What Does "Lomo" Mean?

[ozphoto]

Funny thing is, I've seen "Lomography Film" for sale in a few stores - regular 120 in a nice fancy "LOMO" branded box, for way more than I could buy it in the regular yellow or green box. . . . . talk about ripping you off!!!

I guess if Lomo et al are not "real cameras", then all those people who started out using Box Brownies weren't shooting on real cameras either.

Who cares if they're overpriced, dark-boxes with coke-bottle lenses? The people that are using them are more often than not, overcoming the limited abilities of these plastic ogres to create some outstanding images; sure they results mightn't be to everyone's taste, but can't that be said for all forms of photography/art?

To each their own, and long live film - in any shape or form it is used to create pictures.

 

[Chris Lange]

What's funny, is that you can practice "lomography" with any camera.

Sometimes I do it with my Rolleiflex, sometimes I do it with my Hasselblad.

I even do it with my Leica, Nikons, and Pentax 6x7 occasionally. Lomography is simply the overcoming of obsession with technical limitations and theory, and just giving plain old serendipity a chance.

Sometimes I shoot my 6x7 without the lens mounted, just held in front of the mount, so that I can tilt and shift as I please. A shroud of black duct tape is a serviceable enough bellows. That's pretty f*cking lomo, if you ask me.

 

[DSLR]

Lomography do not make own films. At their best they offer custom conversions.

I was talking about this...Dead Link Removed

That's pretty f*cking lomo, if you ask me.

LMAO!

 

[PeteZ8]

it's hipster for CRAP.

Who cares as long as they are keeping film in production for the rest of us, let them do as they wish.

 

[marenmcgowan]

What's funny, is that you can practice "lomography" with any camera.

Sometimes I do it with my Rolleiflex, sometimes I do it with my Hasselblad.

I even do it with my Leica, Nikons, and Pentax 6x7 occasionally. Lomography is simply the overcoming of obsession with technical limitations and theory, and just giving plain old serendipity a chance.

Sometimes I shoot my 6x7 without the lens mounted, just held in front of the mount, so that I can tilt and shift as I please. A shroud of black duct tape is a serviceable enough bellows. That's pretty f*cking lomo, if you ask me.

nice

 

[EASmithV]

It's like Cholo but for image quality

 

[ozphoto]

The Lomo store is making it easy for buyers to buy all they need in one hit; ($26.00 for a roll of expired Agfacolor 160 (12 years) could be an expensive experiment. . . . . )

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The sardine can camera is also rather neat:

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[MattKing]

There are a few local places that sell lomography stuff. Some of them are labs and serious film outlets, and I'm quite confident that they also offer advice that would aid customers in moving from lower quality cameras to cameras that offer more control. I think that those who seek and/or use that advice have potential to strongly support the continued existence of film.

Other sources for lomography stuff are akin to gift stores. I have concerns about their contribution.

 

[marenmcgowan]

If an interested party walks into the serious film lab/store, and they are embraced with a welcoming attitude...well, then, maybe they become another "supporter of the continued existence of film." I like to think that the buzz will get more people interested and excited, and along the way we'll get more converts.

 

[AgX]

LOMO makes their own film, these "hipsters" may not be saving film.

Lomography do not make own films. At their best they offer custom conversions.

I was talking about this...Dead Link Removed

I don't see where you are hinting it.

 

[Ken Nadvornick]

What Does "Lomo" Mean?

It means more volume for the beleaguered manufacturers of photographic film.

It's just a funny spelling of the term for that...

Ken

 

[AgX]

What the Lomography company does is offering kind of package.
In times when film cameras, except for single-use ones, long have been wiped off the shelves, in some cities you can enter a shop with all these weird looking cameras and accessories and get all that fancy stuff.
The alternative of some 2nd hand film cameras sitting on the shelves of a camera store may not even exist in those cities.
There still would be thrift-shops and fleamarkets. But there the uninitiated would not even know what type of film that camera takes.

I got my Diana, still in box with bulb flash, at a fleamarket for 4€. But that was the only sample I saw in years. And I still would have to look for the bulbs. And had to clean the flash compartment from the residues of leaked batteries.

In a large city nearby I meanwhile can get a re-made Diana with kind of ever-ready electronic flash for about 20x the price I paid.

 

[mfohl]

I see some nerves have been touched here ...

I don't own a Lomo. But I did process yet another roll of film from my Holga. Along with a roll from my Nikon FM2. And I did some digital stuff over the weekend too. All of these are components of the medium.

Keep shooting. And don't feel superior.

 

[kevs]

I have a mixed opinion of the Lomo craze. I'm very glad it's here because it challenges the modern digital* hegemony that decrees that the subject of a photograph MUST be pin-sharp, and provides a small increase in film and processing sales. It may also provide a spur for these 'hipsters' to buy a more serious film camera and discover all that the medium has to offer. The only downside I see is the possible perception that ALL film photography is blurry, has wacky colours, vignetting, light leaks and other technical faults. Some folk just love to make false assumptions based on limited evidence... ;-)

*I'm well aware of Pictorialism, Linked Ring etc. but that's another thread.

Cheers,
kevs

 

[Darkroom317]

The only downside I see is the possible perception that ALL film photography is blurry, has wacky colours, vignetting, light leaks and other technical faults. Some folk just love to make false assumptions based on limited evidence... ;-)

That's my main problem with it

 

[Stephanie Brim]

Considering that all they have to do is search 'film photography' on Google to see that this is not the case, why be worried about that?

 

[Andy K]

it's hipster for CRAP.

Yeah, those little Lomo LC-A cameras are terrible...


LCABug by Takumar, on Flickr

The Minitar-1 1:2.8 32mm lens is superb.

 

[pdeeh]

If your only exposure to Stieglitz (or any photography) was his portrait of Oscar Bluemner, then you might think all photography was blurry, brown and contrastless.

The idea that those who use "lomo" cameras are so ignorant and ill-informed that they are incapable of looking further than wacky colours and light leaks ... well, I think it's a false assumption based on limited evidence, shall we say ...

 

[Andy K]

The idea that those who use "lomo" cameras are so ignorant and ill-informed that they are incapable of looking further than wacky colours and light leaks ... well, I think it's a false assumption based on limited evidence, shall we say ...

I'd say that view is based on outright uninformed snobbery. But then I've never been one to mince my words.

 

[JBrunner]

I'd say that view is based on outright uninformed snobbery. But then I've never been one to mince my words.

I agree with Andy. There are a lot of ways to make a photograph. Running down someone else's isn't one of them.

As far as what things sell for, the market determines that. If you think you can do better for cheaper, consider yourself wise or lucky or both.

 

[removed account4]

Yeah, those little Lomo LC-A cameras are terrible...


LCABug by Takumar, on Flickr

The Minitar 1 1:2.8 32mm lens is superb.

thats sweet andy !
i have a soft spot for slug bugs
l might be wrong but it looks like a 72'

 

[Andy K]

thats sweet andy !
i have a soft spot for slug bugs
l might be wrong but it looks like a 72'

It was indeed a '72. A 1200 DeLuxe, upgraded to a 1600 with twin Webbers etc. Rebuilt from a wreck by my own hand. Best car I ever had.

 

[removed account4]

it's kind of sucks that photographers ( digital or chemical ) are so insecure
they have to cut down people who don't practice the same sort of photography as them.

i'd rather look at a stack of "flawed" images than a handful of clinical ones

 

[removed account4]

It was indeed a '72. A 1200 DeLuxe, upgraded to a 1600 with twin Webbers etc. Rebuilt from a wreck by my own hand. Best car I ever had.

i feel for you. we had a 72 1600 and a 73 super ... both both rebuilt by us, both gone now ... the best cars i ever owned.
a neighbor a few miles away has one i see every time i ride my bike, i keep wanting to make him an offer and buy it from him ...

 

[Stephanie Brim]

I'd love one, but the problem is that my husband finds them very impractical when we can only get one more car. Heh.