paper-thin lens . . .

Paper-Thin, Distortion-Free Lenses Could Make Pint-Sized Pro Cameras Possible

Using an ultrathin wafer of silicon and gold to focus lightwaves, researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences have created a revolutionary new kind of camera lens that completely eliminates the image distortion created by traditional glass lenses. It could not only pave the way for lighter cameras that are still as capable as today's swappable lens models, but even cameraphones that snap images as impressive as a DSLR.

Click here to read more about this new technology.

kodak . . .

Professional photographers still value the unique feel that film gives to their pictures

Debt-struck photography pioneer Kodak says it may sell off its still-camera film and photo paper divisions.

The firm has already stopped making digital cameras as part of efforts to reduce its losses after filing for bankruptcy protection in January.

It has also been trying to raise funds by selling off more than 1,100 digital imaging patents.

It had originally planned to announce a buyer last week, but said "discussions continue" and a deal might not happen.

Apple and Google had been reported to have made rival bids for the patents, but the Wall Street Journal reports they have now joined forces and have added Samsung, LG, HTC and others to their consortium

The WSJ's sources suggested the offer price for the portfolio would be about $500m (£315m) - well below the $2.6bn estimate that Kodak had suggested it could be worth.

The company recently reported a $665m net loss for the first six months of the year, putting further pressure on its finances.

Film's feel

In its latest announcement the US company said it had hired investment bank Lazard to help it sell its Personalised Imaging and Document Imaging businesses.

This would mean an end to it making films for still cameras, photo papers, souvenir photo products at theme parks, scanners and picture print-out kiosks at stores.

It would leave the business focused on printers, cinema film stock and chemicals.

The British Journal of Photography said the news would concern the industry.

"A lot of professionals still shoot with film and like the quality it gives them," Olivier Laurent, news editor at the journal, told the BBC.

"The resolution is still a thousand times higher than most digital cameras can offer so long as a good scanner is used.

"A film photograph has a different mood thanks to its grain - it's about the love of the image and digital still has a hard time trying to reproduce that feeling."

francois robert . . .

“Everyone at Photographic Works/ArtsEye Gallery, a local Tucson business, loves the Holga—a plastic toy camera that shoots 120mm film. In fact, they love it so much, they host an annual photo competition that attracts photographers from around the world. The exhibit features work shot with Holgas and other curious cameras (pin hole, phones, and then some). The giant camera was originally conceived as a prop for the exhibit that paid homage to the Holga. About halfway through the construction process, it was decided it could be made into a functioning camera. All the dimensions are the same as the toy camera, only 20 times larger (to scale).” The builder of the giant Holga and the owner of the photo lab invited photographer Francois Robert to take photographs with the giant Holga on location. “I scouted around and in Tucson for 2 days making sure each location would have an easy access for the horse trailer and the pick up truck.The most challenging aspect of working with it is actually moving it from site to site. Luckily, the camera fits inside a two-horse trailer, though just barely.” –Francois Robert.

The camera is loaded with photographic paper, either color or black-and-white. It can handle film, but there isn’t any large enough on the market that will fit (30″X30″). Hence, the paper, which comes in rolls and can be used as film. A typical exposure depends on how the paper is rated and the filtration. B&W paper typically needs an exposure of about 1 to 2 minutes, while color paper, without filtration, needs about 1 minute. To learn more, contact Photographic Works (520 327- 7291).

jesse burke . . .

August 20, 2012

JESSE BURKE’S INSTAGRAM TAKEOVER

Posted by Maria Lokke

Last week, the photographer Jesse Burke took The New Yorker’s Instagram feed with him around New England, posting photos from wherever he went: a Vermont wedding, snorkeling on the coast of Rhode Island, and other adventures around his home in Providence with his two beautiful daughters and two odd-looking cats. Burke, an avid Instagram user (follow him at @jesse_burke), is part of a growing contingent of professional photographers using the image-based social-media app as an outlet for their work. “Instagram has been really helpful in making the photo world an even smaller place, which is something I really like about it.” told me. “I’ve gained a lot of new relationships that I may have never made in real life. The Internet makes distance a non-issue.” I asked Burke how his Instagram photos compared with his professional and personal work. “My personal work is very considered and more or less produced,” he said. “I use Instagram in the opposite way. It’s quick and dirty, always on the fly. My personal work is meant to be seen as a collection of photographs that act as pieces to a larger puzzle. I use Instagram as a constant stream of thought that doesn’t end, hopping all around from location to location, thought to thought.”

Burke is the second guest photographer in our new series of Instagram takeovers. (The first was Martin Schoeller.) Here’s a selection of favorites from Burke’s week at the wheel of @newyorkermag.

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/photobooth#ixzz246zrl38g

rineke dijkstra . . .

From the antique statue of the Kritios boy to Edward Weston’s photographic meditations on his son Neil and beyond, youth and its attendant qualities of beauty and innocence has fascinated artists for centuries.  Rineke Dijkstra’s retrospective exhibition at the Guggenheim in New York affirms that the Dutch-born photographer is in many ways part of this enduring tradition. For Dijkstra, however, “youth” is not some timeless ideal, but a state of uncertain transition, and since the early 1990s she has produced a complex body of work that offers viewers a decidedly refreshing take on adolescence. Click here to read and see more.

Rineke Dijkstra. "Kolobrzeg, Poland, July 26, 1992." Chromogenic print, 117 x 94 cm. 

Courtesy the artist and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York and Paris. © Rineke Dijkstra.

google street view . . .

How Google Street View is inspiring new photography: You can take a virtual walk down almost any street in the developed world – and it's resulting in some fascinating new art. Click here to read more about this.

joseph nicephore niepce . . .

Joseph Nicéphore Niépce’s “View from the Window at Le Gras” (1826), known as the world's earliest surviving photograph, is to be shown in Mannheim at the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, the museum announced to the press on Monday. Housed normally in the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, the photograph was last exhibited in Europe on 1961. Niépce’s tin plate photograph will be show as part of the exhibition “The Birth of Photography: Milestones from the Gernsheim Collection,” opening on Septemper 9.

Click here to read more.

Joseph Nicéphore Niépce’s “View from the Window at Le Gras” (1826)

camera obscura . . .

Camera Obscura, a room as a large 'pin hole camera' in Venice, from BBC's 'Genius of Photography

florian maier-aichen . . .

Florian Maier-Aichen likens his use of infrared film to an in-between state, discussing photography’s role in picturing the American West and its ability to confound past and present.

jem finer . . .

A perspective-altering work in which a mirrored sphere ‘sits’ atop a shed that internally displays a three-way camera obscura image of the Japanese Garden. Produced with Julia King and Atelier One Structural Engineers.