reflecting on photography past

I was reading a columnist this morning who was reflecting on changes he's noticed over the past decade. It got me to thinking about how photography and photojournalism has changed since I started doing it professionally about 25 years ago. And, yes, I have photographer friends who are older than I and certainly their starting point of reference is different, but here goes.

It goes without saying that film was the norm. But the standard for newspapers was black and white Kodak Tri-X or Ilford HP5. At newspapers, most of us also carried color transparency film like Ektachrome or Fujichrome in addition to some Plus-X if we wanted some really fine grain.

One camera held black and white film; the other often contained color.

To process these films meant using any combination of machine or hand-processing method with a variety of chemicals. It would take anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes--after driving back to the lab/office--before we knew if we hand any "good" images. There was no such thing as a monitor on the back of the camera to check focus, color balance or exposure.

Changing ASA (now ISO) meant changing out an entire roll of film and/or developing a second batch of film in a different chemistry/time combination.

Shooting something at ASA 3200 meant really grainy black and white images often using bleach and a cotton swab while printing under a dim amber bulb just so you got detail in some portions of the image.

If we ran out of film, we were pretty much done for the moment. You couldn't erase an image to make more space. You either begged a roll from someone or found a drug store or grocery store for more film if you didn't have some rolling around the floor of your car.

You used to be able to drive up to booths and drop off film to someone and return a few hours or days later to get your photos.

Looking at your images with any kind of urgency often required a good light table and a nice loupe if you were in the print media industry. Nevermind using a slide projector two weeks later if you shot Kodachrome at National Geographic.

Most every photojournalist carried two camera bodies and a bag with four, five or more prime lenses and had to change lenses OFTEN to get a good variety of images. Zoom lenses were not considered professional lenses.

Oh...and there was no autofocus on ANY of those lenses.

Seventeen millimeters was an exotic lens.

We carried one or two flashes and often had to dial in the best possible setting using a vague guess of red, blue or yellow setting on that flash to accommodate the distance/ASA/situation variables.

Motor drives were add-on devices. They often shorted out in wet weather. I used Band Aids over the button of my Nikon MD-12 to keep rain out of it.

Nikon was the undisputed king for Photojournalists.

Thirty six was a magic number.