>>> [log in to unmask] 02/23/05 7:56 AM >>>
Are negatives now unavailable and useless?
Hi Lynne;
I'm quite concerned about how this trend is progressing--100 years from
now, I expect there'll be a massive gap in the photo record from the
turn of the millennium, because so much photography is now digital, and
produces nothing tangible. Few "real" photos are being produced, or
even hard copies of digital files--and most of those are for
"disposable" uses in publications. Just today I received a message from
our IT department to clear up files on our city hard drive, including "
the entire memory card of Pictures [on] the network drive [when] you
only need one or two pictures." Once those are gone, they're gone for
good.
I've got a bugaboo about how digital photography isn't really
photography anyway--it produces a computer simulation, not a true
representation. No matter what resolution you have, ultimately the
image is just a collection of pixels. Pointillism works fine for
Seuret's art--but it's a lousy way to document the world. Sure, it has
it's uses, and just a few months ago I got some great advice from this
list on purchasing a digital camera to record images of our artifact
collection (I went with the Nikon D70, by the way--thanks for everyone's
input. It's a good camera, but still has all the limitations of digital
photography). But, when I want a long lasting image (ie., 100s of
years), it's black-and-white 35mm for me.
OK, off the soapbox now...
Our archives sends photos out to a medical imaging lab attached to a
university hospital when we need copies, re-prints or negatives made.
So long as X-ray machines still need film, this may be a viable option
for you. It doesn't even need to be a local lab--the one we use is in
a city 500 km away. It takes time to ship things through the mail, but
we get "the real thing" out of the process.
Cheers,
------------------------------------------------------------
Tim McShane, Assistant--Cultural History
Medicine Hat Museum and Art Gallery
1302 Bomford Crescent S.W.
Medicine Hat, AB T1A 5E6
(403) 502-8587
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