Negatives

I agreed to scan a set of photos for a book I've been working on. Included with many of the prints were 4 x 5 black-and-white negatives in faded brown envelopes, with handwritten notes from almost fifty years ago. (The photos were publicity stills for a short-lived TV series that went on the air in 1959. It's small wonder they've survived.) The paper was yellowed and aged, and it had the most wonderful scent. (I've always loved the way paper smells as it ages.) The negatives were in beautiful condition, never betraying a trace of their age. It's hard to imagine digital photography will ever have that sense of permanence.

One of the first jobs I had after leaving college was with a photography lab. This was a small business whose better days had passed — not because of digital photography, that was still in the far future, but because of changing times. General Electric (whose headquarters were literally just down the street) once provided a steady source of business, but fortunes had turned for both the company and the city of Schenectady. There was all sorts of interesting equipment and chemicals, boxes of film and paper, but most were left unused. The business had been purchased with the hope of finding a way to turn it around, somehow, but most of the work that came in were small jobs, making prints from older negatives that more modern, automated labs couldn't accommodate.

The lab could also print murals, on large rolls of photographic paper. Once the exposure had been made, the paper would be rolled up, and unravelled by hand into a series of chemical baths for processing. You had to be very careful doing this, as the paper would easily crease if not rolled evenly.

I once printed one during off-hours — I forget what it was, exactly — that hung on the back of the door of the small studio apartment I shared with my girlfriend at the time.