I used to be more fanatic about B&W...

I used to be a B&W fanatic, everything looked better to me that way...  It felt classic & timeless, the expression & form of an image seemed more dramatic unshackled from color.  (Hello Edward Weston.)  Now, anyone who really knows me is aware that I am either starboard or larboard, rarely even keel.  Which means that I've become as fanatic about color that I used to be about B&W!  Give me verdant greens, radiant yellows, operatic purples, etc...  This is not to say that I've thrown B&W and it's warmer sister sepia down the hatch.  Some images are meant to be one or the other & I shall certainly remain sensitive to that, the images always let me know... 

Farewell Sweet Film

I did something this past week that made my heart bubble up in my throat and my solar plexus sink to my knees.  I sold a beautiful, integral, yummy-smelling part of my past: My (choke) 35mm & medium format (shudder) beloved (sigh) FILM CAMERAS!  The worse part of it was standing in the FedEx store for 20 minutes watching two very unpleasant men package these poignant pieces of my past with anger & derision.  (Thank you, Mr. & Mr. NastyPants.)  I loved the smell of fresh film & stop bath & Kodak Endura paper fresh from the package, blank & brimming with silver halide possibilities...  In college I used to take my radio and Doors CD's and sneak into the darkrooms in the middle of the night.  Red safety lights + Jim Morrison + Images I created coming alive beneath my fingertips in a pool of developer = MAGIC.  I'm ok, I do have a new love in the form of a Canon EOS 1D Mark IV.  I don't share my pillow with her, but then again between Aria, Montana, books I'm reading and notebooks I'm not writing in, there's not a lot of room on the pillow, but now I've made the room inside of me for this new, non-smelling, digital future to grow.