Old Fields: Photography, Glamour, and Fantasy Landscape

3: Shop Theory

 Shop Theory Tinkering with radio equipment quickly supplanted the early nineteenth-century effort of modifying cameras, but both enterprises attracted mostly boys and men intrigued with signals and images. @X IN THE TOWN WHERE I GREW UP, MOST LOCAL women and girls refused point-blank to be photographed in homemade bikinis briefer than those they wore on the beach and aboard boats. The quasi-public gaze of far-off photo processing plant employees and the possibility that clerks at the one local drugstore might open envelopes inhibited image making.¹ At-home processing freed photographer and subject: the tentative use of new Polaroid instant cameras accelerated easiness in front of cameras. Images of private behavior—mother or sister sunbathing or playing badminton in wisps so brief they scarcely stayed in place; mom and dad sharing a beer while curled up in the stern of a boat; mom savoring her coffee while sun-drying her hair and reading a racy novel; teenage siblings sunning or swimming nude in the pool; friends jumping into the estuary on a blistering hot summer day—all existed because the photographer controlled image making. The sixty-second camera gave absolute privacy of image to many photographers unwilling to process film and prints at home and by  produced a plethora of images only infrequently put into albums.² But in the late s and early s Polaroid equipment remained novel, expensive, and o"en tricky to use. Local photography enthusiasts stuck with traditional cameras and film. Out of fascination or financial need, photographers modified obsolescent equipment and made do with homemade equipment.³ They developed their own negatives and prints, learning by intent and by accident the shop theory of what magazines addressing professionals and advanced amateurs designated “glamour photography.” The deep red filter that makes any sky turn sumptuously dark on black-and-white film makes rouged lips appear ghastly fish-belly pale.⁴ Lenses distort the size of feet, especially when sitting subjects thrust feet at cameras. Blondes photograph especially well because blonde hair is finer than brown or black, and because blonde-headed people typically have about a fi"h more strands of hair than others. Disparate filters fitted into homemade holders and simple sunlight reflectors worked wonders: subjects smiled at the contrivances but the contrivances worked. Composition and lighting o"en frustrated, but many images pleased photographer and subject both, now and then by accident. Old cameras worked a peculiar magic in the old fields of my boyhood. From grandparents and great-uncles I acquired a variety of cameras with better lenses and other features than the Brownie box camera my parents gave me on my seventh Christmas. Aperture settings fascinated me: suddenly I could make better images in dimmer light or achieve far greater @[ old fields depth of field. By the time I turned twelve I understood the old cameras as extremely versatile and, while not quite expendable, fine to take into harm’s way. Two folding Kodaks refused to remain folded. Around both I wrapped rubber bands, and on one I stuck black electrician’s tape to repair a tiny light-leaking hole in the fabric bellows. Kodak vest-pocket models from the s made me wonder why adults gave children bulky box cameras: the compact cameras fit in no vest pocket, but folded flat enough to slide easily into a jacket pocket or bicycle saddlebag. Only filmmanufacturing changes irritated me. Eastman Kodak began phasing out - and -size film, and as two general stores and one drugstore retailed the only film in town, I started shi"ing to -size film and then the -size cassette film developed for square-format Kodak Instamatic cameras.⁵ I accepted the first Instamatic hopefully, but it seemed boxy. But the unique aluminum-frame S- Instamatic my parents gave me at Christmas in  partially collapsed, fit in my jacket pocket easily, did well in all weather, and best of all, made the square-format images I treasured.⁶ In  Eastman Kodak introduced a variety of Instamatic accessories, especially the rugged but now forgotten Ektagraphic Visualmaker. Essentially a stand coupled with close-up lenses and parallax-corrected framing accessories, the Visualmaker enabled even the cheapest Instamatic to make high-quality photographs and transparencies of postage stamps and other very small items. A"ermarket manufacturers produced similar items, one with an f/ aperture offering the great depth of field needed by dentists; entomologists, jewelers, and others quickly adapted...