Adding To The Shop

After a bit of research on archival quality printing, I've decided to add a couple more items to my shop today. I chose to go with a few of the more interesting Ttv photos and an unframed print of the Wishful Thinking illustration.

I wanted to make sure that any prints that were purchased from me would resist fading and look nice and sharp. I'm looking mostly for prints that are guaranteed for 70+ years. From the bit that I've read, it's important to print on acid free paper to prevent yellowing, and use pigmented/archival ink to resist fading. I found a few online options that look promising. It took me a bit of time to sniff out these printers, so I thought I'd share them here to save anyone conducting a similar search some time. Here are my findings:

http://www.mpix.com/
http://www.iprintfromhome.com/
http://www.imagekind.com/
http://finerworks.com/
http://www.giclee-factory.com

I have yet to use any of these printers so I can't vouch for them. If you have used any of these printers, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

I would really love to find a local printer to work with, I just am not sure where to start, especially if I'm not printing in bulk. If you're in the Indianapolis area, and you have any suggestions I'd love to hear them.

I'll be sure to post any findings and reviews once I've discovered a printer I like! Yay for learning about print! It's a wide wide world and it's SO not dead.

I think it's a sign

Here is a quick glimpse in to a neighborhood on the east side. The thing about this neighborhood that caught my eye the most was the signage. The style of the signs seemed to suggest that the town must have boomed in the 50's but now they've all experienced a sort of urban decay. Perfect for a little TtV photo shoot.

Mustang Sally, through the viewfinder

Somehow this TtV thing seems to capture the late summer warmth on a cherry red mustang far more eloquently than my dslr on its own. Working in a field where everything is post produced, there's something really freeing about creating a whole mood in an image before it ever reaches my photo editing software. No grunge masks, no massive exposure or color corrections, just a slight tweak of the curves to pop the darks and viola, an unsightly used car lot in a small town can feel completely warm and nostalgic. I posted more small town USA, TtV style, on my Flickr site.

TtV Experiment

Last night I grabbed an old piece of cardboard and some electrical tape to construct my glare blocking tunnel for the TtV experiment. It didn't take long, I suppose I could have tried a little harder to make it look nice, but I was so anxious to get to using it I really didn't care about the aesthetics of the tube.

My contraption, though strange and ugly, worked great!

I took a couple test photos in the living room last night to test it out, then a couple more outside this morning. I can see some definite potential for cool photos. I'm curious if the length of the tube has anything to do with the way the edges of the photo will bubble. (why didn't I pay more attention in optical physics) Well, I'm off, I've got lots of experimenting to do!

The top of the camera flips up and you look down through the viewfinder


Here's my ugly little cardboard tube on the camera. I just stick the lens of my DSLR in the top of the tube and snap away.

Hello Beautiful!

A week or so ago I won an old twin lens Kodak Duaflex camera on ebay. I just think they're super cool looking and I thought it would be something interesting to have on a shelf in the living room. Aside from it's aesthetic value, I of course thought that it would be fun to load it up with film and shoot some photos with it from time to time.

As soon as the package arrived, I opened the box, pulled out my new (old) toy and began to wander around the house. As I gazed down through the top of the camera through the viewfinder there was something really cool about what I saw. The same things I see EVERY day somehow looked different and a little more interesting. I thought little more about actually using the camera other than to show Alex the Duaflex when he got home. Just as I did, he held the camera at mid torso level and looked down through the top of the camera and commented on how neat things looked through the viewfinder.

Apparently we're not the only ones who think that a little magic happens when you look down through the veiwfinder of these old cameras. I recently found a post about TtV (Through the Viewfinder) Apparently there's a whole community of people who rig up their digital SLR cameras to take photos down through cameras like my duaflex. Here's a great how-to article that explains the process. I can't wait til tomorrow when I will rig up my own duaflex for some TtV fun!