Category Archives: history

simplicity again

Posted on October 25, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. In the late 1960s, Kodak aggressively pushed its ads to capture the low end of the home movie market. My October 14th post, “eulogy for simplicity” showed one ad Kodak used in this approach. This teaser ad shows another … Continue reading →

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1839 and all that

Posted on October 21, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) Magazine in the Big Apple offers many interesting talks about photography. In this one, conservator Lee Ann Daffner of MoMA thoughtfully treats the tarnish on a c1842 daguerreotype by Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey. Listen to this … Continue reading →

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a fine balance

Posted on October 20, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. Modern day smartphone cameras have editors with colour balance and other colour effects built-in. The tiny cameras automatically set the colour balance to white as a starting point so few images need any editing unless the image creator wishes … Continue reading →

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what were they thinking?

Posted on October 16, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. Today, we all take photography for granted. Images are shot endlessly to record things once written, or capture family moments, or pets, or property changes, etc. We leave news, tv, political, formal portraits, etc. images to the professionals. With … Continue reading →

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beating the bus

Posted on October 15, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. Even before the announcement of photography experimenters struggled to get drawings and later photos to distant locations without resorting to buses or other vehicles of land or sea based locomotion. Telegraph offered a way to send images if they … Continue reading →

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eulogy for simplicity

Posted on October 14, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. Kodak made its money in the days of film by selling, ummm, film. And to do that, Kodak sold inexpensive cameras – film burners. But with seemingly a big difference to its competitors – they listened to their customers. … Continue reading →

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just a girl and her camera

Posted on October 12, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. At a ZOOM meeting the other day, Celio, noted the most popular posts to our Instagram site were photos of photographers with their cameras. Celio collaborated with our newest PHSC exec recruit, Alexandra, to find a way to celebrate … Continue reading →

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stereopticon

Posted on October 10, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. Over the years people have christened their weird and wonderful optical marvels with odd names like “stereopticon” for a mechanical projector of 3D and 2D images. When I looked up the definition of the name in a dictionary, it … Continue reading →

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that’s how the light gets in – II

Posted on October 8, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. When the Daguerreotype process was announced in January 1839, it was so slow that only still life and landscape views could be recorded. The news of the process speed resulted in a two direction thrust: chemically, to enhance the … Continue reading →

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that’s how the light gets in

Posted on October 7, 2020 by Robert

Toronto. Did you ever wonder how Chevalier managed to make the first camera for Daguerre complete with a lens before 1839 ? The lens had been designed a quarter century earlier c1812 by the  Englishman Wollaston as a landscape lens … Continue reading →

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