Out on my rounds today I saw a couple of kids with a view camera on the river. I call them "kids." They were probably RISD students but seemed like they'd be underclassmen, or could have even been mature and hirsute high-schoolers. But they very definitely did have a view camera on a tripod aimed at the water. This struck me securely enough that I chatted with them about it for a few seconds.
Film is supposed to be dead. Large format photography like that predeceased it. And you don't really expect to see people of any age engaging in time-intensive hobbies like that. So it's a pleasant surprise.
Film is supposed to be dead. Large format photography like that predeceased it. And you don't really expect to see people of any age engaging in time-intensive hobbies like that. So it's a pleasant surprise.
2 comments:
I can well imagine your surprise at finding a group of young people exploring such a fine old tradition. Some of my favourite photographers used view cameras. Ansel Adams was paramount as a landscape photographer but the ones I hold the highest regard for are those who documented the lives of ordinary people - Dorothea Lange used such an instrument.
I guess I was also surprised because of the way that Generation Z is portrayed in the media. Like, my own generation definitely had a sense of the past and things in it being worthwhile, and the 2000s had a retro aspect, but you don't know about the generation of kids who've always known the internet and tiny phones. Of course we tended to get stereotyped, too.
I love looking at Lange's photos. The subject matter could be downbeat, but there's always a sense of life to them.
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