Do you keep a notebook in your camera bag?

[Sirius Glass]

No.

Probably should.

Steve

 

[JOSarff]

I designed an exposure log that I fill out for each film holder and put it in the zip-lock bag with the holder when I'm done. It has the usual info plus filter factor, bellows factor and adjusted exp. I also note how I want to develop the negative. On the back are reciprosity corrections for several films.

 

[nyoung]

I keep two.

The spiral "reporter's" notebook in the camera bag for local stuff - where I record anything relevant about the shoot - names, times, etc.

For road trips, the general journal book - a sewn black and white school composition book - goes in the bag. It catches any photo info from each day as I shoot. Each night on the road I sit down and journal in the events of the day so that by the end of a trip I have a daily diary that includes not only the photo info but all the other notable details of the trip.

 

[RMP-NikonPro]

yep, MacBook Notebook!

 

[n5jrn]

Yes, though it typically is used for jotting down notes of what I just shot, instead of how I shot it.

One of my biggest uses of photography is documenting the native plants of my ecoregion, and if I'm on a native plants hike of an area I'm unfamiliar with, I'll jot down the exposure and roll numbers of unfamiliar species.

 

[sly]

I"m pretty good about keeping notes for my LF work. I usually will jot notes on scrap paper while out shooting, then will transfer to the book once I'm back at car/home. One image per page. I note date, place, film, f-stop, shutter speed, ISO, filters, light conditions, anything else that seems pertinent. I also make a little sketch and/or description of the image so it is easier to match up the negative as it comes out of the tank or tray with the correct information. I also take the notebook into the darkroom with me and note film development info and then add my printing info as well. I used to keep darkroom notes in a separate book, but find it easier to refer back if I have all the info about a particular image in one place. The bad images end up with alot of white space, but with a good image I will end up using the whole page as I note different printing attempts, lith or pd/pt maybe.
MF and 35mm work - I occaisionally make notes while shooting. I write development info on the neg sleeve, and keep printing info on the back of the contact sheet, which I keep in a 8 1/2x11 sleeve next to the negs.

 

[Monophoto]

do you keep a notebook in your camera bag? If yes, what information/data do you keep in it?

I keep records of exposures - aperture, shutter speed, filtration, lens, etc. Also, because I usually try to meter the contrast range of the image, I also note the expected processing - N, N-1, N-2, N+1, etc. I only do this for 4x5 since that's the only place where I have the ability to use the information to make decisions about processing. I also note the subject, date and time of day, and sometimes a potential title in the event a final print is ever made.

After processing the film, that information is transferred to a record sheet that eventually is filed with a proof sheet. That record sheet also has space for making notes about how I print the negative.

 

[Paul Howell]

I keep two.

The spiral "reporter's" notebook in the camera bag for local stuff - where I record anything relevant about the shoot - names, times, etc.

Likewise I keep a reporter's notebooks, but I use them for all of my shoots, 35mm-LF. I record film type,who what, where, when, I add expsoure data to LF and sometimes MF, I keep one notebook in each bag. I tied to keep more comperhensive "logs", but not just in my nature.

 

[tbm]

If I am out shooting with multiple rolls of film and don't want to get confused about which ones have been completely exposed while I am out and once I return home, I prepare a full page of Avery labels where each one simply reads "done". Then, when I finish shooting a roll in the field, I simply pull off one "done" label and affix it to the plastic film container so that I don't end up reinserting a finished roll in my camera. I also do this because my Leica R8 is set to not automatically rewind film rolls completely back into the canisters so that I can trim the end before developing the rolls. This simple habit is a blessing!

 

[archphoto]

Actualy not.... maybe I should for names and so on.

 

[Larry Bullis]

...
I am so horribly unorganized, though, that I wouldn't know what to do with more exhaustive notes if I took them.

Me too, but I am certain that the act of writing the words down helps fix the idea in memory. In college I took voluminous lecture notes, never looked at them again, and did just great anyway.

Age, however, changes everything.

 

[mikebarger]

There is a Fred Picker Zone VI field data guide (notebook) on ebay now.

Mike

 

[jgcull]

What a good idea. I think I'll go put one in there. Oh wait, maybe I do have one but I guess I don't use it. Oh well.

 

[jp80874]

Interesting thread, in that so many people have responded in so many ways, ranging from guilt to almost religious testifying to the use. I would think that it is a personality thing. I also carry a 5x7 notepad in my kit with the best intensions of using it as described. In reality one pad has lasted several years. I have jotted notes when I discovered that a lens needed tightening on a Sinar board or cleaning, that I needed to carry an extra tool in the kit or car. I have written down that I needed to purchase more supplies or go back to such and such location at a different time of day or with different lighting conditions. I have even exchanged addresses and phone numbers with delightful people I have met. I don’t remember ever writing down what was supposed to be there.

I was in sales for forty years and I was told that sales people were always bad with paper work. It was as good an excuse as I needed to avoid call reports as long as I was over quota and could get away with it. I have photographed with a lovely lady who is an accountant. She comes by this documentation thing naturally and I think it works for her. I know a person who makes elaborate detailed notes who consistently takes lousy pictures. He collects all sorts of equipment, but rarely does the grunt work to learn how to use it. His worst pictures are blamed on the models. Another fellow mysteriously takes out a Palm Pilot and jots down things all the time. I don’t know if he uses it for this. My step son, an author in his thirties uses one of the moleskin booklets that is his "life". He has used this since I met him when he was 13 and it seems to work very well for him. If it works for you, God Bless. I am always too busy taking pictures and forget.

John Powers

 

[Ira Rush]

I use Fred Picker's little red notebook in my Hassey bag and one of Jason Brunner's LF books with my Zone VI 4x5. Seems backwards?

Mike

Now, not that I am looking for yet one more... I am curious about the following...

I have Fred Picker's book Zone VI Workshop.. The Fine Print in Black & White Photography, can't find any mention of a red notebook there.
Was this in any of his newsletters? If not where can I find out more?
Googling yields no results.

There is a Fred Picker Zone VI field data guide (notebook) on ebay now.

Mike

Mike,

Thanks for the heads up re: the "Lil Red Notebook"....

Took a look at it... OK... but I think I'll stick with the one I don't use 90% of the time

Now I can sleep at night

Once again, thanks

 

[PCGraflex]

I am just wondering, do you keep a notebook in your camera bag? If yes, what information/data do you keep in it?

Also if there is one piece of information from your notebook that you would give a young starter analog photographer, what would that information be?

I use a little recorder in the field. No tapes, but one with a chip. Small, about the size of a large pack of gum.

Yes, exposure information gets entered, but a lot more. Things like weather, what the scene looks like, what I think the print might look like. Observations, like perhaps photographing at another time, another angle, how I felt about the picture, etc. I then TRY and write down in my book what my field notes were. I say try because sometimes it is alot of work.

I am going to try and use the PDA to make a file to download to the PC so I have it that way.

 

[BobNewYork]

I have the Picker little red book, moleskins and a host of other notebooks and pens but I rarely used them - through pure laziness! Then I bought one of those adaptors that converts my iPod to a voice recorder. It works well for me.

I often go out to look for photo ops, (because, for me anyway,there's nothing worse than just "going out to take photographs" without any idea what I'm looking for.) I take the GPS and the iPod and as I spot possibilities I make "notes". This way I build a book of things to be done, and can also work out what time of day, what season, even what weather conditions etc makes the most sense for that subject.

Been out of operation for the past year, so I've had to content myself with building a "To-Do Portfolio" This seems to work well for me.

 

[colrehogan]

A while ago I made this:

http://www.lulu.com/content/2045656

...mostly for myself. It's geared towards large format. You can make one of your own pretty easy, or many folks use those waterproof notebooks (the name escapes me). Some kind of log is essential for large format, or any kind of work like night photography where it is useful to know what you did in hindsight, so you can do it again, make intelligent adjustment based on observable results with known facts, or at least half the time in my case, what not to do again

Rite in the Rain.

I use notebooks for my LF stuff and have for MF and 35 mm, but usually on these formats only for IR. I also write developing information in them. Something that I do for LF is write down the dates I've loaded my holders and what type of film is loaded in them.

 

[petras@foto.sk]

Never

I do not use any digital camera, so I do not need it. I show photograpgs only. Not LCD. (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

 

[Prest_400]

I do not use any digital camera, so I do not need it. I show photograpgs only. Not LCD. (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

I do have a compact, but since I have my mechanical SLR I don't trust that little thing anymore.
I don't have a notebook for my photography, but I should.