RE: [Leica] Rust belt

["Patrick G. Sobalvarro" <pgs@sobalvarro.org>]

> From: owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
> [mailto:owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us]On Behalf Of Michael
> Garmisa
>
> I plan to be travelling in pensylvania this week and will be
> passing a rusted
> up steel mill.  I plan to take some time to photograph this with my M3 and
> brand new 50 summicron.  Any ideas for film? I think I will be shotting
> primarily color print but maybe some chrome too.  Any thoughts on such a
> progect.  I'll be metering with a handheld minolta incident light
> meter so the
> sparking off the rust shouldn't affect the exposure.
> Any advice will be helpfull.

Probably most of my photography is of industrial things.  I have some hints
for you:

1. The watchman is usually not your friend.  Usually he is barely literate,
so he doesn't remember much about the Bill of Rights and he is worried about
losing his job.  He can't understand what the hell you're doing there, or
why you would want to photograph the site -- unless you're some kind of
INDUSTRIAL SPY.  Yes, you and I know it's 1930s technology and shut down.
He's a little unclear on these things.  He also doesn't understand that if
you're on public property and taking pictures for your own use, you are
within your rights.  He remembers, more or less, that he has seen people in
uniforms with guns on TV destroying cameras and kicking the shit out of
photographers, and he wonders whether maybe that's what's expected of him in
this situation.

If you tell the watchman that you are photographing the site because you
think it's beautiful, he thinks you're crazy.  If you tell him you think
it's beautiful because you're an engineer, well, now he KNOWS you're one a
them there INDUSTRIAL SPIES.

My advice: when the watchman shows up, tell him you were just leaving, and
it's legal for you to take pictures from the road but you didn't take any
anyway because you couldn't get the right angle -- see, that fence is in the
way.  Then leave.  Don't come back.

2. Corollary to the point above:  First, drive by.  Second, plan your shots
and the lenses you'll use.  Third, take your photographs and leave.

3. You need a 20mm lens or thereabouts because often you can't get far
enough from the site to get enough of it in the frame, and you need a 180
and a 400 because often you can't get close enough to the details you want.
You also need a 50 because sometimes it's just right.  Look, just take all
your damned lenses and figure out which ones you'll need when you drive by.

4.  I really like these things in black and white.  I use Tri-X a lot
because I like the grain.  I often use a deep red filter to darken the sky
and bring out the clouds.  Makes things more dramatic.  When I don't want
grain sometimes I use fine-grained color print film and take the red channel
in Photoshop and print that as black and white.  I scan my film anyway, so
ultimate sharpness is not something I'm going to be getting.

5. The best kind of industrial site to photograph is one that you're allowed
to walk around and photograph for hours.  This requires some kind of
agreement with the people who own the site, but it is what I would call a
good time.

- -Patrick