Show & Tell, Gift Exchange, Silent Auction

Posted on November 25, 2015 by Robert
A massive old flash bulb. Single use for illuminating large areas.

A massive old flash bulb. Single use for illuminating large areas.

NEXT TORONTO MEETING: Wed, December 16, 2015.
Show and Tell, Gift Exchange, Silent Auction

**NOTE DATE: Erroneously shown as a week later initially. Thanks to Ms Cook for spotting it** 

For the ever popular show and tell session some members bring in unusual items from their collections to share with others. Anne and Bill Harker of the St James Cathedral Archives will show the restored daguerreotypes of the old church drawings.

A gift exchange has been a feature of our annual December meeting for forty years. The rules are simple. Bring a wrapped gift worth about $15 – $20 nd of interest to a fellow collector. Tickets are used to randomly select gift exchanging members.

The silent auction is a recent activity first recommended and coordinated by the late Christine Mackay. In recent years the items have been owned by or donated to the PHSC helping us to offset annual costs.

Below is a small sample of things to be auctioned. Click “Continue reading” to see the photos.

The public is welcome.  Go to our Programs page for times and directions.

Continue reading →

Posted in activities, program | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Show & Tell, Gift Exchange, Silent Auction

PHSC Auction tomorrow, Sunday Nov 22, 2015

Posted on November 18, 2015 by Robert
Hasselblad gear to be auctioned

Hasselblad gear to be auctioned

Toronto. Take a break and purge or add to your collection! We are holding another auction tomorrow, Sunday, November 22, 2015. At the Legion Hall in Long Branch on Lake Shore Boulevard just west of the bottom of Brown’s Line.

A number of items just received including some Hasselblad equipment is shown here.

 Look here for details and older photos of some items we will auction Sunday. NO RESERVE. Admission is FREE

*** Click above links for a new page and then on that page’s icon to see a few of the items to be auctioned! Click on any icon to see the item full size. Some items in the second link are shown twice to add details. ***

Posted in activities, auction | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments Off on PHSC Auction tomorrow, Sunday Nov 22, 2015

Newsletter 15-6

Posted on November 16, 2015 by Robert

PHSC-E-Mail-V-15-6-smToronto. Editor David Bridge serves up another tasty newsletter! In it we announce our famous annual(ish) auction this coming Sunday November 22nd. This month we have a special meeting NOT at our usual location NOR date.

A review of October’s stereo talk by Felix Russo and another topic on a new stereo camera and viewer for  movies and stills.

There is a two page photo essay on our fall fair last month. another article covers our man in Pasadena – Editor Bob Lansdale’s visit to Pasadena and the Daguerreian Society Symposium in California, Neil MacDonald’s Rare Photo Gallery is mentioned complete with a working link (all links in this pdf work – try them…).

And Louise Freyburger dishes up another excellent round of interesting photo links including links to podcasts of the Film Photography Project. Another illustrated link discusses the difficulty of accurately hand colouring images before colour films evolved. As usual this issue wraps up with notes about coming events and information requests. Click here or the icon at left to read or print this edition of the newsletter.

Posted in newsletter | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Newsletter 15-6

Pictures from Pasadena Daguerreian Symposium

Posted on November 16, 2015 by Robert
Daguerreian Society Members in Pasadena CA by Lansdale

Daguerreian Society Members in Pasadena CA by Lansdale

Toronto.  Photographic Canadiana Editor Bob lansdale is also the official photographer for the  Daguerreian Society. Each year the Daguerreian Society holds a symposium in a different location. This year the society chose to visit Pasadena and the Getty.

Bob Lansdale flew down and once again captured the members and speakers. You can see his efforts here on Shutterfly.

Bob Lansdale (right) signs in at Pasadena

Bob Lansdale (right) signs in at Pasadena

Bob assures us that everyone can view his work. And here areas suggestions in his own words:

“Everyone should be able to go in there without joining.
Suggestion:
Look to VIEW ALBUM in the lower right and click it.
Then click the little blue box for SLIDESHOW at top left
Under OPTIONS you can change the speed.

–  You can view as a slideshow
–  Download the files
–  Order prints or an album of pix

Enjoy!

Bob Lansdale”

Posted in activities-other | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Pictures from Pasadena Daguerreian Symposium

Optical Explosion

Posted on November 13, 2015 by Robert

yorkville-fire-plug-smToronto. Yesterday’s Globe business section had an intriguing graph in its visualization article illustrating the growth in annual camera sales since the late 1950s. Unfortunately the digital version of the article is behind a pay wall and since I already pay for a paper version of the Globe, I chose not to pay more for the right to get an electronic version of this column.

However; the column is of interest to photographers. The graph shows film cameras peaking at about 38 million sales per year in the late 1990s. Digital cameras blossomed and peaked at about 120 million sales per year in 2010. By this year, the cameras – film or digital – have been dwarfed by the sale of smart phones all of which include a camera. Last year (2014) saw over 1.2 billion smart phones sold! Now everyone who has a smart phone is a photographer and videographer. This year, the iPhone 6 even takes HD videos…

The article is slightly inaccurate as it deems modular cameras began in the late 1950s with the Nikon F, ignoring the pre-war Leicas, Contaxes, and Exaktas all of which offered interchangeable lenses and accessories galore. Or the even earlier larger format cameras with various lens/shutter combinations, flash guns, synchronizers, rangefinders, etc.

NB. The fire plug above is in Toronto’s Yorkville district and yes, I snapped it with an iPod Touch (an iPhone without the phone portion) as I walked with my wife to see her foot doctor.

Posted in activities-other | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Optical Explosion

Two Bits

Posted on November 13, 2015 by Robert
WP

Fully 25% of the web uses WordPress

Toronto. Some 412 posts ago on August 15th, 2008 I converted this site to WordPress.  My first post was about the Japanese Hand Made Camera Club. I chose WordPress for one big reason: it was so easy to use anyone could quickly learn it and use it effectively. I had in mind that at some point I would have to turn over running this site to another person and WordPress would make that task easier for me and the incumbent.

The first versions of this site in the mid 1990s were coded by me directly in HTML. As this site and the web in general became more complex and sophisticated, I moved on to a variety of editors like Go Live and Dreamweaver; editors with a much steeper learning curve than WordPress. My goal was to make this site universally readable in any popular browser. Continue reading →

Posted in activities | Tagged | Comments Off on Two Bits

Gigaplex in 2011 Vancouver

Posted on November 7, 2015 by Robert

gigaplex-vancouverToronto. At my daughter’s the other day I saw the new era of television. Her set is a huge flat screen sitting over the fireplace in her downstairs  family room. Fired up, it has many many icons for netflix, games, firefox, etc – a “smart” TV. No conventional tuner or station selector in sight, but tons of detail!

And speaking of detail (icon at left),  few days earlier at our executive meeting downtown at Clint’s condo, a letter was circulated giving a link to a gigaplex image of a crowd of about 700,000 viewing the 2011 Canucks Hockey game in downtown Vancouver. Made with gigaplex technology, the 69,000 x 30,000 2,100 gigapixel image shows the individual fans in sharp detail once you zoom in! The icon shows a few fans after I zoomed in to see the amazing detail. It was similar technology that helped quickly trace the Boston Marathon bombers.

The PHSC saw at least two other examples of digital intense images, one taken more recently than the Canucks fans image and the other a talk and show about an earlier technology that promised such images.

In late October 2013, I did a post about a gigaplex shot of the Khumbu Glacier in Washington State. This shot shows the impact of climate change on our planet.

In our November 2008 Toronto meeting Felix Russo discussed modern panorama technology including an amazing device called a Gigapan Imager. This mechanical gadget takes any digital camera and “paints” a static scene creating a massive image by stitching all the regular sized images together.

Have a look at these massive detailed images and consider the new HD TV and forthcoming 4K TV technology. makes my youthful memories of low resolution black and white TV old and gloomy history these days.

Posted in people, processes | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Gigaplex in 2011 Vancouver

PHSC Auction coming fast – Sunday, Nov 22, 2015

Posted on November 2, 2015 by Robert

2015-fall-Auction-smToronto. Fall is here and the PHSC will be holding another one of its popular photographic auctions. Once again we will be at the Legion Hall in Long Branch, Ontario on Lake Shore Boulevard just west of Brown’s Line (Highway 27) on the south west side of Toronto.

Click here or on the icon at left to see and print the bookmark.

We have over 200 lots covering a wide gamut of photographica. Below are just a few of the items on offer…

PHSC-Nov-Auction

*** Click here or above for a new page and then on that page’s icon to see a few of the items to be auctioned! Click on any icon to see the item full size. Some items are shown twice to add details. ***

Everyone is welcome. First come first served – the number of lots is limited.

 

Posted in auction, events | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on PHSC Auction coming fast – Sunday, Nov 22, 2015

More letters to the Editor – Weegee

Posted on October 31, 2015 by Robert

crayons-letterbundleToronto. Clive Chan replied to my posting of Geroge Dunbar’s observation on Weegee…

Clive replies,”Just saw the Letter to the Editor post on the PHSC site regarding the origin of Weegee’s name. The following tidbit seems to confirm Mr. Dunbar’s assertions. Fellig is quoted by Harvey V. Fondiller in an article that appeared in Popular Photography, June 1978 (he interviewed Fellig some years prior) titled “Weegee’s New York”. Continue reading →

Posted in people | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on More letters to the Editor – Weegee

Letter to the Editor – Weegee

Posted on October 29, 2015 by Robert

crayons-letterbundleToronto.  On October 21st, I wrote a post on Weegee. To my surprise, it resulted in this letter to the editor by my friend and fellow PHSC member, George Dunbar. George has a theory regarding the nickname Weegee, but it has nothing to do with the famous old Ouija Board!

George writes, “I’m a great fan of Weegee and his extraordinary photography (been studying his career since I first learned about him 65 years ago). There’s no doubt that I will soon be enjoying the Ryerson exhibit of Weegee the Famous.

“However, while the nickname Weegee is certainly unique, the origin may be based on myth. In Weegee’s early years, he assisted in a darkroom and used a squeegee in the process of drying prints. That common photo accessory and his small stature may have contributed to the youth’s nickname, Weegee.

Later in his career, after becoming a press photographer and arriving at some crime scenes before anyone else, the origin of his long-held nickname was altered and became part of the Weegee mystique.

George Dunbar.

N.b.The icon of letters for this post was borrowed from an American site, National Braille Press, devoted to writing for Children. Have a look at their charming site.

Posted in events, people | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Letter to the Editor – Weegee