Monday, April 12, 2021

One Negative - Thirty-Nine Years

Driftwood Beach, Jekyll Island, Georgia, December 1982. The original print, made in early 1983, is
on the right. The print on the left was made in April of 2021. 

If you have been shooting film as long as I have, you will remember getting your prints back from the photo lab in two-pocket envelopes, one pocket for the prints and one pocket for the negatives. The prints would be added to photo albums, stuck to refrigerators, passed around, given or mailed to family members and friends, and then stored in boxes or even the envelope in which they came. But what about the negatives? Unless used to make reprints, the negatives rarely left the envelope. Over time, the negatives began to take up more and more space, and I now wonder how many people simply threw out the negatives in the belief that they would no longer be needed. 

I am glad to say that I still have most, if not all of our negatives, and recently I had a chance to reconnect with a thirty-nine year old negative that I shot on Jekyll Island, Georgia, in late December of 1982. Here is the backstory:

During the week after Christmas, 1982, my parents took me, Kelley, and our younger brother, Mike, to Jekyll Island for a week. We stayed in a rented house near the beach, and the idea was that this might be the last "family" vacation for the five of us. Kelley and I had left our teaching jobs to continue our education, and Mike had just entered college the previous fall. We all were going in different directions, so it was good to have this time together, especially in such a magical place. We took lots of walks around the island, and I took lots of photos (Kodachrome slides in my Minolta XG-1 and Kodak Tri-X 400 in my Minolta SR-T 201). One of those took us to the northern tip where the beach erosion had creating a moody but magnificent landscape called Driftwood Beach. Dying live oak trees jut skyward in bizarre directions as the surf constantly berates and eventually brings them down as driftwood scattered on the sand. On this particular day, the sky was overcast with rain eminent, and I was glad that I had 400 ISO film in my camera. As I walked the beach, I saw a single dead live oak tree with most of its branches missing and its roots exposed above the sand. The tree appeared to be pointing to a healthy tree farther down the beach, but the pounding surf may soon reach it as well. It is as if the dead tree is predicting the future of the healthy tree. I raised my camera to my eye and framed a shot of the dead tree with the healthy tree in the distance. 

This film was in my camera the day I shot frame #20 that day on
Driftwood Beach, in late December, 1982. 

At that particular time, I was attending a small bible college in southwest Atlanta. I shot black and white photos for the college yearbook and developed and printed the photos in the small darkroom on campus. It was my first experience making prints in an actual darkroom, and although I didn't really know what I was doing, I loved it. I was allowed to develop and print as much of my own photographs as I wanted, and I still have some of those prints today, like the Driftwood Beach, 1982 print that hangs on the wall of my condo today. I remember how pleased I was that I could make something so beautiful (to me) completely by myself. 

Driftwood Beach, Jekyll Island, Georgia, March 2021.
Minolta Maxxum 7000, with Minolta AF 35-105mm
f3.5-4.5 zoom lens, on Kodak Tri-X 400 film. Printed 
at Safelight Community Darkroom.

Fast forward thirty-nine years. My wife, Debbie, and I have made two recent visits to Jekyll Island already this year. Our walks along Driftwood Beach were just as magical as it was for me in 1982, and I happily shot a number of frames (also on Tri-X 400). Of course, the beach is constantly changing as nature does its work, but once a photography is made, time is frozen. I began to think about that shot I made thirty-nine years ago, and it hit me:  I should try to make a new print of the old negative and see what it tells me. On a recent trip to our community darkroom, Safelight District (Chattanooga, Tennessee), I removed the negative from the sleeve where it had resided for almost four decades and began the printmaking process. My goal was not to make an exact copy of the original 1982 print but to "reinterpret" it in light of new skills I have acquired since returning to the darkroom just over a year ago. I routinely use a technique called Split Grade Printing to bring out details in the shadows while holding the right amount of highlight details and overall contrast. The resulting print looks a bit brighter, but I quite like it. While not perfect, I think it captures the mystery and wonder of the moment in my memory, as photography does.

Takeaways? Obviously, keep your negatives in a safe place. After all, it was that film that was "touched" by the light that came from your subject. The negative represents the closest you can get to the moment that was captured. It was there. Beyond that, I am happy that I can see growth (albeit small) in my printing technique. I've only ever worked in two darkrooms with a gap of thirty-four years in between, so there is much to be learned on my way to my goal of becoming a "master" printer, if that even is possible for me. However, it is my goal as I keep shooting, developing, printing, reading, and asking questions of experienced photographers. Finally, I am reminded of the essence of photography:  the preservation of an instant of light. Photography makes the temporary permanent. I have a strip of celluloid in a plastic sleeve and a silver gelatin print on the wall to prove it.

Sunrise on Jekyll Island, December, 1982. A Kodachrome taken with my Minolta XG-1.
Great colors, if not a great composition.

Walking Path Along the Salt Marsh, Jekyll Island, Georgia, December, 1982. Another Kodachrome 
from my Minolta XG-1. The lens for these color shots was the Rokkor-X 45mm f2.

6 comments:

  1. A great read, thank you. Jekyll Island is definitely a neat place, my wife and I love it there, I can't wait to go back with a few of my cameras next time.

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    1. Thank you, Brandon. Your print is on the way! When you go to Jekyll Island next time, be sure to visit Driftwood Beach at sunrise and bring a tripod.

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  2. That driftwood beach pic is a MASTERPIECE. I just LOVE it! Will you make me a print of it for our July visit?

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    1. Thank you for your kind words, Jeremy. I will have the print ready for you!

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  3. The XG-1 is an underrated camera.

    How interesting to print the same negative so many years apart! I have all of my negatives going back to 1976 but have never done printing myself. Best I can do is scan them and touch them up in Photoshop!

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  4. Thank you for the comment, Jim.

    I certainly understand your situation regarding printing. If our community darkroom did not exist, I would not be able to make the prints I am now making. I envy your Photoshop skills, as I have none.

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