Episode 103

Power Ups

I've never solarized a color photo before.

Sure it's just a PS filter, but back in my day (dark-room chem) I used to do it with B&W film once a month. The process is irreversible and totally destroys the roll, so you have to be really sure you want to solarize a picture. There's other ways to negatively wash prints, but it's not pure and usually just ends up looking shitty.

I miss the dark room. That was my shit. I didn't mind the smell, and could spend an entire week fucking with a single roll of 24 photos, just jury-rigging effects and different chems.

Other kids were all about the picture taking. Others, into framing and post-development painting. I spent my years in the dark room, listening to music and rocking the paper.

My photo shoots (including composition) still take less than an hour, sometimes 15 minutes. After that, I hunker down with photoshop for hours, though you probably can't tell beyond the filters. I really don't get into brightness/contrast, burn/dodge much, but focus on coloring, cropping, and other means of emphasis. The pictures, as I take them, are more or less set in my mind. The manipulation afterwards, that's all about finding the good stuff-sort of like a sculptor with their marble blocks.

Webcomics aside, I need to take more photos.

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