# someday and it won't be long.



## mysteryscribe

My SIL  (Son in Law) came by Sunday with some new pictures he had made.  He finally got all his digital ducks in a row.  So after two years of moving from one look to another, he is back to a classic photo look.  No more of the printed page flat look.  Now it is vibrant reasonably contrasty shots like photographers for hire have always, at least most often, produced.  (My opinion only )

That isn't the point, this is the point.  He saw the daylight photo lab, the one my wife forced me to build.  Then he remarked, "I'm not sure I even remember how to shoot film.  I haven't shot a roll in two years."  He was actually proud of that.  

Hold on to your hats, It might just be that all of us, who still shoot film in any sort of camera, might be viewed as alternate technique photographers soon.  I mention that because I saw something on another thread about emulating b&w film in photo shop.  Someone answered why not just shoot black and white film.   I could almost hear the gasps in the air.  My god what heresy.

So now I am told there is a digital retro studio somewhere in yankee land,(that being anywhere outside my home town).  What the hell is a digital retro studio.  Is it pictures that are pixelated from enlargement past 640x480.   No its some, excuse the term digital people, clown who thinks a Canon or Nikon camera is the answer to world hunger.

And for those of you who are confused by this let me explain more clearly.  Digital is here to stay and I have no doubt that someday you will be able to mix concrete with a digital camera, but you can't shoot retro NEGATIVES with one just yet.   It's the mystique thing, with cut film holders, or maybe lenses that go click without a speaker system.  When you can do that with digital, I hope I am sitting on the right hand of Mathew Brady. 

Again just to clerify, this is not a novel, this is not a confused old man babbling, it is an editorial.  If you don't allow editorials on this forum, feel free to remove it.  Trust me I probably would if it was my forum..


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## terri

It's all right, Charlie! Vent away.


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## mysteryscribe

cool beans...


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## mysteryscribe

Since I have been given permission by the resident artist to vent let me go one more.

On the pictures my SIL brought over. First of all remember he and I both shoot for money. Okay I'm retired he took over. He loves to do outdoor portraits. Given the choice I would never do one. But he does love it. In some respects they are easier in others more difficult.

Two of his best shots had a similar problem. Background dark enough to blend with the hair, and in one case hat, of the model. Now most of us understand that this stuff happens. He is young and somewhat inexperienced but it happens to everyone now and then. I would have seen it in the viewfinder, I hope. God knows I have missed it more than once. Also sometimes it can't be helped. You just cant control the light as well outside. If you want a picture of Lucy on the swings and a tree is there the tree is just there.

So when we see something shot outside, we need to take a shooters point of view. Was that background esential for that shot ect. If so live with it. If not, next time do it differently. The trick is to gently explain that to someone, so they don't get all defensive. A young photographer seems to get one thing right, then we are on him or her about something else. There are a million details in shooting perfect pictures. (assuming there is one)

The true beauty of digital is that you can shoot a hundred shots when you only need one. My first teacher, a painter only slightly older than me, used to say, "If you allow everyone with a camera to shoot pictures at a wedding, someone will make the best shot and most likely it won't be you. It's an odds thing." I believe that about digital. In film, especially retro, you shoot a finite number of shots. You might get the light right, the background right, and the pose right before you click the shutter, only to find the facial expression is way wrong. Or that the balance isn't quite right. Digital gives you at least a little heads up.

In the end perfection is where you aim, good enough sometimes has to be good enough. Define good enough, in my world was the check from the customer.

So sometimes I have to gentle down my remarks to my SIL. I suppose Barbara did for me to. Thank you Barb where ever you are.


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## mysteryscribe

It was dark and it was raining like a muther.  It was the right kind of night for the kind of business I planned.  Eddie from work arranged it, but he refused to come along.  I can't say that I blame him.  The damn informers were everywhere.

The kid with the book of poems was sitting in the darkest corner of the diner.  "Hello, I'M Deacon."

"No names," he replied quietly.

"So do you have the stuff?"

"Do you have the hundred?"  

I flashed him the C note before he made a move to show me the box.  "Where did you get this?"

"From my old man's stuff.  He died last year.  Do you want it or not."

"How many you got?"

"Two of the 100 and one of the four hundred."

"A hundred bucks is steep for just three."

"It's the premo stuff.  If you don't want it someone will."

"You sure it's real fugi?"  I asked.  He handed me the box to examine.  It had never been opened so I paid and left.

The end...

Just so you know, this is a piece of fiction NOW...


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## terri

mysteryscribe said:
			
		

> It was dark and it was raining like a muther. It was the right kind of night for the kind of business I planned. Eddie from work arranged it, but he refused to come along. I can't say that I blame him. The damn informers were everywhere.
> 
> The kid with the book of poems was sitting in the darkest corner of the diner. "Hello, I'M Deacon."
> 
> "No names," he replied quietly.
> 
> "So do you have the stuff?"
> 
> "Do you have the hundred?"
> 
> I flashed him the C note before he made a move to show me the box. "Where did you get this?"
> 
> "From my old man's stuff. He died last year. Do you want it or not."
> 
> "How many you got?"
> 
> "Two of the 100 and one of the four hundred."
> 
> "A hundred bucks is steep for just three."
> 
> "It's the premo stuff. If you don't want it someone will."
> 
> "You sure it's real fugi?" I asked. He handed me the box to examine. It had never been opened so I paid and left.
> 
> The end...
> 
> Just so you know, this is a piece of fiction NOW...


 I hope this doesn't come true in my lifetime!


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## mysteryscribe

most likely depends on how long you plan to live lol.


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## mysteryscribe

(Note to the bosslady... if any of this gets to far off subject just toss it... no harm no foul...)


It was cold outside, but warm inside the basketball arena. It should have been cold outside it was the day after thanksgiving in Richmond Va. It was also the beginning of the Christmas Craft show at the Tri County Rec Center.
The exhibitors were most often middle-aged artisans. The show didn't allow any 3rd world resale items. As the old man, in the somehow disconcerting suit and vest, walked by people stared. With his funny round hat and strange looking outfit, he seemed to have stepped out of a time machine.

He stopped a moment at a booth displaying instant digital costume photographs. He looked in awe at the shots and the large sign that read, Ready In Ten Minutes. He shook his head, but didn't say a word to the young woman behind the foldup table.

He nodded to the exhibitors as he continued down the line. He finally came to a stop at the corner booth just before one would be required to turn left in his tour of the exhibits. The two inside corner booths were similar to the rooms in a motel by the coke machine. They were by far the least desireable. The frontal area of the both was very small, which historically hurt sales.

His first physical action was to remove the covers from four huge poster sized prints. Then he removed the white sheet that covered his large wooden camera with the black cloth. The old man then removed his coat and he was open for business.

His first customera was a woman and her young son. She had spent the better part of a quarter hour staring into the soul of a little girl in one of his guilt framed poster sized prints. Finally she asked if he could do that for her son.

"Yes but not in ten minutes." He explained that he would send her the images in a few days. She could choose one, if she found anything she liked. If she did that, she would have to send along a check for $300.

"That's a lot," she complained.

"Yes it is," He agreed. "You can buy 50 digital prints of your son down the aisle for that." He readily admitted it. Why not it was obviously true.

The image of her son hangs in a guilded frame over her fireplace today. The old man in the time machine suit, who knows where he is. The check for the booth rent was signed Edward Weston, but nobody got the joke, if it was a joke.

(This is also fiction by the way)


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## mysteryscribe

One of the few things I really love about working with film again... Not shooting film and then carrying it to a lab, but working with it...is that I get to listen to the radio. Okay I could have all along but somehow radio and darkrooms go together.

So do country music and the smell of stop bath and fixer... (personal preference I am sure)... What brought this up you ask... Philosophy...

I heard a song that kind of discribes what we are all going through these days. I have no idea what the name of it is, bu there is a line. "He's just an Old Hippie trying to adapt." A lot about hanging onto the old or embracing the new. Not sure where he fits, hes just trying to adapt... I like it.  It seems alot like us old time analogers in a digital world. Take what you need and leave the rest from another old song, but I don't think Joan would want to be called country.

So anyway just a thought along the someday and it wont be long line. I think. By the way there is a whole new generation of country music since I last worked in a room for film.


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## mysteryscribe

I must be doing something wrong here.  No one has stopped in to say i'm an idiot, and I am most of the time.

I have a couple of brother and a sister. We all shared the same dad. Yes it was a sign of the times I grew up in. That really isn't the story.

The story is that my oldest brother was an executive with a fortune 100 company for several years before I moved back home. One Saturday morning we all went to my dad's house to build something or other. Daddy was the real builder, we just banged with hammers.

When the day was done, we all sat about sipping the iced tea my mom had made and talking about how much fun we had that day. My dad who was a factory worker and not particularly well educated turned to my bother who had made the comment and said, "You know a man is never happier than when he is working with his hands."

I had lost sight of that over the years in photography. Shoot the film, take it to the lab, deliver the prints, collect the money. It wasn't a lot that I did for my daily bread. Now that I am back manipulating film and tanks ect, I am finding a new enjoyment and depth to the craft, which I have practiced almost forty years now.

I was a business at the end and frankly a lot like digital photography. No not the artistic aspects, but the actual hands on physcially touching the image thing. I didn't even realized that I had missed anything till I went back to the tanks and the stink of chemicals.

This is where you should insert, "You are such an idiot."


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## terri

You are such an idiot, Charlie. 

Everyone knows the only REAL way to work with your hands in photography is to make bromoil prints! 





:lmao:


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## mysteryscribe

Ah now I see... I knew something was missing but I thought it was sex... See what happens when  you get old.


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## mysteryscribe

It's gonna be a little longer than I thought before they drag me to digital camera land.  I just bought another antigue camera.  Why you might ask, well it was there, I was here, my paypal account had money in it, sooooooo

I now own a kodak no2 pocket brownie camera.  I actually bought it for the shutter.  I need a shutter for some glass I have.  I'm hoping to make a 3x4 super pinhole with it.  I could go 4x5 just as easily and I just might.

The glass I have is 150mm so I can extend the back far enough to do either I expect.  Anyway the point is i have a couple of more weeks to play with this one before digital raises it's ugly head again.

I am also giving some thought to shooting a classic 35mm rangefinder like the one I had in asia in the sixties.  It isn't a leica but it does have a couple of memories for me.  

If I'm boring you to tears somebody stop me.


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## terri

When digital raises its ugly head, slap it down with one of the retro camera bodies you have.   :thumbup:  That'll keep it at bay.    

It's what my mama and them always told me to do.   Yep, it is.


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## mysteryscribe

Trust me when it comes to smack down there isnt a digital made that hold up to a polaroid rollfilm camera ie your 110b type.


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## mysteryscribe

THIS IS FICTION I THINK.

Camping for me is a way to make it to more festivals. Since I seldom sell anything, I can't afford a two hundred dollar motel bill. That would be in addition to a fifty dollar a day food habit. I mean, hell if you are staying in a motel you don't want to eat at Mcdonald's. You want to eat with all the other ARTISTS.

So camping out became the logical move for me. The Apple Knocker Festival was held in a small town in West Virginia. I didn't know they even grew apples in West Virginia. I found the county park on line. It took some doing, but I found that the county where the Apple Knocker Festival was held, had a small park which allowed camping during special occasions. I emailed to make sure the Apple Knocker was special enough. It was.

When I arrived on Friday afternoon, I fell in line at the park rangers desk. It wasn't much of a line actually. I was behind the only other person there.

"What do you mean you don't have electric hookups."

"This isn't usually a campground. We are just allowing campers to use the picnic spaces tonight. They don't have any facilities at all. There are bathrooms here at the ranger station, but no shower or anything like that."

"Well I can do without the shower, but I can't stay here if you don't have electricity. I need it to charge my camera batteries."

"Like I said, I'm sorry but we don't have any place for you to do that. There isn't even a conventional outside plug for our tools. All the plugs are for 220v appliances."

"I never heard of such a thing. Didn't anybody tell you hicks that everything runs on batteries now. Batteries have to be charged. If you want to take pictures you have to have power."

"Not always," I piped in.

"Really, who the hell are you?" 

The would be camper was beginning to p*** me off. He was holding me up for no reason. They were not going to install a power supply for him that night. I handed him my card with a smile.

"Name is Deacon, and I'm a retro photographer." I could see he didn't have a clue. "You know like Edward Weston." Still no recognition. "Ansel Adams," I tried. He still seemed to be lost but fuming as well. "How about Matthew Brady? You have heard of him right?"

"No, I haven't and I wasn't talking to you anyway."

"Actually you were. You asked me who the hell I was. I was just explaining. I shoot cameras that don't have batteries. No power at all, unless you count a spring as power."

"You can't make a decent picture like that," he advised me.

"You know, I'm glad you told me that. I have been wondering for 40 years what I was doing wrong."

"You're some kind of smart ass. If you wasn't a foolish old man I'd kick your butt."

"If I weren't a foolish old man, I would never have tried to explain anything to an idiot." 

The ranger stood up and the man left. 

"So, you are the Deacon, I got your email here somewhere. You got a small camper right?"

"Yes sir and the only thing I need is some peace and quiet."

"I'm putting you by the family picnic shelter. I don't usually put anyone there, but if you will pull your camper out of the way in the morning you can stay there."

"That's no problem at all."

"If you got an extension cord there is a plug on the inside wall about two feet from the floor. We let the kids dance there on holiday weekends." He grinned at me as he handed me the hand drawn map of the park.


The end.


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## hammy

Nice stories.
I'll assume you're on APUG as well?


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## mysteryscribe

No but I just visited their site. I am sure when I have a few minute to look around, I will be very intersted.


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## Torus34

In re the film/digital discussion: it's worth noting that the butter ads never claim that butter tastes like margarine.


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## mysteryscribe

What a great comment Torus34....


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## mysteryscribe

Just more fiction.

I tried to hit the church at exactly 9am. I knew that it was Easter Sunday. I sure as heck didn't want to be around when the members started to arrive. The problem was that the church faced due west. In other words the light was all wrong for the shot I had to make. I might have asked the Pastor on the phone which way the church faced, but it wouldn't have done any good. I doubt that he had compass to check it with.

So I was going to be stuck at the church until afternoon. It could have been worse, and would have been, had I not done the same thing several times over the last couple of years. I had a book and ice water.

I fell into the church photography business. Well not even that business to be honest, when you think of church photographers you think of Olin Mills. What I did was totally different in just about every respect. I had retired by the time I slipped into the niche. I went around photographing old churches with a huge old camera. I took them to fairs and festivals all over the south. Heck I even sold one or two. 

Then one day out of the blue it happened, I got asked to shoot a church. The church was going to be torn down in a few weeks. The congregation was on to bigger and better things, The old frame church had to go. The pastor wanted one last picture of the building to be offered to the older members of the congregation. Two of them had actually put nails in the old building 75 years before.

The story was two years old, but it was pretty much the same one as on that Easter Sunday. The service that day would be the last in the old church. Since I was already there, I waited with a fairly modern camera, for me anyway. 

I planned to shoot a few shots of the members coming out of the, soon to be destroyed, church. I might be able to make a picture using one of the negs but I was pretty sure that it was a waste of film.

Several of the church member stopped by my old WWII ambulance to invite me to the service, but I respectfully declined. I had too much on my mind. At my age they wanted my mind of my job. I waited with a mystery novel until the service ended. 

I shot a complete roll of 35mm negatives. Even though the camera was over fifty years old, I still almost choked when I used it. The shots were just to iffy to pull out the good stuff.

After the service, more people came by to chat and invite me home to lunch. One of the great things about shooting old churches is the people. First of all they are good people, and you catch them at their very best, so it's an unbeatable combination. I refused all offers. I explained that I would only have one chance to make the shot I wanted. I needed to be at the church to make sure.

Yes it was crap, but I had a good reason. I had once had a rather difficult shoot, due to eating bad chicken salad. It was caterer food, so I wasn't the only one. I was just the only one who had to suffer for my craft.
At 2pm the light was pretty good. You need a lot of light for a camera with a f350 lens. Especially if the negative material has a iso of 5. Yeah five I shoot really slow stuff.

Even with the bright light, the exposure was three seconds. I made five well thought out shots before I packed things up. I could have left. I should have left, but I just had a feeling there was a shot I needed to make. I sat around drinking iced tea, provided by at least three different church members. It came in 3 old milk cartons, fitted into 3 cardboard boxes with a total of half a dozen fried chicken biscuits.

Finally I just gave up and loaded the cameras into their padded boxes. I got in the old dodge ambulance and drove away. I looked into my rear view mirror, just to be sure there weren't any boxes on the driveway. I almost put my head through the windshield I stopped so hard. The money shot was in my side mirror.

I got out of the ambulance and began walking back toward the church. I stopped about ten yards from the end of the drive. I loaded a 3x4 film holder into my ancient fixed aperture press type camera. I read the light carefully. I walked around to different angels. I considered the composition, then finally in despair I opened the shutter and the tripped my timer. I held the shutter open for 15 seconds. It was exactly half way between the exposure of the shady drive and the light at the end of the living tunnel. 

I pulled the dark slide and did it all again. No it wasn't to make sure. I was because I had forgotten the first time. I did it all again at a spot closer to my ambulance still sitting half way down the drive. When I finished, I headed home and promised to find the heir of the man who invented rear view mirrors and sent him a thank you email.

The moral I think is, 'Sometimes it's a good idea to look back, or Never, Never stop looking for that right shot. Or maybe when you think you have it, you probably don't.


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## mysteryscribe

Let's call it primative photography....

If retro has come to mean even modern film slr, then what is a camera with a lens and no shutter. I suppose it is primative. That is the assumption I am going to begin working with.

You can still buy a barrel lens on ebay. No they aren't new, and they aren't giving them away, because they are OLD and still work. They will work forever since all you need to do is clean them. You can also make a barrell lens. Just remove the guts from an old lens. The only reason to do that today would be to retro-fit it with a fixed very small aperture. Since it is the only internal repair I will make to a lens, I have plenty of dead carcasses about. Well not so many now I have made three cameras lately from them.

As my mind begins to drift, I look for more and more ways to stay with photography a little longer. The primative camera, or super pinhole, is one way. It is strange that my ability to compose is still sharp, there are some who will argue the point I am sure. It isn't the broad stokes, it's the .000 details that seem to get overlooked. Us old time photographers will get the reference to .000.

The more of those tiny details I can get rid of, the better. Primative, or super pinhole, does that for me. 

Shooting pictures in a couple of slow methodical steps works for now. There is not a lot of detail involved in shooting primative. Compose, read the meter, remove the lens cap or trip the shutter. When I develop the negatives, I can manipulate them in my digital darkroom, just as I would have in my wet darkroom. The prints are much more degraded, but I am still shooting. That's why I'm going with primative more and more these days. My film slr comes out for birthday parties.

I know that using these camera I can't get in a hurry, so I have time to do the very basics. The ones that make photographs work, I hope. People don't rush a guy with a huge camera, he might go off and smack them. It ain't like getting beaned with a nikon dslr, my cameras would most likely be lethal. So primative photography takes me back way past my starting point in the craft. I appreciate the chance that it gives me to keep on working.


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## mysteryscribe

I can't believe they haven't tossed this thread... It's like the seinfield show, a thread about nothing at all.

Anyway today's advice (as if everyone else in the whole world didn't already know) Do not go downtown on Monday morning to make pictures of old buildings.  If you really must, and I feel that I must, go on Sunday.

I couldn't find a parking space, and when I illegally parked the traffic between me and the thing I was shooting as terrible.  I finally gave up and went to the local museum's early american exhib.  Pictures will appear in the super pinhole thead soon.

I can't believe I was stupid enough not to realize that Monday was the worst day to shoot downtown scenes.  I guess if you want traffic flow it would be good.


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## mysteryscribe

Okay now I have heard everyone b**** about walmart's lab, but I went to mail a couple of cameras out this morning so answer me this.  All things being equal who would you want to process your prints WalMart or the postal service.

The prints might be adaquate but you would have to wait in line a day to get them.


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## mysteryscribe

Yes this is fiction darn it.....

The weather was just about as hot as the man standing in front of my counter. I let him rant and rave for about five minutes before I tried to get a word in. It was my hope that he would wind down, but he just seemed to be working himself into an even higher state.

"Mr. Amos, If you will calm down, we can try to discuss this like rational people."

"There is nothing to discuss, I'm gonna kill you."

"If you were going to do that, I would already be dead. Now why don't you just calm down and let's talk about this."

"How can we talk about that," he said it pointing to the manilla envelope with my address in the upper corner. I had known better than to put my return address on the thing, but I did it anyway.

"We can talk about it because it was just business."

"Just business.. my wife has no clothes on."

"Actually she is covered in all those shots. She didn't want nude shots and I don't shoot nudes for customers."

"Oh you kept the nudes ones for yourself you son of a b****."

"There were none. What you see there is all there was." Okay it wasn't quite true, but he didn't need to know that I culled the proofs. I felt like it would be better for us both that way.

"If she wanted naked pictures, why didn't she just ask me to do it?" 

I almost said, Because she wanted good ones, but I didn't. Instead I said, "She said it was a surprise for your birthday."

"It was a surprise alright."

"Mr. Amos, what kind of camera do you have?"

"I have a damn fine digital camera."

"Well that explains it. She wanted the old fashioned western saloon girl look for the picture. You can't really get the old fashioned look with a modern camera." His look told me that he didn't believe me.

"Yeah," he said.

"Mr. Amos you have been reading too many camera advertisements. Let me show you my camera." Okay, I took the pictures with a converted polaroid, that uses 3x4 cut film, but I showed him an 8x10 camera I keep around for looks. Yes it was a little dishonest, but I had him believing me so I just kept it going.

He might not have been convinced that I was right about the specialness of my pictures, but he was convinced that I believed it, and more important that his wife did to.

He was driving home when I called his wife to warn her. 


The end


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## mysteryscribe

You know how you can look at something and it just nags at you.  Well something has been floating around in my chicken soup brain for a while and today I think I see it clearly.

The closer a digital camera resembles a film camera the more it costs.  I give  you the example of the ones that look like a pack of cigarettes for a couple of bills or the ones that look like a 35mm slr for up to a few grand.  Now they have the one that looks like an old time rangefinder.  It's right up there as well.

I just can't wait for the twin lens reflex model for fifty K


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## mysteryscribe

For those people who have a hard time figuring what is real and what is fiction... this is just a personal note.. Partly truth and partly fiction.

I have been shooting alot in cemetaries lately... also building a camera now and then. So when my wife saw the shots from the old time cemetary and asked, "What would you want on a stone if I put one over you?"

I thought about it then decided this would do just fine.

Here lies a man who:
Could make a perfectly good camera from a half pound of junk.... and a half pound of junk from a perfectly good camera... All in all he weren't much trouble....

I think im going to have them run that in the paper lol (I sure would like to see that, too bad ill be dead)


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## mysteryscribe

Last night and today I was faced with a delima. There is a bigger question and lesson than just my delima.  However it is worth noting for the one or two other people who may one day buy antique cameras.

As anyone who has read this before knows I have a house full of vintage cameras that aren't what they used to be. My wife is a real historian antiquer. It isn't just the beauty, or the value that excites her.  It is also the history the item represents. She can wax almost poetic about a piece of pettery. Just imagine this began as clay some potter's son or daughter probably dug from a creed bed in ohio. Well if it is antique maybe, but today a kid wouldn't do that kind of thing. That is a story for another day.

So here I am with this antique folding kodak pocket brownie camera. Yes it is an elegant looking thing but by god it's mine not hers. And I bought it for the lens. Mostly because I hadn't seen a lens like it and I wanted to turn it into a pinhole camera shutter. It would be easy no doubt about it.

I promised to try to save it, that was the best I would do. I had planned all along to use the body since it was 120 roll film and a neet square thing just like my can can cam. It was much better looking since I didn't make the body.

I coated the bellows three times but unfortunately it was just too far gone. The coners weren't just leaking, but big chunks of the bellows fell off as I coated it. I swear to you I gave it my best shot but it just wasn't to be. Sometimes you can remember the old, and respect the old, but you just can't save it. Yes I expect someone to make a case for digital based on that remark but I cant help it. Sometimes you just have to let go of the past, but you can salvage and reuse the things that are still good from the past. 

So what I did was cut out the bellows. Make the kodak into a can cam. Since it had a single element rear lens in a simple shutter it wasn't hard at all. Well that part wasn't. Since it is now a 120 can cam I had to name it so I'm tentatively calling it.....paint can cam model 120.... Named for the can that was salvaged from a can of paint. So I think I will have paint can cam model 120 ready to shoot tomorrow. I'll stick a picture of it up here when I get the last painting of the body done.

Okay the lesson for today.... Don't thow away old things, till you take a really hard look at them... if you cant fix them, butcher them.   You might not want to make a bumper sticker from that one....


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## mysteryscribe

I promised to post a picture of paint can cam model 120 so here it is forgive the image its digital.  Sorry couldn't help that one.  It is from a digital camera I have around to shoot ebay with.  I just didn't get the light right for this but you can get the idea.


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## mysteryscribe

change of plans I shot the paint can cam and it had a leak... The old back has warped. So much for wooden cameras. Its either change the back or carry a pocket full of rubber bands. I choose the new back. It will hence forth be called primative paint can cam 2x3... Thought you might like to see the first shot from it anyway...
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




But you know this thing if the original bellows had been good, would have made a very attractive pin hole 2x3 folding cam.  It would have looked a lot like a mini graflex.  Kinda cute for a pin hole.


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## terri

How fun! Any way to plug up that light leak, or is it toast because of the warping?


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## mysteryscribe

Yes a liberal bed of liquid nail, then close it up with a thick rubber band till it sets.  Cut a hole in the back the size of a 2x3 film holder and make a back to hold them. I'll show you when it is done. Probably tomorrow.

If it turns out to be a leak around the lens, then I pop the end of the paint can off and fix it, clean the lens and replace the paint can lid. The lens is attached to the lid so it comes off and goes on. If I find another can like it, I can have interchangable lenses.. Just like a real camera.

We need to get more people into camera butchery... far too many vintage cameras wind up in display cases....thats a joke...  If there was a humane society for cameras, I would be on the ten most wanted list...


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## mysteryscribe

Terri,
If I ever post a picture outside this room again, I want you to draw and quarter me.  I look lousy in a kilt to so I won't be trying that.

My brother, his son and I are all involved in a blog, mine, where we do great shootout.  Every once in a while I shoot something I think is cute.  So I post it on this site.  So far, nobody gets it.  Or at least it seems that way.  I do hope it isn't my magnetic personality that is the problem.  Though it might well be.

The latest challenge was a communication device.  So I did a shot of two tin cans and a string.  I don't think anyone here got it.  LOL maybe I'm getting senile but I do remember it as a childhood communication device.  Probably as good as some of the com services out there now.

I guess I shouldn't try to be witty with the cell phone generation.   Had to delete about a hundred words right here.  Oh well rant 21 is over....


----------



## mysteryscribe

I am going to tell a true story but there is a lesson for me in it.  Back in the early seventies I was a crime scene photographer.  NO not the gun carrying detective they have on tv these days.  I just make the pics collected the junk and moved on to the next one.  

However it was the first time that I was closely involved with a color lab.  I had always just sent my color work to a prolab.  At the Local PD we had a color photo lab, and our very own photo only lab tech...  Now they insisted that we shoot a gray card to do the color balance.  It was just a throw away shot of the card.   All the cameras and all the lights were pretty much fool proof, so all the test shot was supposed to do was to balence the color.

These days I am shooting a group of primative cameras.  I am beginning to see the need for a test shot on every shoot.  Even with the cut film, it would be a good idea to have a couple of toss away shots, just to see what the camera is doing on that particular day.  I wonder if the early photographers did that as well.  I'm sure I'll eventually settle down to a couple of cameras to shoot, and get to know them intimately but for now it is an experience each time I go out.  Sometimes a good one sometimes not so good.

One thing I have learned on those primative cameras without a tripod screw, I need to weight them down some.  Camera shake is a problem.  I am thinking 'photo bean sock.'


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## mysteryscribe

I was watching the story of the san francisco earth quake on tv one of the last few nights.  The narrator was talking about how the quake was the most photographed natural disaster of all times, at the time I guess.  The reason he said was that Koday had just brought out their 3a camera with roll film.  Every smalltown paper in the country had a man with one, as well as the individuals who could afford a camera.  

I bought one once for the lens.  That thing made a heck of a negative to have been on roll film.  Also got my first lesson in uniform system fstops on that camera.  I sold the lens and thought it was regular fstops.  Fortunately someone explained it to me in time to correct the listing.  Also explained all the over exposed film I was shooting with that lens...  I never said I was bright.


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## terri

mysteryscribe said:
			
		

> I was watching the story of the san francisco earth quake on tv one of the last few nights. The narrator was talking about how the quake was the most photographed natural disaster of all times, at the time I guess. The reason he said was that Koday had just brought out their 3a camera with roll film. Every smalltown paper in the country had a man with one, as well as the individuals who could afford a camera.
> 
> I bought one once for the lens. That thing made a heck of a negative to have been on roll film. Also got my first lesson in uniform system fstops on that camera. I sold the lens and thought it was regular fstops. Fortunately someone explained it to me in time to correct the listing. Also explained all the over exposed film I was shooting with that lens... I never said I was bright.


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## patriciao82173

I bought my first digital in 2003(an SLR that is)I was crazed with digital but by 2004 I was bored with it.  Yeah you can do everything under the sun with one but really it takes ALL the fun out of the process of NOT knowing just what you are going to get.  That said I think it's fine for the typical portrait wedding etc photographer.

I just hope that all the manufacturers realize that there is a market for artists as well before they stop making EVERYTHING.  

Here's a business idea(LOL)...a photography store JUST for alternative techniques NO digital allowed.


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## mysteryscribe

When my son in law took over my business, my advice was go digital.  It just makes good business sense.  He did and never looked back.  I on the other hand looked way back.

I'm afraid there will come a time when the only way you can get traditional equip and supplies is to pay a much greater premium than gas is at the moment.  Small supply and just not enough demand to entice too many people into the production of it.  On the consumer's parts just enough demand to make a couple of guys rich..

I would not be too surprised to see the 35mm slr market drop to only one or two producers.  One very high end maybe and one russian or chinese version.

Antiques are skyrocketing...  

Now all that said...  I think I'll go shoot some paper negatives while I can still get it.  And look for that giant freezer locker for film and paper storage... Not that I don't have faith in modern photographers finally seeing the light.


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## mysteryscribe

Is it just me or has the public done a 180 on digital cameras this quickly. Two years ago film guys were laughing at the guys who spent big bucks on digital. Everyone knew you could never make an image with a digital toy as good as or enlarge it as far as a medium format negative... Heck even as good as a 35mm was only a dream back then.

I just got my first taste of condescension from a digital camera person. I have to say it was humbling. It was a lot like the story about the campground I posted here. I must be getting old lol.


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## mysteryscribe

This post falls into the category of post it or lose it.  My mind is a lot like the guy from that tv show.  You know the time travelor from a few years ago.  I forget the name.

Anyway I was looking for a bit of software to allow me to scan color negative on my homemade backlight scanner.  So I come across this piece of software.  When I googled color photo editor. I found out that  there is a thirty dollar piece of software to add grain to a digital picture.  Not noise but real grain as you would see it in a real picture.  LOL now that it the ultimate "Tastes like real butter" idea.


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## mysteryscribe

Today my Son in Law called.  I was developing some paper negatives but they were fixing so I knew I had a few minutes.  His complaint was  "I feel like I am working harder and making less money.  I don't understand it."

That was number one.  Money is always the issue with photographers.  I know Edward Weston always had money troubles and I'll bet so did Mathew Brady.  Then he went on to tell me about his bridal portrait shoot.  He drove a half hour to meet bride and her daughter, shot the pics for two hours, then drove a half hour back and processed the digital images for several more hours.

That is an example of why he feels that way about the money.  He didn't say he wasn't making any money.  What he said in effect was that he was working too hard for the money.  I can sympathize but not a lot.  Of course one of the first things he did when he took over was to stop offering studio bridal portraits.  All of them are outdoors or on some kind of location now.  In this market you cant charge the same thing for driving to the site, as you charge for shooting the pics even though an hour is an hour.

Given the choice most of the brides I worked with would opt for a heated and air conditioned studio to the sweat and dirt of an out door shoot.  Especially when I added the hundred dollar travel charge.  I took about an hour to shoot a studio bridal portrait so I was two hours ahead of him right there.

When I finished, I took the film to the lab and shoved it through their door.  Three days later, I am back there picking up my proofs.  Now it makes good business sense to shoot digital these days.  I have no problem with people who do, for whatever reason.  But you have to weigh out your time just like you were shooting film.  If photography is a business, then it isn't the same as shooting for ego.  Ego will make you redo a shot fifty times.  When you shoot strictly for money (as in my case) there was a good enough point.  The labs produced 'good enough' prints 95 percent of the time.  If the customer paid me without an arguement, it was good enough.

There is peace of mind with digital that I never had, but it comes at a price.

Of course he lamented again, I can see the difference between a film enlarged print and a digital, even with ten mega pics.  Is one better than the other who knows.  Are they different you betcha they are.

Before I began to sound like an old man doing "back in the day,"  I had to go take care of my old fashioned paper negatives.  Ah well I do miss work.


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## mysteryscribe

The week after halloween had become a big Christmas shopping day. The weekend after had at least three street fairs to choose from. Yes it could be cold. Yes it could be rainy and yes it could be miserable in general. Especially if you were an old man to begin with.
 
The cold and the rain were ten times as bad on me as on my neighbor. The cold rain had forced the festival inside of the national guard armory. It should have been warm and dry, but. There always seems to be a but in my life. Someone had forgot to tell the maintenance crew to turn on the heat. At least that is the explanation offered by the event's organizer.

The result was a bone chilling cold made worse by our wet clothes. Wet clothes that wouldn't dry out in the cold gymnasium sized room. My hands hurt from the arthritis which I had picked up somewhere along my journey to old age.

 I wished that I hadn't bothered to sign up for the event. Since about twenty percent of my income came from those shows, I went to everyone I could find.
Photographers weren't known for their pension plans. My plan had been to eat too much, drink too much, stay out late and just generally wear myself out. 

I figured I would be shooting weddings until I dropped over dead. Things seldom work out like you plan.

I lost my craving for fatty food with the two ulcers that continued to plague my life. The booze went when my balance began to fail, at sixty-three I couldn't stay up late enough to get into any real trouble. Life had settled into a grind. 


Converting cameras by day and spending hours at night on the computer. I was learning more about the world. than I was ever going to need to know. Still it beat I Love Lucy reruns on TV.

I unpacked the display and settled into the novel I was reading. It was one I had downloaded from the internet. Something about a lost photographer and his adventures trying to find his way home. One of those way too symbolic things.

The teenaged boy startled me. I hadn't been paying any attention. I had learned over the last year to ignore the people until someone asked a question. 
"Wow, where did you get all these old pictures?" He seemed genuinely interested so I answered.

"I made them myself."

"No way man these are antiques."

"Well they look antique, but I made them."

"My dad is a civil war nut. He would love this book." The book he had in his hand was a hand bound book filled with primitive shots of a civil war reenactment.

"You should buy it for him then. 
Christmas is just around the corner."

"Yes but I really didn't want to spend fifty dollars. I'm not working anymore."

"I'm sorry son, but I can't sell it for any less."

"How about that picture of the battle."

"It comes framed and unframed." I suggested it so that he could find some way to afford it.

"How much unframed." 

"It's actually a poster that way. You know you can tack it up somewhere. As a poster it's only twenty five dollars." Yes I cut the kid a deal.

It was about closing time when she came in. She was barely five feet tall and if her face hadn't been slightly lined she might have passed for a twenty year old. She walked directly from the door to my table as I watched.

"My nephew said you made antique style pictures?"

"Yes ma'am I do."

"What kind of camera do you use?"

"Hold on I'll show you one of them." The camera I carried to the show didn't have a makers name. The wooden frame wasn't old at all. At least not as old as people thought. The wooden tripod was packed with the camera. but I didn't pull it out. She looked at the mahogany box with the bellows stretched between it and the mahogany lens board. 

Attached to the end of the lens board was a barrel lens. It was all polished brass and worn enamel painted surfaces. Behind the brass lens was a shutter with no speeds at all. It was open or it was closed. The camera had the old air bulb to trigger the shutter.

"Wow that is old," she said. I nodded in agreement. Heck the lens was old. The rest of it wasn't all that old.

"I've been looking for someone to make a picture of me and my husband. Can you do this?"

I took a quick look. I was ready to say of course I can. That was before I took the second look. "Lady, you need to go buy yourself a good digital camera and a tripod." I continued to look at the pictures as I spoke.

"It wont be the same. This is from just after the civil war."

"Let me put it to you this way, I can make it, but I won't make it. I'm sorry I just don't do that kind of thing."

"Are you sure? Lots of photographers with a digital camera will do it, but I can't even find anyone with a really old camera. You are the first one I've seen with pictures sort of like it."

"Lady my picture aren't like that at all. I'm sorry. I just don't think I can help you." I handed her the picture and thought about what she wanted.

The picture would have been her laying on a table under a bloody sheet and her husband standing over her with an autopsy saw. Man why couldn't it have just been early porn that she wanted.

the end


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## patriciao82173

ale::scratch: ooooo kayyyy thats pretty wierd.


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## mysteryscribe

you're new everybody else knows im weird....just ask hertz or terri


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## terri

We don't care that he's weird, either. Weirdness can = creativity. That's the thing.


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## mysteryscribe

To bad it didn't work that way with me. I am the kind of weird guy that they won't sell an assault rifle...rofl.


*Subject:* Fw: WHY THE SCRIBE CAN'T BE A PARAMEDIC 
*Scribe and Salvatore are out in the woods hunting when suddenly Salvatore grabs his chest and falls to the ground. **He doesn't seem to be breathing; his eyes are rolled back in his head. Scribe whips out his cell phone and calls 911. **He gasps to the operator, "I think Salvatore is dead. What should I do?" The operator, in a calm soothing voice says,"Just take it easy and follow my instructions. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence... and then a shot is heard. DaScribe's voice comes back on the line, "Okay, now what?"*


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## mysteryscribe

by the way the last post was a joke for those who you who have problems recognizing the type posts.


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## Alpha

I think the future is in cameras. Not digital cameras. Not film cameras. Just cameras. I think the 'Blad H2 is the future. It's just a camera, albeit a very nice, and expensive one. But that's it. Shoot film, shoot digital; it makes no difference to the camera, and the camera itself doesn't preclude you from doing either.

However, I do sympathize. I don't own a digital camera, and maybe never will. You'll appreciate this story, Charlie. A few weeks ago I went down to Bald Head island. I was riding the ferry, and I noticed this older guy with a big camera. I approached him, and it turns out the camera was some ridiculously expensive consumer digital, like a 1D or something. The guy had retired, and taken an interest in photography. Apparently, there weren't enough other things for him to blow his retirement savings on, so he picked it up as a hobby. He looked at the ME Super around my neck, and said to me that film was dead. Nobody used it any more, especially not professional photographers. Trying not to be offended, I asked some run of the mill questions about his camera, because I was slightly curious about the thing. It had quite a nice lens on it. Some telephoto that went from about 28mm to 500mm or something. I asked him how wide the aperture went. He didn't know what aperture was.


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## mysteryscribe

That is one of the classics....

I totally agree about the camera.  Something new will come along, the hybrid cam for a while, then the biocam or something like it.  As long as guys want to go past the hole in the light tight box, nikon will make something for him.  I shouldn't single Nikon out.

Planned retirement was always in the big camera guy's minds.  Look at Kodak and Polaroid.  Their philosopy was, a camera is not a life time purchase.  Make new and worse cameras ever couple of years.  The best lenses were on the first generation polaroid even their house lens.  From there it was all downhill.

The story you told reminds me to a lesser degree to my son in law.  He has become an excellent photographer with digital.  I mean as good with photoshop as the lab he uses.  But he has a basic insecurity about photography for some reason.  He actually said to me, I need a big big big camera to impress my customers.  I wonder if that is like the middleaged man's sports car.  Or the guy on the ferries digital camera.  

I hate to say this and I know it's going to Upset someone.  The truth is digital was invented for the guy who wants to know nothing about photography.  Of course so was the point and shoot camera.  Digital grew up as opposed to grew down like polaroid did, and to some extent kodak.  Nikon is another company that grew down.  At least in film.  Everybody who makes slrs grew up to them in the digital world.  

I made a statement earlier I find of real interest, at least to me.  You could make a digital camera in the shape of a football shoe, but to get top dollar, it has to look like a film camera.  I find that strange.


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## mysteryscribe

I would bet my last dollar that my basement is flooded.  It has rained hard here today.  Ordinarily I like the rain, it's good for flowers and crap like that.  

Today howevr I was planning to test this old crappy scanner of mine.  My good one went farther south than I am even.  So I am in the doldrums but I don't care darn it, I'm gonna shoot film or go nuts.

So as not to bore you I will cut to the chase.  Well i cant really, you have to get some of it for dramatic effect'

I went out and shot a 3x4 camera.  One side film, one side paper neg.  I developed the film and the paper neg nothing... (read the meter wrong)

Carried out a 2x3 with adjustable retro lens.  Shot two exposures...both film...  Developed nothing (to thin- read the meter wrong again)

Went back out with a primative 2x3 and the brownie can cam  .... Developed the film.. Nothing (one side wasn't loaded the other I hadn't checked the shutter so I held the cable release down for a total of 16 min for NOTHING)

Now I am on the computer and refuse to touch another camera until the sun comes out again.  And they think I'm weird.  Not weird, senile maybe... or just plain snake bit.


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## mysteryscribe

EDITORIAL COMMENT

After I retired from photography, I called the telephone company to advise them.  I had the phone switched to residential so that I wouldn't have to change my number.  You know friends and family called me on that line to.  before I went DSL I also used it for dial up internet service.  The wife had her own number.

I knew that I was going to retire so I cancelled the yellow page advertising that costs me an arm and leg.  I expected everything to be cool.  My phone bill dropped a few bucks a month since residential and business basic rates were different.

Okay so the phone book comes out year one.  My display adv is gone but my name is still listed under portrait photographers in the yellow pages.  I'm not paying for it, but I am explaining a couple of times a month that I never did passport photos, and I sure as heck am not going to start now.

I call the phone company.  "Oh well, we will take care of this for you.  I'm sure it is a pain but don't worry we got it covered."

Year two: I'm in the new book and they screw up my son in law's advertisement.  So in addition to the calls he gets, I give his number to the callers I get.  I'm still getting passport pictures requests at eight am, when I'm trying to sleep late.  I know I should be up by that time but I'm retired.  I call, different lady assures me that she has it under control.

This is year four, the book just came out and I'm in it again.  This is almost as perverted as an old man in a rain coat.  I paid over a hundred bucks a month for yellow page advertising when I was in business, now (when I'm trying to sleep late) I get it free.  There is something wrong with the phone system.  Even if I change my number I think it will be changed in the yellow pages as well.  I think the yellow page god has it in for me.


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## mysteryscribe

Stupid idea stuff...

I have been tinkering with this stuff a while now... I have sold a few camera on ebay and a few more how to cds but I miss shooting pictures. I have been shooting more and more for this site but nothing validates a photographer like someone parting with money for his work. I know that sounds pretty stupid but in my case it is true. 

When someone says I love that pictures, what I think is... ah but would you buy it. 

Along that train of thought, I am going to play with this idea I think...

http://retro-primativephotos.8m.com/

So what do you think????


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## terri

I think - why not? :thumbup:


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## mysteryscribe

Yes I agree.  It is one of the nice things about the internet for the average guy.  You can stroke your ego till hell freezes over.


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## patriciao82173

that's a classic...  
Reminds me of some of the projects I did in school.
Like the one on aperture for instance took me 4 rolls of film to do I think.  For some reason I could visually "get" it I just couldn't apply it (at the time)
Not to mention the other mistakes I made trying to do it.

Like the view camera one I think it was on perspective or something.  That took some time also I think I did it 6 times.


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## patriciao82173

Also this was the weekend I had to acutally accomplish "something" so what happens on the day I planned to take pictures...it RAINS!  So now I have to either come up with a different location aka find some more inspiration in another place or wait til the next time the kids are at Grandmas...which might be June at this point.


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## mysteryscribe

If you wait for it to stop raining in NC it might be june.....Personally I bought and converted an old kodak duaflex twin lens 620 cheapo camera to shoot as a pinhole this weekend let it rain.  I will even take the brownie paint can cam out rain or shine.

Im also going to shoot a really nice camera I made, to see if I still know how after all this primative junk.  I'm going to start my location shots around town this weekend.  Sunday I think will be best for those.  So it's going to be squeeze the pinholer in between the retro/primative stuff.


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## mysteryscribe

Today I understand why retired people say there is not enough time in the day to get everything done that needs doing.

I want to:
1) retest the duaflex pinhole (just cause it aggravated me to bad yesterday)
2) test the ready flash I just finished yesterday (after I paint the pinhole adapter I added of course)
3) I still have four sheets of paper from the anastimat that need developing.
4) I need to test the brownie cam that I broke and repaired yesterday.
5) I still have two paper negatives from yesterday to scan into the computer.  In additon to the four I need to develop.
6) Make a digital picture for the shootout on my blog.  (If you want to join this one is something you light.... I picked the wrong decade to quit smoking.)

I probably will finish, but I will be busy all day.  No wonder I never did any of this when I was running the studio.  I would never have had time to make money.  Oh yes I need to take a shower after all that aggravation from yesterday I smell like a goat.


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## mysteryscribe

editorial comment

I made a statement on the retro camera threat that could use a little explaination and this is the best place for it. since it is really an editorial.

I saw a set of pictures by a very early western photographer.. they are much like my retro paper negative thread photos. But even more I was stuck by something else. 

For over thirty years I made photographs to please everyone but me. It was brides or photos made with a festival buyer in mind. I didn't make photos that I knew weren't mainstream. For almost the first time in my life I don't have to make photo's for any other purpose than my own amusement. 

So I had to ask myself, what kind of photos do I want to make. of any. That question led me along this long and winding road. I have sure had enough of shooting people. Thirty plus years of weddings and specailty portraits will do that I suppose. I could do landscape, but I'm really not suppose to be driving all that much.

I was driving in a nearby town with my Son In Law on the way to a sidewalk art show, when we passed a boarded up photo studio. I had him turn around. The studio had been someones attempt at retro photography. The idea stuck in my head.

What exactly was it, I asked myself. Retro means old of course. There a lot of steps on the road to where I am now and I'm not sure I am even half way there yet. I'm sure this is of no interest to anyone so I won't bother to detail it for you. I just wanted to say I wasn't complaining about no one understanding my work, I was explaining that I had moved to a point that I just shoot for me. What I am on is a journey to retro not a style. At least I hope not.


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## mysteryscribe

ps... yes i know that is pompus


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## terri

I don't read any of that as pompous. I'd say you're lucky to have something in mind that is so much fun, and you finally have time to explore it.

More power to you. :thumbup: Or, as Matt says sometimes, Wave that freak flag high!  

It's all good.


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## JamesD

I envy you:  you have a vision.  I've often wished I had a vision, but so far, I have no vision, no style, and barely any skill.  I'm all right with the technical side, because I'm technically-minded (in real life, I'm an electronics technician).  But I have almost no artistic eye whatsoever.

Yes, I envy you.


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## terri

JamesD said:
			
		

> I envy you: you have a vision. I've often wished I had a vision, but so far, I have no vision, no style, and barely any skill. I'm all right with the technical side, because I'm technically-minded (in real life, I'm an electronics technician). But I have almost no artistic eye whatsoever.
> 
> Yes, I envy you.


You just keep moving right along; it will come. I like what I've seen from you so far. :thumbup: Give it time; think about what is attracting you when you shoot, and ask yourself why. Study some masters and figure out what appeals to you and, again, ask yourself why. Don't try to force it. You'll figure it out.


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## mysteryscribe

You don't need to envy me at all.  I have always been lucky.  My current possition has some up sides as well as down.  Retro was a downhill slide and everything grew from it.

I was floudering around experimenting with digital, when I saw the sign in the window of the closed studio.  Years before I had read Weston's day books and I was fascinated with what it must have been like in those days.  Most of the problems I had over the years he had as well.  Am I going to make enough to pay the car payment.  I can't reproduce their work exactly but I can in my way pay a little tribute to it.  

I think I am going to center in on the WPA photographers of the thirties.  I have decided to do a little research and try to find some of the old pictures to look at.  Not the archived ones but the ones that were in ordinary use.  I know a lot of them were shot for the library of congress and would be really well preserved, but surely some of them have aged.

Some of my favorite lenes date back to that time frame.  I have some one thirty five glass that fits a kodak ballbearing shutter.  I have a camera with such a shutter on the way now.  With a little luck I can add a 4x5 with vintage glass to my 3x4 that I have been shooting lately.  I also have a 2x3 vintage.  I think I'm going to wind up with three vintage cut film cameras in use, and a dozen more odds and ends laying about.

I have been lucky.. While learning to build polaroid cameras, I wrote a small pamphlet and it sold well enough on ebay to buy a room full of old junk cameras.  I have put together several, most are crap but I have a couple of real jewels.  If I can get one really good 4x5 now I'm going to be set.

I have given this some thought lately.  Since most of my cameras are cut film, I think I need to shoot cut film for some deep seated emotional reason that I don't even understand.  Maybe it is the connection with the time period.  Maybe it is because so much goes into each exposure, that you don't want to waste it.  It would be hard for me to walk onto the porch of an old farm house and shoot a hundred digital pictures now.  It probably would be just as good or better images.  Somehow the images isn't all there is to it any more.

The shooting is becoming as large a part of the experience as the image itself.  You might remember my rain barrel.  It wasn't a great shot, but it was a shot I enjoyed making.  It was a joy to stumble onto something unexpected.  To think about the one shot I was going to make, as opposed to shooting ten angles and bracketing it each one twice, just because you could.  When I got home a different mentality kicked in.  

Okay it isn't great but how do I make it usable.   I'm absolutely sure those same thoughts went through Edgar Taff's (fictional character) mind while he made shots for the WPA.  Home in his dark room wondering, how do I salvage this?

It's kind of nice to try to relate what you feel, to how someone seventy odd years ago must have felt.  Anyway I'm sure this is boring but it is where I'm at now.


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## mysteryscribe

Terri: Study some masters and figure out what appeals to you and, again, ask yourself why. Don't try to force it.

My first serious photography instructon was a painter name barbara matrose.... I spent more time with portrait painters books and landscape painters slide shows than I ever did in a dark room.  I'm not all that technical but I can usually compose a picture for drama.  That's what sold paintings drama.  In the really early days there were no fluff pictures.  The same is true of photography.  In the early days it was a studio photographers world.  Again during the depression it was mostly starving photographers with a pony who survived.

That is off topic but try to learn more than just photography...


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## terri

I would agree. I love going to museums and studying paintings, and how they captured the light. It's about imagery, for me.


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## mysteryscribe

How come I knew you would....


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## ksmattfish

When I had all the money in my hand to purchase my first DSLR with all the fixin's, I almost bought a mint condition Graflex RB Super D 4x5 SLR instead.  I'm glad I went with the DSLR; I'm having a lot more fun with digital than I thought I would.  I still grab a film camera more often than the digital when I walk out the door to do my own thing.  Someday I'll have a 4x5 SLR though, and a client base large enough to specialize in BW film photography and gelatin silver prints.


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## mysteryscribe

I have to build my own, too poor to buy one.... 

Seriously I tried digital but it was too much like my last five years with film slr shoot shoot shoot because it was cheap to process.  Now that I am retired, and don't have to produce everytime I go out with a camera, I like this old junk im shooting.

Today I broke my own rule and I'm sorry that I did.  I loade five film holders to go make one shot.  Wound up forcing shots that I should never have bothered to make.  I don't need to make ten shots so I guess it was that old be sure you have something mentality.  

Its like when I shot wedding I promised x number of proofs, so I shot crap just to be sure I had them.


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## ksmattfish

mysteryscribe said:
			
		

> I have to build my own, too poor to buy one....



That's what I've decided too.  I'm looking for a cheap junker for fixing up.  Whenever I see this photo of Margaret Bourke White my heart is filled with lust.  

http://www.ticket.it/Bourke-White/margaret.htm


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## mysteryscribe

for the camera????


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## ksmattfish

mysteryscribe said:
			
		

> for the camera????



For the camera, for the woman, for her photography, for the adventure....  

When Vikings die they are transported to the afterlife by Valkries.  When I die I'll have a vision of a young Margaret Bourke-White straddling a giant metal eagle 1000s of feet in the air, holding a 4x5 SLR.


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## mysteryscribe

I have known exactly three female photographers in my life.  All three were penniless and not much fun.... I might borrow yours lol


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## mysteryscribe

it's just another one of those disgusting old man editorials.

Whatever happened to integrity.  You remember doing the right thing when it was hard to do.  Doing it because it was right, even if it was painful.  Thank god some of us still do that, but the number is dwindling.  Our daily lives are filled with people who take the easy way out.  I'm going to call it the New Survivor Strategy... anyone but me....

Small story,,, small scale... I needed a scanner, mine up and died... I had a few bucks in pay pal, so I took a look on ebay.  I did my comparison shopping and I found one with a low starting bid.  I checked the guy's feedback.  He had 100% positive on a 150 sales.  What I saw, and didn't put much stock in, was that he had four mutually withdrawn feedbacks.  It was a lot but I had no idea what it meant.  I do now.

The seller was one of those 'Let me sell your crap on ebay' things.  Okay now I know, and you are warned...  That is no better than buying from a pawnshop.  We all know a pawn shop is where some people take stuff that si no longer wanted.

The scanner worked fine 2 years ago... has had minimal use... been in storage all that time.  Man it sounded too good to be true.  It was.. the scanner was crap.  

I send four emails to the "I sell your crap store" before I could pin him down to exactly what his refund policy was.  First of all I had to ship it back to him.  When they got it back, and verified that it was crap, I got the original purchase price.  Not what I paid to ship the thing to me or what I paid to ship it back.  Effectively I would have paid a total of 50 bucks to get a 10 buck refund.  This is getting pretty typical for ebay these days.

I figured I should warn other potential buyers.  I expected him to write me a negative feedback when I wrote him one.  Sad but true, some guys think you should smile while they are breaking one off in you.

But here is what really got me... Five minutes after I got the feedback posted, I had a note from ebay... He was offering to mutally withdraw both feedbacks, if I was willing.  The original research came to mind... four other withdrawn feedbacks on 150 sales.  It was his MO stick a negative feedback for a negative feedback,,, then offer to withdraw.  That's extortion plain and simple.  

I didn't agree to a withdrawal in order to make a point.  Unchecked these guys can sell the same defective products, with the same way over priced shipping and the same 'no possible return polocy-return polocy, over and over.  

Sometimes we need to do the right thing even if it is painful.  Of course I enjoyed writing the following respose to the feedback so maybe my motives weren't so pure..

For those who have a problem distriguishing truth from fiction this is a direct copy of the feedback....







Left insulting feedback rather than accepting a refund. SELLERS BEWARE!!!!!
Seller   isoldit.nd0183



 ( 294



)  May-02-06 13:259713046898*Reply* by polar-deacon: he is right.....if you sell crap and offer 20% refunds please dont sell to me

I am the polar deacon lol.  In case you were guessing....
The feedback system is useless when guys can manipulate it.  What he wrote was the absolute truth... So was what I wrote about him on his feedback page and there on mine.  I don't like that he gave me the second negative feedback I ever got.  Thats out of 450 but I will take it willingly to put one on him.  Why? A... because it will help the next guy like me and even more important B... He just P***ed me off.


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## ksmattfish

That sucks.  I bid and won a Hasselblad A16 back for 6x4.5cm.  When it arrived it was actually an A16S back for 4x4cm super slides.  The seller refused to negotiate at all, and said I should of known better, although he clearly labeled it an A16 back, and never an A16S back.  Ebay was no help.  We left each other mutual negative feedback, which doesn't affect either of us.  Buyer beware.


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## mysteryscribe

Now they think the way to do it is to sell it for 5bucks with 25 shipping and offer to refund the five... it makes it sound like they are trying to be honest.. BS.  It is very much a buyer beware market there.  I swear I should know better than to buy there.  I got hit like that twice this year.


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## mysteryscribe

Everyday the old man would walk from his house to his car carrying a brown leather case and a plastic bag. In the summer the old lady across the street would sit on the balcony and watch. In the winter she saw him from her living room window. She wondered what he could possibly have in the bag and what he did on his outings.

She and her neighbors knew little of the old man. But suspected that he was a retired executive of some kind. No one had ever been in his house, so no one knew that the second bedroom of the condo had been converted to a darkroom.

They did know that the post office made regular pickups at his condo. There had even been some discussion within the condo's governing board about discussing it with him. After all, they didn't want anyone running a business from the complex. It was one of those absolute no, nos. They decided that since no one ever came to visit him, the post office pickups almost daily could be overlooked. The same postman delivered the mail so it didn't really create any extra traffic.

A couple of the widows had spoken with the old man now and then, but he had little to say. They all knew that he shopped in the local market near the complex. Also that he bought fresh vegetable from the farmer's market. The distinctive yellow plastic bags from the farmer's market often went inside his condo. They just as often came out with him on his almost daily outings.

It was to be a typical day for Edgar Taft. Edgar was a closet photographer. No he didn't make pictures of, or in his closet. He just didn't let it be known. Edgar knew the owners association would stop him from working from his condo. He could not allow that, Edgar had nowhere else to go.

Edgar drove his beat up old Dodge from the parking lot, then he turned it toward a small park about a mile from his home. The mile was about as far as he dared to drive. Any more and the odds began to increase for him to be involved in some kind of accident. You see Edgar's mind tended to wander.

Edgar found the park empty as he did most mornings. People didn't seem to make it to the park until later in the day. Sometimes he would find a play school using the facilities but not so often that he had to be concerned by their loud voices. 

Edgar moved along the wooden bridge to a shaded picnic table. Once he arrived he placed the yellow plastic bag and the leather satchel onto the tabletop. He sat for a long moment catching his breath. It seemed to take longer each day to get his mind open.

Edgar liked that particular picnic table for a reason. Behind it a very large tree grew. The tree made a natural background for anything he chose to photograph on the tabletop. The gray of the tree bark complimented the gray of the tabletop. It was in fact the ideal setting for Edgar's work.
That morning from his plastic bag Edgar removed a tin can with the top still attached at one spot. The can had been opened with the kind of opener that cut it in jagged edges. The can's label, made on his ink jet printer, was plain white with large black letter stating the contents of the can to be WHOLE TOMATOES. 

Beside the can Edgar placed a fork with one bent tine, a wax paper covered stack of saltine crackers, and a green pepper. It was most likely the ugliest pepper he could find at the farmers market that week. Then from his light weight jacket pocket, he removed a crystal wine glass.
For the next half hour he studied the arrangement. He made changes every few minutes. the changes were minor but nonetheless he made them very carefully. He seemed to be thinking and then second guessing himself. 

Edgar finally removed a large camera from his leather satchel. He also removed several pieces of Mahogany colored wood. The pieces screwed together making a very strange looking holder for the camera. After the camera was assembled, Edgar began rearranging the items on the table yet again.

It was almost 90 minutes after he arrived in the park when Edgar finally slipped a film holder into the camera. He slowly and methodically measured the light and adjusted the camera's lens. 

When he finally snapped the picture it was anti climatic. It was like the period at the end of a sentence. Maybe it would be one day.


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## terri

ksmattfish said:
			
		

> For the camera, for the woman, for her photography, for the adventure....
> 
> When Vikings die they are transported to the afterlife by Valkries. When I die I'll have a vision of a young Margaret Bourke-White straddling a giant metal eagle 1000s of feet in the air, holding a 4x5 SLR.


 Love it.


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## mysteryscribe

Edgar returned home that morning to develop his one negative. Part of Edgar's mystique, if there was such a thing," was the very low number of images he made. Also his age and health issues added to his popularity. Everyone in the gallery business knew there wouldn't be many more prints arriving in the mail.
 
In a far corner of his 2nd bedroom, turned darkroom, sat a four foot cabinet. The cabinet was made for him by his son in law. On top of the rough cabinet sat a large black box. It was a table top changing room. The front door dropped forward to allow easy access to the two compartments. The front compartment was his work space, the rear was for the storage of paper and film.

Edgar slipped a long thin tube into the work space. It was followed by the single negative holder. Edgar was careful. He knew that he was clumsy and forgetful. He also knew that if the negative wasn't any good, he would have the rest of the day off to watch the all day news channels. It was a depressing thought.

In Edgar's condo each of the bedrooms had its own bath. One of the bathrooms also had a hallway entrance. Edgar slept in the room attached to the shared bathroom. He converted the other one to a lab. It was meant to be a darkroom but had gotten itself converted to a den of mixed technologies.

After a short half hour Edgar knew that he had a negative. He also know that he had about an hour before he would be required to do anything else to it.
Edgar fixed himself a glass of vile tasting instant iced tea, then went to sit on the balcony while the negative washed and dried.


----------



## mysteryscribe

After lunch Taft removed the dry negative from its safety pin holder. He laid it carefully onto the bed of his scanner. After scanning the negative he placed it into a thick cardboard holder, then put it aside.

He worked on the scanned image for almost an hour. He worked a while, sat back drank coffee, then worked a while longer. After 48 minutes exactly he knew what he wanted from the negative. He ran a plain paper ink jet print from the image on his computer, then he deleted the image.
He folded the newly printed page, then placed it and the negative, which rested inside its cover, into a pre addressed 5x7 envelope provided by the lab. The forty eight minutes had simply been so that the lab would know exactly how he wanted their scan to me made. He had worked with that lab often enough to know that it would be just as he wanted.

The only reason he developed his own film was to make that single preliminary scan, and to make sure his custom developer was used on the negative. He wanted the proper amount of contrast and grain in the final print. To do that his negative had to look just right, then be scanned just right. Taft's mailman came late in the afternoon, so it wasn't a problem to get his negative out that day. Since the day was clear and sunny Taft attached the envelope to the outgoing mail holder on his mail box. If it had been rainy, he would have taken the envelope to the post office. A lost or damaged negative was the thing Edgar feared most.

With a successful shoot under his belt, Edgar turned his attention to his drawing board. He removed the muslin cloth which covered the table top and the 9x12 black and white ink jet print. Anyone looking at the print would have needed a moment or two in order to determine it's makeup. It was hard to make the mental adjustment, since the print was black and white but on watercolor paper. It was soft and the lines were broken by the heavy grain of the paper.

Edgar stood over the board, coffee cup in hand, for a long time. Even though he knew exactly what he would be doing, he stood making plans line by line. Making a plan of attack suitable for any general, of any army in the world.


----------



## mysteryscribe

Edgar hated his cordless phone... Well only when it rang and he couldn't find it. That evening he found it on the sofa under last night's shirt. Edgar had a habit of removing articles of clothing and leaving them where ever he was at the time.

"Hello," he said into the tiny phone.

"Hey Edgar how you doing." The voice belonged to his son in law Michael.

"I'm fine Mike, no need to call the Lawyers just yet." Michael laughed along with Edgar. It was a joke they both participated in. Michael freely admitted that he wanted Edgar's camera collection. To Edgar it was obvious that Michael did not want to display it. He pretended to believed Michael wanted it for that reason.

"Good, I still owe him for that last false alarm." The laughter was genuine. It was also at Edgar's expense. Cindy had called three times but couldn't get an answer. She panicked first, then called the paramedics. It was a simple case of the cordless phone being off its charge too long. The next day Michael was forced to buy and attach a corded phone to the upstairs extension.

"You need one phone that works," Cindy had demanded.

Edgar just shook his head. Edgar looked at the storage cabinet Michael had built him. Inside what looked like a second home entertainment center rested all Edgar's unused negative and disks. Edgar could not possibly finish a print everyday, but he shot a picture. The storage cabinet had one large drawer filled with 4x5 negative which had been scanned but not printed. Another drawer held the cd's which had also not been used. Inside three four inch thick and twenty eight inch square drawers rested about fifty prints that had been produced but not shipped to any gallery. They were Edgar Taft's 401k.

Michael had insisted on building the storage cabinet after Cindy explained the potential value of those items. It would be even more after Edgar passed to his reward or lack there of. The large cabinet doors were about two inches thick and filled with some fire retardant material. The sidewalls, back, top and bottom were constructed the same. Over Michael and Cindy's objections the doors stayed open most of the time. 

"By god," Edgar had remarked to himself on more than one occasion. "If they are so hot to have the damn doors closed, Michael should have but a counter weight to have them close by themselves."

"So Edgar you still want to go to that festival in Terrytown?" 

"I've paid the fee, but I'm not sure. If you need to make other plans go ahead. I can find another way down there." Edgar did know a couple of people who would be more than happy to drive him to the festival.
"Not at all, Cindy just wanted to know if she should plan to take that Friday off."

"Well tell her not to do it. I don't want her losing any money on my account."

"Edgar you know it isn't like that. They just count on her being there unless she tells them a week in advance."

"Actually I had been planning to skip that festival. The attendance was down last year so I think I might just stay home and work."

"Yeah, you do enough with the gallery stuff. You don't need to do the festivals."

Edgar almost told him that it wasn't about the money, but he decided not to bother. Michael and Cindy had never understood that part of it.
"So, I should figure that you aren't going?"

"Yeah, do it that way Michael. Just figure I'm going to stay home and work." Edgar hated the part of his life that had limited his ability to do what he wanted. It made him feel like cripple, which would come later.


----------



## mysteryscribe

Edgar agonized over the loss of his festival for about twenty minutes, then made a fresh pot of coffee. A total of half an hour passed before he sat down at his drawing table. The small, old fishing tackle box gave up her acrylic pigments, but only after a short battle of hide and seek.

Twenty bottles of colored paint and one bottle of distilled water lined the table beside the one with the slanted top. A three light bank of 60 watt bulbs burned behind and above Edgar. He found his paint stained mixing dish in the drawer. It was the kind they used to test drugs at the local pd. It had come from a police auction years before. The dish was like half an egg carton, but larger with many more dimples. It was also ceramic made before the days of disposable everything.

Edgar picked a bright red color of paint, then he watered it down to a consistency similar to water color. With a 000 sable brush he began the arduous task of tracing the lines of the rose. The rose would be bright red. He had laid the yellow rose, picked fresh from his rear yard, upon a Bible. He hoped that he could do the black and white print justice. He didn't feel that he ever did, but the colored prints sold much better than the pure black and white ones ever had. 

He had been told, more than once, at a festival that they had a 3D effect. There was a certain amount of depth from the different textures. There was the rough paper of the print itself, the strong lines of the photograph, then the elevated texture of the smooth paint on the surface. Acrylic though flat by nature was more solid looking than water color. Water color hinted at color and Acrylics were color. That's how he explained it when asked why he didn't just do the watercolor thing.

Edgar painted until 8 P.M. He might have continued had his daughter not called. Cindy was checking to make sure he ate his dinner. She wasn't concerned enough to invite him to her house, just enough to make an after dinner call to bother him. Edgar hung up the phone again biting his tongue. Life would have been so much more simple, if his wife had lived.
He looked back at the picture on his drawing table before covering it with the muslin. I can finish that tomorrow, he thought. 

The question then became where to send it, if he decided to send it out at all. It might well turn out to be one of his better pieces. Something about that bright rose on the black Bible with the gold left page edges was haunting. If he felt it, he was pretty sure others would to. 

"Most likely some greeting card company would suck it up." he said aloud.


----------



## mysteryscribe

The thought of all that work to have it wind up on a greeting card would have been upsetting, if Taft had considered it great art. He didn't. He considered what he did poster art, most often without words, but nothing more than posters.

After dinner from the microwave, Taft sat in front of his average sized TV to watch the world news. If he had been a young man, he would have missed the news all together. Partly because he wouldn't have been interested, and partly because back then there were no 24 hour news networks. It was almost 9 PM when he found his way to the comfortably worn sofa.

After his allotted hour he came to the same conclusion that he did every night. The world was going to hell in hand basket. American soldiers were in harm's way again and the world all hated him personally. It seemed the more things changed, the more they remained the same. All of it had been exactly the same in his youth. Back then the world shared its hate between the US and the USSR. With only one giant, all the hate centered on the US. I didn't seem like a good place to be, if you were a proud American.

Taft was torn between bed and donuts. He suddenly had an overwhelming desire for Krispy Kreme donuts. Living alone with no one to stop him, he often indulged such silly idea. He did that night as well.

It was just late enough for the most of the after dinner crowd to be off the roads, and early enough that the second shift factory workers were still in the plants. He made it most of the way to the donut shop before the tree leaped from the grass strip between the road and the sidewalk. How it got in front of his car, he had no idea.

Fortunately at night Edgar felt less than secure driving, so he drove slowly. At twenty five miles an hour the tree still buried itself in the grill, radiator, and fan housing of the Dodge. If the car had been several years younger, the damage would have been considered minimal. As it was the damage was enough to total the under valued, in Edgar's opinion, car.
A passer by with a cell phone called the police, who found Edgar seated in the car's passenger side. The passenger side was well off the street, while the driver's side blocked the curb lane. The police report said Edgar seemed confused and disoriented. Edgar said he was simply shocked to see that the tree had found it's way back onto the grassy strip. It had to be a vast left wing conspiracy.

It was unfortunate that the police felt he might have head trauma. He was disoriented and seemed unsteady so they called an ambulance. Edgar tried to tell them that he was just old, but they would have none of it. They sent him off to the hospital for evaluation. The hospital promptly called his daughter.

A few hours and several thousand dollars later, it was determined that Edgar was too old to be driving at night. At least they hadn't decided that he was too old to be driving period. He accepted the Doctor's advice with a sarcastic smile, if a smile can be sarcastic.

By the time they released him at 4 AM his daughter still hadn't arrived, so he called a cab. His daughter managed to call and wake him at 7 AM.
"I would have come to the hospital, but the nurse said you were just fine. I didn't want to wake the baby and Michael had to install some cabinets out of town this morning. He left very early."

"Don't worry I'm fine. It all worked out for the best." In his opinion it had. Since she had barely been inconvenienced, she didn't have any leverage at all . He learned again just how strained their relationship was. He said goodbye trying not to show his disappointment.
 
The worst thing going through Edgars mind as he lay on his bed trying to shut his mind down, was that he still wanted the donuts. That thought ran around his head as he drifted off to sleep for the second time that morning. All the other problems were just hurdles, but damn it he wanted those donuts.

Edgar's routine was shot, but he wasn't so senile that he couldn't adapt to the change. Instead of the park, he found the portable studio. He had Michael make it a couple of years before and then never used it. The thing they made was no more than two 24" by 24" pieces of 1/2 inch plywood trimmed out and hinged. A small brass chain allowed for the rear piece's tilt to be adjusted. The idea had been to take it to the park and sit it on a picnic table. With the adjustment feature the back could be moved to catch more or less light on the background. It was a pain, so seldom made it to the park, even when it was new.

He made his one shot that morning, his hospital bill laying on his empty money clip. It wasn't very artistic but would most likely find a buyer, if he ever got around to painting it.


----------



## mysteryscribe

After lunch Edgar found his nephew's phone number. Getting through to him was another matter. John's phone stayed busy most of the time. John was a ladies man of the first degree. He loved the ladies and from what Edgar had heard from his sister, most of them loved him right back.

"John this is your Uncle Edgar. You son are a hard man to catch."

"I've been here all morning Uncle Edgar."

"Yeah, well you should get call waiting or something."

"I have call waiting, but Uncle Edgar that was Jane Martin."

"Who the devil is Jane Martin?"

"She owns Martin Trucking Company."

"I thought it was owned by Simon Martin and his brother Everette."

"Was is right. It wasn't a pleasant divorce."

"John, you weren't the cause of it were you."

"No, but I know the girl who was. Simon likes younger women it seems. Jane's lawyer got it in front of a lady judge. So poor old Simon got the house in the country and Jane go the company."

"And now you have Jane?"

"Oh no, I'm just thinking about moving to Martin Trucking."

"I thought you were dealing in trucks now?"

"I am now and then. I'm still driving now an then as well." He paused a moment to see if I had anything else to say. Since I didn't he went on. "So what can I do for you."

"I need a favor kiddo."

"Uncle Edgar I'm 42 years old. No one in their right mind would call me that."

"Who said I was in my right mind. Which leads me to the favor. I wrecked the Dodge that you got for me."

"I didn't get you that piece of crap. You did that all on your own."

"You got me into the auto auction."

"Unk that auction is open to the public now. You don't need me to get in."

"Okay, then I need a ride out there."

"That I can do. How about I just drop you off. I know you. You will buy something."

"That's fine. I have to have a car you are right about that."

That's how Edgar Taft came to be at the automobile auction early on a Saturday morning. John left him with his cell phone number. Edgar and John both knew the odds were Edgar wouldn't be calling.

Edgar had two thousand dollars in $100 dollar bills in his pocket. John had stopped at the bank on the way to the auto auction. It was a ***** to get that much money from the teller machine, but he had managed it. He expected a call on Monday morning asking if he was okay. He had never made a withdrawal for more than $100 before.

Edgar walked around looking at the small sedans. He for sure didn't want anything larger than the Dodge. Even smaller would be better. He toyed with the idea of a mini van then discarded it. The idea of camping at the festivals popped in his head. Then he realized that a motel smelling of curry was his idea of roughing it.

Edgar narrowed it down to another Dodge and a small Chevy. Just as he was about to go inside, to await the two cars crossing the block, he saw a small yellow convertible being parked by one of the auction company's drivers. The convertible was tiny compared to either of the cars on his short list. Just for something to do to kill time he walked down to the convertible. 

He found that it was an orphan. It was a Geo metro. The Geo line was an ill fated attempt by general motors to get into the mini car line. The little beast was automatic transmission and it started on the first try. It didn't seem to be smoking and the radiator wasn't filled with rust. The oil looked clean and sterile. The turn signals seemed to work. The odometer had 130,000 on it. Even so the car felt tight. He struggled with the top and found it wasn't completely in rags.

Edgar was working himself into a sever case of second childhood senility. He made himself a promise. If the convertible came up before he had bought another car, and if it went for under a thousand dollars, he would buy it. He figured that he had enough ifs built in so God could stop him.
The convertible came up first of the three and he bought it for $950. Edgar paid the casher after a half hour wait. He had his tags from the dodge. A tow truck driver had brought it to him. As payment he signed the junk over to the tow/salvage company.

Edgar was pleasantly surprised to find the little car drove well. The brakes and the electrical system seemed to work as well as the engine and transmission. The air conditioner did not work, but hell he told himself, it's a convertible.

After he pumped gas into the car he put the top down. It was another struggle but I was doable, even for an old man. He loved the feel of the open car, he also loved the attention he got from driving it. Edgar knew better than to joy ride. The tree incident was still fresh in his mind. He did make the minor detour to the krispy kreme for donuts.


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## patriciao82173

Think maybe I'll get Krispy Kremes tomorrow morning.  Just something about a Sunday morning that has Krispy Kreme written all over it.


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## mysteryscribe

The sunday morning paper strong bitter black coffee and the box of KK on the table.  What in the world could be better.  Okay a couple of things but not many...


----------



## mysteryscribe

At 7pm on sunday night Egar completed the rose picture


----------



## mysteryscribe

"Richmond Technical College, good morning," the bored female voice said from the phone. It was early Monday morning the woman had a right to sound bored.

"Good morning, is Dr. Sikes in?" Edgar tried to sound even more cheerful than he really was. If he had succeeded, he might sound like a the village idiot. He already had breakfast and even driven his new convertible to the park for his morning shot. That morning he shot a withered apple. He had no hope that the shot would be usable, even so the drive in the little convertible wiped away any feelings that might have turned to depression on a normal day.

"This is Doctor Sikes," the strong male voice said as a greeting.
"Bob, this is Edgar Taft."

"Damn Edgar I thought you were dead." It was his standard greeting since the two of them seldom spoke. It wasn't from lack of friendship, or respect. It was simply that they traveled in different circles since Edgar's wife died.

"No I just don't get out any more. So how's Sarah?"

"Sarah is Sarah. How is your daughter?"

"Better these days," Edgar replied. There might have been five people in the whole world who would have understood the remark. Bob Sikes was one of them.

"Yeah, kids make you crazy."

"And now you have a thousand of them," Edgar said it with a small laugh.

"Yeah, so Edgar what in the world can I do for you."

Edgar had called Bob Sikes because Richmond Technical Community College, also called RTCC, had one of the best photography courses in the Southeast USA. Since Bob had taken over, it had gone from purely technical to technical and artistic. Bob had needed help and support to make the change. Edgar and his wife had been early supporters. Edgar had donated a couple of his antique cameras to the school's museum. Bob had also promoted the hell out of the school. He did it to make sure the local artist and patrons knew who they were and what they were doing.
"Bob are you doing a display at the Williamsburg thing."

"You mean arts on the river walk?"

"Yes that one."

"Not a chance," Bob replied. The place is to free wheeling for us. That's not your kind of crowd Edgar. Surely you aren't going down there."
"Actually I am if I can find a driver. You know my doctors will have a fit, if I drive that far alone."

"And you would tell them?"

"No, but the highway patrol might." Edgar went on to explain about the tree with legs.

"That sounds like you need to stop driving at night." Bob Sikes paused a minute then went on, "Edgar let me get back to you on this. I don't really have a lot of close contact with the students these days. I can ask around."

"Thanks Bob, don't make a high priority. If you don't come up with someone I'll just skip this festival." It was pretty much the end of the meaningful conversation. The end came with a simple, "Goodbye and promise to call more often."


----------



## mysteryscribe

Bob never did call back. Instead Edgar got a call the next day from someone calling herself Tammy Smith. Yes it sounded like an alias to him as well. She claimed to be a student in the adult education department. She had seen my note on the schools computer system.

"I'm sorry Tammy, I don't know anything about a note." I was just a little bewildered. I had a feeling Bob had placed an Advertisement of some kind in my name. It was hardly how I wanted it to happen.
"It says here to contact you about a job helping you with a festival June 5th."

"I need some help alright but I didn't put any note on the computer. I think Bob Sikes might have."

"Dr Sikes the head of the art department?" she asked a little in awe.

"Yes, I told him I needed some help setting up the show at Williamsburg."

"You mean 'The Arts on River Walk' festival?"

"That's the one, but it isn't really a job. I was hoping to find a student who would like to show with me. One who wouldn't mind doing the driving and give me a hand with the booth."

"I'll pick up all the expenses but I'm afraid only an art student would be interested."

"My major is art with a minor in industrial design. If you will have me,I would be thrilled to be your assistant."

"Can you put together a show on short notice?" I asked it not really caring as long as she wasn't some kind of serial killer.

"Oh yes, I have a few things. I can knuckle down and make a few more."

"You do know River Walk is a two day show?"

"Yes I know. It won't be a problem. I'll leave the kids with my husband."

"He isn't going to mind you taking off with me. The fact that I am old and harmless might not matter to him."

"He doesn't really have anything to say about it. He and I are divorced."

"I would like to meet you but as far as I'm concerned you sound fine."

"Could I ask why I sound fine." She seemed a little skeptical all of a sudden.

"You have kids so you are stable. You aren't showing the same kind of art that I am showing, so you won't be competition.  Most important of all, you haven't demanded money."
"I expect a booth at that show is a hundred dollars or more. The trip down and the motel will be expensive I think. I get to see how real people react to my designs. I think that is more than payment enough. How about we meet for lunch one day. I work during the day so it will be hard. We could do it this Saturday, if you don't mind the kids being along."

"Name the time and place." Edgar suggested in his kindliest voice. They struck a deal for a fast food restaurant at noon on the next Saturday. She didn't live in his little town, so the restaurant was about half way between. Edgar called Bob Sikes's office and had the secretary stop the advertisement. I would be off the site in an hour she assured him.


----------



## mysteryscribe

The week neither flew by nor did it drag. It went along at a steady pace based on Edgar's normal schedule. He made negatives, and painted on his pictures. 

As was usually the case, more pictures went into the storage cabinet as got mailed off to a gallery. Some of them, after much thought and study, got tossed into the shredder. When he rejected a print, it was for a fault he found in the composition. Everything else could be corrected by reprinting or repainting. 

When an image was rejected the print and the negative both were shredded. Edgar was extremely fortunate, in that he didn't need to produce a large number of prints. The price of his prints was based as much on his limited production number, as on his limited talent. Edgar was a fad and he knew it. If he suddenly lost favor with the public, his cabinet of prints would be worthless. He did everything he could to prevent that from coming to pass.

His drawer of unpainted negative was both large and filling quickly. Edgar had figured to shoot the drawer full and maybe start on a second before he was forced to stop driving. He was honest enough with himself to know that he couldn't keep up the driving forever. 

His balance was going fast, as was his ability to juggle the many details of driving. On an Interstate highway, Edgar tended to lose track of traffic around him. His eyes constantly darted at his mirrors just to keep some kind of image in his mind. The 3D map, which most people constantly update while driving in traffic, Edgar had no control over. His 'fresh' map might be one from ten minutes or two minutes. Edgar just couldn't remember which it was.

In other words Edgar was quickly becoming a hazard to himself. Equally important to him, Edgar was becoming a hazard to the family of four driving along beside him. Someday soon Edgar might become the man you didn't want to meet head on while crossing a two lane bridge. 

Since the darkness made it worse, and he had already had his accident with the tree, Edgar had decided to never drive at night again. He began to make his plans accordingly. When the sun started down, Edgar had to have whatever he planned to consume that evening, already in the house. No more midnight trips to the donut shop for him.

Since his drawer was full, Edgar decided to begin a series of pictures. The idea was one that had floated around in his brain for many months. Edgar often visited the farmer's market, held once a week in the rear corner of the city hall parking lot. He always arrived early. When he made that shopping choices, he liked to be alone. He not only liked to get a preview of the produce, but he also liked to check out the vendors. 

Edgar had an unquenchable thirst for details. He felt, rightly or wrongly, that it made him a better artist, if he understood the subject. He had made images of the vendors erecting their tables, then placing their wares on them. One morning he had noted a farmer picking over his basket of potatoes. The potatoes he culled had buds on them.

The image of an ugly potato going into a plastic bag, to wind up as fertilizer most likely, fascinated Edgar. As with a lot of his ideas it slipped from his mind but not into oblivion. Edgar resurrected it that morning. 
He drove to the grocery store where he shopped for his meager rations. Since Edgar had no illusions about cooking, one store was as good as another in his mind. He chose a medium sized supermarket near his home for all his grocery needs.

"Good morning Mr. Taft," the blonde clerk said in greeting him.
"Hi there how are you?" he asked hoping she would say fine and he could be on his way. It happened just as he expected. Edgar bought one potato. It was what he went into the store to buy and it was what he bought. The thought of doing real grocery shopping never entered his mind. Why should it? After all it wasn't Sunday morning.

Back home Edgar made his one exposure of the day... A single potato on a white background. He had no idea what he would do with it. He did know he planned to make one exposure per day of that potato for a while.

He spent about ten seconds that day wondering what Tammy Smith would be like. He would have to suffer with her company for a couple of days, but no more. He could do that, after all he had spent an entire day with his daughter once.


----------



## mysteryscribe

Edgar worked on the first potato picture, then saved it.  After he finished he went back and in a whimsical mood made a silly poster from it.  He finished with it just in time for the late news on Fox.  Yes Edgar was a republican... even though he knew he shouldn't be.


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## mysteryscribe

The days marched on toward Saturday and his meeting with Tammy Smith. His curiosity grew, since he hadn't asked her near enough questions. Still it was only a two days trip how much did he really need to know. He shook his head, trying to clear if of the distraction.

Edgar had a thought the night before. He spent an hour over his coffee trying to dredge enough of the memory up to act on it. He couldn't pull the bit of meat from the chicken soup his mind was becoming. It might come back to him and it might not. Probably some great ideas had come and gone that very same way.

On day two Edgar found that his potato had not changed in any significant way. He left it in the window, then turned his mind toward the day's shoot. The one day, one shot rule had come about to keep his mind active after his wife, of many years, passed away. With her death, his life had changed completely and not for the better.

It was a shame that after all the years of struggling, she hadn't lived to see his minor success. His slight success was probably more about his circumstances, than his dubious talent. Not only was it well known in the arts community that Edgar was ill, and in serious danger of losing his mind, but also that he produced just a few prints. His low production was partly his illness, but also to some degree his lack of interest in accumulating wealth. 

Edgar's life style suited him, he saw no need in improving his basic needs. His food was more than adequate, his house was warm and dry, and how many pairs of cotton twill slacks did a man need. Edgars life was basic, but basic on a comfortable scale. 

And now of course he owned a convertible for the first time in his life. Being 63 years of age, the car was a bit of a joke to those who saw him in it, but he really didn't care at all. The open car reminded him of his youth in some ways. He had never owned a convertible, but still it was part of his lost youth anyway. The feeling of freedom, that even the small, under powered convertible gave him was a bit disconcerting every time he got in the car.

That morning instead of being the first person in the park, Edgar waited until the sun was high enough to make driving the yellow convertible a pleasant experience. He still had no idea what he would shoot as he drove from the parking lot. He knew that he could always find something while walking around the park. His bits of time caught on film, and then posters, were as popular as his still life posters. Still, he liked to have some ideas in mind before he left home. 

At a stoplight Edgar found himself beside a rusty pickup truck. The truck was adorned with ladder racks on the rear bed, also a large aluminum tool tied to the top of the rack. The little magnetic sign on the truck's door read, 'Do it right alum Siding'. All that Edgar took in, but it was the highly tanned blond hair young driver drinking a can of soda that struck Edar. No Edgar hadn't become interested in men, at least not in THAT way. The image pulled something from his decaying mind. He remembered working for his dad as a youth. The memory was sitting on a saw horse drinking RC Cola and eating chocolate Moon Pies. Yes it was a cliche, but it was also true. A shared memory like that is what makes a cliche.

Edgar turned into the next strip mall with a grocery store and began his search. A search that took him to three stores before he found what he wanted. He couldn't find the cola in a bottle at all. It had to be a can of RC and a moon pie. Not quite right, but it would do. One day he might find the bottle at a yard sale or antique store.


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## mysteryscribe

film version


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## terri

An RC cola and a moon pie! :lmao: 

As southern as it gets. :thumbup:


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## mysteryscribe

but time they are a changin... I had to be a box of cans of RC and a box of moon pies.  That shot cost me 7bucks in props.  I can drink the rc even though it isnt sugar free but the moon pies im not sure about.  I had a huge moon pie ten minutes before my big heart attack.  Kind of ruined the taste for me.

But I see that two ways.  One a memory and two how the memory has been whored up lol


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## mysteryscribe

When Edgar woke on the Thursday before he met Tammy Smith, it was raining as if God was going to do it again. Edgar drank coffee while trying to decide if he wanted to make a picture that day or not. In the end, his promise to himself won out. 

He searched the house over for something to shoot. He just couldn't find anything that sparked his imagination. The first pot of coffee was ru
nning low when he noticed two things in his small, enclosed rear yard. 
 
The first thing he noticed was that the rose bush he had brought from his real home, had one single rose left on it. It looked close to the end of its life span. He wanted to do something with it before it was gone.

The second thing he noticed was that the grounds crew forgot to trim his bushes inside the privacy fence. Most of the owners complained about there shrubs being hacked on, so he guessed that the grounds crew left the plants inside the fence to the homeowners. Edgar didn't mind. The bush was about to get a haircut.

Edgar dashed out into the rain to trim the bush and cut the single rose. He was soaked when he finished but the rain had somehow refreshed him as well. He laid all the wet plant trimmings and the rose on the day's newspaper while he took his morning shower.

The vase was one his daughter had sent after his wife died. It had been filled with cut flowers. The kind his wife had loved so much. He kept the vase because it reminded him of both the women in his life. He didn't expound on that memory. instead he just moved on to fill the vase. He filled it with long green shoots from the bush and then the single rose low in the vase. He expected it to be a dramatic shot. Or maybe a complete bust, one never really knew which till he printed it. It was the true joy of the craft. It was also Edgar's daily battle, to find enough of his brain still working to make something of beauty. If not of beauty then at least appealing.

Some days he won, some days he lost, but he always fought the fight.


----------



## mysteryscribe




----------



## mysteryscribe

Taft was beginning to get really nervous. Meeting the woman that he would most likely be sharing a couple of days with made him antsy. One more day and he would know if it was to be a great adventure or a chore. He had day dreams of it going both ways. Everything for romantic kisses to a knife wielding Glenn Close ran through his mind.

He was adventurous and willing to take a chance, but he did wonder if possibly the decision to find a driver had been a foolish one. Still she was taking art courses at the college. She had a family, even if it was just children. The children were a positive, but the ex husband was a negative. There was some reason that he was an ex.

Edgar knew that he was just making himself crazy, so he tried to get his mind off his minor dilemma. He concentrated on Friday's image. The sun had finally come out, but the grass was still sparkling with drops from last night's rain. He chose to avoid the grassy park one more day.

When he checked the potato, he found it beginning to shrivel but not nearly ready for his next shot of it. He had eleven cans of R C cola in his refrig, but he had no idea that he could ever use them in a shot again.

It seemed to be a good day for concrete of some kind.


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## terri

mysteryscribe said:
			
		

>


awww.......thanks from me!


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## mysteryscribe

It was bedtime when Edgar finished the picture of the concrete lawn jockey. He went to bed with images of Tammy Smith running through his mind.


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## mysteryscribe

On Saturday morning Edgar arouse at his usual 6AM. Too many years of waking for breakfast with his working wife had carved a groove in his brain which time had failed to erased. Edgar had learned to cook, well in all honesty it was more to microwave frozen food. Nonetheless, he prepared his own breakfast. It consisted of microwaved frozen pancakes, with frozen link sausage also microwaved. The trick was to have them be at least warm at the same time. 

All the animal fat and sugar were his weekend treats. On weekday mornings it was a bowl of crunchy bran cereal with a handful of dried fruit for taste. Either way after only a few minutes Edgar was ready to begin his day. 

That Saturday morning his day was going to be a little less boring.
Edgar struggled with whether he wait at home, then go directly to the meeting, or go out to shoot his daily picture on the way. The decision had to be made before he left the house. The time of his leaving would depend on that decision.

Edgar spent several minutes drinking coffee while looking out at the wet grass. He knew that he should make a decision soon or his indecision would be the decision. Edgar decided that the time had come to take the bull by the horns. He turned on the TV to watch the morning news shows until time to leave for his meeting with Tammy Smith.


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## mysteryscribe

Taft had kept an open mind. He felt that he was prepared for Tammy Smith to be anything at all. He was wrong of course. Edgar was never going to be completely open minded.

The woman matching the description Edgar had been give had two children in tow. The kids were both hers there was no doubt of it. Either she and her ex husband were clones or he contributed nothing to the gene pool.

Tammy Smith was tall and stick thin. Not quite concentration camp thin, but damn close. She had a thick head of flaming red hair. She would have had the pale skin to go with the hair, had it not been for the end to end freckles that covered every exposed piece of her. The look could have easily been southern mill trash, but not on Tammy Smith. She rose above it to be a 100% yuppie princess. She lacked only the sweater tied around her neck and the tennis racket to make the stereotype complete.
The kids were both thin, pale and red headed. Their freckles weren't as noticeable as Tammy's, so maybe the husband had contributed something after all. Taft walked to the table where they all sat before he spoke.
"Hi, I'm Edgar. You must be Mrs. Smith." What he really wanted to say is, this isn't going to work out after all.

"Mr. Taft, I have been so looking forward to meeting you."

"Now that's hard to believe." Edgar smiled to let her know he didn't really mind the little white lie.

"Actually it's true. I have heard a lot about you."

"Nothing good I'm sure."

"The art department still runs the debate you had with that Professor from the physics department. I was curious so I learned a little about you after I saw it."

"Well I hope the debate didn't discourage you from continuing in the art department." He mentioned it because there were mixed opinions as to who had won the debate. Most felt he lost it. The more entrenched artist around thought he made all the right points so he won. Edgar felt it had all been a huge waste of time. He only did it because he was asked by his old friend the head of the art department. That and he didn't recognize it for the ego thing that it was till it was over.

"On the contrary, I felt that you were speaking directly to me. It's what got me more serious about my designs."

"Didn't you say you were involved with industrial design?"

"Yes but since starting in the art department, I have begun to design a line of jewelry. At the moment I am manufacturing it myself on a very small scale. The industrial design was of some use."

"You will most likely find that everything is of some use to a working artist." God that sounded pompous, he thought. Edgar tried to break the BS thread by mentioning her kids. "Well there is no doubt who the mother of those two is."

"There is also no doubt who the father is." She gave him a wicked smile before continuing quietly. "We had the same postman for years." Edgar couldn't help the smile.

"That hardly seems like the country club thing to say." He laughed happily.
"I'm learning a little more than my mother and father planned." She smiled again, but not so wickedly. She wasn't exactly flirting with him but she was trying to convince him that she would be good company on his festival trip. Against his better judgement Edgar relented in his mind. After about ten more minutes the arrangements were complete. They would meet at four AM at his condominium. She would leave her car there and drive the convertible for him to the festival. She explained the size of her exhibit so that he could make plans accordingly.

Edgar had planned to drive to some old barns on the way home, but decided against it. Instead he drove straight home with an idea burning in his head. He picked up a wine decanter on the way home.

He rummaged around his storage room until he found his old bridal bouquet. From it he removed a couple of roses. He set up the still life on his patio using a folding chair to hold the portable background his son in law had made for him.


----------



## mysteryscribe

Shot with a 25watt bulb for 8 min with asa 100 sheet film in a polaroid framed camera with retro lens


----------



## mysteryscribe

Edgar spent the next week living his routine. It was the only thing that gave his life any structure. However between the breakfast and the time he left to shoot his one morning picture, he worried about the coming weekend and the festival. 

How would his latest work be received? 

His mind was changing was it effecting his work? Questions he hoped would be answered at the River Walk Festival.

After developing it and while the new images dried, edgar worried about his future. How would he survive if he lost the ability to shoot pictures? 

After he painted a while on whatever image he was working at the time, he worried about how his trip with the yuppie princess would go. Actually she was a bit old for a princess. She was at least in her late twenties. He didn't like the sound of yuppie queen. Even in his mind the sound of it made him smile wickedly. He decided to go with yuppie soccer mom.

The major thing the meeting had done for Edgar was to reassure him that the woman wouldn't become a personal issue. She had her life and he had his. Their two lives would just dovetail that one weekend, then never again. That was his plan and he was sticking to it. In the meantime he did one simple picture especially for the show. He tried to do one specially for every show. He always did it at the last minute to cut back on the time wasted agonizing over it.

Edgar chose to shoot a paper negative on Tuesday morning. He printed it out then did a thin color wash on the print after sealing it with a spray on poly material.


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## mysteryscribe

This thread have over a thousand hits... which proves something ......I'm not the only one with too much time on their hands....


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## mysteryscribe

Edgar was dressed in a pair of cut off jeans and a butchered sweat shirt on Monday afternoon. It was about three PM when the knock on the door startled him. Me might have looked out just to make sure that it wasn't a home invasion, if he had given it any thought. You see in the two years Edgar had lived in the Condo, not a single person had visited him unexpectedly. He therefore assumed that it was a delivery man with some forgotten package.

To his utter amazement it was Tammy Smith, minus her gaggle of children, who stood on his stoop. "Tammy?" he asked through the closed storm door.

"The Kid are at 'Mother's afternoon out. I thought I would stop by to find you before the middle of the night on Saturday."

"Well you found me, come on in." Edgar said stepping back. "Forgive this mess, I never have company."

Tammy looked around before she answered. "Edgar, you need to hire a cleaning lady. Maybe one of those maid services."

"I guess I should, but about once a month I break down and clean."
She turned up her nose at that thought. She looked as though she wanted to run away before the clutter attacked her. Her face was a scene right out of some fifties horror move. "Calm down Tammy, it's just clutter. Trust me, I'm not harboring ebola virus in here."
 
"Mr. Taft, if I had more time, I would help clean this place right now. I'd put you to work as well. This is disgusting."

"Well, when you come back on Saturday morning, remind me not to invite you in for coffee and donuts." Edgar's voice took on a sarcastic tone.
"And they said you weren't a thoughtful man," her sarcasm matched his. It seemed the Yuppie Soccer Mom could hold her own.

"Who said that?"

"No one, they actually said a lot worse." She broke into a smile. "Okay, you're a slob. Thank god its only for two days. I can live with it. I had a college room mate almost this bad once."

"Did they ever find the body?" Edgar was smiling as he said it. Somehow in the few words they exchanged that afternoon their relationship was defined.

"I think it might have been spring before she emerged from under her own clutter." Tammy stopped to think a minute. It broke the mood as well as gave her time to find the right words. "Edgar, I really wanted to ask if we could leave on Friday? If we leave that early on Saturday, we are not going to have time to sleep at all. We will both be a wreck before we even get started. I will be happy to pay for my own motel room that night. I would rather do that than drive."

"I should take your money, but I won't. I didn't suggest leaving on Friday because you have kids."

"Michael, my former husband, can pick them up from our sitter's house on his way home from work. It just means subjecting them to another evening with him, and the slut de jour, but it won't scar them for life. Don't worry, I checked with my therapist before I suggested it."

Edgar wasn't sure if she was serious about the therapist, but he wouldn't have been surprised. "I wasn't at all worried. You have the responsibility for your own life. I can't and won't try to interfere." It was an easy promise to make, since Edgar didn't know or care about her life. "As for leaving on Friday, what time?"

"It's a three hour drive, and I read the on-line brochure about the festival. If we get there by four, we can get our space assignments Friday. We will know where to go first thing Saturday morning. Since we won't have to stand in line to get our assignment, setting up that early shouldn't be too hard."

"Okay, can you be here around noon? If you do that, we can eat a late lunch somewhere on the road."

"Since you insist on me driving your teeny tiny convertible, maybe and extra hour is called for. How about I get here about 11am?"

"That's just fine, would you like a cup of coffee? I think I have a clean cup somewhere."

"No thanks, I hate to tell you Mr. Taft, but I wouldn't eat or drink anything in this house. It should be declared a super site by the EPA. I'm going shopping for a hazmat suit as a matter of fact."

"You wouldn't like one of those. They don't come in pink." Edgar hoped it didn't hurt her feelings.

"Oh I bet you like pink sometimes." She said it as she turned for the front door. He was surprised by how fast she could leave a room. No good-byes no wind down of conversation, she was just gone.


----------



## mysteryscribe

I really should feel badly.  This has become a soap opera without a sponsor.


----------



## mysteryscribe

For some reason Edgar felt depressed, even more than usual, after his visit from the Yuppie Soccer Mom. He had lost the ability to think of her as anything else. Imagine the YSM challenging a decision he had made for her. Of course, he was glad that she had. Packing the car in the sunlight was far more to his liking, than packing it in the dead of night. Oh he would have been packed during the daylight hours on Friday either way, but most likely he would have to rearrange the car to accommodate her two 'small' cases.

As usually happened Edgar lost interest in painting, even though he continued to shoot pictures. One new one everyday, even though about two weeks would pass before anything found its way onto his drafting table, and maybe one week before a print even made it into the 'do it later' cabinet. His concentration was gone, it wasn't the degenerative brain thing, it was the festival. He had always produced crap before a show, but never so much crap. Then he had really never put himself on a shooting schedule before either.

Friday morning came, Edgar had gone to the other donut shop before dark the night before. He had a nice assortment of donuts on the table when the YSM arrived. She ate about half of one donut. 

"Donuts are pure sugar. They play absolute hell with the figure and the complexion." Tammy said it as if lecturing one of her children.

"You mean to tell me that you don't do anything just because you enjoy it Tammy?" He continued. "Do it without considering the consequences, just because it sounds good at the time?" He said it because donuts were such a minor issue. Yet she had made a big deal about her explanation, even when one wasn't required.

"I usually give things at least a little thought. It isn't just me you know. I don't want my kids bouncing through life like balls in an arcade game." She could defend her position, he had to give her that. She had either given it a lot of thought, or read way too many self help books for young mothers. 
Still Edgar had to admit she did have a well controlled figure. Something about her frame told him that she could have gone either way. He would have enjoyed seeing about twenty extra pounds on her. Still keeping a nice figure but losing the starving model look. Still it was none of his business. A YSM would do what a YSM had to do, he supposed.

The space behind the seats of the little yellow convertible he reserved for clothes. His one soft bag took up only the space behind the passenger's seat. He had left the same amount of space behind the driver's seat for her case. The trunk was over half filled with cardboard tubes, foam core boards and broken down easels of different heights. Edgar had done festivals before.

When the YSM opened her trunk, edgar found a small cloth case. It wasn't over filled, but it wasn't soft either. He guessed that she had packed exactly the amount that the instructions advised. He had already formed a new opinion of Tammy Smith. Tammy was the ultimate conformist.

As Edgar lifted the firm but not bulging bag from the trunk he said out loud, "Long weekend ahead."

"Yes, I am so looking forward to it." Tammy answered. She had obviously missed the sarcasm in his voice. Or maybe there was none, since she was doing him a favor.

The work case was what might have been a book salesman's sample case. As a matter of fact it most likely like was a jewelry salesman's case. She could have ordered one from someplace on line. In the case of a YSM it was the most likely scenario.

It was well before noon when the little yellow convertible labored out of the parking lot. Now lest you think Edgar just took off in a car he bought a week before, let me assure you the car had been checked and tuned by a mechanic who owed Edgar a favor. The car got about twenty dollars worth of wholesale parts, and Edgar got peace of mind, all for a hundred bucks.

The underpowered car strained only when it left the stop sign from his parking lot. The small condo complex was built in what must have been a sink hole at one time. The driveway was impassable on icy days. Since it was the first of June, that wasn't a possibility unless hell really did freeze over from time to time.

Edgar noticed that Tammy was very tense. "You okay, you seem nervous."
"It feels funny to be in a car without a roof. These are supposed to be very dangerous in an accident."

"They are. It is my understanding that you are twice as likely to die in a sever crash." Edgar had no idea what the number was, if there really was a higher risk at all. "But your odds of having that crash are much higher if you drive in fear. Over compensation," he suggested.

"So are you telling me to just drive normally?"

"I think that would be best. I would also try to relax. Personally I would prefer to die in an auto crash than to live as a tomato." He noted her curious look. "In a crash sever enough to kill you in a convertible, you would most likely be in a coma if you had been in your car."

"Oh I see your point. If I had the choice, would I rather die outright or be cared for the rest of my life with no conscious thought?"

"It wasn't exactly what I meant but yeah that's it."

"In that case," she said that as she raised the speed of the tiny yellow car to match the traffic around them. It didn't take long for the magic of rag top to infect her. It took about three younger men in rusty pickups looking down and grinning at her. They no doubt thought it a shame that she was with her father. That really was a lust inhibitor Edgar suspected.
"I believe those boys were staring at me."

"Well I am pretty damn sure they weren't looking at me with longing in their eyes, at least I hope not." Edgar said it enjoying the YSM's smile. It had obviously been a while since she had been the object of anyone's lust. Let alone a couple of redneck teenagers in a rusty old pick up.


----------



## mysteryscribe

The totally mismatched couple had been on the road for what seemed like hours. Edgar checked his watch as the convertible cruised past the state capitol building. The two of them had been on the road for well over an hour. They weren't making very good time. 

In spite of her best intentions, Tammy Smith drove like an old lady. Edgar could have made the drive faster, but he really would have been a menace in the heavy traffic around the state capitol. As it was, it took both of them to spot the exit in time to prevent a major accident.

After leaving Capitol City they switched to the smaller two lane roads which would take them to the almost coastal festival. They could have stayed on the Interstate but Edgar sensed that Tammy was terrified every time an eighteen wheeler passed.

"Tell you what, how about we look for a place to have lunch?" Edgar suggested. Even if she had a 'real' breakfast it had to be wearing thin. If not hers, his sure as hell was.

"Sure but there probably won't be much in these small towns. Unless we just go looking for something." Tammy didn't seem all that enthusiastic about lunch in a small town for some reason.

"Oh hell Mrs. Smith there will be plenty of places between here and the festival. But personally I vote for the very next one that sells food, no matter what it is." Edgar was smiling but also firm.

"Alright, we will just toss caution to the wind," Tammy agreed. Well she agreed until the next place came into view. The building was no larger than a fair sized storage shed. Certainly smaller than a garage.

"Oh no," she said.

"Oh yes, you agreed."

"But they probably don't have anything but greasy food."

"Yeah," Edgar said it with a devilish grin. "You go to save us that table under the tree over there, and I'll get the food."

"Aren't you going to ask what I want to eat." She said it to his back. Edgar had already gone.

"Howdy," he said to the chubby teenager behind the counter. There was an equally chubby black man standing over a grill. "You got a menu?"

The girl was obviously bored as she pointed to the hand made sign over the grill. The side of the road grill severed both hamburger and hot dogs. That was bad news for Tammy. The good new for Edgar was they had a million variations on the theme. He took a look at the YSM sitting on a bench under a tree looking very nervous, then he ordered two large burgers Carolina style and two trays of onion rings.

"Don't you want a coke with that?" the chubby girl asked.

"You got RC?" Edgar asked with a grin. Might as well go all the way, he thought.

"Sure," the teenie bopper replied looking insulted.

"Give me three of them."

When Edgar got to the picnic table Tammy's eyes were dancing. She was not at all comfortable. "Easy there partner, don't blow anything till we get home. I don't need you going postal on me."

It took her a few long seconds to get it. "No I'm fine. This is just a lot of new things to absorb all at once."

Edgar nodded placing the food onto the table. You ain't seen nothing yet, he thought. "I didn't know how you take your burger, but I thought you should try one of these."

When she opened the wrapper, she looked as though she might be sick. She didn't say anything just pushed it away. She did the same with the onion rings. "Didn't they have diet?" she asked surveying the RC Colas.

"Tammy listen to me. You may never have a chance like this again. Try everything, you can hate it, after you try it, not before. You and I are totally different, but remember why you wanted to make this trip. You wanted to find out about you." It wasn't exactly what she had said at their first meeting, but it was what she had meant.

To her credit she nodded shyly, then took the RC from his hand. She took a sip made a face, then placed it down in front of her. She tried one of the onion rings, Then tasted the burger. Taft was forced to go back to the counter for more napkins. He made a mess, but he had at least clue how to eat a sloppy chili burger. Tammy just wore most of it.

They were back on the road when she said, "I'm miserable. I may never eat again. Damn it Taft you are trying to poison me."

"Ah hell loosen up some Tammy. You might even smile back at the teenagers."


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## mysteryscribe

The drive from the roadside diner to the next place where Tammy asked for directions was made in silence. Tammy was not happy. She felt that Edgar had not even considered her feelings, when he made the lunch arrangements. Tammy was not used to being considered less than a full partner. She didn't much like the idea of being anything less.

She kept telling herself that it was only two days and then it would all be over. She could do anything for two days. After all it wasn't marriage, she could just ignore him for two days. 

Ignoring Edgar was difficult. Edgar was Edgar Taft. He was the closest thing to a real artist she was ever likely to meet. Oh she had met a couple of art school kids with a lot of promise, but frankly they were all so normal. I mean an artist should be different, shouldn't he? She had that thought, while she was working out Edgar's forgiveness.

"Which way?" she asked as she reached the stop sign in the tiny town. She would not have asked, if she could read a map herself. To her the lines could have been a piece of modern art. They made no sense at all, but they had a kind of beauty to them.

"Turn right but pull over first chance you get."

"You mean stop in the middle of the block."

"Yes, but find a parking space. We might be a few minutes." Taft saw the look she gave him, but didn't care. It was only two days, then she would be back in her Yuppie life. She would just have to tough it out. 

She parked the little yellow convertible behind a rusted pick up truck filled with bags from the farmers exchange. What was inside those bags, Tammy had not a single clue. 

Edgar rummaged though the space behind his seat until he had free access to leather box of some sort, and a small soft backpack. The pack was the kind kids carry their school books inside.  From the leather box, he removed what had to be the worlds ugliest camera. She recognized it as a camera only because she had seen old movies on cable TV. It looked a lot like the cameras the newsmen of the thirties and forties pointed at Clark Gable. It lacked the huge flash on the side. but still it most likely was one of the same camera or a sibling.

Edgar put a small square thing into the camera before walking across the street. She also noticed what looked like a pair of worn red socks that he carried in his hand as well. After he had crossed the street, he motioned for her to join him. He did so only after having turned and found her still sitting in the open car. He walked her deep into the small park. What he was looking for she had no idea.

The park was no more than a couple of adjoining vacant lots that had been covered with sod. The small town managed to find the money, probably from the state, to put in a fountain and a few benches. It was urban renewal in small town American. What they hadn't been able to do, was to convince the owner of the building beside the park to paint over his worn cigarette advertizing sign. The sign had been painted onto the bricks of the building many years before. It sat above a rear door. The door had obviously once been a popular entrance to the small, downtown market. The door was boarded with weathered and decomposing plywood, and the sign faded and peeling. 

Edgar had no way to know that the sign and door were there, but he had felt something call him while Tammy was stopped at the stop sign. Edgar didn't need the beanbag sock, since the doorway sat in the open sun. An old time film holder has two sides and each side holds one sheet of film. Edgar made one careful exposure of the door and sign. The turned the holder over.

"Go stand by that door," he demanded of Tammy.

"Why?"

"Because I want to give the picture some scale and you are the only thing I have." She did it without even combing her hair or fixing her make up. She knew it would only upset Edgar if she wasted the time. Besides she was just there for the scale. It certainly wasn't as if Edgar wanted her there because she was who she was. Even to her that thought made no sense.

Edgar fiddled with his camera then without any warning he lifted it quickly and fired the shutter. Without a word he turned for the car. All that trouble for one quick shot. It made no sense to her at al, but then she made jewelry not photographs. 

Still she did own a Nikon digital SLR, she had even brought it along. It was packed away in her suitcase. Maybe I should take it out of the bag, she thought.


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## mysteryscribe

I slipped out of the cave and posted something somewhere else.  I wonder how long it will take before I am told that I must be getting senile.... LOL truth is I am


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## mysteryscribe

Finding the river walk festival area was easy. The small river town had originally been built alongside the river. It was just a matter of looking for the whored up historical district. Most historic districts aren't whored up at all, but for some reason that one was. It could have been that way at the towns beginnings, but Taft had his doubts.

Tammy drove the convertible over the cobble stone 'Old Main' street to the River Walk Park. The part was a lot more classy than the historic downtown. It had to do with the governor's river front redevelopment committee. All the old towns in the state got money to build parks along the river, but only if they used the state's plans. Each one was allowed a small variance but not much.

At the entrance to the River Walk Park, Tammy drove by a table with a patio umbrella over it. She tried to stop to talk to the older woman but the woman would have none of it. 

"Park you car right over there and came back so we can talk." The older woman said it turning away. 

Tammy started to object but Taft touched her arm. She realized that he meant for her to do as the woman said. Tammy waited until she was out of earshot of the old woman, then asked, "What the hell was that all about. She could have told us what we wanted to know there was no one behind us."

"Mrs. Smith, the woman has not assigned us a space yet. I would prefer not to be on the very end of the line. People and their children tend to get tired somewhere before the end of the line of tables. I don't want you to upset her enough that she moves me to the end of the line. If you still want to call her a *****, do it after the show ends."

"I don't use language like that," Tammy almost shouted.

"Then whatever a proper bred lady calls another older proper bred lady." With that Edgar led Tammy to the table with the blue and white patio umbrella. The umbrella cast a nice bit of shade, but only on the old lady.
"Hi, I'm Edgar Taft. Could you point out my spot for tomorrow." Edgar had noticed the table and chairs already in position even though each was covered with a blue tarp. He supposed that the city employees had no desire to set them up at four AM.

"Taft, oh yes you are the poster man."

"That and a few other things, but yes that's me."

"And what are the other things?"

"I make a snapshot now and then of a festival patron. I don't take money for it, so I'm not shooting for profit here."

"Alright, I don't see the harm in that."

"And I have jewelry to show," Tammy piped in. Edgar wondered what the bounty was on YSMs that week.

"I don't see any mention of a shared booth."

"This is Tammy my wife," Edgar was thinking as fast as he could. "I didn't think it could harm anything, if she used a corner of my table."

"You should have mentioned it."

"It was a last minute decision for her to come along. Please I really don't want to have a problem."

"Well I have you in the fine arts section, I will have to move you to the artisan section. Jewelry just will not fit in that category."

"You should see my jewelry before you make that decision." Edgar was afraid Tammy would get all filled up with righteous indignation, so he cut her off.
"It's alright Tammy, we will be fine in the craft section." It wasn't all right at all, but Edgar was determined not to make a scene. Tammy hadn't known any better.

"Mrs Taft how large is your display?" Edgar and Tammy had no idea why she asked it.

"It will be a simple jewelry sample case open with thing hanging from it. It takes up hardly any space at all."

"Mr. Taft, I am going to allow you and your wife to remain in the Fine Arts section. Just try not to make to big an issue of selling the jewelry."
"We won't even have a sign up. Just have it out in case anyone stops bye to look."

"Very well then." 

Tammy and Edgar walked to the table behind the chalk number 21 written by hand on the pavement. "This should do just fine," Edgar suggested.
"How did a poster shooter get into the fine arts group?"

The posters are hand painted, a lot of artist did the same thing. They would have prints made of their drawings, then hand colored them in. It's an old tradition even before photography was advanced enough to make prints big enough to sell as posters. Easy way to produce multiple copies of the same print. The fact that mine are all original, one of a kind, helps some too. Make the print, sell the print, cut the negative that's my business plan.


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## mysteryscribe

"So what do you usually do at night?" Tammy asked it while sitting on the porch of the small fishing cabin Edgar had rented for them. 

The cabin had come about after the motel owner took pity on them. The motel had been booked solid for weeks. It was rent the fishing cabin that slept ten, or drive fifty miles to the next motel. The drive to the motel wasn't the problem it was the drive back at 4 AM. That drive would have defeated the purpose of leaving a day early.

"I usually paint on pictures, but I don't have one here to paint. I also don't have my paints."

"So you want to have sex?" Tammy asked it and Edgar was instantly shocked and confused. "It was a joke Edgar. My god you're older than my father."

"Well I am certainly glad you don't have sex with your father." He replied.

"Hey, I never said that now." She burst into laughter again. I wish you could see your face. I didn't think it was possible for a yuppie mom to cause such a reaction.

"I just never expected such things to come from you of all people."

"I know, but I'm not home. I don't have the kids to think about, and it is a beautiful night. It's probably a good thing that you are old."

"Probably is at that. So what are you going to do with your new found art education?"

"I'm going to teach I think. I really love kids, and I'm not ever going to be a great artist."

"Well, you aren't if you think that way for sure. You know I have met a couple of guys who have big gallery followings. Most of them say they aren't great artist, but they are great actors. Most claim to be faking it."
"Are you faking it?"

"No but then I'm not all that popular either. Just sell a few poster pictures. Nothing important, like the others."

"Edgar you are probably the most laid back man I ever met. Nothing at all seems to bother you."

"Lots of things bother me, but I have no control over them. If I have no control, there is nothing I can do. If there is nothing I can do to right the wrongs, I just try to wall them off."

The sun had finally set, when a car drove into the gravel space beside the tiny convertible. "Hi there," The voice belonged to a man. In the car sat a woman who looked to be closer to Taft's age than the man speaking. "Guy who owns the motel said you might let us crash here tonight."
"Are you with the festival?"

"Yeah Arts by Art." He handed Edgar a card. "You won't even know we are here, I promise." The car looked as though it belonged to a gypsy. Lots of dirt and scratches covered the rust and dents. Edgar didn't know what to do. The cabin would sleep ten alright but there were only two bedrooms.
"It's up to the little lady," Edgar said. Then he whispered into Tammy's ear. If we let them stay we are going to have to share a room. You are safe I promise, but I wouldn't trust some else to keep you safe. You decide.

"What the hell, we are all in this together," Tammy said it and meant it. She helped the older lady from the car, then into the cabin. 

Surprisingly enough it was a quiet night. Everybody seemed to be deep in thought about the festival so everyone just keep to themselves. Leaving the next morning at 6 AM wasn't a problem. Edgar and Tammy made sure the two new arrivals were up and moving about, then they went in search of breakfast.

To Tammy's dismay, she didn't bat an eye when Edgar found a Hardee's restaurant. He assured her that Hardee's had the best biscuits in the entire state. She admitted to her friends back home that he had been right. She never admitted it to Edgar.

Tammy was in awe of the prints Edgar removed from the cardboard cylinders. Edgar called them posters but Tammy doubted anyone else would. they were paintings on paper. That is how they looked to her anyway.

"You only have four posters?" she was surprised.

"Yes the point of this show is to have people see the samples then look on the web at the catalog. All my current prints are on the web and available through different galleries around the country. The shipping is minimal so this works pretty well."

"What about those two portraits?" 

"Oh I might get a retro portrait commission or two here. You never know." Odds were not good with Tammy along. She hadn't asked to see his portrait samples and he didn't particularly want to show them to her.


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## mysteryscribe

Tammy was at first surprised by the number of people who commented on her jewelry. She was excited to find that some people even paid to own it. She was feeling very good about herself when she looked up to see Taft looking slightly bewildered.

"Are you okay?" She realized that she had been so involved in her own little world that she hadn't noticed Edgar for over an hour. He might have been staring off into the river for all that time. He certainly wasn't looking at the people who stopped by to see his posters. Tammy suddenly realized that the people didn't even exist for Edgar. Edgar wasn't there any more.

"Edgar," she shook him as well as call his name. He jerked back to reality. 
At least he appeared to be in touch again. "Are you alright?"

"Sure," he said it but he didn't sound alright at all. He sounded a bit disoriented. "Do you want me to call someone for you?"

"No there is no one to call." While the two of them whispered, people came looked at the posters read the information. Some took his card with the web address, others just walked away.

"Is that why you needed someone to drive for you?" Edgar nodded. "Is it alzheimers?" He shook his head. Tammy gave him a questioning look.

"I have a slow growing brain tumor. If my bum ticker doesn't get me first, I'm gonna lose it all one day. Just slip a gear and never come back. Driving more than a few miles is just too dangerous.  That's why I needed a driver."

"But today isn't the day is it." He turned looked blank to her question. "The day you drift off?"

"No today isn't the day. It most likely will be progressive, not an all at once thing. You know longer and longer times away."

"Damn Edgar I am sorry."

"Not your fault. Just a simple birth defect." He spoke to a few people. It was no more than a "Hi, take a card." kind of thing.

Without knowing Tammy made the decision to just go along for the rest of the weekend. To stop resisting his life style. She would just go back to who she was on Monday. At about the same moment a song came from one of the patron's portable radio. It was a country music station and the song was something like... I don't have to be me till Monday. Tammy grinned which was totally out of place at that moment.

The rest of that day she talked constantly to Edgar. She hoped that it would keep him in the ball game so to speak. She questioned him about his life, about his work even about his strained relationship with his daughter. At six, when they closed up the display, Tammy found that she was becoming immersed in the old man's life. The more he told her, the more she wanted to know.

On the way back to the fish camp Taft spotted a pizza restaurant. It wasn't a chain restaurant, but one of those little mom and pop kind of places. Tammy thought it might be a hang out for bikers, since there were four large motorcycles parked outside the door. 

Once inside she found that it was indeed a biker restaurant and pub. The bikers turned out to be a club of retired cops, who just happen to like motorcycles. The tri-county area was a fast growing retirement center. There was a ton of gray money around, the pizza place just managed to land some of it.

Tammy was surprised by the number of men Taft's age sitting with women of her age. She wanted to ask someone what it meant. She thought that until one of the blonde bimbos kissed her ancient looking biker. It wasn't a peck on the cheek either. Tammy's face reddened as she wondered what the other women must think of her.

When the pizza arrived, she asked, "How about a bottle of wine?"

"Sure," Edgar replied Since Tammy knew wine better than edgar she chose the type and even a brand.

The gypsy car was already in the parking lot when Tammy pulled into the fish camp parking lot.


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## mysteryscribe

Tammy opened the pizza box while Edgar opened the wine bottle. The restaurant had provided two plastic cups, but Edgar crushed one before he got them home. 

"Oh hell Edgar it's okay we can share." Edgar filled the one cup. They passed it back and forth while munching the pizza.

"You know, when I first started in photography I had a girl friend. I was so poor that when we dated, she would bring pizza and wine to my house. Otherwise it would have been beans and bread." He paused to look into the night. He had drifted away, but it was a different place that he went on that occasion.

"I never dated a poor man. I wonder if it would have been different?"

"Well, I've been poor and not so poor. I like not so poor better." Edgar took a small sip then handed her the glass. Tammy emptied it, then refilled it.

"Edgar tell me, where do you go when you drift off?" Tammy would never have asked that if she hadn't had the wine.

"Oh I'm still here, just in a different time. It's like reliving a very intense recent memory. But god it makes me tired when it is over."

"Do you need to rest Edgar?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so." Edgar walked into the cabin and fell sound asleep. 

Tammy Smith took a shower in a moldy steel shower stall. She even managed a chuckle at her own expense.

When she returned to the room, she looked at the bed where she had slept the night before. I had been as far from Edgar as possible. That night she brazenly walked to Edgars bed and slipped in. It wasn't anywhere near the hussy level, because Edgar was out like a dead man. She had to listen carefully to hear his shallow breathing. 

Tammy lay beside him under the dirty sheet and wondered about the man. How much could she learn from him. How much could Edgar Taft teach her before he died or got lost in a memory from which he couldn't break away.


the end....


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## mysteryscribe

The Taft story is finished and I fear it is time for this thread to be finished.  So again.... the end lol


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## Luke

mysteryscribe said:
			
		

> I hate to say this and I know it's going to Upset someone.  The truth is digital was invented for the guy who wants to know nothing about photography.  Of course so was the point and shoot camera.  Digital grew up as opposed to grew down like polaroid did, and to some extent kodak.  Nikon is another company that grew down.  At least in film.  Everybody who makes slrs grew up to them in the digital world.
> 
> I made a statement earlier I find of real interest, at least to me.  You could make a digital camera in the shape of a football shoe, but to get top dollar, it has to look like a film camera.  I find that strange.


bearing in mind i shoot film, only film, in a full manual pentax.  mostly ilford.  now, i think more to the point, program mode was made for the photographer who wanted to know nothing bout photography.  what i do resent is that theres no rites of passage with digital, the right of passage im going through now. the one where you set the focus manually on f.8 because you don't have time to pic it up, you have to assume that youve got the right aperture and shutter cos youve no time to look at your meter and you go around taking pictures trying to capture nice light (using a red filter if you're me).  digital full program mode + autofocus + plus lens that means you dont even have to be involved with what you shoot + channel mixer = instant street photography.  ****es me off, anyway, most who do that will end up crap.  other than that, im thinking digital is good for pros, youve got all the elements of film, just cheaper, only reason i dont convert is:
1. i havent earnt it yet IMO, im still a padawan, if i had a digital, id end up sucking.
2.  too expensive for one
3.  digital is still young, and crap:  you need at least 9 megapixels to print a4, digital noise is horribly ugly, nothing like real film grain and most digital shots reak of digital.


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## mysteryscribe

On digital picture looks someone else said you never hear them say that butter tastes just like margarine do ya?  Digital pictures even the best one look different.  My word for it is Plastic I doubt that will hold up in any camera advertising but it's how it looks to me.  Just like rc paper.


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## JamesD

Hey, now! What's wrong with RC paper?


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## mysteryscribe

It just ain't natural... lol i use it myself but it looks like something that goes in a bathroom not a darkroom..


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## mysteryscribe

I decided to pull this thread out of the closet, clean the cobwebs off it and have a say one more time.  Who knows I might lose my ability to type any day now.  So for what it is worth... which ain't much..

I took a visit to the black and white gallery.  I was shocked to realize how hopelessly old fashioned I am.  I am so lost in the world of photography these days that it is sad.  I mean guys were talking about the converstion from digital color to black and white and the lost detail in the shadow area.  My first thoguht that was why are you converting digital color to black and white.  That's when it struck me that digital (usually I guess if not always) shoots in color.  

Okay thats fine, then I realized that in my old brain that is just wrong.  Then it came to me how many things are really different in the shooting of the images.  How my film images look so different from my SIL digital images.  No value judgement intended here just a statement of fact.  They look different.

Then I wondered why there wasn't a gallery in this little film section of the forum.  Somewhere for us old timers to display the silver image rather than the electron.   Now before anyone jumps my butt, I know they let me post my antigue images here, and some of the other alternate processes show up almost daily and thats wonderful.   

But why not a gallery for just modern film images.  Anything from 35mm film to medium format film or even 4x5 film.  As it is now you have to wade through a mass of digital images and probably not find a one.  Im not suggesting they start one because I seldom shoot modern film cameras but it seems a shame that those who do are pretty much overlooked for display purposes.  They are kind of a footnote.

Yes I know there is no reason not to put shots in the general theme galleries just would be nice to see film images in a place by themselves for me anyway, but that's just me.  Could call it yesterday's technology if it would make the digi people feel better lol...

Let the firestorm begin....


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## terri

No firestorm needed, Charlie.  The B&W gallery is for B&W images, and it doesn't matter if people are more enamored of computer conversions or if they shoot in actual B&W film. I've seen plenty of both on that gallery.

The Alt forum is also a gallery of sorts (check the title) :mrgreen: for all things Alt. It's a dedicated film forum, with a little bit of hybrid stuff thrown in for good measure. 

You can post your images wherever you'd like, wherever you think they fit best. I don't think we have a need for a "film only" gallery at this point - but I'd love to hear others weigh in, maybe I'm wrong. I'd need to hear from a lot more than our usual crowd to convince me, though.


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## mysteryscribe

Im not saying that it doesnt take a lot of skills to shoot digital images it certainly does... It just takes different skills in some ways.  

As for not doing it because I said so, I agree completely I don't shoot that much modern film stuff.  I just have no interest at all in digital because it's not in my mind set.  It was a purely personal observation.

Oh i expect to hear from some people who never shot film that its a waste of space since it is what it is....


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## JamesD

I believe that, with this being a general photography forum, rather than a digital, analog, pinhole, alt-process, or poetry forum, that the focus is on image than medium or technique.  And that technique takes precedence over medium.  Image is what photography is all about, and technique is necessary to produce images.

I do wonder one thing.  The Alt Process Gallery is the only gallery which is separated from the others.  It is also the only technique forum which is combined with a gallery.  I've often wondered about this; after all, it's not the Graphics Programs Techniques & Gallery, or the Darkroom Techniques & Gallery.

I'm not calling for change.  I'm merely wondering why any technique, whether it be film, digital, pinhole, or calotype, is separated by process rather than content.  After all, if I produce a portrait using cyanotype process, shouldn't it go in with the rest of the portraits?

Just my two dits.


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