The Photographic Slipstream - Weblog Columns Of The Past

I have just been reviewing this weblog column for the past 6 years. I did it by means of the historical record over on the right-hand side of the page - and I've come to some conclusions about it:

a. I really did write a lot of columns, didn't I?

b. Some of them were pretty naff, weren't they?

c. A great deal of the product promotion is irrelevant now - goods overtaken by other goods and fallen into the disused portion of our camera bags.

d. The people promotion still holds up - mainly because the people we introduced as professional or enthusiast photographers really can do the business well.

e. Nothing lasts forever. Not only do cameras and lenses wear out and computer programs fall into disuse, but whole businesses can disappear. There's a couple of postings that feature other camera stores that have since shut.

f. I noticed the postings introducing the new look for the shop - the grey paint job. The paint job is holding up pretty darn well - evidently the painters did a good job and selected good paints. They would be a good firm to employ for domestic work too...

g. I made a joke about full-frame mirror-less cameras. The manufacturers made full frame mirror-less cameras. I made a joke about a medium-format digital mirror-less camera. Hasselblad made a medium-format mirror-less camera.

I am going to make a joke about a brass-mounted faux-wood 1840's-style digital camera on a wooden tripod and see what happens...

h. The management never really censored any of the posts, even the ones that had to be typed with rubber gloves and a clothespeg on the nose. I think they were brave men.

The business of telling people about photography is both easy and tough - easy in that there really does seem to be some new little topic each day that can be introduced - tough in that most people know more about the subject than I do. I really only get away with it by virtue of the fact that no-one  knows everything about everything and I can find little novel tit-bits to show. I am just running along with the pack and scooping up stuff as I go.

The other consideration is that when we find something out, or say it, or do it, it can be swept away in a very short time by the advances of science or commerce. New products, new processes, new prices...we fly along and the old goes out into the slipstream and is gone in an instant. This is a great comfort to a person who makes mistakes because these can go away just as fast.

Bit worrisome, though, in that list of past posts that the Blogger mechanism provides. A couple of the readers of this column will probably go through them to see if they have gotten a mention...in some cases they have.

Ooh, I hope the time I named names won't come back to haunt me...

The Daily Dredge

I trawl the bottom of the camera trade harbour every day looking for items that can be turned into weblog posts in this column. Amongst the discarded boots and old tuna tins, I find snippets of news from manufacturers and their wholesalers, American review sites, the rumour and geek sites, and our local competitor's advertisements. Some of it is distinctly suspicious, while other items are so blatantly bland as to suggest a trainee intern is clocking up time on the press-agent's computer.

The rumours you can all get for yourselves, and you can involve yourselves as deeply as you wish with the fan-boy fights on the various forums. They are a good way to keep up your level of rage in between camera club meetings. And they have the advantage over club meetings in that while you cannot actually strangle anyone when engaged in an internet argument, you do get a better class of coffee and biscuit at home.

The manufacturers can sometimes be cagy in their announcements but are often candid about what is really happening back at the factory. You can expect some delays in new cameras because of this latest Japanese earthquake - one factory has frankly admitted this today as some of their subcontractors are located in the affected areas. Our sympathy to them and people would do well to wait patiently rather than pester retail and wholesale outlets every week to see when something will arrive. Delayed items will get to Australia eventually, and in the meantime there is nothing to stop people from either continuing to use what they have or buy the items that are in the shops right now. The wise buyer does not delay lest the delay be extended by further bad fortune...

The American DP Review site is a good one and is pretty well organised to analyse new cameras and lenses. They'll do a preliminary report on something when it first hits the trade show circuit, then a hands-on, and finally an in-depth review. These latter exercises are detailed enough to let any sensible person make a clear decision about the equipment...but they cannot tell you whether you will like it, or succeed with it, any more than they can tell you what your breakfast oatmeal will taste like or whether you will stick the spoon in your eye.

Some trade snippets that come through are genuinely helpful - like a note a few days ago telling us that there is to be a new repair agent for Epson printers down in Rockingham - a boon for the Southrons.

Looking at adverts from other places can be annoying if they have offered something just pennies under our shop price and you know that the number is all that prospective clients will look at. It becomes interesting, however, when the offerings are either way, way above the normal CE price, or way, way below it. The first suggests that somebody wants to keep their hand in the game but don't have stock to sell - the second that they have just had a container-load of something delivered and are stacking the cartons in the toilet - they will sell low to gain some room. I ponder on this stuff but leave the major financial thoughts to the management.

Then there is the gossip about prominent Perth photographers...about the one who...ah, but you now that already...

Write Rite,Right?

Every morning I sit down to write something for the Camera Electronic blog page. Every evening I sit down to write something for my own personal blog pages*. Surprisingly, all three posts are different, even if they have a common origin in something that has happened or has been observed. This is the advantage of having a scattered mind.

This post is linked automatically to Facebook - how I do not know. It may further echo onto other social sites and contaminate them. I like to think that it does.

The best posts are the ones that attract attention, engender love, and stimulate sales - running  a close second are the ones that attract attention and cause furious anger in the readers - because this makes the readers respond just as much as the lovely ones.

We do take notice of what is written back to us via Facebook - and generally respond to it. Nearly always the response is polite, because it is not me writing it. We hope that when people express themselves in this highly visible way that they will remember that they are being seen and judged as much as we are.

Sometimes it is very helpful. Errors of fact do occur with this blog - again they are not generally deliberate, if you discount the week in January when I offered genuine portions of the iceberg that sank the TITANIC...in pint bottles. Anyway, when we are wrong, tell us gently and we will set ourselves right.

* I'm not allowed to tell you what they are but you can ask me because I am HERE ALL WEEK...

Uncle Dick

Anti-Ken

I rarely indulge in video clips on the computer. There is too much to do in my own computer room on my own files - not to mention writing two more blogs at home - to spend time watching people bicycling into trees or crashing cars in Russia.

Last night, however, I chased up a video segment that had popped up on the work computer. I'd dialled up Ken Rockwell to look up a specification on an old lens - he reviews them on a regular basis. The Google search engine turned up another blogger who makes long video segments - one promised to tell us how Ken Rockwell was dangerous for photography...

Wrong, annoying, crass...these were adjectives I could understand. But dangerous? That seemed sort of inflammatory. So I did the right thing - I did not indulge here on the firm's time - I waited until I was at home to look this one up.

The blogger has a dead set against Rockwell, but he excuses it by saying that he has talked with the chap himself. Then he proceeds to malign him liberally for advice he has given on a small camera. The advice might have been simplistic, but the audience that Ken was writing for in respect of the little entry-level camera are simple people with simple needs.

The performance of the blogger, with his wingman and "producer" watching was interesting - theatrical and overblown. Perhaps it was aimed at a particular audience as well. I found it as annoying as anything that Rockwell writes but without any of the charm.

Investigate it at your leisure - or your pleasure, if it proves to be so. I think I am going to let them both disappear over the mental horizon firing on each other and not bother going to search for survivors...

Click On Us - And Get A Surprise

A friend who follows these blogs contacted me via the Facebook system yesterday to tell me that he was getting a surprise when he tried to read the blog - it shuffled him off to a sex site.

Most annoying. And a bit of a professional challenge. After all, how can I compete with the various things displayed on a sex site - busty, dusty, dusky, or damaged - if my resources are limited to the contents of our photography shop. I realise that our staff have their charms but I am hesitant to uncover them...

Please rest assured that the management here have no interest in sex. The sales staff have no interest in sex. The repair technicians have no interest in sex. The writer of this blog has no interest in sex. We are moral and straight-laced and buttoned up to our chins in sensible woolen garments.

The answer will lie somewhere in the complex computer system that runs the web - someone somewhere has thrown the thing in and until the IT chap comes back and exorcises it you might get sex or gambling or cheap medications. And Nigerians. " Hello Dear, This is Precious Imbubu..." All you can do is keep the firewalls up and hope for the best.

Meanwhile, if you are running a bit low on hysteria, fraud, and Grumpy Cat, may I recommend an hour on Facebook? You'll never get that hour back in your life but you will get to see what a lot of your friends have had for lunch.

Uncle Dick

ELINT - Or The Fine Art Of Feeding The Dog

You all remember the joke about the blind man whose dog pisses on his leg. A passer-by sees this and watches the man offer the dog a biscuit. Leading to this question and answer:

" Why do you give that dog food when it has just pee'd on you?"

" So's I can find out which end to kick..."

I tried the biscuit this last evening with a mildly revealing posting on my personal blog. I followed it up with an insincere apology on Facebook. So far I have three bites on the FB page and I have filed away the information for future use.

This is akin to the air force practise of flying a snooper plane close to an enemy coast with a load of radar detectors aboard to see what sort of electronic response you get - what lights up. Clever air forces also arrange for ground-based detectors to watch at the same time in case the snooped-upon decide to send up interception. Really clever air forces correlate data from the snoop, a satellite aloft at the same time, a ship and a sub, and ground stations and file it away for future use. The best air forces decoy out an interception....and then don't let the interceptor go home again.

It's a good model for commercial and personal electronic communication. This blog is linked to Facebook and Twitter and I think our IT maven has made arrangements for anything I type to fly over there automatically. Then a flood of statistics comes back and makes pie charts somewhere on the computer. Then I get fed the pie so that someone knows which end to kick.

No no no, that can't be right.

I want to see this blog linked to Spy, Sneek, CreepRound, and ShuffleThroughThe Bins - all good legitimate electronic forums for businesses. This will increase the amount of information - and false names - that return to the central data base and will enable us to construct bigger and better pie charts with thicker crusts and more apples inside. Then all we need is a big 'ol wheel of red cheese and a pot of coffee and the REAL writin' can begin.

Eh?

Uncle Dick

The Last Blog Of The Day

This is my last blog for today but perhaps it might be an opportunity to send you to your first blog of the evening. Look over to your right at our recommended blog links and find the one that says etcetera several times. it is the production of the Wood Dragon, who I suspect is Mr. Wing.

He recently attended a course at Shoot Photography Workshops with Thorsten Overgaarde and seems to have thoroughly enjoyed himself - the fine photos he took attest to that.

It is a pleasure for the sales staff to see someone make good use of good equipment, and we hope to see more on his page as time goes by.