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Saturday, August 31, 2024

OOPS – I DIDN’T SEE THAT or WHAT NOT TO DO




By Heinz Richter

During the 13 years I taught photography, one important aspect was composition.  This was often an enigma to many of my students.  But it served to improve their photography to quite an extend.

However, it also created another, new problem.  People began to concentrate so much on the subject matter, to present it as good as possible, that they began to ignore the background.  The result were often good photographs that, however, were useless because of a very bad background.

A similar problem often occurs by choosing the wrong place to shoot at in the first place although this cannot be helped at times.

One type of photography that is easily riddled with mistakes like this is wedding photography.  Modern cameras with automatic everything have created a venue of wedding photography that is done by ultimately totally unqualified individuals.  Mistakes abound.

Most people are familiar or at least are aware of Photoshop.  In the past I have written about the advantages of Photoshop as a tool to improve our photographs.  But it has also created a certain carelessness during actual shooting because ‘Photoshop will take care of that’.

Yes, it can, but that often is not easy.  Here are some examples:

The first was a situation where the photographer concentrated on the wedding party and totally ignored the background.  Then, when it was pointed out that a cemetery as a background for a wedding party was less than ideal, his answer was that Photoshop would take care of that.

Well, Photoshop did indeed take care of it, but the photographer did not have anywhere near the necessary skills to do so with the result that I was asked to take care of the problem.


After finding a photograph with a suitable background and very similar lighting, I carefully separated all the individuals in the wedding party, including some of the shadows and transferred them onto the photograph with the much better background.


Photoshop saved the day, but not with considerable time and effort, something that easily could have been avoided by using an appropriate background in the first place.

The next photograph is a very good example where the photographer forgot to take an important photograph under pressure from the time restraints of the moment.  He forgot to take a photograph of the bride with her mom.  Not a good thing to do.  Photoshop allowed to put the bride into another photograph with the mother.  Mom was happy.

This is a montage of two separate photographs to put the bride into one photograph with her mother.

The next photograph is not so much a mistake by the photographer, rather a situation where time constraints demanded that the photograph was taken then and there.


The result is a lot of clutter and distracting detail which ultimately hurts the photograph as a whole.  In addition, the photograph is slightly blurred. Again, Photoshop allowed changing an almost useless picture to a worthwhile memory of the important day by removing some of the clutter, and using the artistic filter gallery to give the photograph a painting like appearance.  It turned out to be one of the favorites of the bride.


The final example is another photograph which had to be taken right then with little possibility to change the background reflected in the mirror.  Simply removing the distracting pipes in Photoshop resulted in a much better photograph.



Many photographers feel that Photoshop is used much too often to cover mistakes that should have been avoided in the first place, and rightfully so.  But Photoshop should also be recognized as a very good tool to improve photographs that suffer from having been taken under less than ideal conditions.


For other articles on this blog please click on Blog Archive in the column to the right

To comment or to read comments please scroll past the ads below.


All ads present items of interest to Leica owners.

_______________________________________________________________________

EDDYCAM - the first and only ergonomic elk-skin camera strap     
 www.eddycam.com        

      


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Wednesday, August 28, 2024

THE LEICA COMPANY ARCHIVES




By Heinz Richter

David Farkas of Leica Store Miami wrote a very interesting article about the Leica company archives. Unfortunately, these are not open to the public. I have always been interested in the history of Leica. Subsequently, on my visit to Wetzlar on June 9, I decided to tour the archives myself, to see what other interesting items I might discover.

Unfortunately, our guide Tim Pullmann had only limited time because he was busy setting up for the Leica Auction that weekend. Even though with more time I might have seen more of the treasures tucked away, it was a memorable experience none the less.

Needless to say, much of what we saw has been covered in David's article. Here is his account first, with additional examples from my visit to follow:


David Farkas, LeicaStore Miami

Up a back staircase and through a few nondescript double doors, the Leica Company Archives house valuable documents, patents, design sketches, books, photographs, production records, prototype cameras, and more. We took a tour of the Archives, which is located on the second floor of the New Building. Even seeing just the tip of the iceberg, we came away duly impressed.


Records Room

First on our tour was the records room. Here, documents of all sorts were stored in large moveable metal shelving units and more classic file drawers.

 
Lots of records, with room to grow

 
An entire section with Leica patent records
  

 
Collection of Leica photography books

 
Dealer and trade show display model cameras and promo items

 
A book of old advertisements

 

 
Hand drawn 3D product renderings

 
Renderings for concept cameras that were never developed

 
Binocular schematics

 
Original screwmount camera schematics from 1929


Museum

The next stop on the tour was more of mini museum, with several glass display cases. On offer were some significant historical pieces, like a camera and lens from the Hindenburg, the Jony Ive designed camera for (RED) which sold for $1.8 million, Oskar Barnack’s original notes and sketches, contact sheets from the first roll of film ever shot, production records, and some prototyping models for various cameras.

 
Camera and lenses from Hindenburg

 
Camera and lenses from Hindenburg

 
Detailed production records

 
Oskar Barnack’s original employee ID card

 
Oskar Barnack design sketches

 
The first ever roll of film shot with a Leica camera, by Oskar Barnack

 
Notes by Oskar Barnack

 
Oskar Barnack design sketches

 
More Oskar Barnack design sketches

 
Old school prototyping

 
New school 3D printed prototyping, here for the X-U

 
Jony Ive (Apple’s head of design) designed M for (RED) camera


The Camera Vault

For the third and final stop on the tour, our guide led us through another set of double doors and into the crown jewel of the Archive – the camera vault. This large room, about the same size as the records room, had row after row of metal shelving, with almost every spot occupied by storage bins, each labeled with a product name or two. Our guide removed one of the bins and opened it. Inside was about a dozen cameras of that type.

Sadly, no pictures were allowed in there, so you’ll just have to imagine what a Leica collection with thousands of cameras and lenses looks like.


The Future

Leica plans to make the archive available to the public in the future. In the meantime, a team of full-time archivists keep the growing collection preserved for future generations. Leica created the first 35mm still camera over 100 years ago. In that time, the company has had an enormous impact on photography. Clearly, the company understands the importance of maintaining and curating this history.

Additional discoveries during my visit:

All photogrphas by Heinz Richter unless otherwise noted

Groundbreaking fo the new headquarters at Am Leitz Park in Wetzlar, April 25, 2012


Ceramic replica of a Lerica ! (model A), made by a Japanese collector

A while ago Leica acquired the Leica collection of Rolf Fricke. The collection was much too extensive to put on  
display and most items are tucked away in foam lined storage containers.

Leica M 4-P Half Frame


All individual parts of a Leica IIIf, including the manufacturing steps for the top plate


60mm f/2 Lens made for the US Navy




Early experimental model of a digital M7
For more information go here


Earliest production records for Leica cameras


Original negatives of photographs with the Ur-Leica by Oskar Barnack


Photographs of Ernst Leitz with the Ur-Leica by Oskar Barnack

Biggest Leica I ever had in my hands
Photograph: Tim Pullmann



For other articles on this blog please click on Blog Archive in the column to the right

To comment or to read comments please scroll past the ads below.


All ads present items of interest to Leica owners.

_______________________________________________________________________

EDDYCAM - the first and only ergonomic elk-skin camera strap     
 www.eddycam.com        

      


Click on image to enlarge
Please make payment via PayPal to GMP Photography

Click on image to enlarge
Please make payment via PayPal to GMP Photography

Click on image to enlarge
Please make payment via PayPal to GMP Photography