U of S | Mailing List Archive | alt-photo-process-l | Re: problem

Re: problem



Sandy,

Sorry to hear about your negative experience with depression.

You may have also stumbled upon an interesting thread by accident—your depression may be the list's gain.

I've had that experience of looking for a specific negative and not being able to find it. One time I found the a negative I had been searching for about a year later—tucked away where I would be able to "easily" find it.  By the time I found it, I forgot what the hell I wanted it for.  In the meantime, during one of my searches, I came upon an a botannical image I shot about 10 years ago that was identical to one I had just recently shot.  What does it mean when you start repeating yourself?

Sandy, one option, instead of throwing everything out, is to have Sam and I come over and cull out the good ones for you—do you have a few six packs there?

Organization of work, both negatives and digital files, is difficult.  I just got a new desktop computer with a few terrabytes storage and I am in the process of re-organizing my digital files from digital cameras and scans.  I have been using keywords on folders by topic plus symbols included in the folder names to indicate which camera the contents were shot with.  I can then do searches on the keywords or symbols or use smart folders to locate various groupings.  All my 35 mm contact sheets were numbered from the beginning and I have used those numbers along with the frame number and an abbreviated title for the file names of the scans—this allows me to go back and access the original negative rather easily if I want to scan it again.

Sometimes it is interesting to go through old work.  Looking over landscapes taken while travelling, I often can recall being overwhelmed with some sort of feeling of creative genius while taking the shot—only to find now that I am quite puzzled as to why I ever considered taking the shot in the first place.

The proof sheets and digital files are an interesting record of what has captured my eye over the years.  I also find it interesting to note that upon viewing old contact sheets, I may find that images I ignored at the time are far more interesting to me now than the ones I originally chose.  It's fascinating to see how some aspects of our work changes over time and other aspects seem to remain the same.

I am sure that the world could survive just fine without a lot of the images I have saved.

Sandy, if you were here, you could blame your funk on the cold weather and dismal skies of winter—Cabin Fever!!!!

Save the negatives!

Best Wishes,
Mark Nelson

Precision Digital Negatives - The System
PDNPrint Forum at Yahoo Groups
www.MarkINelsonPhoto.com


In a message dated 2/4/08 11:30:54 AM, sanking@clemson.edu writes:


Diana,

Not sure why others are not posting but in my case it is not because
of happy printing. I am in something of a major funk regarding the
dismal lack of organization in my system of negative storage. I have
been going through hundreds of negatives that were not well organized
and filed over a period of many years and trying to put them into
some kind of category or date system. The task is quite overwhelming
and makes me realize that even I never make another negative I
already have so many that I would be lucky to print even 1/10 of
them.  And after several days of doing this I still have not located
the lost or misplaced negatives that set all of this off.

The whole experience has made me quite depressed and I am starting to
wonder if it would not be best to simply burn all of them and start
from scratch. Is anyone else having similar problems, or is this just
a side effect of my bi-polar tendencies?

Sandy












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