Venice old and new

[David Kilpatrick]

Well, we have been in the inflated eurofest which is Venice in summer for a few days. I can't really live with 7 euro beers and then visit my Alamy page to find a £14.50 sale, less 40% distributor commission, less 20% Alamy cut... less than the price of a glass of beer for a stock photo to be used for three years on a website.

But - on return, my Dimage Scan Multi Pro gets back into use. NO image I can shoot in Venice this summer matches the stuff we shot on film here in the 80s and early 90s during Carnevale. Some of it is on Alamy and sells OK, but my week would have been better spent scanning old Venice images and working on them than trying to shoot new! 3M 640T and 1000, Agfachrome 1000 and other strange films included - that old stuff was magic, and I now see just how unique it is compared to recent shots of Venice.

Enjoying a 1 euro can of beer bought from the local shop right now - the hotel bar (4.50 small beer) closes at 11, so we come down at 11.05 with a couple of cans kept in the minibar fridge and sit outside for half an hour!

Daviid

[bakubo]

Well, we have been in the inflated eurofest which is Venice in summer for a few days. I can't really live with 7 euro beers and then visit my Alamy page to find a £14.50 sale, less 40% distributor commission, less 20% Alamy cut... less than the price of a glass of beer for a stock photo to be used for three years on a website.

Whew! That's expensive for a beer, but I am not surprised. I can beat it though. When I was in Milan in June 2005 it was really hot, I mean Texas summer hot, with humidity too. I was with my Italian friend and we had been walking around the area around the Duomo so I really wanted to find a shady place to get a cold drink. Although I knew it would be expensive I suggested we stop at one of the places right outside the Duomo that had tables with umbrellas. We sat down and I ordered 2 cans of Coke (12 oz/355 ml). Turns out they were 7 euros *each*. Ouch! I paid for her's too so it was 14 euros for the 2 cans. I can't say I really enjoyed it all that much thinking about how much I had paid for it.

But - on return, my Dimage Scan Multi Pro gets back into use. NO image I can shoot in Venice this summer matches the stuff we shot on film here in the 80s and early 90s during Carnevale. Some of it is on Alamy and sells OK, but my week would have been better spent scanning old Venice images and working on them than trying to shoot new! 3M 640T and 1000, Agfachrome 1000 and other strange films included - that old stuff was magic, and I now see just how unique it is compared to recent shots of Venice.

Going back and scanning some old film shots can be sort of fun. A month or so ago I scanned some more of my old slides and negatives. Many of the ones I scanned I hadn't seen in a long time.

Enjoying a 1 euro can of beer bought from the local shop right now - the hotel bar (4.50 small beer) closes at 11, so we come down at 11.05 with a couple of cans kept in the minibar fridge and sit outside for half an hour!

I have enjoyed sitting outside with some cold, cheap, local beer with friends in Ecuador, Laos, Tanzania, Thailand, and other places. Doing it like that is usually the best!

One of my favorite meals was in Interlaken, Switzerland in 2005. I had my backpack and was traveling around on my own (Germany, Austria, Italy, Hungary, Switzerland) and stayed at a backpacker hostel in Interlaken for a few days. I shared a 6 person room with 4 very attractive young women from Canada, UK, and Australia. Not sure how it turned out I was the only guy in the room. A great bunch of ladies. Anyway, I had been out all day with my camera and had gone to the top of Jungfraujoch. I got back late in the day and stopped at a grocery store near the train station and I bought some bread, Gruyère cheese, a bottle of red wine, and some chocolate. I got back to my 3rd floor room in the hostel and went out on the balcony to eat. The view was gorgeous looking out at a big snow covered mountain and I enjoyed the wine, bread, cheese, and chocolate. Simple, but very good. I had a book too and spent about 1.5 hours out there in the early evening hours. It was all cheap too!

When do you get back home?

[pakodominguez]

Venezia had always been an expensive place. Now it is even more expensive!

I always wanted to go, there is a night train from Paris to Venezia every day. I never took it: I'd worked hard and nevr had enough money, and I always thought (I still think) you have to be in love if you want to go to Venize. Now I have a girlfriend but there are no train to Venize from NYC and everything cost even more than 10 years ago -my bad.

This fall we'll be going to France and Spain, visit good old friends, eat good food and drink good non expensive wine. Venezia can wait...

[bakubo]

But - on return, my Dimage Scan Multi Pro gets back into use. NO image I can shoot in Venice this summer matches the stuff we shot on film here in the 80s and early 90s during Carnevale. Some of it is on Alamy and sells OK, but my week would have been better spent scanning old Venice images and working on them than trying to shoot new! 3M 640T and 1000, Agfachrome 1000 and other strange films included - that old stuff was magic, and I now see just how unique it is compared to recent shots of Venice.

Are you saying the photos you took back then in Venice are more interesting than what you got this time or are you saying that image quality of those are better than what you are getting with your A900? I am assuming the former, but it sort of sounds like in that last sentence you meant the latter.

[bfitzgerald]

Another convert to film
It's the look that is hard to match.

[David Kilpatrick]

Tuesday is flyback day, via Paris CdeG (Air France ultra cheap flights, but very good service). Previous trips to Venice we have been tour organisers, with a party and an itinerary, during the Carnevale in February and March. One year it snowed.

A semi-deserted, cold Venice with fog and darkness actually works better than a sunny summer Venice. Take a look at Alamy.com and search for 'kilpatrick venice' for some old film scan shots. The earliest ones were on Barfen CR100 film (bulk rebranded Fuji, c1984) with Cromofilter G2 - looks magenta not grey - on some lagoon views.

Venice is wrecked this summer by many things - graffiti, which even spoils the Rialto bridge; Biennale art festival posters covering rthee facades of the best palazzi; the Bridge of Sighs is entirely cloaked in scaffolding art to mask renovation; commercial signs and branding now spoil the little shops in the squares; installations and art are everywhere, dating or spoiling shots. Gondoliers wear jeans all too often.

But - we managed to photograph the inauguration of the first ever female gondolier! A very pretty blonde was being shot by TV and press on a gondola. We took a few snaps, thinkiing it was some Italian football wife. I asked, and learned the story - the first female gondolier ever. Not very good pix, had we known at the start (of about two minutes' shooting) more effort would have gone into it!

And I have the environmental, social, etc images which sell better than straight views. Water ambulance, police, stuff like that.

Even so - it's clear that some our older film shots not only catch Venice without marring details, they were taken at a better time of year, and the monochrome and special fast grainy colour slide stuff suits the city well.
I thought they were out of date, but not so. All the posters and cards of Venice are also out of date. Today's shots are just not as good, the details of euro-influenced signage and global branding fit badly.

David

[bakubo]

Someday I would like to visit Venice in the winter. The conditions you describe sound fantastic.

Coincidentally, I just saw this cool Venice gondola shot someone got:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read. ... e=32251818

[David Kilpatrick]

The conditions are like that shot generally. Of course, it would be no use as a stock pic, which is our purpose when shooting generally - the gondola is empty. He's not got any tourists on board. Therefore, not usable for mags, guide books, or anything much!

I got a good one today, can't post it (no raw processing on my Asus for A900 files) - gondola, couple, gondolier, perfectly framed by freshly laundered sheets hanging out along the little rio. Our best selling Venice pix are of washing hanging out.

David

[bakubo]

The conditions are like that shot generally. Of course, it would be no use as a stock pic, which is our purpose when shooting generally - the gondola is empty. He's not got any tourists on board. Therefore, not usable for mags, guide books, or anything much!

Yeah, that is right. I don't look at photos from a what is good for stock standpoint though. I think his photo would look good in B&W.

I got a good one today, can't post it (no raw processing on my Asus for A900 files) - gondola, couple, gondolier, perfectly framed by freshly laundered sheets hanging out along the little rio. Our best selling Venice pix are of washing hanging out.

Sounds good. Please show it to us when you get home.

[bakubo]

Venezia had always been an expensive place. Now it is even more expensive!

I always wanted to go, there is a night train from Paris to Venezia every day. I never took it: I'd worked hard and nevr had enough money, and I always thought (I still think) you have to be in love if you want to go to Venize. Now I have a girlfriend but there are no train to Venize from NYC and everything cost even more than 10 years ago -my bad.

This fall we'll be going to France and Spain, visit good old friends, eat good food and drink good non expensive wine. Venezia can wait...

Pako, I hope you get another chance someday. But, your trip to France and Spain sounds better right now to me too! Coincidentally, I just read this article called Frugal Paris this morning:

http://travel.nytimes.com/2009/06/28/tr ... is.html?em

[pakodominguez]

Pako, I hope you get another chance someday. But, your trip to France and Spain sounds better right now to me too! Coincidentally, I just read this article called Frugal Paris this morning:

http://travel.nytimes.com/2009/06/28/tr ... is.html?em

I'll be going to Spain and France only for 7 or 8 days, not enough time for discover new things but just enough for visit friends and family.

I read the article @ nytimes, the reporter is probably comparing prices of wine with those here in the states and that's why he found not expensive bottles of Pinot for 40 Euros -Le vere vole is a nice bar a vin, people from "L'Ardeche" region that offer wine and food from that region. It is really nice place, nice ambiance, but it wasn't cheap the last time I went, 7 years ago, and alas, I don't think it will be cheap today. But don't worry: I know the non expensive places I used to like are still there and I'll try to visit at least a couple. and, for good and non expensive food, San Sebastian is the perfect place!

Regards

[Ossie]

David

I got a good one today, can't post it (no raw processing on my Asus for A900 files) - gondola, couple, gondolier, perfectly framed by freshly laundered sheets hanging out along the little rio. Our best selling Venice pix are of washing hanging out.

I am interested to note that on your trip to Venice you took a small Asus with you. I have been thinking of buying a small Netbook to act as a backup for the memory cards but with the small processors they use I have been wondering what the file transfer speed is like from card/camera to Netbook. I have struggled to find out from searches on the internet. I use an A700 and cRAW or cRAW+JPG. I was not intending to do any editing except perhaps very basic work on JPG's e.g. levels. What has been your experience?

I currently use a Jobo Giga One (40gb) as a backup, not one of my best purchases, but you can not view the images on it. I was thinking that with a Netbook and using PSE6 I could at least see the images and do some basic editing.

My 9 year old 12" laptop (a Sony) is just not up to the job now and I can't justify the expense of buying a full blown laptop nor, with airline weight restrictions, do I want to carry one around with me.

I had my first trip to Venice in September last year when I attended a week long photo workshop. I thought it was a good time to visit. It was less crowded than I had expected not too hot, good light and without having to get up too early for shots of dawn. All the walking and climbing up and down those bridges nearly crippled me though but I still want to go back

Ossie

Ossie

A100 16-80mm CZ

[MarcoC]

Ossie,

I use a small Samsung NC-10 netbook, which is very nice and compares well to the Asus models. It has a built in SD card reader, like most netbooks, but you would need a card reader or adapter to transfer any other files across, or else plug the camera straight into the netbook via USB. File transfer of a700 files onto the netbook is OK speed wise. But note that the max resolution is 1024 X 728 so you can't view files as nicely as you can on a regular monitor. Don't bother trying to eit raw files or do serious post-processing either.

My main concern though, is the idea of a netbook a backup. I would never recommend one form of backup only - always go for at least two, such as netbook + online backup.

p.s. - netbooks are more attractive to thieves than photo viewers, so you also need to bear that in mind.

[bakubo]

A few months ago I bought an Asus EeePC 900HA with 8.9" screen. You can read about it in my November 17, 2008 and January 12, 2009 entries in my blog:

http://bakubo.blogspot.com

[David Kilpatrick]

I have the smaller original EeePC - I do have GIMP and ufRAW installed, but only to view A700 files. I do not find Unix installation friendly so have not downloaded anything new - our son is familiar with Unix command-line stuff and will probably update the Asus some time in future. It has 1GB RAM but would be struggling to handle A900 files.

It can view JPEGs perfectly of course but I do not shoot JPEG at all with this number of files to handle. I use a 250GB Iomega HD, bus powered via the plugged-in Asus, and a card reader, to backup my cards. I do not wipe the cards, just back up and keep the full cards.

The Asus is most useful for wifi internet, we deliberately picked a hotel with very good fast free wifi throughout the building - even outside.

David