Focus on Imaging 2012

Not sure if I have placed this on the right forum. Mods please move if I haven't. Anyone from the U.K. or rest of Europe been to the above this week and what was there which was of any interest to we analoguers?

I think this is the first year where I haven't seen any mention of the above at all. A sign of how little the above show caters for us these days, apart from the Harman stand?

pentaxuser

Dear Pentaxuser,

I was there!!!!! did'nt see many Apuggers sadly : Lets face it photo shows are mostly about d****l nowadays but to be fair FOCUS in Birmingham UK is one excellent show......

We had a fantastic show.....we showed the prototype of the HARMAN TiTAN 10x8 pinhole camera, that just wowed everyone, we moved a lot of of film and a lot of paper and a lot of TiTANS!!!!!

But what was best is that our stand was busy, not a bit busy, but the most busy....and lots and lots of photo students, hundreds in fact.

Interestingly, I was given the photo studio to look after, I was taking 10 x 8 paper portraits on a 10 x 8 sinar, we had students from Warwickshire College, processing them and contacting them down....these kids were 17 and 18 and they did a fantastic job, I was knocked out by the enthusiasm they showed and the sheer love they had for analog photography.

In fact we got so carried away we did 600, yup thats right, 600 10x8 mono portraits in four days.....by the end the students were doing all the photography as well, I was just helping managing the work flow...I do not think we had a single sitter who was not chuffed to bits with their portrait, I had the best and most motivating four days of hard graft that I can remember, monochrome photography is alive, its the best, its fun, and people of all ages love what we, and all of you produce...


Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

Thanks for your interesting reply, Simon. I can think of no better way to promote analogue processing than what you did.

Actually on another mainly U.K. site called FADU where I posted the same thread I got a good response so there were forum members at Focus some of whom may well be APUGers but replied on FADU instead knowing that many here outside of the U.K. or countries in Europe close to the U.K. had little chance of getting to Focus.

The consensus on FADU was that analogue seemed to be better catered for than in previous years. Call me an optimist but there have been other signs as well that analogue is attracting more interest. A certain UK magazine in recent months now has articles on analogue when in recent years it was as if analogue was dead.

pentaxuser

Sounds absolutely fantastic Simon, really wish I was there to witness it. After hearing from other posters over at Talk Photography about the sort of people there, wielding massive rucksacks, a glutton of 70-200s and excessively rude people I'd heard a lot of negative stuff about it, so glad to hear there was a lot of enjoyment had by some.

I didn't go to the show this year but when I was there last year it was a useful trip - obviously *most* of the show is towards digital but that's what the market is now, however, if one is looking to see equipment it is a good place to go. Last year I went because I was in the market for a paper trimmer and no retail store had the entire range on hand to look at - but the manufacturer did on their stand. Besides, not all new gear is actually digital, I got to compare Manfrotto, Giotto etc tripods - nothing beats the experience of handling a £600 Gitzo tripod to see if it's worth the money!

Anyway, good to hear that Harman were there and having a busy few days. All is not lost for the analogues!