Judy Seigel (jseigel@panix.com)
Fri, 12 Feb 1999 23:55:08 -0500 (EST)
On Fri, 12 Feb 1999, Jeffrey D. Mathias wrote:
> .... If I read one more post saying "you can find out
> how it's done by reading Post-Factory", I'll just puke. (No offense to
> Judy S. as she has done a good job of putting together an informative
> journal, albeit targeted mainly for the gum process.)
No offense to you Jeff, but "targeted mainly for the gum process" is
false. In fact Issue #2 had barely 3 pages out of 52 on gum !
Scandalously little of course, because there is so much to say about gum
printing that is NOT reliably in print elsewhere, and as folks keep doing
it, it keeps opening up.... but 3/52nds is hardly "mainly."
(I hope to squeeze in a few more pages in Issue #3, in work now, but the
main theme will be silver gelatin toning.)
> ....The thing is -
> answers should be provided for all to digest in this forum of easy
> access and free to use. Don't just reference some journal or document,
> provide the information, and more.
My own experience is that, although the list is a PRICELESS resource, Web
pages are uneven. There is much MIS-information. The great beauty (or one
of them) of The List is that it's interactive, that is, error is almost
certainly corrected, or a warp modified, sooner probably than later. I've
found absolute HOWLERS on web pages, and how is the tyro to know? (Until
I get an e-mail from them saying "I read so and so on a Web page,
and....)."
True, I've only been to a limited number of web pages, because I dislike
the format so --it's possible I missed the best ones. But, as previously
noted, I do not see even the best as a match for an *edited*, coherent
source in print...
> What's the matter with divulging the nuts and bolts of how we do things
> (alt-photo that is). I've put a fairly complete guide to Pt/Pd printing
> on my web site and have kept tract of those getting into the meaty
> sections. I've had a lot of visitors, but wouldn't you guess, not any
> who have published work or reside in academia. One would think there
> would be an interest....
It's possible that the Web site isn't the most efficient source of
information, which perhaps is sensed by "academics." Of course I'm only a
semi-academic, and arguably a biased observer, but my sense of the
material I've found on web sites is that the most valuable ones were an
upload of material IN PRINT elsewhere or previously ...
> ....It would be nice
> to have a banner that the links could place on their page to get to the
> main alt-photo linking page. I would expect one of the links to go to
> the Post-Factory journals.
Excuse me Jeff, there is only ONE Post-Factory journal (but the term is
a good one, isn't it?).
> I would expect detailed answers to many of
> the inquiries on this list to become a linked page. I would expect on
> going interactive research to take place at a site. I would expect the
> archives to be better organized at a site.
I would expect chaos.
Perhaps I speak from my own limitations, but I find it a TREMENDOUS
effort, at times nearly full time, to do the interactive one-on-one
editing and organizing required to make a limited amount of material
coherent, relevant and accessible -- and I have some 20 years' experience
as an editor.
> We're beyond the social novelty of this list, we're ready to get down.
> As we seem to do quite well with the technology of alt-photo processes,
> let's make this technology work for us. Having a good, informative,
> accessible, pertinent, and organized site should not only provide us
> with the help we search out from time to time, but will free up more of
> our time for our art.
If you figure out how to do that.... you're a veritable national treasure.
And if you figure out how that's going to "free up more of our time for
our art," I'm going to fly down there on my broomstick and beg for your
secrets.
But meanwhile, why, I wonder, do folks keep writing and buying photography
books? Merely habit? An anachronism? The chicken still running around
doesn't know its head has been cut off? I see more of them listed in the
catalogs now than ever before....
Judy
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