Got a darkroom job in 2014

Darkroom317

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I have been on this forum a while but I didn't know which to post this news.

In October I started working at Shiloh Museum of Ozark History. I am the museum's photographer/ darkroom technician.

For the last two months I have been making and printing copy negatives from prints. I also have been making contact prints and direct enlargements form glass negatives from the early 1900s.

Here is my workspace
 

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Sirius Glass

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A job that is your hobby is a dream come true.
 

Ektagraphic

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Wow + congratulations! It is so inspiring to hear that jobs like this really do exist out there! It is also neat to hear that a museum isn't resorting straight to scanning and would have things actually printed!
 
OP
OP

Darkroom317

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We are in the process of getting a digitization grant. But my boss, the archivist told me that they are not convinced in the archivability of digital. Silver gelatin is known to hold out as evidence in the negatives I am printing directly from. Digital has not been proven to be archival.
 

mike c

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What a great Boss, wish there were more like him.
 

Truzi

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Cool, congratulations. It has to be interesting working with all of that history.
 

AgX

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Congratulations!

I'm very surprised to learn that in times of scanning a museum still runs a darkroom for printing.
 

ToddB

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That's awesome!! What a dream job for an Analog photographer.

Todd
 

MattKing

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The summer I spent working as a darkroom technician for the Vancouver Sun newspaper was one of my favourite jobs ever.

Working with other people's negatives, and having the responsibility of turning out high quality work, is both challenging and satisfying.

Congratulations.
 

Black Dog

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Hello and congatulations!
 

Sirius Glass

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AgX said:
Congratulations!

I'm very surprised to learn that in times of scanning a museum still runs a darkroom for printing.
Click to expand...

Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles.
 

AgX

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PE, Sirius, you both hint at photography museums. With those it is not that surprising.
I rather thought of non-photo museums, as that regional historic museum.
 

Sirius Glass

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AgX said:
Congratulations!

I'm very surprised to learn that in times of scanning a museum still runs a darkroom for printing.
Click to expand...

AgX said:
PE, Sirius, you both hint at photography museums. With those it is not that surprising.
I rather thought of non-photo museums, as that regional historic museum.
Click to expand...

Picky, picky, picky! You wanted examples and we supplied two. Now you want to tighten up the requirements. That is called "requirement creep".
http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Requirements+creep
 

canuhead

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I would think a forward thinking archivist would digitize everything NOW as a precaution to something happening down the road. While it's debatable that digital may not be proven for long term, it would be prudent to have parallel archives. The only issue I see is that one will need to keep making copies of drives if one is serious about digital archives.

Whatever happens, DO NOT let the digitization grant slip away in spite of what one thinks of digital archives.
 

Sirius Glass

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That sounds like backward thinking.
 
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