It seems I lost my sense of humor as a side effect of the pandemic.
Do you use a footswitch with your enlarger?
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Since the thread is pretty much off the rails, this seems as good a place as any to mention that I am watching the Phillies/San Diego playoff game, and there was a commercial showing that Samsung (I think) is introducing a flip phone. Of course, it is pretty gigantic, roughly the size of Captain Kirk's communicator. It is doubtful it will fit in anyone's back pocket, but pants manufacturers are kind of excited about having to introduce new lines of pants to accommodate the phone. Women are already carting around handbags which can and do double for grocery store shopping bags so this new phone should pose no impediment to them. Captain Kirk used a holster for his communicator, so a holster is always an option. Or maybe he used velcro. No, I think velco was for his phaser.
How is this related to photography you ask? Simple. They showed how you can lay the phone on a table and then bend the top half up, and voila you can take a selfie without having to hold the phone. Presumably, this reflects the genius of its design.
I am using an iPhone 4 I inherited from my daughter what, a decade ago, which I am pretty happy with, so no new pants are in the offing for me.
Update:
Now Apple is showing a commercial for the iPhone 14 (I never thought I would be ten versions behind). As with all Apple commercials, it is long on style and short on substance, but the take away is that it has three cameras and car crash detection. I haven't delved into the details to find out what you do with three cameras on your phone. Maybe I'll just wait and see what Petapixel has to offer on the subject. Oh, the iPhone 14 isn't a flip phone so you still have to hold it to take a selfie, so no progress there.
How is this related to photography you ask? Simple. They showed how you can lay the phone on a table and then bend the top half up, and voila you can take a selfie without having to hold the phone. Presumably, this reflects the genius of its design.
I am using an iPhone 4 I inherited from my daughter what, a decade ago, which I am pretty happy with, so no new pants are in the offing for me.
Update:
Now Apple is showing a commercial for the iPhone 14 (I never thought I would be ten versions behind). As with all Apple commercials, it is long on style and short on substance, but the take away is that it has three cameras and car crash detection. I haven't delved into the details to find out what you do with three cameras on your phone. Maybe I'll just wait and see what Petapixel has to offer on the subject. Oh, the iPhone 14 isn't a flip phone so you still have to hold it to take a selfie, so no progress there.
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Indispensable for me too.
I use foot switches for all my enlargers and my wet-side timers.
On the wet side, I wired two foot switches in series so I can start/stop the timer from different locations. One switch lives under the developer tray, the other under the fixer tray.
For enlarging, I use the "focus" toggle switch on the wall-mounted unit to turn on the enlarger for focusing. For exposing, however, I use the foot switch.
My timers are set on the maximum number of seconds possible (99 in the case of my digital GraLab timers) and the metronome "beep" function is turned on. I start exposures with a card held under the lens, let things settle down and then pull the card and start counting seconds. Dodging is done between certain counts, say this shadow from counts two-five, then this other one from 10-14, etc. Exposure is ended by putting the card back under the lens. Burning is then a simple matter of counting seconds with the metronome. I can switch off the light with the footswitch while burning to check notes, change filtration, etc. easily.
Test strips are made by pulling the card away and beginning the exposure and then covering up stripes on the test strip in pre-determined 25% 30% interval. (10 - 13 - 17 - 22 - etc. for 30%). Exposure is ended by putting the card back under the lens.
Enlarger light gets turned off after exposure with the footswitch.
Taping, gluing, Velcroing, etc. your footswitch to the floor or wherever is easy. There's no reason to complain about not being able to find it or having to search for it on the floor in the dark.
Best,
Doremus
I use foot switches for all my enlargers and my wet-side timers.
On the wet side, I wired two foot switches in series so I can start/stop the timer from different locations. One switch lives under the developer tray, the other under the fixer tray.
For enlarging, I use the "focus" toggle switch on the wall-mounted unit to turn on the enlarger for focusing. For exposing, however, I use the foot switch.
My timers are set on the maximum number of seconds possible (99 in the case of my digital GraLab timers) and the metronome "beep" function is turned on. I start exposures with a card held under the lens, let things settle down and then pull the card and start counting seconds. Dodging is done between certain counts, say this shadow from counts two-five, then this other one from 10-14, etc. Exposure is ended by putting the card back under the lens. Burning is then a simple matter of counting seconds with the metronome. I can switch off the light with the footswitch while burning to check notes, change filtration, etc. easily.
Test strips are made by pulling the card away and beginning the exposure and then covering up stripes on the test strip in pre-determined 25% 30% interval. (10 - 13 - 17 - 22 - etc. for 30%). Exposure is ended by putting the card back under the lens.
Enlarger light gets turned off after exposure with the footswitch.
Taping, gluing, Velcroing, etc. your footswitch to the floor or wherever is easy. There's no reason to complain about not being able to find it or having to search for it on the floor in the dark.
Best,
Doremus
That is definitely worth looking into.
When you get your iPhone 14 how will you test the car crash detection?
[/QUOTE]
I don't know. How do you know your airbags work? So many uncertainties in life.
I don't know. How do you know your airbags work? So many uncertainties in life.
I don't know. How do you know your airbags work? So many uncertainties in life.
[/QUOTE]
I got rid of the biggest air bag when I got divorced.
You're ahead of me: At least you had a sense of humor. The engineer in me makes me too serious.
I'm not quite old enough to remember pushbutton transmissions, but I still drive a manual tranny.
Maybe I'll try that trick of putting Velcro under my footswitch so it'll stay put on carpet. I've been putting it almost between my knees and squeezing.
Install a footswitch circuitwise parallel to the expose switch.
I would be easy to create a circuit and write some firmware for a microcontroller to turn on the enlarger when you speak loudly into a microphone for over one second. Just say, "START EXPOSING NOW" (or say anything else), and the timer would start. The firmware would detect that there was nearly nonstop noise for at least one second. The one second ensures that brief sounds from moving or dropping things don't start the timer.
Has anyone made such a sound-triggered timer?
I like to listen to (sometimes loud) music in the darkroom. Wouldn't work for me.
This VRM is well suited for a process timer. We don't want to touch the process timer with wet fingers, so instead, we could vocally command it to "ZERO" when we put the print in the next tray. And also "NO COMP" to disable temperature-compensation when development is done. And say "PAINT IT BLACK" to play a Rolling Stones song. Based on the length of the "What are you listening to?" thread, that feature would sell many timers.
I already have the overhead light turn on and off via voice command - and subsequently feel stupid enough talking to an empty room. I can't imagine how irritating it would be to have to tell the enlarger to turn on and off. Maybe just hook it up to The Clapper?
I find the darkroom a respite away from talking things like people, TV, radio, Siri, those Google and Amazon things that carry on conversations (often between themselves), etc. I don't want to be talking to my enlarger, and timer, and lights, and dry mount press, and all the rest. How can you get in the zone with all that jabbering going on? Of course, everyone has different workflows, so talking to their darkroom equipment may be just the thing. Am I being curmudgeonly? Are all the new film enthusiasts now going to leave Photrio? I'm not saying you have to do it my way. If you want a voice activated Jobo for Christmas, knock yourself out.
When stuff like this comes up, I think it is a good time to remember this show tune from the musical Oklahoma:
When stuff like this comes up, I think it is a good time to remember this show tune from the musical Oklahoma:
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Not every thread has to reflect on that.
After all those harangues on curmudgeoness in the CatLABS thread I'm hypersensitive. Talk about being taken to the woodshed. It was the mother of all woodsheds. I was in tears. Fortunately the thread died down before they brought out the hickory switches.
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I stopped reading CatLABS threads a while ago and my blood pressure went down.
The art is learning how many of those steps can be integrated into one sequence of operations.
If they don't, you probably won't have too much to worry about afterwards.
No, just a long hospital stay, big medical bills and possible paralysis. But the pain pills will keep you from worrying.
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