Steven M. Anthony
(K=1408) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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The premise of your initial question seems to be whether we could afford to engage in photographic activities if not for the existence of photographic genre you consider UNPURE.
Leaving untouched the issue of what is considered PURE or UNPURE (which is, no doubt, a topic area in and of itself), I still find no real answer for this question, for it is dependant on the cost of services in a market environment that does not exist in the part of the world I live in.
Relating your question to the topic you chose for the thread, the question seems more slanted toward whether our creativity is linked to the technology of the day--in so much as the technology has reduced the cost of products and services.
I can say with a large amount of certainty that my creativity is not technology- or economic-based. The extent to which I create, however, is very closely related to the two.
As far as the WWW goes toward solving or worsening the dilemma, I don't see a dilemma to overcome.
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Pico diGoliardi
(K=1327) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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Your question is academic today, but in fifteen years when silver based film and paper is extraordinarilly expensive it will ring like bell in sea port fog. Alarming?
So, what are you trying to portray as Pure photography? Put yourself in the days of the wet plate. Was that pure because photographic applications were rare, exceedingly difficult, and expensive? Should we go back further to the camera obscura?
When you speak of the WEB, I think you are aluding to the plethora of imagery, the explosive growth of digital photography, the growing commoness of pitures in yet another form. Of course this additional medium effects human beings, communication and therefore changes the environment from which art draws its vocabulary.
So, the web does not worsen or better things. There is no dilemma.
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bill zelinski
(K=609) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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I can't really afford to do the photography I want to right now. If I wanted a "cheap hobby" I should have taken up rubber band collecting. My hedge on what's coming is to learn more about alternative image making and slowly accumulate quality tools that will not go obsolete in nine months I do agree that its the great unwashed mass out there that may keep the traditional filmmarket going for awhile but I would like to become less and less dependant on commercially made products. I see tintypes in my future.
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Steven Hupp
(K=288) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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First, I don't know why you don't know the word IMPURE or at least NOT PURE. Second, I don't follow why commercial photography is "unpure."
In any event, there are a large number of people who do needlepoint out there, and a large industry to supply them endlessly with materials. But there are not very many (if any) professional needlepointers. If there are enough photographers out there, there will be someone to supply the materials. Of course, they will be more expensive (good example: you can still get 620 film, it just costs 3 times as much). Many hobbyists will switch to digital and not think twice.
The web will help those who wish to continue shooting film (me included, probably) in the same way it does now. Think of it: where do you get 620 film? At your local pro/specialty shop, or on the web.
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Steven Hupp
(K=288) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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That last sentence was supposed to be a question:
Where do you get 620 film, at a pro/specialty shop, or on the web?
Who knew that typing course would be so important.
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Mike Dixon
(K=1387) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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I've looked at your question a few times, and I'm not sure if I've really made sense of it. But here's how I interpret it:
Your intitial question is essentially one of economics of scale (with PURITY being nothing more than a measure of whether you like something or not).
Of course, having a larger market base makes the supplies cheaper. I'm not as pessimistic about the short- and medium-term future of silver-based photography as some people here; silver-based photography is still expanding in a number of HUGE world markets.
On a different level, IMPURE photography also makes it more affordable for me to support my photography habit because I actually derive income from some of the "crap" that you listed.
I don't see the dilemna that you mention in your final question, so I really have no answer for it.
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steve
(K=816) - Comment Date 10/25/2000
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"Seymour, set the WayBack Machine for late 1981." The Hunt Brothers are trying to corner the market on silver and the price goes from $4.85 and ounce to $8.30 an ounce. Photo manufacturers go nuts and advise all the accounts that the price of silver-based photo materials will be doubled, so place an order for as much as you want right now at the old price.
Customers come streaming in and order enormous amounts of film and paper - including one guy who orders ten 40-inch wide rolls of Ektalure 'G' paper. Manufacturers make windfall profits because the silver they are using to deliver all the special orders is purchased at even lower prices than the pre-Hunt market price of $4.85 because it is from their reserves.
As stated, prices of photo materials double overnight. Sales remain steady. 18 months later silver prices are BELOW $4.50 an ounce. Photo manufacturers raise prices to cover "continued rising costs." Photo material sales remain steady. Moral - people will pay higher prices for photo materials and the photo companies were happy to find that out.
Your postulation that some types of photography may underwrite "pure" photography (whatever the hell that is) just doesn't mean much in the face of past photo material cost markups to cover labor and market driven factors.
The WEB oh, it'll make it worse....no wait it'll make it better...ummmm....what's the dilemma?
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Tony Rowlett
(K=1575) - Comment Date 10/26/2000
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Fifteen years. Damn, that's too soon to consider photo paper, film, and chemicals as exotic purchases. I hope you're wrong about that but I know you're not.
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Todd Frederick
(K=529) - Comment Date 10/28/2000
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Well Tony, I hope I'm still around in fifteen years, and I'll probably be searching for "antique" photographic paper at garage sales...hum, maybe by then: "vehicular air-transport enclosure" sales!
The issue of "technology" interests me since most of us think of technology as being electronic stuff...a piece of charred wood to a Neanderthal was a serious piece of technology for cave drawings in his time...think about it. I would have loved to have lived then knowing what I know now...maybe I did! :)
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