it with. For people who shoot DSLR all the time, it doesn't fit into their notion of "interesting".

Yet another point that someone touched before is the location and subject. I already resigned the fact that I live in a metropolitan with a suburban way of life. People get in and out of cars, not walk around (at least not in my neighborhood). And I can't go out taking pictures in the only few hours with golden-light during the day.

So, if I can get one technically good pictures and not boring image out of a roll, I'm content. 😀

 

[ferider]

If I'm lucky I get about 5 keepers per year, 2 rolls per week.

All other photos are imperfect results of trying to get those keepers.

 

[sepiareverb]

If I'm lucky I get about 5 keepers per year, 2 rolls per week...

Nothing lucky about it- that's the game ain't it?

 

[dmr]

If I get one real keeper on a roll I'm tickled pink! 🙂

 

[lament]

What did Ansel Adams say, 12 per year? One per month, a nice round figure that suspiciously doesn't depend on how much you're shooting...

 

[vrgard]

You guys are making me feel so much better. I had been thinking I was a lousy photographer because I so rarely get a "keeper." After reading all your comments it has become clear to me that despite one's best efforts, it's a very uncertain craft (hence "art?") and is, therefore, something of a numbers game. Yet I still get discouraged when first viewing a freshly developed roll and don't see anything that amazes me. Unreasonable? Of course. Human nature? Probably. So, thanks guys for providing me with a bit of perspective.

-Randy

 

[pcfranchina]

Yes. I too am starting to feel much better. Thanks!

 

[Welsh_Italian]

I've had rolls where nothing good has come out despite my initial hopes. It's so disheartening when you look through and find nothing of value.

I generally find that the camera I shoot with determines how many keepers I get, much like the folks who mentioned that they get more keepers with medium format. My Olympus XA is a wonderful camera, but I get far fewer keepers than with my Fed 4. The Fed is good because the viewfinder is so poor that I have to concentrate far more when I take a picture and I'm not tempted to snap away. My Konica C35 is even worse- a nice viewfinder, easy mechanism, just click and wind, click and wind...

C35 - about 10%
XA-2 - about 15%
Fed 4 - about 35%
Fed 2 - still waiting for the test roll to come back! 🙂

The Fed 2 roll was good (well, the camera taking the pictures was!) but nothing really interesting there.

Also - when using the term "keepers", I mean pictures that I like looking at myself. When it comes to genuinely high quality pictures that might say something to other people, maybe 2 or 3 a year. And for truly superb pictures: not yet. Am still waiting!

 

[Bosk]

I scan all my shots and usually keep anywhere between 1-5 scans per roll and delete the rest. But there's a huge difference for me between shots that I'll keep simply as a record of how successful I was with that roll, and a shot that stands out as being really impressive.

I might only get one shot every couple rolls that I'm really pleased with, much depends on how interesting my subjects were. It's so much easier to get a great shot when you're photographing something extroadinary, and maybe it's the mark of a great photographer who can make the ordinary seem extroadinary. (and no doubt that finding great light also helps enormously)

 

[gb hill]

You guys are making me feel so much better. I had been thinking I was a lousy photographer because I so rarely get a "keeper." After reading all your comments it has become clear to me that despite one's best efforts, it's a very uncertain craft (hence "art?") and is, therefore, something of a numbers game. Yet I still get discouraged when first viewing a freshly developed roll and don't see anything that amazes me. Unreasonable? Of course. Human nature? Probably. So, thanks guys for providing me with a bit of perspective.

-Randy

Me too! Now I don't have to go out and spend all that money on anti-depressants.😉

 

[dmr]

What did Ansel Adams say, 12 per year? One per month, a nice round figure that suspiciously doesn't depend on how much you're shooting...

Uh, calendars, maybe? 🙂