Digital BW, The Print

Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have general
interest.

Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find it hard
to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often baffled about
why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at exhibitions. I
therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain what it
actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on

Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and  Ashley la Grange "Basic Critical
Theory for Photographers". I already have "
<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also probably
going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the recommendations
on this list.

 

Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?

 

regards,

Peter._,___ 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

You have probably asked the most interesting question that I have seen on
this forum. Some produce images that are completely technically correct and
containing huge amounts of technical ability but are just plain boring.
Individuals who take those types of images find comfort in their ability to
master technology. The image is secondary. Others produce an image that
plucks at the heartstrings but can be attacked all day on many technical
fronts. I would say, understand the technology but trust your heart, your
eye your mind and your life experience. You will know. If you see another
picture of another flower, who cares? But if that flower is being held by a
young girl offering it to a soldier with a rifle, another story.

 

  _____  

From: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Peter
Oksen
Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 9:02 AM
To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Digital BW] Good books on photography (OT)

 

Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have general
interest.

Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find it hard
to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often baffled about
why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at exhibitions. I
therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain what it
actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on

Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and Ashley la Grange "Basic Critical
Theory for Photographers". I already have "
<http://www.amazon.
<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
> co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also probably
going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the recommendations
on this list.

Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?

regards,

Peter._,___ 

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

All that matters is whether you find value in looking at the image or 
not. If you do, then the image is "good" for you. 

If you can find it, William Mortensen's /The Command to Look/ is 
excellent.  It's been out of print for years, though.

Start with the gospels: Weston's Daybook I and especially II and
Ansel's "The Negative" and "The Print" ...not his "art books" which
IMO simply stun, don't reveal. 

Here's a link that was given to me yesterday..Wessel...watch the
excellent video and listen to the man..might help make sense of Shore...

http://www.kqed.org/arts/people/spark/profile.jsp?id=17900

Few photographers write well and although Szarkowski did, I think he
over-emphasized certain angles, inspiring tiresome trends. I don't
think he understood his photographers but he did interpret their work
credibly, writing well. 

IMO both Wessel and Shore are yesterday's news (whereas Weston and
Adams remain deities) but Wessel's life work is an inspiration ...
thanks to this video I'm going to look back on old negatives with an
eye to selective reprinting. And there may be more to learn from old
B&W American and French "noir" films than from old B&W still
photographers :-)

John



--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Peter Oksen"
<oksen@...> wrote:
>
> Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have
general
> interest.
> 
> Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find
it hard
> to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often
baffled about
> why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at
exhibitions. I
> therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain
what it
> actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
> probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on
> 
> Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and  Ashley la Grange "Basic
Critical
> Theory for Photographers". I already have "
>
<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
> 5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
> Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
> much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also
probably
> going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the
recommendations

> on this list.
> 
>  
> 
> Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?
> 
>  
> 
> regards,
> 
> Peter._,___ 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>

Thank you for sharing this video! Here I am in California all my life 
and never really appreciated it.
Debbi

>Start with the gospels: Weston's Daybook I and especially II and
>Ansel's "The Negative" and "The Print" ...not his "art books" which
>IMO simply stun, don't reveal.
>
>Here's a link that was given to me yesterday..Wessel...watch the
>excellent video and listen to the man..might help make sense of Shore...
>
>http://www.kqed.org/arts/people/spark/profile.jsp?id=17900
>
>Few photographers write well and although Szarkowski did, I think he
>over-emphasized certain angles, inspiring tiresome trends. I don't
>think he understood his photographers but he did interpret their work
>credibly, writing well.
>
>IMO both Wessel and Shore are yesterday's news (whereas Weston and
>Adams remain deities) but Wessel's life work is an inspiration ...
>thanks to this video I'm going to look back on old negatives with an
>eye to selective reprinting. And there may be more to learn from old
>B&W American and French "noir" films than from old B&W still
>photographers :-)
>
>John
>
>
>
>--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Peter Oksen"
><oksen@...> wrote:
>>
>>  Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have
>general
>>  interest.
>>
>>  Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find
>it hard
>>  to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often
>baffled about
>>  why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at
>exhibitions. I
>>  therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain
>what it
>>  actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
>>  probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on
>>
>>  Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and  Ashley la Grange "Basic
>Critical
>>  Theory for Photographers". I already have "
>>
><http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
>>  5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
>>  Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
>>  much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also
>probably
>>  going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the
>recommendations
>>  on this list.
>>
>> 
>>
>>  Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?
>>
>> 
>>
>>  regards,
>>
>>  Peter._,___
>  >
>  >

> Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?

-------------------

Peter,

the link below is not to a book but to a blog that may lead you to
books and other interesting references (after some scavenging):


http://tinyurl.com/3xdpm7


I trust you realize that the "goodness" of a photo depends on other
factors besides just looking at one and deciding if you like it.

Time - everyone's opinion changes with time (including our opinions of
our own work)

Context - and related information - can make or break the value of a
picture. A recent piece in the NYT on that:
 http://tinyurl.com/2vsegv

Category - is it good in the "aesthetic" sense, in the "informative"
sense, good as "memorabilia" ?... etc. 

Presentation - do you think it's good when it's framed and properly
lit but wouldn't look at it otherwise? -- do you like it equally
"good" small and big? -- 

You get the idea.
I wouldn't send you to find "definitive answers" in books or other
sources, just food for thought....

Antonis

Is this Amadou Diallo you guys are talking about?
http://www.amazon.com/Police-Officers-Shooting-Amadou-Diallo/dp/0766021661/ref=sr_1_4/002-1189655-7586421?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185481252&sr=8-4

Peter Oksen <oksen@ruc.dk> wrote:                                  Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have general
 interest.
 
 Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find it hard
 to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often baffled about
 why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at exhibitions. I
 therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain what it
 actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
 probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on
 
 Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and  Ashley la Grange "Basic Critical
 Theory for Photographers". I already have "
 <http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
 5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
 Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
 much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also probably
 going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the recommendations
 on this list.
 
 Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?
 
 regards,
 
 Peter._,___ 
 
 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
 
 
     
                       


 Rob 
  
  
 Incoming and outgoing mail scanned by AVG 
 www.grisoft.com
  


       
---------------------------------
Park yourself in front of a world of choices in alternative vehicles.
Visit the Yahoo! Auto Green Center.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

This is such an open ended topic it is akin to trying to define beauty. I
think to some extent the answer goes beyond photography and into the greater
theatre of art. In that spirit I would offer Ranier Maria Rilke¹s  ³Letters
to a Young Poet² as a strong statement. It is easily available on the web,
one site being  http://www.tiny.cc/oHpcT

Another small book that might be of interest is Robert Adams ³Beauty in
Photography, Essays in Defense of Traditional Values.²


Roger




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

No. 

> Is this Amadou Diallo you guys are talking about?

Robert Frank. Browse and you'll find hundreds of essays on Robert Frank.

Here's one: http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/1803




>
> Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have
general

> interest.
> 
>

The Szarkowski book you mention is very good but for your purposes I think 
"Looking at Photographs" would be better. Also "Criticizing Photographs" An 
Introducton to Understanding Images" by Terry Barrett.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Peter Oksen" <oksen@...>
To: <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 9:02 AM
Subject: [Digital BW] Good books on photography (OT)


Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have general
interest.

Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find it hard
to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often baffled about
why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at exhibitions. I
therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain what it
actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on

Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and  Ashley la Grange "Basic Critical
Theory for Photographers". I already have "
<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also probably
going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the recommendations
on this list.



Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?



regards,

Peter._,___



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



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Yahoo! Groups Links

Peter,

I read the following two books. I think they are related to your
message and may be helpful.

How to look at photographs by David Finn
	
The Tao of Photography: Seeing Beyond Seeing by Philippe L. Gross and
S.I. Shapiro

Have fun!

Manuel

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Peter Oksen"
<oksen@...> wrote:
>
> Sorry for going slightly out of topic, but this issue may also have
general
> interest.
> 
> Having photographed for years on amateur basis, I still often find
it hard
> to decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often
baffled about
> why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at
exhibitions. I
> therefore am looking for references to good books that may explain
what it
> actually is that makes a good photograph (knowing that such an answer
> probably does not exist - but anyway). I have my eyes on
> 
> Szarkowski's "The photographers eye" and  Ashley la Grange "Basic
Critical
> Theory for Photographers". I already have "
>
<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nature-Photographs-Primer-Stephen-Shore/dp/07148458
> 5X/ref=pd_sim_b_1/202-7939729-4406211?ie=UTF8&qid=1185448294&sr=1-1> The
> Nature of Photographs: A Primer" by Stephen Shore but did not really get
> much out of that one. The text was too rudimentary I think. Am also
probably
> going to get Diallo's new book on BW printing based on the
recommendations

> on this list.
> 
>  
> 
> Are these books any help, and are there other suggestions or comments?
> 
>  
> 
> regards,
> 
> Peter._,___ 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Peter Oksen"
<oksen@...> wrote:
>
> ...I am often baffled about
> why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at
exhibitions...

I think you show all of the characteristics necessary for success as a
career diplomat.

Tyler

In a message dated 7/26/2007 9:22:51 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
tyler@... writes:

I think  you show all of the characteristics necessary for success as a
career  diplomat.

Tyler



Or perhaps, a diplomatic trash collector. There is so much crap hanging on  
good wall spaces, and a huge waste of film and paper.
 
Richard Massie



************************************** Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL at 
http://discover.aol.com/memed/aolcom30tour


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Thanks a lot to all for the answers to this admittedly impossible question.
As said I don�t expect to get an answer, but am merely looking for sources
to better understand what makes a photo tick. I enjoyed a lot the Wessel
video � thanks � and like his photos. Many are quite Cartier-Bresson like
and dependent on this magical moment which exactly produces this WOW effect
f.ex. the Santa Barbara 1977 photo of the man watching the dows fly �
fantastic. And then again there is a good example of what I don�t
understand. Have a look at Wessel�s gallery site � HYPERLINK
"http://renabranstengallery.com/wessel.html"http://renabranstengallery.com/w
essel.html  - there�s a photo in the Las Vegas serie of the parking lot or
road called Las Vegas no.3 from 2000 (top right). Could someone please
explain to me why this deserves a place there? Actually most of the Las
Vegas serie are the kind of photos that I sometimes also shoot, but would
most likely discard as being un-interesting or even boring. Please
understand I am not flogging Wessel here � I am merely trying to understand
something that really puzzles me.

Regards,

Peter


No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition. 
Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.10.22/922 - Release Date: 27-07-2007
06:08
 


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Nope, it�s this one:

HYPERLINK
"http://www.masteringdigitalbwbook.com/main.html"http://www.masteringdigital
bwbook.com/main.html

From: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of RobLee
Sent: 26. juli 2007 22:23
To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Digital BW] Good books on photography (OT)

 

Is this Amadou Diallo you guys are talking about?
HYPERLINK
"http://www.amazon.com/Police-Officers-Shooting-Amadou-Diallo/dp/0766021661/
ref=sr_1_4/002-1189655-7586421?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185481252&sr=8-4"http://
www.amazon.com/Police-Officers-Shooting-Amadou-Diallo/dp/0766021661/ref=sr_1
_4/002-1189655-7586421?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185481252&sr=8-4





No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition. 
Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.10.22/922 - Release Date: 27-07-2007
06:08
 


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I read books from the library and then if I still like them when I'm 
done I purchase a copy.  There are four books on my shelf side-by-side 
that I go to when the question arises, "I still often find it hard to 
decide whether a picture is really good or not. I am often baffled 
about why a specific image is supposed to be so good when being at 
exhibitions."

Robert Adams "Beauty in Photography" (a second vote for!)
Ted Orland "Art and Fear"
Bill Jay "Occam's Razor"
David Galenson "Old Master and Young Geniuses" (Galenson's 
earlier "Painting Outside the Lines" covers similar material)

I've found that giving some time to art in historical context and the 
artists' impulse makes understanding what is being shown to you quite 
a bit easier ... even for things I'm not personally fond of.

Best regards,
cleavis

I would add one more in particular (too quick with the reply)

David Hockney, the 1988 publication of "Hockney On Photography: 
Conversations with Paul Joyce"

Whether you like Hockney's photography or not doesn't matter as the 
text is a critical examination of painting and photography.

Cleavis

Peter:

On a forum that can at times be tediously technical, your question has, I think, tapped into a question that many of us think about often. As you yourself say, perhaps there is no definitive answer.

I would be sceptical of anyone who tries to tell you what is good and what is not, as I think this is an intensely personal decision. As an amateur (as opposed to a professional), you have the luxury of photographing purely for yourself. My suggestion to you would be this: look at as many photographs as you can and decide what moves you. What catches your eye? When you stop and pause to look over a particular photograph, try to identify the element(s) that you find moving or interesting. I have found that a public library card has allowed me to look at an amazing amount of photographs, without actually buying them all, allowing me to find my favourites and buy those if they are still in print or to be found.

Unfortunately, identifying what makes a photograph good or even exceptional in your opinion, does not translate into taking exceptional photographs, at least not initially. I know this from personal experience. Perhaps it brings you one step closer though.

Enjoy the journey.

Paul



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Peter, this new question is even more difficult than your first one. Both
are in the strictest sense unanswerable.  But there is an awful lot of
skating around trying to come up with an answer by a lot of us photographers
who wonder why our images never make the galleries or museums or wherever we
believe it's important that they make an appearance.  I went to see an
exhibit by the Japanese artist Sugimoto in San Francisco and some viewers
were asking the very questions you asked.  Sugimoto offers detailed reasons
why he does what he does.  And those reasons strike a chord with the folks
who make decisions at the museums and the galleries and also impress private
collectors.  So that's one path that we could choose to take, or not.   PS
what is a dow? is that a cow?  Cheers.

On 7/27/07, Peter Oksen <oksen@...> wrote:
>
> Thanks a lot to all for the answers to this admittedly impossible
> question.
> As said I don't expect to get an answer, but am merely looking for sources
> to better understand what makes a photo tick. I enjoyed a lot the Wessel
> video � thanks � and like his photos. Many are quite Cartier-Bresson like
> and dependent on this magical moment which exactly produces this WOW
> effect
> f.ex. the Santa Barbara 1977 photo of the man watching the dows fly �
> fantastic. And then again there is a good example of what I don't
> understand. Have a look at Wessel's gallery site � HYPERLINK
> "http://renabranstengallery.com/wessel.html"
> http://renabranstengallery.com/w
> essel.html  - there's a photo in the Las Vegas serie of the parking lot or
> road called Las Vegas no.3 from 2000 (top right). Could someone please
> explain to me why this deserves a place there? Actually most of the Las
> Vegas serie are the kind of photos that I sometimes also shoot, but would
> most likely discard as being un-interesting or even boring. Please
> understand I am not flogging Wessel here � I am merely trying to
> understand
> something that really puzzles me.
>
> Regards,
>
> Peter
>
>
> No virus found in this outgoing message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.10.22/922 - Release Date:
> 27-07-2007
> 06:08
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
> Please visit the Group Homepage to check the Files, and other resources as
> they are often being updated.
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint
>
> If you wish to receive no emails or just a daily digest, or you wish to
> unsubscribe, please edit your Membership preferences by visiting this same
> page.
>
> Please follow these basic guidelines:
> - As threads develop, trim off excess portions of earlier messages to keep
> them short.
> - Good manners are required at all time. No personal attacks or flames.
> Hostile, aggressive or argumentative users may be removed from the
> membership without notice.
> - Keep your posts and threads related to the group topic of digital B&W
> printing. Users who persistently make off-topic posts may be removed from
> the membership.
> - By posting on this forum you agree to abide by the group rules and
> guidelines, and to abide by the actions and decisions of the group Owner and
> Moderators. See "Group Topic, Rules and Guidelines" in the Files section:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint/files/
>
> BY PARTICIPATING IN AND/OR POSTING MESSAGES TO THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT
> YAHOO! GROUP YOU EXPRESSLY UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT THE "OWNER" AND
> "MODERATORS" OF DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU
> FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR EXEMPLARY
> DAMAGES, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS,
> GOODWILL, USE, DATA OR OTHER INTANGIBLE LOSSES (EVEN IF THE  "OWNER" AND
> "MODERATORS" OF DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE
> POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES), RESULTING FROM: (i) THE USE OR THE INABILITY
> TO USE THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP; (ii) UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO OR
> ALTERATION OF YOUR TRANSMISSIONS OR DATA; (iii) STATEMENTS OR CONDUCT OF ANY
> THIRD PARTY ON THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP; OR (iv) ANY OTHER
> MATTER RELATING TO THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Sorry, meant dove or pigeon. Non-native writing in English...
Peter

-----Original Message-----
From: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Sandy
Schaffell
Sent: 27. juli 2007 22:11
To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Digital BW] Re: Good books on photography (OT)

Peter, this new question is even more difficult than your first one. Both
are in the strictest sense unanswerable.  But there is an awful lot of
skating around trying to come up with an answer by a lot of us photographers
who wonder why our images never make the galleries or museums or wherever we
believe it's important that they make an appearance.  I went to see an
exhibit by the Japanese artist Sugimoto in San Francisco and some viewers
were asking the very questions you asked.  Sugimoto offers detailed reasons
why he does what he does.  And those reasons strike a chord with the folks
who make decisions at the museums and the galleries and also impress private
collectors.  So that's one path that we could choose to take, or not.   PS
what is a dow? is that a cow?  Cheers.

On 7/27/07, Peter Oksen <oksen@...> wrote:
>
> Thanks a lot to all for the answers to this admittedly impossible
> question.
> As said I don't expect to get an answer, but am merely looking for sources
> to better understand what makes a photo tick. I enjoyed a lot the Wessel
> video – thanks – and like his photos. Many are quite Cartier-Bresson like
> and dependent on this magical moment which exactly produces this WOW
> effect
> f.ex. the Santa Barbara 1977 photo of the man watching the dows fly –
> fantastic. And then again there is a good example of what I don't
> understand. Have a look at Wessel's gallery site – HYPERLINK
> "http://renabranstengallery.com/wessel.html"
> http://renabranstengallery.com/w
> essel.html  - there's a photo in the Las Vegas serie of the parking lot or
> road called Las Vegas no.3 from 2000 (top right). Could someone please
> explain to me why this deserves a place there? Actually most of the Las
> Vegas serie are the kind of photos that I sometimes also shoot, but would
> most likely discard as being un-interesting or even boring. Please
> understand I am not flogging Wessel here – I am merely trying to
> understand
> something that really puzzles me.
>
> Regards,
>
> Peter
>
>

No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition. 
Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.10.22/922 - Release Date: 27-07-2007
06:08

I am not an expert and would like other's comment on
my observation.

   Peter, I think your bewilderment is justified.  But
my understanding is Wessel or for that matter any
great artist is known by 10 or 12 good photographs in
their entire lifetime....if you can have that you are
at par with them.  But the rest of their photos are
not as good but the piggyback on the fame of their
predecessors.  The trouble with the rest of us are
that we have what I call is a 'prominent midtone', a
gamut of average pictures which cannot pull along
themselves let alone their inferior brothers into
limelight.  SO remember when you are talking about
wessel or any great photographer judge them by their
top 10 and not the rest.  The rest may be mundane but
they don't really matter either.


--- Sandy Schaffell <sschaffell@...> wrote:

> Peter, this new question is even more difficult than
> your first one. Both
> are in the strictest sense unanswerable.  But there
> is an awful lot of
> skating around trying to come up with an answer by a
> lot of us photographers
> who wonder why our images never make the galleries
> or museums or wherever we
> believe it's important that they make an appearance.
>  I went to see an
> exhibit by the Japanese artist Sugimoto in San
> Francisco and some viewers
> were asking the very questions you asked.  Sugimoto
> offers detailed reasons
> why he does what he does.  And those reasons strike
> a chord with the folks
> who make decisions at the museums and the galleries
> and also impress private
> collectors.  So that's one path that we could choose
> to take, or not.   PS
> what is a dow? is that a cow?  Cheers.
> 
> On 7/27/07, Peter Oksen <oksen@...> wrote:
> >
> > Thanks a lot to all for the answers to this
> admittedly impossible
> > question.
> > As said I don't expect to get an answer, but am
> merely looking for sources
> > to better understand what makes a photo tick. I
> enjoyed a lot the Wessel
> > video \ufffd thanks \ufffd and like his photos. Many are
> quite Cartier-Bresson like
> > and dependent on this magical moment which exactly
> produces this WOW
> > effect
> > f.ex. the Santa Barbara 1977 photo of the man
> watching the dows fly \ufffd
> > fantastic. And then again there is a good example
> of what I don't
> > understand. Have a look at Wessel's gallery site \ufffd
> HYPERLINK
> > "http://renabranstengallery.com/wessel.html"
> > http://renabranstengallery.com/w
> > essel.html  - there's a photo in the Las Vegas
> serie of the parking lot or
> > road called Las Vegas no.3 from 2000 (top right).
> Could someone please
> > explain to me why this deserves a place there?
> Actually most of the Las
> > Vegas serie are the kind of photos that I
> sometimes also shoot, but would
> > most likely discard as being un-interesting or
> even boring. Please
> > understand I am not flogging Wessel here \ufffd I am
> merely trying to
> > understand
> > something that really puzzles me.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Peter
> >
> >
> > No virus found in this outgoing message.
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> > 06:08
> >
> >
> >
> > [Non-text portions of this message have been
> removed]
> >
> >
> >
> > Please visit the Group Homepage to check the
> Files, and other resources as
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> >
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> > "MODERATORS" OF DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP
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> > POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES), RESULTING FROM: (i)
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> [Non-text portions of this message have been
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=== message truncated ===



       
____________________________________________________________________________________
Yahoo! oneSearch: Finally, mobile search 
that gives answers, not web links. 
http://mobile.yahoo.com/mobileweb/onesearch?refer=1ONXIC

Hi,
last night at a university reunion dinner I talked to an old friend who is an 
archivist.

I asked her: What is the most stable archival medium today? She said, 'Paper'. 
Then added, 'actually, parchment's better than paper. And rock's better than 
parchment! We don't know how digital media will fare because it hasn't been 
around long enough. But is likely to be the least secure way of storing 
information that we've come up with so far.'

The more technologically advanced we have become, the more insecure our 
archival media have become.

So no wonder the Rosetta Stone has lasted so well. Good thing it wasn't 
written on a CD-R.

So silver negatives are a good thing to have. 

Food for thought,
Richard

I've deleted all the responses from a previous reply to make my 
response short and to the point. The two recent books I've read on 
photography are the "Mastering Digital Black and White", by Amadou 
Diallo", and "The Art of Photography", by Bruce Barnbaum. Both of these 
have widened my horizons regarding the creativity aspect and the 
technical aspect of my photographic endeavors lately. I've been taking 
photographs for the past 45 years and now I am ready to start making 
photographs for the next 45 years.

Your friend in Photography,

Johnny Eades

Could have fooled me; your English is perfect.  So that means I've learned a
Danish word?  Hurrah.

On 7/27/07, Peter Oksen <oksen@...> wrote:
>
> Sorry, meant dove or pigeon. Non-native writing in English...
> Peter
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
> [mailto:DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Sandy
> Schaffell
> Sent: 27. juli 2007 22:11
> To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: Re: [Digital BW] Re: Good books on photography (OT)
>
> Peter, this new question is even more difficult than your first one. Both
> are in the strictest sense unanswerable.  But there is an awful lot of
> skating around trying to come up with an answer by a lot of us
> photographers
> who wonder why our images never make the galleries or museums or wherever
> we
> believe it's important that they make an appearance.  I went to see an
> exhibit by the Japanese artist Sugimoto in San Francisco and some viewers
> were asking the very questions you asked.  Sugimoto offers detailed
> reasons
> why he does what he does.  And those reasons strike a chord with the folks
> who make decisions at the museums and the galleries and also impress
> private
> collectors.  So that's one path that we could choose to take, or not.   PS
> what is a dow? is that a cow?  Cheers.
>
> On 7/27/07, Peter Oksen <oksen@...> wrote:
> >
> > Thanks a lot to all for the answers to this admittedly impossible
> > question.
> > As said I don't expect to get an answer, but am merely looking for
> sources
> > to better understand what makes a photo tick. I enjoyed a lot the Wessel
> > video � thanks � and like his photos. Many are quite Cartier-Bresson
> like
> > and dependent on this magical moment which exactly produces this WOW
> > effect
> > f.ex. the Santa Barbara 1977 photo of the man watching the dows fly �
> > fantastic. And then again there is a good example of what I don't
> > understand. Have a look at Wessel's gallery site � HYPERLINK
> > "http://renabranstengallery.com/wessel.html"
> > http://renabranstengallery.com/w
> > essel.html  - there's a photo in the Las Vegas serie of the parking lot
> or
> > road called Las Vegas no.3 from 2000 (top right). Could someone please
> > explain to me why this deserves a place there? Actually most of the Las
> > Vegas serie are the kind of photos that I sometimes also shoot, but
> would
> > most likely discard as being un-interesting or even boring. Please
> > understand I am not flogging Wessel here � I am merely trying to
> > understand
> > something that really puzzles me.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Peter
> >
> >
>
> No virus found in this outgoing message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.10.22/922 - Release Date:
> 27-07-2007
> 06:08
>
>
>
>
> Please visit the Group Homepage to check the Files, and other resources as
> they are often being updated.
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint
>
> If you wish to receive no emails or just a daily digest, or you wish to
> unsubscribe, please edit your Membership preferences by visiting this same
> page.
>
> Please follow these basic guidelines:
> - As threads develop, trim off excess portions of earlier messages to keep
> them short.
> - Good manners are required at all time. No personal attacks or flames.
> Hostile, aggressive or argumentative users may be removed from the
> membership without notice.
> - Keep your posts and threads related to the group topic of digital B&W
> printing. Users who persistently make off-topic posts may be removed from
> the membership.
> - By posting on this forum you agree to abide by the group rules and
> guidelines, and to abide by the actions and decisions of the group Owner and
> Moderators. See "Group Topic, Rules and Guidelines" in the Files section:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint/files/
>
> BY PARTICIPATING IN AND/OR POSTING MESSAGES TO THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT
> YAHOO! GROUP YOU EXPRESSLY UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT THE "OWNER" AND
> "MODERATORS" OF DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU
> FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR EXEMPLARY
> DAMAGES, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS,
> GOODWILL, USE, DATA OR OTHER INTANGIBLE LOSSES (EVEN IF THE  "OWNER" AND
> "MODERATORS" OF DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE
> POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES), RESULTING FROM: (i) THE USE OR THE INABILITY
> TO USE THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP; (ii) UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO OR
> ALTERATION OF YOUR TRANSMISSIONS OR DATA; (iii) STATEMENTS OR CONDUCT OF ANY
> THIRD PARTY ON THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP; OR (iv) ANY OTHER
> MATTER RELATING TO THE DIGITAL BW, THE PRINT YAHOO GROUP.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

The best set of instructional books on photography I found are the
Freeman Patterson series of books:

http://www.freemanpatterson.com/books.htm

I haven't seen any other photography book that teaches you visual
design and focus on such basics as shapes and lines.. 

They are easily available in Canadian book stores and amazon.ca (But
amazon.com is often out-of-stock).. 

Michael

A thick little book by Alfred Stieglitz "Camera Work" is published by  
Taschen. It is a Gem.
"Family of Man" was a huge influence on me at Expo '67.
W. Eugene Smith is one of my favorites, and Edward Steichen.
 
But then.... I'm an old portrait photographer, turning 72 today.
 
Richard Massie



************************************** Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL at 
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Make that "Stieglitz"

Editor, P.O.V. Image Service wrote:
> Gotta agree on Steichen and Steiglitz.
>
> HAPPY BIRTHDAY Richard!
>
> CorrPro96@... wrote:
>>
>> A thick little book by Alfred Stieglitz "Camera Work" is published by
>> Taschen. It is a Gem.
>> "Family of Man" was a huge influence on me at Expo '67.
>> W. Eugene Smith is one of my favorites, and Edward Steichen.
>>
>> But then.... I'm an old portrait photographer, turning 72 today.
>>
>> Richard Massie
>>


 
Keith Krebs

"Just some guy," caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer 
User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo 
Publications), at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSON_Printers/
and  the Multiverse's largest Canon printer User  Community at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Canon-printers
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together 
guys"

 

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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Gotta agree on Steichen and Stieglitz.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY Richard!

CorrPro96@aol.com wrote:
>
> A thick little book by Alfred Stieglitz "Camera Work" is published by
> Taschen. It is a Gem.
> "Family of Man" was a huge influence on me at Expo '67.
> W. Eugene Smith is one of my favorites, and Edward Steichen.
>
> But then.... I'm an old portrait photographer, turning 72 today.
>
> Richard Massie
>
> **************************************
>


 
Keith Krebs

"Just some guy," caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer 
User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo 
Publications), at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSON_Printers/
and  the Multiverse's largest Canon printer User  Community at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Canon-printers
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together 
guys"

 

****************************************************************
CONFIDENTIALITY & COPYRIGHT NOTICE:
This e-mail message, including attachments and contents, is © Copyright, 
Keith Krebs, 2001-2007, All Rights Reserved. It is expressly for the 
sole use of the intended recipient and may contain confidential and 
privileged information. Absent the express written authorization of the 
author, any unauthorized review, use, disclosure, transfer, or 
distribution is explicitly prohibited and taken at your own risk. If you 
are not, or are unsure whether you are, the intended recipient, please 
contact the sender immediately and destroy all copies of the original 
message. Violations will be prosecuted to the FULL extent allowed under 
applicable civil and criminal law. Imagery published or distributed in 
violation of these conditions shall be subject to a $1500/image 
liquidated damages charge, in addition to any applicable Copyright 
violation penalties.

POV IMage Service Banner
****************************************************************
{ The P.O.V. Image Service Website is still at http://www.p-o-v-image.com/ }





[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I second Johnny's recommendations: both Amadou Diallo's and Bruce 
Barnbaum's books are musts - mine are both near by all of the time - 
next to Ansel Adam's: "The Camera," "The Negative," and "The Print".

Barry



--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Johnny Eades" 
<jeades1@...> wrote:
>
> I've deleted all the responses from a previous reply to make my 
> response short and to the point. The two recent books I've read on 
> photography are the "Mastering Digital Black and White", by Amadou 
> Diallo", and "The Art of Photography", by Bruce Barnbaum. Both of 
these 
> have widened my horizons regarding the creativity aspect and the 
> technical aspect of my photographic endeavors lately. I've been 
taking 

> photographs for the past 45 years and now I am ready to start making 
> photographs for the next 45 years.
> 
> Your friend in Photography,
> 
> Johnny Eades
>

Three books I have found useful are:

         Susan Sontag, On Photography -- a classic, and perhaps more 
philosophical than applicable to individual approaches
         Geoff Dyer, The Ongoing Moment -- quite idiosyncratic but 
one of the most interesting books in recent times.
         Eamonn McCabe, The Making of Great Photographs Useful as a 
discussion of individual photographs.

There are a number of what amount to textbooks on photography 
criticism. My local Half Price Books has a bunch, and I would think 
that any reasonable used book store might have a selection at 
reasonable prices. Styles in criticism change but not so dramatically 
that you need the absolutely latest versions. If you do, then I 
suggest finding out what people are using in college classes these 
days. One, perhaps inefficient, way to find out is to look for web 
sites for individual courses. At most universities these days course 
materials are web-based, and at a minimum course readings and a 
syllabus are listed on a web site. Goggle might work for this, but 
another way is to go to university web sites (all universities have 
them -- typically university.edu as in Stanford.edu), find a listing 
for the art or photography department, and then hunt around for 
course syllabi. Sometimes the department web site will list such 
courses, but often you get to them by clicking on individual 
professors who then list syllabi as part of their university-based 
web sites. I'm far from suggesting that such resources provide the 
best approach, but it is a start.

The best approach is to get books by individual photographers and 
study and think which individual photos work for you or not. The 
bottom line is that here are no absolute rules, and photos that 
please you are good regardless of whether they fit existing "rules" 
or appeal to others. Obviously if commercial considerations are 
important, different issues arise. And academic and philosophical 
criticism aside, it should be fairly obvious that a good portrait may 
follow different "rules" than a good landscape.

Dave Schneider


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I checked my library, and I have quite a number of excellent and very good  
books on photography, that could use a new home. 
The Time-Life series is one, as well as Family of Man and some of Ansel's  
books. Photography history books as well.
Anyone interested can email me off list with any titles you might be  
interested in, and we can work something out.
 
Richard Massie



************************************** Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL at 
http://discover.aol.com/memed/aolcom30tour


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Well, yes and no. I think it depends what kind of data we're talking about
and hence what care is taken. If it concerns less important things, that
tend be put away and then forgotten for 30 years, then yes, probably your CD
or whatever will be ruined where paper would likely still be readable.
However, if it's important stuff that you really want to keep, you have
loads of possibilities to copy on various media and on new emergent media
ensuring future readability. Hereby data security is increased by at least
the two factors of easily being able to keep identical copies in separate
locations thus protecting against theft, fire etc., and by no quality loss
in the reproduction. Even silver negatives fade with time, and hence
information is lost. If care is taken with digital media, it could in
principle be reproduced infinitely with zero quality loss. Also remember,
that most historical paper-based sources have been reproduced several times,
and often with certain corrections, mistakes and amendments each time. But
then again, in the historical perspective we're at best making qualified
guesses.

 

On the practical level I store my photos on two identical sets of CD or
DVD's stored apart, written with 4x speed only as this is supposed to reduce
risk of degradation. As I use older photos now and then, I can check on the
readability of the media. Before or later I am also going to get a extra HD
just to store photos as an extra precaution. I have done this for 7 years
now and have never lost a photo.

I have somewhere a very technical article exploring the durability of CD/DVD
media. If anyone are interested I can probably find it.

 

Would be interesting to hear how others are storing their photos. 

 

best regards,

Peter

From: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Richard
Smallfield
Sent: 28. juli 2007 02:26
To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Digital BW] OT - My chat with an archivist

 

Hi,
last night at a university reunion dinner I talked to an old friend who is
an 
archivist.

I asked her: What is the most stable archival medium today? She said,
'Paper'. 
Then added, 'actually, parchment's better than paper. And rock's better than

parchment! We don't know how digital media will fare because it hasn't been 
around long enough. But is likely to be the least secure way of storing 
information that we've come up with so far.'

The more technologically advanced we have become, the more insecure our 
archival media have become.

So no wonder the Rosetta Stone has lasted so well. Good thing it wasn't 
written on a CD-R.

So silver negatives are a good thing to have. 

Food for thought,
Richard

 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

> So silver negatives are a good thing to have. 
> 


hmmm - so did I miss where she mentioned plastic?

Tim Atherton wrote:
> 
> 
> 
>  > So silver negatives are a good thing to have.
>  >
> 
> hmmm - so did I miss where she mentioned plastic?

Heh.

I'm admittedly not an expert on what the accepted use of
the term "archiving" is, but it's clear that this archivist
is thinking in terms of material stability - which is apparently
what she was asked about in the first place.  If "archiving"
means "create a physical artifact and store it deep in a
salt mine", then, sure, archiving is entirely about material
stability.

If one chooses to create DVD-Rs and stash them in a binder
which is forgotten, then material stability *is* the limiting
factor and the archivist's observations are totally relevant.

As others have pointed out, though, data archival is a different
beast.  Material stability is a factor, but it's not a limiting
factor because data can be replicated without degradation.  The
question then becomes one of how to manage an archive; when to
replicate data to avoid loss due to material instability or
disaster.

The downside is that there's a cost associated with actively
maintaining an archive, not something we tend to think of when
we're accustomed to storing negs in boxes.  Would I be willing to
pay $15 a month to Amazon S3 to keep 100GB of my data safe?  I
doubt it; I don't need that level of reliability and availability.

Photo-sharing services (pbase.com, flickr.com, photobucket.com,
etc.) are positioned to own the bulk of consumer image archiving -
they're arguably already doing it.  There are a couple of problems
with them, though; fundamentally, photo-sharing services require
one to give the service the use of your images, not something that
commercial photographer or artist is likely to agree to.

The other problem I personally have is that I generate much larger
image files than the typical consumer digital camera and have
limited upload bandwidth unless I'm willing to pay a lot more on
a monthly basis.

Clearly, the photo-sharing services have the infrastructure in
place to offer a different tier of service which does not require
sharing of images, probably for a fee.  I haven't investigated;
perhaps such services are already available?

Dana

The degredation of CD/DVD media has been known for a while. There are 
archival quality gold reflective layer CDs and DVDs that you can use. 
According to manufacturers, they will last up to 200 years. 

The life span of regular CDs and DVDs (like you buy cheap at Staples) 
are much less -- I've heard 50 years on the high end, but down to 5-
10 years on the low. 

The only thing is, in 75-100 years will there be the hardware around 
to read these disks, or will it be like Beta video tapes and 5 inch 
floppies. 

Best, David



--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Richard 
Smallfield <r.smallfield@...> wrote:

> Good thing it wasn't written on a CD-R.
> 
> So silver negatives are a good thing to have. 
> 
> Food for thought,
> Richard
>

David wrote:
> 
> 
> The degredation of CD/DVD media has been known for a while. There are
> archival quality gold reflective layer CDs and DVDs that you can use.
> According to manufacturers, they will last up to 200 years.
> 
> The life span of regular CDs and DVDs (like you buy cheap at Staples)
> are much less -- I've heard 50 years on the high end, but down to 5-
> 10 years on the low.
> 
> The only thing is, in 75-100 years will there be the hardware around
> to read these disks, or will it be like Beta video tapes and 5 inch
> floppies.

Betamax and 5-inch floppies had fairly short lifetimes, yes.
However, cassette tapes, though in decline, are still a fairly
useful format nearly 45 years after introduction.

CD/DVD may have a longer useful life as a format; since new
formats have been developed compatibly, 120mm optical discs
may be with us for longer.  Already, the Compact Disc itself
has been around for just about 25 years, and a Blu-Ray or HD
DVD player will still read them.

But, as I mentioned in a previous note, the notion of archiving
data is much more than creating a single physical item and
storing it forever.

Dana

>>>
I have done this for 7 years
now and have never lost a photo.<<<<

Keep in mind, seven years is nothing in archival standards. The Library of
congress started losing data from their CD archives after 15 years. After
extensive research, they turned to gold standard CDs.

Another requirement will be that as technology continues it's profit 
motivated advances our jobs will be to transfer our work as necessary. Buy a 
computer every 2-3 years, move your archives over to the new medium every 
5-7 years.


Take care out there,
Gregory
www.fireframeimaging.com
www.soundexposure.org

Or archive with one of the many online archive services. Then, you  
don't have to deal with the slow and cumbersome CD/DVD media.

Chris

On Aug 4, 2007, at 10:54 AM, Gregory Stempel wrote:

> >>>
> I have done this for 7 years
> now and have never lost a photo.<<<<
>
> Keep in mind, seven years is nothing in archival standards. The  
> Library of
> congress started losing data from their CD archives after 15 years.  
> After
> extensive research, they turned to gold standard CDs.
>
> Another requirement will be that as technology continues it's profit
> motivated advances our jobs will be to transfer our work as  
> necessary. Buy a
> computer every 2-3 years, move your archives over to the new medium  
> every
> 5-7 years.
>
> Take care out there,
> Gregory
> www.fireframeimaging.com
> www.soundexposure.org
>
>
> 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

At 1:22 AM -0700 8/5/07, Chris Wong wrote:

>Or archive with one of the many online archive services. Then, you
>don't have to deal with the slow and cumbersome CD/DVD media.


That's right!

You don't have to make "cumbersome" copies.

_If_ you believe your online "archive service" will remain in 
business indefinitely.


But:

You _do_ have to worry about whether your "online archive service" 
will be in business five years from now.

And where their servers' hard disks will wind up after the inevitable 
bankruptcy.


Not to worry:

They'll probably be shredded during the standard asset-transfer.


There was an article about this in last week's Wall Street Journal.

The author was lucky, but that doesn't mean that everyone stupid 
enough to trust their only copies of their photos (or albums) to an 
online service will be as lucky.


Back up to CD or DVD.

Make refreshed copies at least once a year.

When new technology comes out migrate, and make more yearly copies.

(Anyone got any important files on 8" floppies? Or maybe your choice 
was 5-1/4" DOS, or 3-1/2" MFM 400Ks, or even twiggies? No? Maybe your 
choice was Zip {can anyone read 800K any more?}, or cassette tape, or 
SCSI HD with a Centronics connector, or even an HD with 25-pin SCSI, 
or...)

NEVER trust the medium -->  Backups cannot be static.

Always refresh.

Always use the newest proven media.

Always keep multiple copies in different locations.

Never trust anyone else's hard disk.

Especially the hard disks of a company far far away that may go out 
of business and destroy your photos when they nuke their servers HDs 
with an industrial "media shredder."


-=-Dennis
















.

I met an artist not too long ago that was actually painting on rock, 
using some of the same material used thousands of years ago…material 
like bone marrow, not exactly available at your local art store. Not 
only can you pass her artwork down to your children, but possibly to 
the next evolution after human. ;<)

Cheers, Mark
http://www.pbase.com/lila161
http://www.framedestination.com/ 

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Richard 
Smallfield <r.smallfield@...> wrote:
> I asked her: What is the most stable archival medium today? She 
said, 'Paper'. 
> Then added, 'actually, parchment's better than paper. And rock's 
better than 
> parchment! We don't know how digital media will fare because it 
hasn't been 
> around long enough. But is likely to be the least secure way of 
storing 
> information that we've come up with so far.'

Jonathan S. Farley, Senior Conservator at Royal Botanic Gardens did
comprehensive study of Bell Labs "Corrosion Intercept"
technology as used to protect CD/DVD's:

CD_Instert_Report
<http://www.conservation-by-design.co.uk/corrosioninterceptpdfs/CD-Inser\
tfinalreport.pdf>

His findings about CD Jewel Cases were interesting. Here is a quote from
page 17 in the conclusion:

"The most deleterious factor in the CD's environment which will
contribute to its decay is the Jewel Case in which it is supplied. Acid
off gassing as a result of poorly chosen materials in the products'
packaging can reduce the longevity of a CD to decades rather than the
centuries predicted by most manufacturers…As a consequence, unless
Jewel Cases undergo a radical redesign, the presence of deleterious
plasticizers will be continued requirement, and a continued threat to
the longevity of CDs. Not one commercial CD manufacturer will admit
publicly that their CDs are manufactured from decayable materials which
can be affected from deleterious factors in their immediate environment.
As a consequence of this, many packaging manufacturers pay little, or no
attention to their choice of materials."

My company resells CD/DVD protective storage cases and jewel case
inserts and we have a sale on them going on right now for 15% off via
discount code: FDPSAC7

Cheers, Mark
http://www.pbase.com/lila161 <http://www.pbase.com/lila161>
http://www.framedestination.com/ <http://www.framedestination.com/>


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "David"
<dkfreed@...> wrote:
>
> The degredation of CD/DVD media has been known for a while. There are
> archival quality gold reflective layer CDs and DVDs that you can use.
> According to manufacturers, they will last up to 200 years.
>
> The life span of regular CDs and DVDs (like you buy cheap at Staples)
> are much less -- I've heard 50 years on the high end, but down to 5-
> 10 years on the low.
>
> The only thing is, in 75-100 years will there be the hardware around
> to read these disks, or will it be like Beta video tapes and 5 inch
> floppies.
>
> Best, David
>
>
>
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Richard
> Smallfield r.smallfield@ wrote:
>
> > Good thing it wasn't written on a CD-R.
> >
> > So silver negatives are a good thing to have.
> >
> > Food for thought,
> > Richard
> >
>




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

If you really want to keep you data for a long time you need to have a 
least two copies in different locations and you need to rotate the 
media every now and then (replace the harddrives and rewrite new copies 
of CD/DVDs). Offsite is a hassle and I found myself not doing it as 
often as I should so I subscribed to www.livevault.com which was 
purchased by Iron Mountain. It is expensive so I only use it for my 
more critical data. As long as they don't go out of business the day my 
server with RAID gets stolen or fried by lightening, I will probably be 
ok since they are only keeping one copy of my data. They keep copies up 
to a couple weeks old so if I need a version of a file from last week I 
can instantly download it via the web. 

Cheers, Mark
http://www.pbase.com/lila161
http://www.framedestination.com/

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Dennis W. 
Manasco" <dmanasco@...> wrote:

>
> 
> At 1:22 AM -0700 8/5/07, Chris Wong wrote:
> 
> >Or archive with one of the many online archive services. Then, you
> >don't have to deal with the slow and cumbersome CD/DVD media.
> _If_ you believe your online "archive service" will remain in 
> business indefinitely.
> But:
> 
> You _do_ have to worry about whether your "online archive service" 
> will be in business five years from now.
> 
> And where their servers' hard disks will wind up after the inevitable 
> bankruptcy.

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Mark Rogers" 
<mrgs1001@...> wrote:
>
> I met an artist not too long ago that was actually painting on rock, 
> using some of the same material used thousands of years ago…material 
> like bone marrow, not exactly available at your local art store. Not 
> only can you pass her artwork down to your children, but possibly to 
> the next evolution after human. ;<)

You might be able to pass the rock on down to post-humans, but what she 
puts on it? BONE MARROW? She'll have maggots munching on her art before 
too long....

Steve Karafyllakis

I'm surprised that anyone should ever consider long term storage of CDs 
in jewel cases, any more than most of us used to store slides in those 
plastic boxes in which they came back from processing.

Peter

Peter Marshall    -    Photographer, Writer: NUJ
petermarshall@...       +44 (0)1784 456474
_________________________________________________________________
>Re:PHOTO                     http://re-photo.co.uk
My London Diary	              http://mylondondiary.co.uk/
London's Industrial Heritage: http://petermarshallphotos.co.uk/
The Buildings of London etc:  http://londonphotographs.co.uk/
and elsewhere......




Mark Rogers wrote:

> Jonathan S. Farley, Senior Conservator at Royal Botanic Gardens did
> comprehensive study of Bell Labs "Corrosion Intercept"
> technology as used to protect CD/DVD's:
>
> CD_Instert_Report
> <http://www.conservation-by-design.co.uk/corrosioninterceptpdfs/CD-Inser\
> tfinalreport.pdf>
>
> His findings about CD Jewel Cases were interesting. Here is a quote from
> page 17 in the conclusion:
>
> "The most deleterious factor in the CD's environment which will
> contribute to its decay is the Jewel Case in which it is supplied. Acid
> off gassing as a result of poorly chosen materials in the products'
> packaging can reduce the longevity of a CD to decades rather than the
> centuries predicted by most manufacturers\ufffdAs a consequence, unless
> Jewel Cases undergo a radical redesign, the presence of deleterious
> plasticizers will be continued requirement, and a continued threat to
> the longevity of CDs. Not one commercial CD manufacturer will admit
> publicly that their CDs are manufactured from decayable materials which
> can be affected from deleterious factors in their immediate environment.
> As a consequence of this, many packaging manufacturers pay little, or no
> attention to their choice of materials."
>
> My company resells CD/DVD protective storage cases and jewel case
> inserts and we have a sale on them going on right now for 15% off via
> discount code: FDPSAC7
>
> Cheers, Mark
> http://www.pbase.com/lila161 <http://www.pbase.com/lila161>
> http://www.framedestination.com/ <http://www.framedestination.com/>
>
>
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "David"
> <dkfreed@...> wrote:
>   
>> The degredation of CD/DVD media has been known for a while. There are
>> archival quality gold reflective layer CDs and DVDs that you can use.
>> According to manufacturers, they will last up to 200 years.
>>
>> The life span of regular CDs and DVDs (like you buy cheap at Staples)
>> are much less -- I've heard 50 years on the high end, but down to 5-
>> 10 years on the low.
>>
>> The only thing is, in 75-100 years will there be the hardware around
>> to read these disks, or will it be like Beta video tapes and 5 inch
>> floppies.
>>
>> Best, David
>>
>>
>>
>> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Richard
>> Smallfield r.smallfield@ wrote:
>>
>>     
>>> Good thing it wasn't written on a CD-R.
>>>
>>> So silver negatives are a good thing to have.
>>>
>>> Food for thought,
>>> Richard
>>>
>>>       
>
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
> Please visit the Group Homepage to check the Files, and other resources as they are often being updated.
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint
>
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>
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> - By posting on this forum you agree to abide by the group rules and guidelines, and to abide by the actions and decisions of the group Owner and Moderators. See \ufffdGroup Topic, Rules and Guidelines\ufffd in the Files section:
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>  
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>

Smugmug.com uses Amazon's S3 technology which has at least 3  
redundant copies of your data distributed.

I think it's vital that we all read the user agreement when we pay  
our hard-earned money to the online archive service and make sure  
that when they want to go out of business, we'd be at least notify  
ahead of time to transfer our asset over to another service.

Using online archive service doesn't mean that you should have a  
reliable storage solution yourself though.

I have a RAID system taking care of my local backup and use Amazon S3  
as the online backup for a third backup copy in a geographical  
different location.

The drawback of CD/DVD is its speed.  Totally not worth it in my  
opinion.  I'd rather bill myself to have a faster but slightly more  
expensive solution.  Unless the data you need to backup are not a  
lot, CD/DVD is just not very scalable.

Chris

On Aug 12, 2007, at 2:22 AM, Dennis W. Manasco wrote:

>
> At 1:22 AM -0700 8/5/07, Chris Wong wrote:
>
> >Or archive with one of the many online archive services. Then, you
> >don't have to deal with the slow and cumbersome CD/DVD media.
>
> That's right!
>
> You don't have to make "cumbersome" copies.
>
> _If_ you believe your online "archive service" will remain in
> business indefinitely.
>
> But:
>
> You _do_ have to worry about whether your "online archive service"
> will be in business five years from now.
>
> And where their servers' hard disks will wind up after the inevitable
> bankruptcy.
>
> Not to worry:
>
> They'll probably be shredded during the standard asset-transfer.
>
> There was an article about this in last week's Wall Street Journal.
>
> The author was lucky, but that doesn't mean that everyone stupid
> enough to trust their only copies of their photos (or albums) to an
> online service will be as lucky.
>
> Back up to CD or DVD.
>
> Make refreshed copies at least once a year.
>
> When new technology comes out migrate, and make more yearly copies.
>
> (Anyone got any important files on 8" floppies? Or maybe your choice
> was 5-1/4" DOS, or 3-1/2" MFM 400Ks, or even twiggies? No? Maybe your
> choice was Zip {can anyone read 800K any more?}, or cassette tape, or
> SCSI HD with a Centronics connector, or even an HD with 25-pin SCSI,
> or...)
>
> NEVER trust the medium --> Backups cannot be static.
>
> Always refresh.
>
> Always use the newest proven media.
>
> Always keep multiple copies in different locations.
>
> Never trust anyone else's hard disk.
>
> Especially the hard disks of a company far far away that may go out
> of business and destroy your photos when they nuke their servers HDs
> with an industrial "media shredder."
>
> -=-Dennis
>
> .
>
> 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Peter Marshall wrote:
> I'm surprised that anyone should ever consider long term storage of CDs 
> in jewel cases, any more than most of us used to store slides in those 
> plastic boxes in which they came back from processing.

Good point, Peter. So what do you use to store CDs?

Peter Marquis-Kyle

I wouldn't. Even if you fix the chemical issue with inserts they are 
too bulky and less convenient for the preferred vertical storage. 
Personally, I use the corrosion intercept pages in a light blocking 
album.

Cheers, Mark
http://www.pbase.com/lila161
http://www.framedestination.com/
--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Peter Marshall 
<petermarshall@...> wrote:
>
> I'm surprised that anyone should ever consider long term storage of 
CDs 
> in jewel cases, any more than most of us used to store slides in 
those 
> plastic boxes in which they came back from processing.

I use the aluminium cases as used by DJs, which have plastic hanging 
sleeves to contain the CDs, but I suspect there may be better solutions 
from an archival point of view, as I don't know the composition of the 
sleeves. But they do greatly reduce the storage volume, and also 
organise the disks better. It takes me generally less than 30s to find a 
file out of the several hundred thousand here if I know the file name.

At the moment I'm feeling rather envious of these people who have an 
internet connection faster than my 8xDVD 52xCD drive :-)  I abandoned 
the idea of Internet storage when I worked out how long it would take to 
upload the typically 8Gb I shoot in a working day.

Regards,

Peter

Peter Marshall    -    Photographer, Writer: NUJ
petermarshall@...       +44 (0)1784 456474
_________________________________________________________________
>Re:PHOTO                     http://re-photo.co.uk
My London Diary	              http://mylondondiary.co.uk/
London's Industrial Heritage: http://petermarshallphotos.co.uk/
The Buildings of London etc:  http://londonphotographs.co.uk/
and elsewhere......




Peter Marquis-Kyle wrote:

> Peter Marshall wrote:
>   
>> I'm surprised that anyone should ever consider long term storage of CDs 
>> in jewel cases, any more than most of us used to store slides in those 
>> plastic boxes in which they came back from processing.
>>     
>
> Good point, Peter. So what do you use to store CDs?
>
> Peter Marquis-Kyle
>
>
>
>
>

Fancy more storage? Seagate Hard Drives at competitive prices!Hi,

Surely external storage is the way forward at 28 cents a gig (Check ad below) honest I am not promoting these guy merely using them as an example.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Micro_Direct_E-Shot@... 
To: bamaye@... 
Sent: Monday, August 13, 2007 7:26 PM
Subject: [Norton AntiSpam] Fancy more storage? Seagate Hard Drives at competitive prices!


     
          
       
     
        
     
      To unsubscribe use this link or send an email with subject remove to news@... 
      E & O E. Availability whilst stocks last. Prices may be subject to change.  
             


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

http://www.lightimpressionsdirect.com/servlet/OnlineShopping?DSP=50000&PCR=30000:400000:450000&IID=20817

The ideal thing is to make two cds or dvds and also put it on an
external hard drive. All these storage options are cheap considering
the amount of time and sweat put into the work.

john

At 2:25 PM -0700 8/12/07, Chris Wong wrote:

>Smugmug.com uses Amazon's S3 technology which has at least 3 
>redundant copies of your data distributed.

So?

If SmukMuck tanks, you tank.

That's the whole point:

If you let your non-replaceable data out of your hands you lose control.

It doesn't matter how many redundant copies of your data they have 
if, for any reason, you cannot connect to it.

>I think it's vital that we all read the user agreement

Which is couched in lawyer-speak, and is meaningless unless you can 
afford a better legal team than they, or their trustees, can field.

>we'd be at least notify ahead of time to transfer our asset over to
>another service.

I'd think not.

When something folds, it tries to fold before the creditors know 
about it. It certainly doesn't broadcast on the internet.

>I have a RAID system taking care of my local backup.

A good choice.

May I offer you two words common among those of us who live in "Tornado Alley"?

"Total detestation."

And then there's every RAID owner's greatest fear:

"Lightning-induced massive voltage spike."

And then there's:

"Fire!"

Or maybe, every Katrina victim's least favorite:

"Flooding."

>The drawback of CD/DVD is its speed.

So go take (short) nap.

>Totally not worth it in my opinion. I'd rather bill myself to have a
>faster but slightly more expensive solution.

A slightly faster but much less secure one.

>Unless the data you need to backup are not a lot, CD/DVD is just not
>very scalable.

You mean you don't have a date-inverse backup paradigm _and_ you 
aren't making incremental backups?

Now that, regardless of the backup destination, is a disaster that 
_will_ happen.


-=-Dennis






















..

Absolutely so.

I keep two copies on different hard drives, one on CD and one on DVD.

Writing the CDs gets to be a bit of a chore but I think they are rather 
a better moderate term storage bet than the DVD. I use very much cheaper 
boxes than the Light Impressions ones, probably less archival, but I 
suspect the difference isn't going to be to great.

I used to rely on a Raid 5 system rather than 2 separate hard drives, 
but really it is easier to use two separate copies.  I'd never rely on a 
single hard drive, as I've had several fail in the past. It would be 
nice to keep one of these off-site, but it isn't convenient for me.

But then I don't bother with off-site copies of my negatives either:-)

Peter

Peter Marshall    -    Photographer, Writer: NUJ
petermarshall@...       +44 (0)1784 456474
_________________________________________________________________
>Re:PHOTO                     http://re-photo.co.uk
My London Diary	              http://mylondondiary.co.uk/
London's Industrial Heritage: http://petermarshallphotos.co.uk/
The Buildings of London etc:  http://londonphotographs.co.uk/
and elsewhere......




john dean wrote:

> http://www.lightimpressionsdirect.com/servlet/OnlineShopping?DSP=50000&PCR=30000:400000:450000&IID=20817
>
> The ideal thing is to make two cds or dvds and also put it on an
> external hard drive. All these storage options are cheap considering
> the amount of time and sweat put into the work.
>
> john
>
>
>

Cyberguys has the same box at half the price. Check it out.

Dennis wrote :

 >If SmukMuck tanks, you tank.

Yep. 

One of the best and cheapest solution is to have two backup hard drive :
one at your office with daily or weekly incremental update, and another
one on another location. And you just have to swap the disks every week
or month depending on the amount and sensitivity of the data you create.

The advantages are that you always have an up to date backup in case of
defect of your main hard drive, and a maximum one old week backup if all
your system is stolen of lighting damaged, and your hard drives are used
and so tested every week so you're sure they are still running well. 

I don't trust CDs or DVDs. Even when it's correctly burned (how many of
you guys verify all his CDs after burning ? ) it's so easy to let one
fall on the ground and scratch it just when you try to put it on the
drive after a HD crash.....

Fred - my 0.02

I don't feel the critical issue is who has control. The real problem 
is that nothing is 100% reliable, not Raid5, not internet backup, not 
CD/DVDs…NOTHING. Lighting, Fire, Atmospheric pollutants, and 
bankruptcy can and will destroy anything. That is why you have to 
have at least two copies, in independent locations on media that is 
replaced every few years. If offsite company X files bankruptcy you 
have your hard drive copy. If buglers steal your PC with the 
redundant raid you have your Offsite internet backup or your CD/DVD's 
in a safe deposit box.

Cheers,
Mark
Frame Destination, Inc.
http://www.framedestination.com

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Dennis W. 
Manasco" <dmanasco@...> wrote:
>
> At 2:25 PM -0700 8/12/07, Chris Wong wrote:
> 
> >Smugmug.com uses Amazon's S3 technology which has at least 3 
> >redundant copies of your data distributed.
> 
> So?
> 
> If SmukMuck tanks, you tank.
> 
> That's the whole point:
> 
> If you let your non-replaceable data out of your hands you lose 
control.
>

> From: Mark Rogers
> 
> If buglers steal your PC with the 
> redundant raid you have your Offsite internet backup or your CD/DVD's 
> in a safe deposit box.

That's an insult to trumpet players everywhere.

-- 

Ciao,               Paul D. DeRocco
Paul                mailto:pderocco@...

>Unless the data you need to backup are not a lot, CD/DVD is just not
> very scalable.
> 
> You mean you don't have a date-inverse backup paradigm _and_ you 
> aren't making incremental backups?
> 
> Now that, regardless of the backup destination, is a disaster that 
> _will_ happen.
> 
> 
> -=-Dennis


Well, I use two 500GB external drives that I bought from Dell for
under $170 each.  You can also buy a Terrabyte Hard Drive for under
$300. I also take all my prized CR2 photos and convert to Adobe DNG
files, then archive them on Gold DVD's.  I bought a cheap ($500) gun
safe with a one hour burn limit to store all my important items in the
shop.  If it catches fire, my data will still be OK, as the safe is
fire-proof and water tight.

Uncle Dannie

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Vinyl Graphics
of Taft" <hedgpeth_98@...> wrote:
SNIP 
> Well, I use two 500GB external drives that I bought from Dell for
> under $170 each.  You can also buy a Terrabyte Hard Drive for under
> $300. I also take all my prized CR2 photos and convert to Adobe DNG
> files, then archive them on Gold DVD's.  I bought a cheap ($500) gun
> safe with a one hour burn limit to store all my important items in the
> shop.  If it catches fire, my data will still be OK, as the safe is
> fire-proof and water tight.
> 
> Uncle Dannie

I want to caution everyone, that while external disk drives are a lot
more convenient than CD's or DVD's, don't get lulled into thinking
that just because a drive isn't on all the time, doesn't mean it won't
fail!

I learned the lesson the hard way. Lost 120 gigs of pictures because
the drive wouldn't spin up any more. Sent it in to one of those drive
data retrieval places--they tried the $500 fix, but were not
successful. (didn't have to pay them that amount though--just
shipping) Next step was the $1500-2000 clean-room job, but I wasn't up
for spending those kind of bucks.

By all means have at least two copies of all your stuff.

Currently I'm using a Raid 5 NAS server, which I back up to an
external drive once a week.

If one of the RAID 5 disks go, I'm supposed to be able to plug in a
new drive, and it will reconstruct everything. But just in case, I
also have an external drive, which I can plug into any PC and read the
stuff off it. I've also become a believer in having both MAC & PC's
around. 

John Nollendorfs

As a gun owner I've investigated gun safes over the years, with an eye 
to protecting both my guns as well as my (many shelf feet of) film 
negatives and more recently, CD-archived digital images.  An important 
point on "fireproof" ratings is that they are USUALLY based on how long 
before PAPER inside the safe catches fire or scorches  (roughly 450 
degrees F.)

I concluded on several occasions that consumer-grade "fireproof" gun 
safes wouldn't protect my negatives nearly as long as their rated time 
(they would melt the sleeves onto the negs, as I recall).  There is also 
the issue of safe location - in my case, it would have to be in a 
basement, and in the event of a fire a risk as great as heat is the 
collapse of the (burning) upper floors into the basement.  Even if the 
safe were keeping the heat out, dropping a few tons of burning house on 
it would breach both the heat and water seals, and probably ruin 
whatever was inside almost immediately.  In any event, I never made the 
investment of money and space. 

I have a feeling I would reach the same conclusion today as to my gold 
archive CDs, but I keep a duplicate set off site and so am less 
concerned about a local fire or flood.

Cheers,
Kip

Vinyl Graphics of Taft wrote:
>
>
> <snip>   I bought a cheap ($500) gun
> safe with a one hour burn limit to store all my important items in the
> shop. If it catches fire, my data will still be OK, as the safe is
> fire-proof and water tight.
>
> Uncle Dannie
>
> _._,_


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

In a past life, I use to work as a computer technician mostly for 
businesses. I use to remind our customers that hard drives have a 100% 
mortality rate. It is not a question if, only a question of when. Seen 
some businesses actually go under because they lost all of their 
account receivables among many other things. 

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "sinar001" > > 

> I learned the lesson the hard way. Lost 120 gigs of pictures because
> the drive wouldn't spin up any more. Sent it in to one of those drive
> data retrieval places--they tried the $500 fix, but were not
> successful. (didn't have to pay them that amount though--just
> shipping) Next step was the $1500-2000 clean-room job, but I wasn't

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "sinar001" 
> 
> If one of the RAID 5 disks go, I'm supposed to be able to plug in a
> new drive, and it will reconstruct everything. But just in case, I
> also have an external drive, which I can plug into any PC and read the
> stuff off it. I've also become a believer in having both MAC & PC's
> around. 
> 
> John Nollendorfs
>


Dont forget to check those drives every now and again. Raid 5 arrays
that are built with more than 3 drives will run nicely with a single
drive dead, but be gone with 2 drives dead. Running more drives can
help with this, but they can still surprise you. There is a furmula
for the number of drives used, and the number of dead drives that can
be recovered, but I don't know it off the top of my head. And some of
this depends on how the drives are striped, there are two ways (that I
know of) to make these arrays. One way is to put all the parity (error
correction) information onto a single spare drive, the other is to put
the error correction across a portion of all the drives. The second
way is the more robust method, and is what most of the newer hardware
controllers will use. Windows XP and 2003 software raid5 uses the
second method (I think).

One thing that still stands out as a winner is the Travan style of
tape backup. Part of this has to do with the error correction built
into the scheme, the other part is just the way tape handles things.
They may be slow, but they are durable. Something to consider for your
offline (and offsite?) storage.

At 3:26 AM -0500 8/14/07, Dennis W. Manasco wrote:

>"Total detestation."

Don't you just detest devastation ?

Thankfully, mine wasn't the only late-night misspelling. Hopefully 
the meaning carried through.

At 3:14 PM +0200 8/14/07, Frederic Combaneyre wrote:

>One of the best and cheapest solution is to have two backup hard drive :
>one at your office with daily or weekly incremental update, and another
>one on another location.

Yes!

But make sure that they are compatible with current connections and 
specifications.

Nothing is more useless than a hard drive that cannot be connected to 
your computer because it's connection or specification is too old. 
(That was from personal experience!)

>and your hard drives are used and so tested every week so you're sure
>they are still running well.

You are right in using this approach. Just don't get lazy about the 
changing connection standards...

>I don't trust CDs or DVDs.

I don't either, but multiple copies, often refreshed, are my best 
hedge as far as I can determine: The technologies are currently 
supported, they require no specific connection other than the reader 
(which, by definition, is currently supported) and, with multiple 
copies, I've done my best.

>how many of you guys verify all his CDs after burning

Always. No exceptions.

At 3:04 PM +0000 8/14/07, Mark Rogers wrote:

>That is why you have to have at least two copies, in independent
>locations on media that is replaced every few years.

Yes!

That is the cornerstone of any backup strategy -- Multiple copies in 
multiple locations, religiously refreshed.

It would, however, be prudent to monitor any off-site locations 
constantly, so they don't slip between your fingers.

That is one of the aspects of on-line backups that really worries me: 
They can blink out in a heart-beat.

At 9:15 AM -0700 8/14/07, Paul D. DeRocco wrote:

>  > From: Mark Rogers
>>
>  > If buglers steal your PC
>
>That's an insult to trumpet players everywhere.

You're right. Everyone knows that tuba players and trombonists are 
the scariest guys in the pit :-;

At 4:26 PM +0000 8/14/07, Vinyl Graphics of Taft wrote:

>I also take all my prized CR2 photos and convert to Adobe DNG files,
>then archive them on Gold DVD's. I bought a cheap ($500) gun safe with
>a one hour burn limit to store all my important items in the shop. If
>it catches fire, my data will still be OK, as the safe is fire-proof
>and water tight.

Our safes are rated for scorch/burn on paper. I hate to think what 
those temperatures would do to gelatin negatives (an old example of 
which I once, sadly, melted with 80 degree water).

I don't know what CD/DVDs are good to, but I doubt it's in the 
paper-flammable range.

At 8:16 PM +0000 8/14/07, sinar001 wrote:

>don't get lulled into thinking that just because a drive isn't on all
>the time, doesn't mean it won't fail!

Definitely.

Turning drives on and off stresses them. Letting them cool promotes 
thermal stiction.

I always keep my drives on whenever possible. When I've had to turn 
them off I've almost always had failures.


Anyone who has followed my message this far deserves an apology, 
since I've not expressed one of my primary reasons for disliking, 
perhaps even despising, on-line storage:

I think that on-line storage is an almost certain conduit to 
releasing the photographs of those who rely on it into the wild.

"User Agreement" ??

Does anyone really think that their lawyers are bigger than theirs?


Whatever...

I'm sitting here with my CD/DVD burners, some redundant hard disks, 
and a place off-site to store my copies...


For what little _that's_ worth to posterity...  :-)


-=-Dennis











































.

Check out the archival DVD/CD storage products in the catalogue from LIGHT IMPRESSIONS.

I am about to order their archval components for a complete DVD/CD storage system.  

Up to now I have stored my computer generated DVD/CD's in the Fellowes an other similar storage portfolios. However, since most of these cases are made in China, the recent QC (think Mattel) news out of there has made reconsider using them...they are also bulky.

I am also reconsider in going on the "gold standard"...DVD wise not monetarily.

David

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

A commercial Photographer friend is using this setup. It is 
interesting.

http://www.drobo.com/products.aspx

John H

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Dennis W. 
Manasco" <dmanasco@...> wrote:
>
> 
> At 1:22 AM -0700 8/5/07, Chris Wong wrote:
> 
> >Or archive with one of the many online archive services. Then, you
> >don't have to deal with the slow and cumbersome CD/DVD media.
> 
> 
> That's right!
> 
> You don't have to make "cumbersome" copies.
> 
> _If_ you believe your online "archive service" will remain in 
> business indefinitely.
> 
> 
> But:
> 
> You _do_ have to worry about whether your "online archive service" 
> will be in business five years from now.
> 
> And where their servers' hard disks will wind up after the 
inevitable 
> bankruptcy.
> 
> 
> Not to worry:
> 
> They'll probably be shredded during the standard asset-transfer.
> 
> 
> There was an article about this in last week's Wall Street Journal.
> 
> The author was lucky, but that doesn't mean that everyone stupid 
> enough to trust their only copies of their photos (or albums) to an 
> online service will be as lucky.
> 
> 
> Back up to CD or DVD.
> 
> Make refreshed copies at least once a year.
> 
> When new technology comes out migrate, and make more yearly copies.
> 
> (Anyone got any important files on 8" floppies? Or maybe your 
choice 
> was 5-1/4" DOS, or 3-1/2" MFM 400Ks, or even twiggies? No? Maybe 
your 
> choice was Zip {can anyone read 800K any more?}, or cassette tape, 
or 
> SCSI HD with a Centronics connector, or even an HD with 25-pin 
SCSI, 
> or...)
> 
> NEVER trust the medium -->  Backups cannot be static.
> 
> Always refresh.
> 
> Always use the newest proven media.
> 
> Always keep multiple copies in different locations.
> 
> Never trust anyone else's hard disk.
> 
> Especially the hard disks of a company far far away that may go out 
> of business and destroy your photos when they nuke their servers 
HDs 

> with an industrial "media shredder."
> 
> 
> -=-Dennis
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> .
>

I recently updated our website with a CD/DVD storage guide from the 
National Institute of Standards and Technology's special publication 
of the care and handling of Cds and DVDs
http://www.framedestination.com/CD_DVD_storage.html

Here is a copy:

Do:
Handle discs by the outer edge or the center hole. 
Use a non solvent-based felt-tip permanent marker to mark the label 
side of the disc.
Keep dirt or other foreign matter from the disc. 
Store discs upright (book style) in plastic cases specified for CDs 
and DVDs. 
Return discs to storage cases immediately after use. 
Leave discs in their packaging (or cases) to minimize the effects of 
environmental changes. 
Open a recordable disc package only when you are ready to record data 
on that disc. 
Store in a cool, dry, dark environment in which the air is clean. 
Remove dirt, foreign material, fingerprints, smudges, and liquids by 
wiping with a clean cotton fabric in a straight line from the center 
of the disc toward the outer edge. 
Use CD/DVD cleaning detergent, isopropyl alcohol or methanol to 
remove stubborn dirt or material. 
Check the disc surface before recording. 

Do not:
Touch the surface of the disc. 
Bend the disc. 
Use adhesive labels. 
Store discs horizontally for a long time (years). 
Open a recordable optical disc package if you are not ready to 
record. 
Expose discs to extreme heat or high humidity. 
Expose discs to extreme rapid temperature or humidity changes. 
Expose recordable discs to prolonged sunlight or other sources of UV 
light. 
Write or mark in the data area of the disc (area where the 
laser "reads"). 
Clean in a circular direction around the disc. 


For CDs especially do not: 
Scratch the label side of a CD. 
Use a pen, pencil, or fine tip marker to write on the disc. 
Write on the disc with markers that contain solvents. 
Try to peel off or re-position a label. 

Cheers, Mark
http://www.framedestination.com/


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Mark Rogers" 
<mrgs1001@...> wrote:
>
> 
> Jonathan S. Farley, Senior Conservator at Royal Botanic Gardens did
> comprehensive study of Bell Labs "Corrosion Intercept"
> technology as used to protect CD/DVD's:
> 
> CD_Instert_Report
> <http://www.conservation-by-design.co.uk/corrosioninterceptpdfs/CD-
Inser\
> tfinalreport.pdf>
> 
> His findings about CD Jewel Cases were interesting. Here is a quote 
from
> page 17 in the conclusion:
> 
> "The most deleterious factor in the CD's environment which will
> contribute to its decay is the Jewel Case in which it is supplied. 
Acid
> off gassing as a result of poorly chosen materials in the products'
> packaging can reduce the longevity of a CD to decades rather than 
the
> centuries predicted by most manufacturers
As a consequence, unless
> Jewel Cases undergo a radical redesign, the presence of deleterious
> plasticizers will be continued requirement, and a continued threat 
to
> the longevity of CDs. Not one commercial CD manufacturer will admit
> publicly that their CDs are manufactured from decayable materials 
which
> can be affected from deleterious factors in their immediate 
environment.
> As a consequence of this, many packaging manufacturers pay little, 
or no
> attention to their choice of materials."
> 
> My company resells CD/DVD protective storage cases and jewel case
> inserts and we have a sale on them going on right now for 15% off 
via

> discount code: FDPSAC7
> 
> Cheers, Mark
> http://www.pbase.com/lila161 <http://www.pbase.com/lila161>
> http://www.framedestination.com/ <http://www.framedestination.com/>