Who in the hell is Bill Pierce anyway?

amateriat said:
One of the mags I miss most; had it delivered to my mailbox up to the bitter end in 1982. Still have all my copies,


- Barrett
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Wish I still had mine, but they were damaged in storage several years ago; it was remarkable for being mostly written by working photographers instead of equipment geeks.
Still remember the sinking feeling the day Modern Photography showed up instead.
Bill's columns at the the Digital Photojournalist site are well worth the time. So is the rest of the site.

http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0709/contents.html
 
Bill Pierce said:
Bill Pierce is a working stiff who has used Leicas all his professional life. But he doesn't think a tool box should contain just one tool.
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I will confess that I don't know anything about Bill Pierce, Mr. Pierce, but what you've stated simply already makes me want to shake your hand. I mean, his hand. ;)

As I finish reading the intro by SG, I look forward to looking up everything there is to know about Bill Pierce, Mr. Pierce!
 
In response to this post, the answer is self evident. He's the son of Mr and Mrs Pierce. Hope it helps your identity crisis, have a good one!
 
Welcome Bill,

Man did you influence me! I still have cuttings from some of your columns in the early 70's. Still looking for that, what was it, "Chock-O-Block" coffee scoop for dumping sodium sulfite into my Rodinal!

One of the big differences for me from then to now is that I no longer work in a traditional darkroom. Still dev my films, but then scan them. Which way have you gone with this?

Gene
 
Here are the answers to two questions.

(1) Mr Pierce, what has been your favorite assignment to date?

Wars, homelessness, really ugly things that people don't like to look at, but should. All the folks who do this, TV, mags, agencies, wires, papers, the folks who do it well and the folks who are just average, the sheer weight and volume of their coverage might at least slow us down as we attempt to flush the earth down some giant toilet.

(2) I no longer work in a traditional darkroom. Still dev my films, but then scan them. Which way have you gone with this.

I shoot a lot of digital, but the film I shoot is scanned and then printed with an inkjet printer. I loved the darkroom and was a pretty good silver printer. But inkjet printing gets more impressive and more stable all the time. I'm convinced if Gene Smith were alive today, he would be the master of Photoshop. Silver prints are still in demand by museums and galleries. But, since much of the color they buy and sell is inkjet or earlier print forms that Henry Wilhelm puts at even less long lasting, silver for silver's sake alone seems a bit silly. Especially since black and white inkjet can have some very good long life characteristics.
 
Dear Bill, no disrespect meant in my post above here. I see so many of these "who is", "what's the best a ... or a... " posts that I have become jaded. My apologies. I still don't know who you are but if Gene W does, you are someone in my books. Now to find out! Welcome to the forum. It can be fun when it's not all deadly earnest.

cheers, Jan
 
Pierce, I have been trying to convince Epson to make a a 4-5 cartridge dedicated
black/white printer since last photokina (2006). I have a loose promise of seeing (or hopefully getting) a prototype next year in Cologne. Stephen and I ended up at the same lunch table as a couple of the project guys from Epson Japan. I explained what i REALLY wanted and in spite of slight linguistic challenges (explain spot-varnish function to a non English speaker!) we managed to get them interested.
Every one keeps telling me to use the big monsters with 8 cartridges, out of which 6 have color in them. My feeling is that if I want color, I shot Velvia or K-chrome, but when I shoot black/white I want the control and no interference from any stinking color cartridges. A matt black, a glossy black, a 50% grey and a 18% grey and the spot varnish for glossy image surface on matt paper.
I suspect that one of the problems with companies like Epson/HP etc is that most of the development guys have never seen a really good fibre based print. They should all be forced to go to Tucson and see the Gene Smith archive, particularly the Pittsburgh sets of prints. Then they would now what to aim for!
Well, they have another year to come up with this. Of course I also wanted larger bottles for the ink etc. They claimed that there could be problem with settling of the pigment - I told them to put a small ultra sonic platform under the ink-bottles (OK, I think they got it, but it could be that we will have to kick the bottle rack at preset intervals instead!).
 
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Who is Bill Pierce? Why the greatest writer the popular photo magazines of the 1960`s ever had- thats all.

All you have to do is reprint the columns from Modern I think, maybe one a week, and we will have enough to talk about forever.

Start with the rolling pin developer tank procedure. I still use it. It still works.
Perfect negs every time.

I learned more from you than most all the other places together.
 
Welcome to our little online home here, Mr.Pierce. It is a pleasure to see such well-known writers and contributors to photography being invited to RFF.
 
Welcome Bill and I look forward to your posts.

Best regards,

Bob
 
Tom A said:
Pierce, I have been trying to convince Epson to make a a 4-5 cartridge dedicated
black/white printer since last photokina (2006).

Tom -

I think this is an incredibly important subject, one that deserves it's own thread. But I'm a newby to this site. All you folks can laugh. But I'm not quite sure how to start a new thread.

Anyway, there are printers and there are other printers. The Epson printers like the 1800 produce incredible color and the gloss enhancer pretty much eliminates the gloss differential in the highlights. But I think they make awful b&w prints.

The 2400, 3800 on up have three black-and-white inks and add a little of the color to give you a choice of "tones" (the straight carbon blacks tend to warm). The colors are a little less saturated and both b&w and color prints can show a change in surface texture on glossy papers in the highlights (no gloss enhancer). But the results, especially with some of the new papers that have a bartya coating and really mimic silver paper do an amazing job. I was showing a mix of silver and inkjet prints to a museum, one of the biggies. They lean towards silver. When the meeting was breaking up, I asked some of the curators if they realized some of the prints were inkjet. They didn't; they hadn't. The folks who make paper for Ilford have an inkjet paper with the bartya coating, e.t.c., that's even better than what I was using.

And in the end, I just want a good print. Initially, I felt exactly as you do about the b&w inadequacy in off-the-shelf inkjets. Felt that way for a long time and I think I was correct. But things are changing. And as a bonus, some of these new inkjet papers hold a D-max you wouldn't believe.

Pierce
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Even when I was temporarily rangefinderless I checked in to RFF daily because the commentary here is a notch above what is generally found on the internet and the participants are gentlemen (and ladies in few cases).

Now that you're here, Bill Pierce, my confidence in RFF is confirmed.
 
Hi Mr. Pierce,

Welcome. I didn't know who you were before reading this thread but then there are so many things I don't know. I wanted to ask you a couple of question if I may (and if this is the right thread):

1. What was the trigger point that got you working as a photo-journalist (am I getting the right term)?

2. What was the most taxing assignement you have ever done (not physically but rather mentally)?

thank you
Clarel
 
Clarel -

I started working full time as a photojournalist because I needed the money. I had just gotten divorced and needed money to make sure my kids would be taken care of.

Until then I had bounced around doing some photography, some writing, everything from lighting design to stage electrician to actor in NYC. John Durniak, the photo editor of Time Magazine was building a new staff and had signed on Eddie Adams and Dirck Halstead. I delivered some film of riots in Philadelphia and John asked me why I wasn't submitting prints. I told him I had lost my darkroom and was crashing on the floor of a friend's NYC apartment. He said, "Is that for the reason I think it is?" I said, "Yes." And he said, "Do you want a contract?"

I think the assignments that are the hardest are the dull ones - photographing a box of soap, shooting the editor holding up some award... The ones where you learn something, see something important, talk to someone who is brilliant in a given field may be a touch rough on body and soul at times but they are absolutely wonderful. They are why you do what you do.
 
What are some of the best schools to learn photojournalism these days? or does it matter?

What amazes me is how photojournalists deal with the pace and still can be creative. With the convenience of digital, it seems the expectations have skyrocketed as well.

Photojournalism done artfully is my favorite kind of photography.
 
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