New York March NYC Meet-Up

[Calzone]

Haha, you taught me how to walk far for photos Cal... I'm sure I lost some weight during those days. Good times...

Now, I walk a lot by myself and it is no big deal.

John,

Don't discount all those earlier walks. It seems that having a good base and a long time of even walking does a lot of long term good. The health consequences persist.

Thirteen years ago, when I was 49, I basically ran the NYC Marathon off the couch. Pretty much my only training was jogging 5-6 miles 3-4 times a week. This was not serious training and pretty much was not enough.

But the real strong base of earlier training when I raced bicycles (and got my ass kicked) was a real advantage. It was pretty remarkable how much muscle memory and knowing your body can be an asset.

The point I'm trying to make is that stopping exercising is when the decay speeds up.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Nah, no rush on the cap. Appreciate it Cal.

So I have gone mad gentlemen. I have sold the Mamiya 7, just wasn't using it. Bought a Toyo 45. Thats gonna be gone soon, Im awaiting delivery of a Chamonix 45f-2. So Im 35 or 4x5, that middle format just wasnt doing it. 😛

Fidel,

Last night I was fondling many of my cameras trying to see which ones I loved the most. Basically call me a whore, but I love all of them.

I understand. Mark Cuban says, "Go big or don't go."

Blick Art Supply is now open for curbside retail. This is going to be weird. I need sheet foam with adhesive to make the "Devil Christian 4x5" complete. Ordering online was not good for me. Basically I would of had to buy a colored assortment, and the thicker sheets I know they stock were not posted on their website.

Also I'm mucho excited. Pro-Mone hates Rodinal, but it is mucho great with slow speed films. The tonality and sharpness blow me away. With slow speed films Rodinal the grain does not get mucho ugly as say Tri-X.

Also I like using 50:1 dilution (cheap-cheap-cheap) as a one shot, and I get a compensating effect.

I can see me contact printing 4x5's and being happy until I have a real darkroom in Beacon.

So when are you going to get an 8x10 Ebony? LOL. Also beware of "Linhof Disease."

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Nah, no rush on the cap. Appreciate it Cal.

So I have gone mad gentlemen. I have sold the Mamiya 7, just wasn't using it. Bought a Toyo 45. Thats gonna be gone soon, Im awaiting delivery of a Chamonix 45f-2. So Im 35 or 4x5, that middle format just wasnt doing it. 😛

Fidel,

Back in the day I purchased a stockpile of Fuji FP-100 when it could be purchased for $20.00 a pack. I bought 25 packs and somehow I still have 23 packs of Polaroid film in my fridge.

This is enough for some kind of project.

I snagged a Polaroid back from Christian that's 4x5. It is kinda evil on the Devil Christian 4x5 with the 90/8.0 Super Augulon.

Cal

 

[MrFujicaman]

Fidel,



Blick Art Supply is now open for curbside retail. This is going to be weird. I need sheet foam with adhesive to make the "Devil Christian 4x5" complete. Ordering online was not good for me. Basically I would of had to buy a colored assortment, and the thicker sheets I know they stock were not posted on their website.



Cal

Cal...do me a favor and see if Blik's has 8 X 10 sheets of the self-stick foam core mounting boards.

If you want them, I have 2 sheets of black 9 X 12 self-stick foam. Near as I can tell, it's just over 2mm thick.

 

[fiddle]

Ha!
No Ebony for me, I like good stuff, but not fancy stuff.... 😛
Now Im on the search for a 4x5 enlarger..... lol
Thought the Beseler 23 would be good forever, guess not.

 

[Calzone]

Cal...do me a favor and see if Blik's has 8 X 10 sheets of the self-stick foam core mounting boards.

If you want them, I have 2 sheets of black 9 X 12 self-stick foam. Near as I can tell, it's just over 2mm thick.

MFM,

Thanks in advance, but the Devil Christian 4x5 needs about 4mm thickness of light seal just inbetween the lens board Christian had laser cut alone.

Then I need some more for the nose piece, and than I want to use some foam sheet as a soft covering over the flat lens board.

This Devil Christian 4x5 will sport great ergonomics and also be mighty handsome.

Even though Blick has curbside service I still have to interface with their website which is no improvement. I also called an 800 number and was directed to a more local email address in Brooklyn, but that ended up also being a dead end because again I was directed back to the website.

I know Blick carries these foam sheets in all their stores in various thickness: 1/16" (2mm), 1/8th, and even 1/4.

Oh-well... Seems like I'll have to wait. Likely what you have is the same as in Blick. If I could find the individual sheets online all would be well. They sell colored assortments, but of course that would be a waste.

BTW I read an interesting article about CLO's (Collateralized Loan Obligations). Not saying it is going to happen, but this article connects the dots saying that it could be 2007-2008 again with the banks and AIG again.

Instead of CDO's (Collateralized Debt Obligations) which were basically risky mortgages bundled together to mitagate risk, that this time it is CLO's that bundled debt from risky businesses that borrowed money that are not AAA rated.

So again AIG instead of CDO's this time has a pile of CLO's. Do you think owning junky debt of bad businesses as risky? What if there is a pandemic, a lock-down, an economic collapse, double digit unemployment, protesting, and rioting.

Will AIG and others be bailed out again? Does the FED have enough dry ammo?

Hidden from their spread sheets the same game basically has been played. I'm no Chicken Little, but remember when Greenspan said the contagion is "contained," then it took about a year and we had a full blown housing crisis.

This has me very concerned.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Ha!
No Ebony for me, I like good stuff, but not fancy stuff.... 😛
Now Im on the search for a 4x5 enlarger..... lol
Thought the Beseler 23 would be good forever, guess not.

Fidel,

Pretty soon we will be like Devil Dan. That dude has mucho gear, and it seems like he uses all of it. How crazy is that?

BTW I also own a Beseler 23 (non XL). LOL.

If things go crazy like I think, who knows, I might buy a drum scanner on EBAY, scan, and then enlarge my negatives to contact print. Pretty much I have that capability of getting as far as making the digital negatives with the 24 inch printer and Piezography system I already own and use.

I think when I retire I'll be doing lots of crazy things. "Don't tell Maggie."

Cal

 

[fiddle]

Yeah, I have the 23 XL, looks new, really great shape, 6x9 glass carrier, all the extra doohickies..
Ill search around, see If I can find a decently priced LPL or something.
I currently only have my M2 and the 4x5. This is how I plan on staying, I hate too much stuff... LOL
And Drum scan, yes. you have a customer my friend.. 🙂

 

[Calzone]

Yeah, I have the 23 XL, looks new, really great shape, 6x9 glass carrier, all the extra doohickies..
Ill search around, see If I can find a decently priced LPL or something.
I currently only have my M2 and the 4x5. This is how I plan on staying, I hate too much stuff... LOL
And Drum scan, yes. you have a customer my friend.. 🙂

Fidel,

It seems that if you want one they are available for almost the taking. The problem is they are mucho heavy, and pretty much local pickup only. Pretty much is so heavy that you need a concrete slab. Anyways this is for a Hell Drum Scanner the real deal.

One house had a 1 1/2 detatched car garage. I could see me setting that up with heating and plumbing. This same house had a nice one open space finished attic that would be a great digital print studio.

Kinda mucho crazy when I installed a Corvette engine into my Jeep Scrambler. Did it all by myself.

The same for old 7800, 7880, 9800 and 9880 Epson printers. The Jersey Barrier is a 15 year old 7800. Just recently I changed out the dampers which are filters that are right before the printhead.

Know that these printers are known as workhorses with long print head life, but the best thing about them is that they are also deemed user servicable.

I spent $320.00 for an OEM set of 8 dampers and was nervous about doing the install. EZ-PZ.

Don't tell "Maggie" but I can see me collecting and refurbishing these printers. They are kinda like old pickup trucks pre-pollution controls. Call me a hill-billy, but I could see me having an Epson junkyard of sorts specializing in these printers.

Don't tell anyone but Piezoflush unclogs print heads. I lent Christian my set of carts for a 3880 he secured for "no-money." Of course Christian is a clever devil, that's how he got his name/reputation.

On Craig's List there was a 9880 in the Brooklyn Navy Yard for free pickup with a clogged print head. Others cost a few hundred dollars. Cheap-cheap-cheap.

I could see me having a small farm of printers: one would have to be color; but I could see me printing really big and needing a 44 inch printer (9800 and 9880). The Gloss Overcoat from Piezography K-7 is supposibly great over color prints. It is said that at Jon Cone Press that they have one printer set up with all carts filled with Gloss optimizer for a speedy Gloss Overcoat.

I still have my Juki commercial sewing machine. At FIT it seems many people took notice that I have good hand to eye, and a great set of hands for building. Probably was fully developed at Grumman over 17 years I worked there building prototypes. I can see me making some really cool clothes. I'd be selfish: only for me.

Cal

 

[jsrockit]

I might buy a drum scanner on EBAY, scan, and then enlarge my negatives to contact print.

Customer #2

 

[Calzone]

Customer #2

John,

Jon Cone Studios has a Hell scanner. This is the real deal with a photo multiplier tube for no digital artifact. Basically pure analog.

Mark Cuban said, "Go big or don't go."

I have resisted scanning, but when I do why not go all the way.

I remember seeing that exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum on War Photography. Some of those iconic shots that were analog image capture were somehow seamlessly displayed as digital prints. I suspect the prints were scanned. No sign or any sign of digital artifact, only analog smoothness.

In the EBAY ads it seems that the weight of a Hell Scanner requires a slab. The scanner needs the mass and a firm foundation free of vibration. Also know this is an analog scanner.

Also it requires some skill to operate, and know I am mighty stubborn.

Next would be to digitally manipulate the files to create/print literally a perfect negative to make a wet contact print to print limited editions.

Amazing to know that this technology is within reach. It was about 6 years ago when I went into Piezography and saw the digital negative portfolio I borrowed from Jon Cone Studios that I recognized the future.

When I saw Salgado's Genesis show at ICP I knew I was not that far behind.

Presently I'm very happy with the phasing into my body of work. I have an archive that somehow over time already has become historical. I have work prints, and a good part of a Book of Proofs, but the cost of printing the limited editions (paper, ink, and time) is at the moment out of reach.

It was sobering to see the $1408.00 price on the 700 ml bottle inkset of just 8 inks. This would allow me to fill my carts about twice. Then there is the paper... Pretty much to get serious I need about $10K in paper and ink, but already I have done a lot of the work in proofing and in the records required to organize the next big move. It is so fast and easy to make copies of things I proofed.

Meanwhile as a result of the lock down and paid leave I have an impressive amount of work done. Also know that my printing skills got even better.

Those 4 shots of Orlando in Harlem the day of the Trayvor Marten verdict with your hand pointing at Orlando in one shot is such a powerful series. I have it all worked out to where all 4 images will be printed four 6x9 images on 17x36 sheet. Of course this involves huge borders for matting and framing.

A lot is going on in those 4 shots. Funny thing is that they are best displayed in the order shot and that tense day I only took only 4 shots of Orlando.

Cal

 

[Nokton48]

Pretty soon we will be like Devil Dan. That dude has mucho gear, and it seems like he uses all of it. How crazy is that?

Yes I do. Darkroom area is basically done for now, as if it will ever be 🙂

Darkroom Reno II No 5 by Nokton48, on Flickr

Cal,
Next beeg project is a retro 60s vintage studio space to my tastes. I have everything I need to outfit it HEH HEH

Studio Renovation 1 by Nokton48, on Flickr

Most of early today I was cleaning and loading 13x18cm 8x10 5x7 and 4x5 sheet film holders.

 

[Calzone]

Yes I do. Darkroom area is basically done for now, as if it will ever be 🙂

Darkroom Reno II No 5 by Nokton48, on Flickr

Cal,
Next beeg project is a retro 60s vintage studio space to my tastes. I have everything I need to outfit it HEH HEH

Studio Renovation 1 by Nokton48, on Flickr

Most of early today I was cleaning and loading 13x18cm 8x10 5x7 and 4x5 sheet film holders.

Dan,

Looking forward to doing a "Dan" when I retire. Who would think that retiring would be like building a bunker of sorts where you can happily live in a bubble.

Andre and I use to make fun of our antisocial behaviors, and we took pride in being social D-V-ants.

Right now the bottlenecks are space, time and capitol. Leaving NYC frees up the finances after I stop working. I plan on having multiple studios like you. "Don't tell Maggie." LOL.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Bored at work just conditioning the vacuum with RF. No schedule.

Calculated my BMI, where 21.7 is the mean for a normal BMI, but my BMI is 20.8, meaning I'm a skinny bitch at 145 pounds.

Also since I'm under 146 pounds I'm a Welterweight.

In talking with "Maggie" 80% of the Covid Deaths are over 65 years of age, but many of these deaths are highly concentrated in nursing homes.

A "Rolling Stone" article about how age-ism and how the data is skewed lead to us talking about "Biological age."

Maggie took a test and even though she is almost 67 that her Biological age is 44.

So in doing one of the more in depth calculators the typical life expectancy is 83 years for me, but I'm expected to live to 106.9 years, and even though my cronological age is 62 my Biological Age is only 38.1 years old.

If I dyed my almost white chin beard and the grey on my sideburns I likely could pass for a 40 year old. Pretty much retirement looks like 4 decades for me in 4 more years.

I regress back to in high school when I worried about the future and wondered about what I was going to do over the next 40 years. Pretty much I'm in the same space and frame of mind where I don't want to screw things up. I fled to safety after the markets not only rebounded, but also got ahead of itself thinking that the recovery will be a Vee.

Pretty much we are all cash. I'm waiting for the next shoe to drop. July 31st is when some mortgage forebearance runs out and also the freeze on evictions. In Arizona hospitals are currently at 83% of capacity due to spiking Covid patients. Florida had 1.7K new cases yesterday. At its peak New York had only around 700 new cases as its high.

BTW Florida has a population of 22 million, while New York has 19.5 million. Arizona has 7.2 million. Florida and Arizona have sizable retiree populations.

My dad lived till 94, but he was an illiterate illegal immigrant who was poor and had a brutal life.

Things are looking good. Tested negative for Covid. I had an antibody test as well as the spit test. Now every two weeks I'll be getting spit tested.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

I printed out the four 6x9 "Orlando Sequence" onto a 17x24 sheet as a proof. It is pretty great, but the next size will be four 10x15's exploiting 24 inch wide paper.

The problem with the 24 inch wide prints is that I don't have a way of storing them. I engineered the 17 inch wide to fit in the museum box that hold my 24x36 inch prints. The 24 wide will be mucho long.

"Maggie" is in Westchester staying with her daughter, granddaughter, and son-in-law. This created a time to be able to amp up and pull out guitars. This has been the first time Maggie has really been away, otherwise she has been locked down in our apartment.

The 1960 Brown Super I noticed has a green tint to the brown Tolex from where the sun has been hitting the amp. I'll have to position the amp to get even exposure. It seems the color theory is red is the most impermanant color and fades so easily, and that brown is a blend of red and green two complementary colors, as the red fades the green emerges.

Towards the end of the year, depending on how Maggie does with income this year, I likely will get a pay-out for doing photography for her. I'll have to pay taxes, and I'll get a 1099, but perhaps this is how I will finance bulking up on paper and inks to move forward.

In Beacon, an nicely renovated and updated turnkey cottage that we loved sold, as well as this modern rendition of a "Carriage House" that had only 850 square feet of living space but also an oversized two car garage that I would of made into heated studio space. There are other properties we like, but these were ideal.

There is this cheap Sigma AF lens in L-mount that is a 45/2.8. It features a 55mm filter size and is knda small and lightweight. Not the highest resolution, not the Leica look, and pretty much for me would get used on the SL with the lens always stopped down to F5.6.

Reported not to be so sharp wide open, and pretty much has light fall off till even F5.6, so not really modern rendering. The design though is for smooth OOF and bokeh. The price of $550.00 is mucho cheap. The SL will likely become my color street camera. No "Monster lenses" for the SL anymore. The Monster glass is best utilized on the SL2 with 47.3 MP and the mucho speedy Maestro 3 processor.

Cal

 

[Range-rover]

I like that Fender Brown super you have, bet it sounds sweet.

 

[Calzone]

I like that Fender Brown super you have, bet it sounds sweet.

Bob.

Those Jenson P10R's opened up nicely. Yesterday I played the amp at TV volume and the voicing was wonderful. Still a bit throaty and 2 tens can make tight bass and push a lot of air for blues shuffles. The clean sound was great for speedy chops and for some jazz melody.

For me I like the lower gain "Normal" channel the best. It features the wider dynamic range and the most touch sensitivity. Generally I don't use distortion pedels or effects, plug and play. I get my sound from my fingers and hands.

I use a pick, but I also pull strings to get a sound like an acoustic piano. At times is sounds like two instruments, but I don't have that kind of smoothness yet.

My goal would to be a solo player.

Cal

 

[Range-rover]

Nice, On my Fender deluxe I was able to get this Weber speaker, the story goes
that a vintage style amp maker had a bunch of original P12R or Q's and wanted to
duplicate the sound of those speakers so he went to Ted Weber and they when though
a few prototypes but they nail the sound, this model doesn't come around to often but
it was only used in these repro vintage amp. they do sound nice.

 

[Calzone]

Nice, On my Fender deluxe I was able to get this Weber speaker, the story goes
that a vintage style amp maker had a bunch of original P12R or Q's and wanted to
duplicate the sound of those speakers so he went to Ted Weber and they when though
a few prototypes but they nail the sound, this model doesn't come around to often but
it was only used in these repro vintage amp. they do sound nice.

Bob,

Nothing like a real vintage speaker, but also know that cones age and get soft too.

I'm cool that the reissue Jenson's are not perfect clones. First off they can handle more power than the originals, so they are more durable.

I played some vintage speakers that were so worn that their sound was too fuzzy to the point they lacked definition. Also the bass was "farty."

This 60 Brown Super is a rare transitional model. It features the early 1960 pre-amps that are more Tweed sounding, but it also features the Vibrato circuit that has the extra tube. The Plate voltage is also lower due to also having a bigger value resistor for more voltage drop on the B+ feed.

In my research it ends up being that my layout and circuit follows that of the "Fender Blonde Twin" which was released mid 1960. Forensics suggest that Fender used the circuit from the 80 watt 2x12 twin to build my Super 35-40 watt amp with two tens. Of course the tranny's are smaller.

BTW since I'm primarily a Tele player the 2x10 works great for me.

The Mark Sampson era Matchless Spitfire and Matchless Lightning are also unusual and rare 2x10 versions. Know that Mark Sampson was a Drag Racer who decided to make Vox clones in a Mil-Spec kinda way. These amps are bombproof, but know that Vox amps like the AC-30 are known to overheat and catch on fire.

Mark Sampson came from nowhere and created the "Boutique" guitar amp market.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Yesterday I reworked the ML-Grip for my Monochrom. I had drilled and tapped a metric thread to receive and use a Leica Finger Loop made for a Leica CL grip or a Leica "Q."

I love the ergonomics, but the ML-Grip is made of pretty soft aluminum, so I decided to beef it up by drilling and tapping a steel hex stand-off I salvaged from some electronics or computer.

I set this steel insert into a bed of epoxy to secure it into a tight fighting hole. Had to use some force to set and push it into the interference fit where the edges of the hex cut into the aluminum for bite.

Anyways this is an interesting mod. I am mucho happy. Don't tell "Maggie" but I borrowed her finger loop (size small) off her CL. The cost of a Leica finger loop is kinda crazy.

Cal