The Online Photographer

The World's Best Photography Magazine Tries a Different Revenue Model

Given the previous post, this might be as good a time as any to note that the World's Best Photography Magazine (my nickname for the New York Times) is transitioning (again) into being a pay site. The deal is that your first 20 visits every month are free, but if you want to visit more often than that you're going to have to subscribe.

As a "content provider" in web terms, sort of, I can sympathize. The bills have to get paid somehow. The Times is probably outscaled for the web; the web is a mist of fine particles, and doesn't lend itself quite naturally to providers of buckets full of information. Even the mighty Times is usually experienced by browsers of the web a drop or two at a time: you follow a link to an article or two, then surf away again—you don't spread the web version all over the kitchen table and wallow in it for 45 minutes over a bagel with coffee.

The Week: what a newsweekly should be
The cap limit is likely to be just an annoyance to most users. From that perspective, the agument is that a spoiled and entitled internet audience, foiled from accessing the Times' content, will just go elsewhere, to wherever the information is free. (I'm even put off from visiting sites—and, much more importantly, from linking to them—by free registration firewalls.)

The New York Times building, across from the Port Authority. From Wikipedia.

The argument from the other perspective is quite a bit more chilling: it's that the world is increasingly full of vampires, and no one is tranfusing any blood. Even I am a sort of vampire, half the time: witness the subject of the previous post. Jim Lewis is a TOP reader, and leaves comments here from time to time, but all I've done with that post is to point you to an article the Times paid him to write and then gave us all for free. 

My recent favorite magazine has that pall over it, too. The magazine is called The Week, recommended to me by my brother Scott, whose reading recommendations are sparse but always good. Apropos my analysis 13 months ago of old TIME vs. new TIME, The Week's inspiration is the original TIME magazine. Much more modest, though. It's a slender rag (I like that about it) with all the news in it that can be crammed in, and just the news, and as briefly as possible. The Week is just what I want and need from a news magazine: it's what I have time for. It's the exact opposite of the direction the foundering Newsweek took when it lately moved to becoming a collection of long essays, something I don't really need (and, actually, don't really trust: I don't always know where the authors stand, and I'm not sure to what extent their analyses are interpretations or arguments, explanation vs. persuasion). But The Week is produced by a skeleton staff and is largely cobbled together from other sources: that is, it's vampirish. It still strikes me as a very valuable, but it's essentially a glorified clipping service. It combs the news and sifts and winnows it, and thanks for that—I do need help processing it all—but what it's not doing is much original reporting.

Of course, the New York Times is often cited in The Week as the source of its news. Along with many other sources, of course. The Week reports not so much on events, but on what the Times, and others, are reporting on events. You see the distinction.

The 30% Rule
The problem, of course, is that not everyone can be a vampire. Someone somewhere has to get down on the ground, do the shoe-leather work, and grind out the content. I do feel I provide a fair amount of original content—mostly in the way of opinion, entertainment, and commentary—but, for the most part, I'm not a reporter. I'm not out in the world gathering news. I'm not a replacement for the Times sending Jim out to work up an article on Herr Steidl.

What the situation reminds me of is what a naturalist I spoke to a number of years ago called "The 30% Rule." He was with the Michigan DNR, and I had contacted him to pick his brain about the controversial destruction of a local swamp. Speaking of America's wetlands, he said that the draining and filling of the first 30% of wetlands was essentially inconsequential; it didn't really matter (past tense because that 30% is gone now). The environment could spare it. The middle 40% is a gray area—arguable. But the final 30% is absolutely critical to the ecology of the nation's lakes, rivers, and streams: we destroy the last 30% of our wetlands at great peril to the hydrology of the land, the health of the ecosystem. Thus, business and development interests who claim that destruction of wetlands in the past hasn't had much bad effect are correct, but environmentalists who say the last remaining wetlands must be preserved at all costs are also correct.

I think The 30% Rule might apply equally to news-gathering organizations as well. You can kill 30% of them right off the top and hardly feel the loss; the middle 40% are debatable; but the last 30% are essential to the functioning of a free democracy and the interests of an adequately informed public. We're clearly in the middle 40% right now. But we're headed towards dangerous territory. Especially with the public wells increasingly polluted by uneducated demagogues and propaganda channels, somebody has to do original reporting under old-fashioned standards; everybody can't just repeat what somebody else said somewhere else.

To put it another way: we don't need a dozen photographers clustered around the corpse of a child who was shot by police. But we sure as hell need one.

Mike

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Featured Comment by HT: "I forgot about your old blog post about old Time vs. new Time magazine. Have you seen this video from The Onion? Hits the nail right on the head."

Mike replies: That is hilarious. Thanks, I needed that.

Featured Comment by Jessica: "Jessica here from The Week. Thanks for the praise—we actually saw a nice spike in traffic today thanks to your post! We appreciate it. Are you on Twitter or Facebook anywhere? We'd love to link to you. Thanks!"

Being Steidl

From Jim Lewis's short but incisive article about Gerhard Steidl:

Being Steidl is a calling, of sorts, and it has made Steidl himself a somewhat odd, and somehow endearing, man. Small, dark-haired, with thick glasses and dressed in a white lab coat, he comes across as part White Rabbit, always harried and usually late, and part Boss Man, supremely confident, decisive and in control. Like many single-minded people, he's almost childlike in his absorption: make a small joke and there will be a slight hitch in his response while he tries to reconcile the levity with his forward momentum....

Everything in his life is devoted to making the best books he can, and as many of them as possible.

Good reading about the man who is currently the preeminent publisher of photography books in the world.

(Here's a link to a picture of Gerhard.)

Mike

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Featured Comment by Eamon Hickey: "What an artful piece of writing that is—always a special kind of pleasure to see a lot of story packed into a small box of words."

Featured Comment by Julian: "After reading the article, I went to my modest collection of photography books and pulled out my copy of The Americans and, sure enough, there were the head and tail bands. I wouldn't even have noticed them if it wasn't for the article. That book has always somehow seemed to be of a higher quality than most of the other books I possess so it was fascinating to read about the care and devotion that went into its production. In today's world where people are cost-conscious often to the point of lunacy, it's good to know there are people who still care about producing a quality product. My copy will be treasured all the more now."

Featured Comment by Geoff Wittig: "That's a wonderful article. Books in their own small way are an artform just like paintings or sculpture: tangible objects whose physical form and aesthetics can augment their content, or sabotage it. Famed American book designer and typographer Bruce Rogers (1870–1957) obsessed about every detail of his books, from the hand-feel of the paper to the specific color of the ink (i.e. blue-black rather than warm black) to the aroma of the finished product. And he meticulously 'tuned' the choice of font and page design to reinforce the author's intent. For all that, most of his books were affordable trade volumes rather than pricely limited editions. It's great to know a few stalwart souls out there are keeping the flame alive."

Featured Comment by Konstantin: "I used to work for Steidl, back in the late '90s before I moved to London. I used to do rights for the fiction and nonfiction books but I was also responsible for international sales re photography.

"At that time the photography list was smaller but really exquisite. The fascinating thing about the production was and still is that everything happens in one place. The printery is downstairs, scans and post production first floor, layout, marketing, typesetting and everything else second floor.

"Photographers used to come and stay for days or weeks if necessary and I believe nothing has changed in that respect. It was normal to meet them: Jock Sturges, Gilles Peress, Juergen Teller, Fazal Sheikh, Peggy Sirota, Paolo Roversi, Nan Goldin, just to name a few. Steidl did all the printing for Scalo while they were still around.

"Gerhard Steidl is a fascinating character, totally dedicated, in love with his books, a true craftsman, nuts about what he is doing, full of enthusiasm, a perfectionist."

Metamaterials and Photonic Crystals

By Ctein

The future of photographic optics and sensors is going to be profoundly affected by advances in materials science that most photographers have never even heard of.

Broadly defined, metamaterials are substances whose properties depend on their microstructure more than their chemical composition and that exhibit novel properties not usually found in nature. Most of the definitions I've seen don't include photonic crystals, although I must confess that I don't understand why. Photonic crystals are also materials that have novel properties due to their structure.

The most notable thing about photonic crystals is that they can be what amounts to an optical semiconductor. Electronic semiconductors are valuable because they only allow electrons to have certain energies; between those allowable energy bands are what are called bandgaps. An electron cannot exist inside the material in that bandgap. The way an electron gets from one conduction band to another is by absorbing or emitting a photon that changes its energy by enough to let it jump across the bandgap. You can see where that leads: photodetectors, LEDs and laser diodes. By adding small amounts of contaminants (a.k.a. dopants) to a semiconductor, one can tailor the energy levels and bandgaps to one's needs, yielding the whole array of solid-state electronics and integrated circuits that exist today.

Photonic crystals can play the same tricks with photons. Within them, certain energy levels (a.k.a. wavelengths, a.k.a. colors) are forbidden while others are not. A natural example of a photonic crystal is opal; it's not chemistry but the geometric packing of silica spheres in bulk opal that cause the brilliant flashes of color that we see. Those packed spheres will only allow certain energy levels to exist. The phenomenon is very different from diffraction; when you tilt an opal, you don't see a continuous change in color as you would with a diffraction grating, instead you see it flash brilliantly when the angles are just right to reflect light at an allowable energy level into your eyes.

Artificial photonic crystals, like semiconductors, can be made to do all sorts of interesting things. You can make photonic crystals that act like diodes: Light can pass through them in one direction but not in the other. True one-way mirrors. You can make converters: if a photon of forbidden energy attempts to pass through the crystal, it's converted to a photon of a different energy.

Applications in sensor design are immediately apparent. Near-perfect anti-reflection coatings are one possibility. Another is much better color filters for the sensor. For example, digital cameras don't do well with blue light for two reasons only one of which is that today's blue filters aren't anywhere near perfect. The other is that silicon is relatively insensitive to blue light. Consequently, digital cameras don't have anywhere near perfect efficiency in this part of the spectrum.

One can imagine a photonic crystal blue filter. It blocks red and green light entirely. It doesn't allow blue light to passthrough, either, but it does convert blue photons to, oh say, infrared photons. Silicon is very responsive to infrared photons; the same sensor would have much more sensitivity with this filter than with a conventional one. A filter  might even convert a blue photon into two infrared photons, thereby doubling the signal in the sensor and improving the signal-to-noise ratio in the final output.

This is relatively normal stuff compared to metamaterials. They just plain break the rules, at least as we thought we understood them. When modern metamaterials were proposed about 10 years ago, the mathematics of them allowed for such outrageous possibilities that many physicists fairly felt that they would turn out to be a theoretical concept that could never be realized in actuality. Well, that turned out to not be the case. We can make metamaterials, and they have proven themselves to be extremely weird.

The most important weird property for photographers is that metamaterials can have refractive indices of less than one. Nothing "normal" does that; a pure vacuum has a refractive index of one and all ordinary materials and gasses have refractive indices higher than one. Not only can metamaterials get below one, they can even go negative. The holy Grail has been a refractive index of less than –1 at optical wavelengths, broadband, and we're closing in on that.

What do such negative indices allow that you didn't have before? Superlenses and hyperlenses: optics that perform better than what conventional optical theory allows in a perfect lens. You think the Raleigh diffraction limit is the ultimate resolving limit for a perfect lens? Not for a superlens; it can resolve much better than that theoretical boundary. Do you believe that you can't build a lens that can resolve details smaller than a half wavelength of light? Hyperlenses blow right past that.

These technologies are working their way out of the laboratory into scientific (translated: expensive!) instruments right now. They will migrate down to the photographic equipment that we use. Unless, of course, something even better comes along in the meantime.

Timeframe? My guess is during the next decade; I'd be surprised to see much appearance of these materials in our toys before 2020, but I'd be utterly amazed if it was after 2030.

Ctein

Physicist/photographer Ctein's regular column on TOP is published on Wednesdays.

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Ethics Around the Web

At Prison Photography, a summary of the "Brouhaha in Sweden following Award to Paul Hansen for his Image of Fabienne Cherisma." I was interested that he characterized the types of objections people raised about the image. I was also interested by the second picture at the link, by Nathan Weber, showing "vulture behavior" by photographers.

At Phil Coomes' blog at the BBC, the early comments to a post about a photographer working in Sendai, Jake Price, all focus on the photographic aspects of the pictures, rather than their content. The second commenter expresses a rather extraordinary view: "I'm sorry but I don't think B&W photos should be taken of this catastrophe—whilst it may emphasise the tragedy of the situation I personally think we should avoid the 'artistic' view of this nightmare unfolding before us."

That reminded me of the post "Moral Confusion" from 2006 (the post is a little confusing itself because the first paragraph doesn't link back to this post, to which it refers. Note especially that post's first two comments: "Anonymous" said, in response to Jerry Spagnoli's Daugerreotype of 9/11, "This crosses the line from techno-fetishism into something much worse: taking the trouble to make, and expect to have appreciated, an image of 3,000 people being burned to death just because it uses an 'interesting' process is obscene. Shame." David A. Goldfarb responded with a counterpoint view). That discussion raised the issue of whether a photograph could be unethical simply because of the process used.

Mike
(Thanks to Wei Li Hur and Louis Cullagh)

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Random Excellence: Francis Harrison

Francis Harrison, Duty

Unlike hordes of expats who left after the earthquake, TOP reader Francis Harrison decided to stay in Tokyo with his Japanese wife and his job at Ricoh. As the initial jitters subsided a bit he began to document everyday life around him. He says of this shot:

Odakyu Line guard. Early morning rush.

Much is made in the foreign media of the epic courage of the Japanese, but what is courage? A better way to understand what is going on here is the concept of 'duty,' of being more afraid of the 'shame' of not manning your post than of death itself....

Mike

(Thanks to Francis)

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Featured Comment by Steve m p: "Never met Mr.Harrison, but having followed his online photographic career—I can say: that if there is just one man who will get the shot, it's Francis. He defines the meaning of dedication to the craft."

Featured Comment by Animesh Ray: "It is wonderful to see dear Francis recognized here on TOP. He has been an inspiration, instructing us through TrekEarth, and lately through Photoholik, by his tireless encouragement and insightful critique. All told, his is a hard act to follow."

Featured Comment by David H.: Most folks I know in Tokyo have a less heroic reason for staying in Tokyo and going to work: no choice. Can't just pull up and leave. Another major reason is that the situation in Tokyo and vicinity is not / was not nearly as dire as people overseas seem to believe. We are basically back to normal, and we were within a few days. The uncertainty was not earthquake related, but due to conflicting, ever-changing reports on the nuclear reactors...and even that is subsiding.

"Common among those of us, Japanese and non-Japanese, who were lucky enough to have been in the Tokyo area instead of up north during the quake, is a reluctance to complain about what has so far been minor inconveniences—power outages, transportation delays—for most of us. It seems a bit embarrassing that we got off so easy.

"To put what happened into some perspective, the death toll in the tsunami areas is more than 11,000 with more than 16,000 still missing. In Tokyo, the last figure I heard was 7 people dead. Kanagawa to the south, 3. Chiba, just north, 13 dead. Eleven thousand plus deceased up north, to approximately 23.

"Now if I can just convince my friends and family in the States that Tokyo is safe. At least until the long overdue Kanto quake hits."

The Ultimate Canon versus Nikon Guide*

The common question: "Should I buy a Canon, or a Nikon, or something else?"

Mike's Ultimate Answer: Yes.

Mike

*Shortest post ever?

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Featured Comment by Daniel Clements: "Oh, good! That means I did the right thing."

Featured Comment by Pascal Sauvé: "Your shortest post comment made me think of an anecdote... When he wanted to inquire about the success of his new book Les Miserables, Victor Hugo sent a letter to his editor simply saying this: '?' Reply from his editor: '!' Now that is the shortest post. Ever."

Featured Comment by Russ: "Sorry, the correct answer is...maybe."

Featured Comment by Sheridan: "Mike, now we know: you are a Vorlon!"

Mike replies: Actually, "Mike" is just part of my encounter suit.

Featured Comment by Ophelia: "Succinct, accurate, to the point, and very very wise. Same thing that should be said if someone asks if they should buy a PC or a Mac, really. No, I'm kidding—of course you should buy a"

Featured [partial] Comment by Ben: "Socratic questioning is a really old concept, but another suggestion for the ultimate answer in almost anything is 'Why?'"

Mike replies: ...At least when you're five.

Featured Comment by Daniel Fealko: "Follow-on question: 'Why?' Dan's Answer: 'Because.'"

Mike replies: Are you by any chance the father of a five-year-old?

Featured Comment by Thomas Osborne: "...Just to the right of the Pentax ad."

Mike replies: Yes, the real answer is you should use a Pentax K-5 because that's what I use and you must be just like me.

Featured Comment by Miserere: "'Cos everyone wants to be like Mikey...."

Mike replies: 'Zackly. Who's guruing whom here?

Featured Comment by Patrick Perez: "So you didn't want to recommend the Lamborghini Murcielago?"

Mike replies: I recommend you go with the Ferrari 599.

Featured Comment by Maggie Osterberg: "Q: 'Should I buy a Canon, or a Nikon, or something else?' A: Mu! ::gong::"

Featured Comment by Boglev: "I am shocked—no one mentioned Ricoh GRD!?"

Featured Comment by Dennis Huteson: "What will you sit on now Mike, now that you've got rid of that rickety old fence?"

Featured Comment by Murchu: "Good. That's that sorted, then."

Rio Carnaval 2011

Photo by Peter Turnley

It hardly seems possible that it's now been more than a year since we posted Peter Turnley's portfolio from Brazil's 2010 Carnaval here on TOP. This year Peter returned to Rio for Carnaval as he has many times before—he teaches a photo workshop centering around Carnaval every year—and he's posted this year's "take" of selects at his redesigned website.

There's also a program of Peter's Carnaval pictures set to music as a Vimeo video. This is a nice selection from the work of a number of years, and I must say looks fantastic full-screen on my 27" iMac.

Peter will be teaching his Rio-Carnaval Workshop again next year from February 15th through 21st, 2012—details at the link.

Mike

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Book of the Week

Our book o' the week this week is Lee Friedlander's Recent Western Landscape 2008–09 (here's the U.K. link) for three very superficial reasons and one deeper one:

• The book is the catalogue of a recent show at Mary Boone Gallery, which I sorta slagged in these precincts recently;

• We've been discussing limited editions over the past several posts, and Lee Friedlander is one big-name photographer who doesn't edition his prints, feeling that to do so is "undemocratic";

• It's reputedly a pretty, well-made example of bookmaking (I haven't seen it); and finally,

• In the words of the good short review on dlkcollection, "...The most reasonable conclusion would be that Friedlander, even at his advanced age, is a bomb-throwing, rule-breaking subversive. His pictures disregard nearly every landscape convention and cliché on the books...."

If you're new to Friedlander, this might be like beginning your acquaintance with Beethoven with the late quartets or the Hammerklavier, but then again, the best introductions are out of print.

By the way, the prints at Mary Boone (again according to dlkcollection) are priced at $8,500 each. In case you want one. Doesn't seem all that democratic (man, I gotta get a grip and stop being so catty), but then, for that, the book will serve.

Mike
(Thanks to QT Luong and Pete)

Last week's book of the week: Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes
How many readers bought it through our links: 50
Popularity: Moderate

ADDENDUM: Well, this is kinda funny, and I hope you can see the humor in it...Lee doesn't edition his prints, but the Mary Boone Gallery tells me that the book is a limited edition. There will only be 500 copies. It's scheduled for publication later this week, and it will essentially sell out on publication—that's my best guess, anyway. It could last a few weeks, or, you might pre-order it right now and eventually have your order go unfilled. I don't know. But I don't think it will last very long. Anyway, if you want one, I'd suggest you put your order in today.

ADDENDUM No. 2: As of 11:00 p.m. Tuesday, 52 TOP readers have ordered this book from Amazon—53 if you count me. That's more than 10% of the entire production run according to the Gallery. We'll have to see what happens. I'll keep you posted—and if you ordered one, let me know if you get it, will you?

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Open Mike: Penguin Great Ideas

Well, I started out today by biting off more than I can chew. So what else is new?

I was going to concoct a recommended reading list. I get sort of frustrated that I can't find a list of the sort that I'd like, so I thought maybe I'd write one. At least then, other people would have from me what I want from someone else. But that's going to be a much bigger undertaking than I imagined at first... certainly more than the work of a single day.

So, as a sort of weak-coffee impromptu substitute, I thought I'd throw up another little plug for the pleasing and wonderful "Penguin Great Ideas" series. If you don't already know the series, it's a uniform edition of very nicely designed and printed deluxe paperback pamphlets that provide brief "samples" or "tastings" of great authors and great books.

The key to the project is that they are authors and books we might not—no, that we probably would not—otherwise read. I mean, it's all well and good to be able to make references to Thorsten Veblen, Nietzsche, and Schopenhauer, but what non-specialist, post-University, actually reads books by them? It's common to assume that every educated person is more or less conversant with the identities and ideas of thinkers such as Adam Smith, Rousseau, and Marx, but, again, who actually delves firsthand? (Even most economists have never read Smith in the formidable original. I haven't either, even though I own the magnificent Folio Society three-volume set. I have it scheduled for my sixties). Finally, there are those authors who, unless they were assigned to you in school (and maybe not even then, if we're honest), you will just never read if you live to be a hundred and ten, like Thomas Hobbes or Gibbon or David Hume—and of course nobody reads classics these days, so Seneca, Plutarch, and Lucretius are pleasant to encounter en passant. (I have read Plutarch, in North's translation, but that's because I have a side interest in Elizabethan translations.)

So this is where the Penguin pamphlets come in. They're good for those of us willing to admit that no, we're not ever going to read the whole Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire or Hannah Arendt. Because, if you don't actually read Thoreau (now that idea actually fills me with consternation—Walden is my favorite book, #1 all time, the best ever, the top of the heap, the one book I would take to the apocryphal desert island), you should certainly at least read a little.

I have a longstanding fetishistic fondness for books, I admit—books as objects, books as art—and the "Great Ideas" pamphlets are lovely little fillips in that regard too. Most of the covers are entirely or mostly typographical, and all of the pamphlets I've seen have been especially well designed. Clearly, Penguin employs some talented designers, and clearly, they've been given the green light to do their thing. They've created many modest masterpieces.

Into every such series a clinker must fall, of course, and I regret that I cannot recommend the Penguin Great Ideas Tao te Ching. It is the world's second most-translated book (after the Holy Bible), but the translation they've chosen isn't very good. (I've made a bit of a study-on-the-side of the Tao, too—I now own some 18 translations and counting.)

Although this series has proliferated—I remember when the first ones came out, and there are many more now, some of them already out of print—it's probably not a series you'd want to collect comprehensively. There's no real reason to do so. Just as the series itself dips its toe into many waters, so it would be best to pick and choose what appeals to you personally from within the many offerings. (Here's the U.K. link.) I certainly don't need the Orwell titles, for instance, because I already have everything he ever wrote. I bought them anyway; but do as I say, not as I do, and don't feel bad if you only try a few—that's the nature of sampling.

Really, though, shouldn't everyone read at least a little Montaigne and just a little Emerson? The whole works might not fit a busy modern life, but an acquaintance with the actual words of many of these great authors goes a long way toward enriching it.

Mike

"Open Mike" is a series of off-topic posts that appears on TOP on Sundays.

P.S. This is one of those posts that cost me a lot of money to write. :-)

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Question from Mark Roberts: "OK, which translation of the Tao te Ching would you recommend? :)"

Mike replies: I was afraid someone would ask me that. I can't really answer. I don't speak or read Chinese, so I'm not in a position to expound directly on the accuracy of the translations, and (obviously, since I don't speak Chinese), I'm not an expert on ancient Chinese literature and its cultural context. Plus, I can only comment on translations into English.

One problem is that various translators' beliefs about the interpretations of the meanings of the chapters will color their choices when rendering the texts in English. A further difficulty is that (I'm told) the shadings of meanings, connotations, and references implicit in Chinese word choices cannot be conveyed into English without great pendulous explanations, which leads to...excessive specification, you might call it. Finally, translators' goals have differed: some are trying to accurately convey philosophical meaning, some are trying to hew to the best textural sources, some want the literal meanings of the characters to convey, and some are trying to reproduce the poetry and simplicity of the original. All this can lead to widely varying results.

That said, Arthur Waley has long been considered the most accurate English translation, although his is literarily ponderous. Prof. Chichung Huang's is reputedly the most literal from a linguistic and scholarly perspective. My vote for the "best" would be the one by Robert G. Henricks (Ballantine Books, 1989), for its balance of scholarly scrupulousness and the rather easy, colloquial, effortless quality of the prose he uses in his translations, and his, let's call it, nonpartisan approach to the various controversies and allegiances.

That said, my very favorite is the most demotic (in America at least)—the longstanding bestseller ostensibly translated by Gia-Fu Feng—and not just because it is illustrated with photographs! (By Jane English). To enlist a musical analogy, there is a great danger with this text of "talking about notes" instead of playing them and feeling the swing. This version does get some of the trees wrong, but it sees the forest.

It is actually not a true translation. The book was evidently conceived to show off the photographs of Jane English, and Gia-Fu Feng did not have a very comprehensive command of English when he did the translation. His editor at Knopf/Vintage, however, was the most excellent Toinette Lippe, then at the beginning of her distinguished career, who saw promise in the project. So she worked with Feng to extensively re-write the English text. The result might be considered a "fantasia" on the Tao te Ching, rather than strictly a "translation." And yet, it...well, it's music, and it swings. It's been a perennial bestseller, and deserves that status in my opinion. It's vivid, communicative, poetically simple, and implies the text's profundities without forcing them to earth with a thud.

My position is that Eastern classics, like Eastern religions, take on a new life when they come to new lands, and slavish devotion to the historical and cultural contexts and original meanings is not necessarily superior to the life it finds in new soil; and in that respect, the Feng/Lippe book has an important place in the American cultivar of philosophical Taoism. It is still the version I recommend first, and love best.

Featured Comment by Otto Pietinen: "My answer to Mark Roberts as a student of classical Chinese philosophy is: None are satisfactory, at least from the point of view of philosophical content. The language used in the texts of the Hundred Schools era (6th to 3rd centuries BCE) is grammatically very open to different interpretations because of its lack of redundancy. Any communication of information requires a certain amount of noise in addition to the actual content in order to be legible, but the written Chinese of the period minimizes this. It doesn't mark definite/indefinite, plural/singular or gender distinctions, and has no cases or verbal inflection. In addition, parts of sentences are often omitted, and distinctions between parts of speech is only indicated by syntax, meaning you can't distinguish to win, victory, victoriously and victorious except by the context of the other things contained in the sentence, to which the same of course applies. And they didn't use punctuation either, so deciding what to actually include in a sentence can be a bit tricky at times.

"Now when you add the facts that the earliest dictionary of Chinese is from early 2nd century CE, at least 350 years after the writing of the Daodejing [Daodejing = Tao to Ching...just different ways of transliterating —Ed.], and the earliest commentary on the text was written some 100 years after that in an intellectual climate transformed by the introduction of buddhist philosphy to China, it is quite apparent that the explicit meaning of the text is very difficult or impossible to decipher, which is the reason translators differ so wildly in their interpretations. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't read or enjoy them, and unless you're going to learn classical Chinese, you should read many. One theory, not my own though I can't remember the source, for the popularity of the Daodejing is that it actually contains very little theoretical content, but rather evocative, poetry-like language that requires the reader to fill in the blanks with their own thoughts, thus making it accessible to anyone who enjoys thinking. This would mean that the individual translations are more like separate works inspired by the original book, but by reading several and comparing, you'd get a more and more complete view of the Daodejing by considering the viewpoints of the translators.

"For those interested in the philosophy of the period, I would recommend Chad Hansen's book A Daoist Theory of Chinese Thought. For maximum enjoyment you should first read a more conventional introduction, such as Feng Youlan's (also romanized Fung Yu-lang) A History of Chinese Philosophy or for a slightly modernized view, Angus C. Graham's Disputers of the Dao, as the Hansen book is a very polemical attack against what he calls 'the traditional interpretation.'"

Featured Comment by Toinette Lippe: "'Fantasia' is a strong word, Mike. There are many good collaborative translations that have stood the test of time and this, I believe, is one of them (it has sold over a million copies in North America).

"Gia-fu Feng grew up in China and studied with a classical Chinese scholar. He owned both ancient and modern Chinese versions of the Tao Te Ching and, to begin with, he translated both versions character by character and compared the two. He then shared one chapter each day with the students of the Stillpoint community he had founded. Each morning the group studied the text as a spiritual exercise, exploring its ideas and refining the language. I don't read Chinese and so I could not compare any of the English translations with the original. So I chose a dozen translations ranging from Arthur Waley’s historically accurate version to Witter Bynner’s lyrical poem, which seemed to take liberties with the text while perfectly expressing its spirit. I would study how each of the twelve translators had rendered a particular sentence and then return to Gia-fu’s translation to see what he thought it meant. I would then find a way to express his understanding in a simple natural way and in words that had not been used by other translators. It was the opposite of plagiarism. Finally, I would read each page aloud to a young Mexican friend and if it did not read well or if she looked puzzled, I would adjust the words or the cadence until the meaning was clearly delivered. After which I sent batches of the new text to Gia-fu who would approve (or occasionally disapprove) of what I had done.

"Over time all languages shift and some words and phrases become less immediate than they were a generation or so earlier. This October, Vintage will be releasing a new version of the book in three formats—the illustrated edition, the text-only edition, and an ebook for the first time. The new version remains faithful to the original text while using contemporary language that rings true for our time. And, in the illustrated edition, Jane English has replaced over a hundred of the photographs with others that she has made in the ensuing years."

Toinette Lippe is the former Rights Director at Alfred A. Knopf and the Founding Editor (emeritus) of Bell Tower, an imprint of Crown/Harmony. She is the author of two books, Nothing Left Over and Caught in the Act. You can see her brush paintings at her website. —Ed.

On Scarcity and Rarity

One more thing to mention about limited editions is a consideration we haven't talked about yet, which is that, in order to make a picture valuable on the art market, scarcity alone won't do the trick. It's a truism in book collecting that most books are first editions, because most books never reach a second. Similarly, most photographic pictures have great scarcity—these days, most pictures exist in print editions of zero, and a great many more exist in a print run of one. That doesn't help their value. It doesn't matter how limited your print edition is if no one wants your picture.

The first task is to publicize and earn an audience for yourself and your photographs.

And, of course, to some extent the goals of adding value by enforcing scarcity, and making a picture well known to begin with, oppose each other. The more prints there are out there in the world, the more places the picture's exhibited, the more people see it, the more people you can find who might want it. I'm not saying that's necessary to make a picture well known—traditionally, publication in magazines and books and in other forms of reproduction helped greatly, and now, notoriety on the internet and in other electronic forms could help the cause—but some pictures communicate much better in the original than in reproduction, so having more prints out there in the right places could help, not hinder, their worth.

My brother, a medical doctor by profession, has been an avocational gemologist since he was 14. He points out that to be valuable, a gemstone has to be rare, but it can't be too rare—because then there's not enough supply to satisfy and sustain a market. Diamonds aren't particularly rare. They're rare enough, and they have scarcity vectors (the larger or the more perfect, or both, the more scarce they become—there's only one Hope diamond)—some of which are artificial (diamond production is largely controlled). But if scarcity and rarity were what mattered most, many other kinds of stone would be much more valuable than diamonds. (I'll ask Charlie if he'll comment on this post and amplify the point from a position of better gemological knowledge.)

Of course, the picture is not all that people are buying when they buy a print—they're buying the artist. One print is in a sense a "sampling" of an artist's entire body of work, and implies the rest of that body of work. Or they might be buying a particular provenance, or something else intrinsic to the object. You might remember an article I wrote about Diane Arbus—certainly the print that Arbus gave to Colleen and Cathleen Wade with a note of thanks scribbled on it is worth more than a similar print without that provenance, and an Edward Weston print made by Edward himself is more valuable than a print made later by his son Cole, even if Cole's is the better print.

Lewis Hine, Powerhouse Mechanic (a.k.a. The Steamfitter), c. 1920s

There was a case detailed in The Atlantic Monthly a while back* of a photography expert, Walter Rosenblum, who was accused of forging a particular famous Lewis Hine print, "Powerhouse Mechanic." Rosenblum was an acknowledged expert on Hine to whom galleries took their prints for authentication—and he also (probably—I'm not sure this was verified) owned a negative of the Hine picture (there were several); and he was also an accomplished photographer and printer in his own right. Trouble was, a modern (or "posthumous," meaning not made in Hine's lifetime) print by Rosenblum was worth about $2,000, and a vintage print made by Hine was worth about $20,000. So one thing led to another, apparently temptation proved too much, and he allegedly began producing counterfeits which he himself would then authenticate as vintage prints! He was eventually exposed both because of the suspiciously expanding supply of supposedly vintage originals, and because experts detected the telltales of his own distinctive printing style in the questionable "Hines." Now, obviously, professionals were being fooled by the counterfeits, at least for a while (although it was alleged that some might have suspected what was going on but turned a blind eye because they, too, were profiting from it). My point is, the fact that a vintage print can be ten times more valuable than a modern print good enough to fool experts demonstrates that there is value inherent in objects that has nothing to do with the picture itself or how famous it is.

Still, one can at least propose, if not prove, that maybe Ansel Adams's "Moonrise" is worth so much not despite existing in an 800+ print unlimited edition, but in part because he made so many prints for so many people over the course of 43 years.

This argument doesn't preempt the desirability of limited editions, but it might temper it somewhat.

Mike

*Well worth a read.

P.S. I'll be off tomorrow. See you on Sunday!

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Featured Comment by Charlie Johnston (Mike's bro): "Classic economic theory. Price is a function of supply and demand, but both can be manipulated—demand by advertising, and supply by manipulation of a market. Diamonds and DeBeers illustrate both. Using aggressive advertising, they have created a perception of rarity that boosts demand, and they have in the past supported prices by withholding material from the market.

"The supply and demand equation also breaks down at both ends. Demand for air is infinite—but so is the supply, so the price is essentially zero. When supply is near zero (as in your Hope Diamond or single print examples), price is no longer set by a market, but by an individual transaction.

"Examples abound in the world of gems. Benitoite (the State Gem of California) has all the attributes a gem needs. It is durable, beautiful, and rare. Thousands of times rarer than diamonds, in fact—but the price is not commensurate with the rarity, because so few people outside of California are familiar with it. At one point, the rarest gem on earth was Painite, limited to a single crystal and a single faceted specimen. Kind of hard for that to be a "must" for a complete collection. The source was eventually (recently) found, and a cut stone can now be procured for less than a hundred bucks. Vanishingly rare, to be sure, but only of interest to collectors.

"Your print forger was essentially creating a synthetic. Synthetic ruby, for example, is arguably more beautiful than a natural stone, and shares the exact same chemical composition, hardness, crystal structure, and color. It's also manufactured by the hundreds of tons, and is widely available for pennies a carat. A comparable natural ruby set the record for the highest price ever paid for a colored stone: $425,000 per carat.

"A collector of rare photographic prints does have one distinct advantage over a gem collector. There will never be any more prints made by Ansel Adams, because he's in no position to make any and will never be again. On the other paw, there is a gem named for the type locality of Danbury, Connecticut, called Danburite. Found in small crystals with even smaller cuttable areas, it was once a very scarce and fairly high priced collectors' stone. Then someone found a huge deposit in Mexico which produced large, flawless crystals, and the price dropped like a rock!

"So, despite being your little brother, I entirely agree with you. While collectors are by nature an odd breed, it is clear that there must be some critical mass of both demand and supply to be able to gauge the market worth of any collectible."

The Status Monkey-Wrench

Another thing we need to remember when considering limited editions is that status and prestige are very important in some markets and certain outlets. If, as Joe and Ken say in the comments, all galleries simply insist on limited editions, well, then, that's that. Image is everything in art; many galleries, I'm sure, would regard a high-volume, low-cost sale like one of TOP's with some low-emotion subvariant of horror.

As you know if you've ever frequented the best galleries in the world's largest cities, a good gallerista can take in at a glance whether you're the sort of person they want buying their art. I recall one trip back in the go-go '80s to a high-end New York gallery where I was approached by an astonishing creature. She was ravishingly beautiful, slender as a stiletto, dressed entirely in spotless black, with high heels that could hurt you, a face that could grace billboards, and a haircut most Americans couldn't afford. Despite the fact that I fairly radiate frumpy Midwestern stylelessness, she came up to me and told me my face looked familiar. To my astonishment, she turned out to be one of the former students from the school where I'd taught—a girl who, in high school, had been more than a bit plump and had favored a sort of English-eccentric fashion sense—floral print skirts and headbands and bright red lipstick, that sort of thing. We had a nice conversation, during which I was nonetheless not able to get over her startling conversion from cuddly duckling to black swan.

No such luck at Mary Boone midtown, where I swear the willowy bored gallery fauna could tell I wasn't a customer prospect using only her peripheral vision. Without even looking straight at me she could tell I was not worth talking to.

Probably the funniest story I have about being too uncool to talk to—I'm sure I've told this before—was when Jim Hughes, whose writings now occasionally grace this site, had written an article for the magazine about Richard Avedon. We wanted to illustrate the article with an Avedon picture, and of course we had to get permission. So I called Avedon's studio, and was transferred in due course to his third assistant. The negotiations were fairly intricate, and lasted over several phone calls. During the last one, Avedon himself was in the room at the other end of the line—but he still wouldn't talk to me directly. I'd ask the third assistant a question, the third assistant would repeat it to Avedon, Avedon would answer, and the third assistant would relay the answer to me. Back and forth, back and forth. As the editor of a little podunk photo magazine from Chicago, I was just not cool enough for Avedon to talk to directly—such things weren't done.

Anyway, I think I've thought of one way how I might price my prints if I ever got the opportunity to sell any at a gallery. First five prints, $650 each. Numbers 6–10, $1,800 each. Prints 11–15, $4,000 each. Prints 16–20, $10,000 each. Prints 21–25, $16,000 each. So I'd say the edition was limited to 25. Price: "Up to $16,000."

And then I'd make five prints.

Mike

P.S. In case you're curious about the outcome with Avedon, we were allowed to reproduce a photograph, provided we a) scan it from a book and b) not attempt to pay him anything for it. The reason for a.: he did not want to send us a repro print which we could then fail to return and sell for a profit; the reason for b.: we couldn't afford to pay what it was worth, and anything we could afford to pay would be an insult that would demean the worth of the picture. The reasons are my interpretation—they weren't made explicit by the third assistant—but I'm pretty sure I'm right.

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Featured Comment by Janne: "I've long been thinking that prints should be valued and sold using the same progression as half-stops, without any explicit limit. So, the very first print—that the photog keeps, perhaps—would be 100 (in dollars, euros or 100s of yen). The second print would be 120. The third, 140, Fourth, 180. then 200, 240, 280 and so on. The prints would definitely be limited, but without the photographer having to decide on a limit. Instead, the market would decide exactly what a given image would be worth to print. You'd also reward early buyers—friends and acquaintances, and people who 'discover' you early on—as they'd be able to buy a print for far less than a later buyer. And you can always, with no exception, accommodate the possible (and for most of us, illusory) 'I just must have this' buyer; the price for the next print is fixed before they even walk in the door."

Mike replies: I love your f-stop scheme, but then, I would.

Two things to remember about graduated pricing schemes: first, they add a not-inconsiderable extra layer of bookkeeping complexity—I could never do it for one of our sales, for instance, without getting someone to write a program for me—and second, they merely replicate, in an artificical way, what happens naturally in the market as the demand for scarce things rises and/or as scarcity increases.

Featured Comment by John Camp: "You know how to get attention in any gallery? Be an older guy, accompanied by a pretty, much younger woman. They won't leave you alone."

Featured Comment by Ken Tanaka: "Funny (not) how an experience like getting snubbed at a gallery can so deeply tattoo one's mind. But consider the other side of the coin. There are plenty of folks who would welcome being ignored when they walk into a gallery. Not public celebrities, mind you. But prominent collectors and museum curators who often get spotted, and then get managed, as soon as they enter big-time galleries. Even when they just want to browse casually. Then, of course, there's yet a third side of the coin; the visitor who gets the cold shoulder but who turns out to be a big name. I know of at least two such stories, both hilarious, that have occurred in NY galleries. These days ya never know. Although I am not a gallery hopper it's been my limited experience that galleries these days tend to welcome nearly everyone with respect and grace. They cannot afford not to do so."

Mike replies: You're right, Ken—I've had many good experiences in galleries, too. I was just talking about Kathleen Ewing a little while ago, in the post about the AIPAD show. Kathleen was really extremely indulgent of me at her gallery in D.C. when I was a student—generously allowing me access to work not on display when she knew full well I wasn't a prospective buyer.

And, really, we have to realize that people are in business to make sales, and part of smart selling is not to waste time selling to people who aren't legitimate prospects. (Kathleen would just turn me loose and then go do her work—she didn't spend any time trying to sell me on anything. She'd chat when she had time, but she had her priorities straight at all times.)

And finally, some people are just not pleasant people. The most recent bad experience I had with a rude employee was at my vet's, where everyone else is as nice as can be. And that's not snobbishness at all—it's just one employee who either rubs me the wrong way, or who I rub the wrong way, or who is just rude—I'm not quite sure which.

Featured Comment by Chris: "You wrote, 'And then I'd make five prints.'

"Then it would be limited, but not an edition.

"I haven't read all the comments on this edition rigamarole, but as you certainly know, it is only an edition if you actually make all the prints at the same time, to the same standard. Which is why Vestal always pointed out that 'limited' editions usually guaranteed a photo print was more common than most non-edtitioned prints.

"In theory, one could do it your way in the digital era and expect to get identical output, but in practice, it doesn't really work. And besides, then the earlier prints in the edition would age differently than the later ones....

"I like the idea of progressive pricing, but let's not beat around the bush: limited edition either means something, and you make an actual edition of limited run, or it doesn't, and you don't need to.

"I would be much more amenable to editioning in digital photo prints if it were clear that what was limited was the particular print size and treatment, not the eternal use of that 'negative' as a starting point for making prints. If this were the case, then limited editions would finally contribute something to the art of the print (as opposed to merely the economics)—it would make clear the variety and progression of the photographer's thinking and skills in relation to a particular image."

Featured Comment by matthew langley: "When I was at the Corcoran my friend Chris and I worked for Nancy Drysdale Gallery—Jonathon Borofsky was installing his show at the same time that Avedon was installing his (Photos From the American West)—so the Corcoran reached out to Borofsky's local gallery (Nancy Drysdale Gallery) for install help. It was a great experience. Especially interesting was lunchtime when we are all sprawled on the ground with sandwiches and drinks—just talking—the show originated from Philadelphia and at the time the main installation guy was a biker named "Blues" McCaw. He and Borofsky got along in an almost non-verbal like conversation.

"Meanwhile across the room...

"There is Avedon having lunch with his 'team.' Avedon is on one of the couches and his assistants are in the neatest semi-circle on the floor around him—just looking up the whole time, while his food is on a small table brought in for him.

"So did he just not want to talk to you? I think you might just be on the money on that one."

Featured Comment #2 by John Camp: "When I was a newspaper columnist, I wrote what all newspaper columnists write about, i.e., the daily b.s. of life. However, once a month I wrote about art, because it was my main interest in life, and I just wanted to do it, even if general readers weren't particularly interested. On a couple of occasions, in trying to interview somebody with a show at the Walker Gallery in Minneapolis, I was told by an assistant (off-the-record) that the famous man wouldn't talk directly to me because he was afraid I'd quote him, and that he'd had a bad experience with quotes. In other words, if he spoke to somebody in the press, he wanted a very controlled situation with ground rules. Later, when I was selling a lot of books, and was often interviewed myself, I found that many interviewers from newspapers, small magazines and blogs have a very loose grip on accuracy, and was once told by a blogger that he'd quoted me very incorrectly because he'd confused my interview with an interview with another writer—he was writing out the quotes from memory, rather than from notes. A couple of experiences like that can make you very wary. So it's at least possible that Avedon simply didn't want to make it possible for you to quote him...and nobody's really much interested in reading quotes from a third assistant. I have found that you can get much more accurate reporting if you actually sit down and talk to a reporter, if you're friendly and open, and create a kind of relationship—if they feel that friendliness, they'll work harder to be accurate, and are less likely to write something weird to make their story more interesting. But phoners (as they're called) can make you very nervous. Especially when you get the feeling that they want something 'good.'"

Mike replies: Good point, John. It's certainly quite possible that Avedon's procedure had nothing to do with me or my status, but was just his usual protocol for whatever reason, which might well have made sense.

Featured Comment #2 by matthew langley: "One last thing—I've been blown off by the assistant at my own gallery (in Chelsea). This is actually not too uncommon, especially with newish assistants.

"One last story (sorry I'm so talky today)—

"Frank Stella was at Leo Castelli in the Sixties (he showed there—but I mean he was there looking at the art) and he approached the assistant to inquire bout a price. Understand that Stella was never much of a dresser—but during this time he was bad—old raincoat and funky hat—completely unfashionable (early 'seventies). So the gallery assistant plays a bit coy and the next thing you know Castelli comes out for something else and recognizes one of his artists and of course gives him everything he needs and Stella evidently ends up buying the artwork.

"So don't feel bad. It happens to nobodies like me and to somebodies like Frank Stella.

"I think of it as the artifice of the art world."

Filling in my Brackets

Albert Renger-Patzsch, Winterlicher Wald, 1925 (SFMoMA)

I had trouble with my brackets for the big tournament this month. Some of them were easy, but a couple were really tough. I mean, how do you choose between Sudek and Renger-Patzsch? There were some very close matches in the First Round—Moriyama's Bye Bye Photography squeaked by Eugene Smith's Minamata in a thriller, 47-45, and Brodovitch's Ballet mounted a strong challenge to Meatyard's Lucybelle Crater, which I never felt was the optician's strongest work.

The Inhabitants, out early, routed by a strong seed. (The Clark Collection)

Walker Evans trounced Wright Morris, but that one was the hardest call for me. I actually enjoy Morris more than Evans, so I voted for him. Of course I would rather neither one of them had to knock out the other so early in the tournament.

The Second Round has begun. The toughest matchup this time is #10. I'm not sure I can take the excitement!

Mike

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Limited Editions

In the Question Mark post below, I forgot to mention one more way in which photographers disqualify themselves for our TOP sales...by limiting their editions. I've looked at specific pictures by several photographers as possibilities, only to find that they're painted into a corner by a limited edition. I hate seeing that—obviously, it's a problem for a high-volume, low-price alternative model of selling prints.

Maybe I'm conditioned by years of reading GRUMP, David Vestal's iconoclasic, now-defunct newsletter, but I don't believe in limited editions for photography. It's a carryover from the art world, specifically from printmaking, where a master in many cases has a finite lifespan and can't be used indefinitely. From a sales and marketing standpoint it "protects the investment" of the buyer, helping haute art galleries in their efforts to inflate the value of photographs as art-commodity—galleries and art buyers have always been uneasy with photography's ability to flood its market and retroactively alter the rarity of items already sold.

My objection isn't just the usual one—that limited editions are not a good fit with photography's infinitely-reproducible nature—it's that it doesn't fit the way photographs "come to us," either.

Basis "Work of Art" turntable: $150,000. Mind you, this won't play records by itself—to get sound out of it you still need to buy the rest of the system, amplifiers, speakers, etc.

I'll explain what I mean, but first a disclaimer. As the disparity of wealth has spiraled out of control in society, more and more producers are following a model of making far smaller production runs of items for sale at far higher prices. I see it in hi-fi equipment, another of my interests—we're now seeing things like a pair of speakers selling for more than the cost of my house, but designed to sell only to, say, sixty individuals (this is a real case, not an exaggeration). Some products are actually designed to sell in the single digits. So I'm not talking about true high art-world art here—in those rarified precincts, editions of, say, seven or even as few as three prints might indeed help each one sell for the hundreds of thousands of dollars asked. That's the business of those whose business it is, and has nothing to do with me.

But think for a moment about how photographers work. The analogy to pop music isn't terribly far off. Photographers tend to be "hot" for a relatively limited period of time and we tend only to get a few real "hits" in our careers. So, given that you're only going to get a few big hits, why limit your ability to profit from them?

David Vestal used to make the point that ordinary photographic prints are actually more limited than "limited editions." He himself habitually made five copies of each of the pictures that he printed, but, according to one of his surveys, the average limited edition was "limited" to 25 (this was a couple of decades ago; I don't know what it would be now, or even if there is a meaningful average any more). The counterexample is that when photographers have a picture that's truly in demand, there's little evidence that an unlimited edition hurts its value. Famously, Ansel Adams printed more than 800 copies of "Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico" in his lifetime, and yet for a while it held the record as the highest-priced photograph of all, and the market for it is still robust. Why? Because it's a beautiful picture, and they're beautiful prints, and people want them.

Unlimited: According to Afterimage Gallery in Dallas, Sotheby's recently sold a 20x24" "Moonrise" for $115,000, and the much more common 16x20's go for $50,000 to $70,000. It was never a limited edition.

The solution is to do limited runs, or limited offers, or distinguish the product/objects in some other way—by dating them, or by size. (Many times, photographers will limit the edition of the "real" or large size but make smaller prints unlimited. Makes sense to me.) The prints of Peter Turnley's we sold are a specific size, and are signed on the front and back by Peter and on the back by Voja, who printed them. These will be identifiable to art dealers of the future who run across them.

I tried to buy a print from a photographer a number of years ago. It was a platinum contact print from an 8x10 negative. Unfortunately, it was a limited edition of ten prints, and had already sold out. I didn't give up quite so easily—I called him and tried to wheedle him into selling me one "under the table," so to speak. He refused, which was honest of him, but along the way I discovered something that made an impression on me. It turned out that he limited the edition of all of his platinum prints to ten prints—and not a single one had sold out except that one—which he kept getting more requests for. Because it was his best picture, of course. "I sure wish I had set the edition on that one higher," he said, ruefully.

Or just not limited it at all, duh.

I hope you can see the irony there. Here was a guy who got lucky and had a picture he should have profited from—but he had prevented himself from benefitting from it. He left my $500 sitting on the table, that's for sure.

There might be a few people for whom limited editions actually make sense—but they're so few as to make them the exceptions that prove the rule. For 99% of us, limiting editions of photographs is, sorry to say it, stupid.

Of course, you could say I'm biased.

Mike

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Featured Comment by Brooks Jensen: "Bravo, Mike. Well said. I came to basically the same conclusion and wrote about my reasons for not limiting editions back in LensWork #36 in July of 2001 and a reprint of that article can be found here [link is a PDF]. It's all so silly and meaningless. And, as you say, it only hurts the working artist and only benefits the secondary players/markets. I just cringe every time I see that 1/250 on a print because I know that 99.99999% of the time the photographer won't make it to print #7. We actually had one of our Special Editions prints sell to 1,200 customers and I can assure you that photographer was very glad he resisted the limited edition nonsense. Keep up the good work!"

Brooks Jensen is the editor of LensWork Publishing. —Ed.

Featured Comment by QT Luong: "Limited editions are clearly nothing more than a marketing technique, however, besides one anecdote, the article provides little evidence that this technique does not work. I once talked about this subject with Ted Orland, who was one of Ansel Adams's assistants. Ted indicated that by limiting, Ansel Adams actually increased substantially his print sales. What benefit the galleries and the collectors also benefit the photographer. A gallery sale is better than no sale. If a collector is happy that his piece has gone up in value, won't he be more inclined to buy again? 99% (?) of photographers are not able to make a living solely out of their print sales. It would be interesting to see amongst the remaining 1% what is the percentage who limit their editions. I bet it is more than 1%."

Q.-Tuan Luong is the creator and editor of the LFphoto site. —Ed.

Featured Comment by Kenneth Jarecke: "Mike, This article should be mandatory reading for all photographers wishing to sell their work. I've been preaching the same for many years, but I don't say it quite so well. Limiting the number of prints only helps the gallery owners and the secondary market. I think in most cases it actually hurts the photographer. Also, wasn't it Ctein who once did a survey proving that there were more so called 'limited edition' prints floating around then the open edition prints? I think it had something to do with the definition of 'edition.' Like a photographer could create an edition on a different type of paper, or a 1/4-inch difference in size and call it a completely new edition. Personally, I think the printing part of the process should either be done by the creator of the photograph or a master printer working under the direction of the creator to best realize their vision. This approach would deliver the best possible interpretation and also naturally limited the number of prints produced."

Ken Jarecke is a leading photojournalist who took one of the iconic photos of the first Gulf War. —Ed.

Featured Comment by Joe: "If you want art gallery representation these days, the odds are great that your contract will require you sell only in limited editions. That's just the way the art world is working. Gallery clients want limited editions, and usually won't touch an open edition. And since the typical gallery/photographer split is 50/50 (I'm ignoring the many qualifications), the interests of the gallery align with the those of the photographer (mostly). A gallery's interest is in getting the most income out of the photos, and if more money could be made with open editions, you can be sure the galleries would be happy to oblige. Hence the many counterexamples, like that Ansel Adams cited by Mike. This isn't to say that every gallery-represented photographer is well served by this model, or every print or every sale. But for the vast majority of gallery sales, limited editions make the most economic sense."

Mike replies: How many gallery-represented photographers do you know? More to the point, how many of the ones you know are doing something other than dying on the vine with their gallery sales? By rough calculation, I know five times as many gallery-represented photographers who hardly ever sell a print as contrasted to gallery-represented photographers who make a significant portion of their living from their gallery's efforts. Your experience might differ, of course.

Also, I would amend your sentence "A gallery's interest is in getting the most income out of the photos" to be "A gallery's interest is in getting the most income out of the photos for the gallery." Emphasis mine. I have no hard numbers, but I suspect a lot of worth at the high end gets added on resales, which don't benefit the photographer at all. My allegiance is to photographers, not necessarily to galleries, and what I'm talking about is how photographers can get the most income out of their photos for themselves.

X100's Selling for Huge Premiums on Ebay

This "Completed Listings" page on Ebay shows early examples of the now-delayed Fuji X100 selling for premiums of up to $1,400 above list price. Apparently there is no shortage of sellers...or buyers.

I'm as big a fan of this little camera as anyone, but at the same time it seems like all this might be getting just a little out of hand...a bit of a pop phenomenon, or at least what passes for one in the world of camera enthusiasm....

Mike

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The Ultimate Viral Image

Israeli-American photographer Noam Galai's incredible story, from Fstoppers. The ultimate viral image?

This is really the sort of thing you can't make happen on purpose—and, as Noam notes at the end of the interview, it's something that couldn't have happened twenty years ago—at least not quite this way.

Mike
(Thanks to Scott F.)

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Why I'm Getting an iPad 2

(But you don't need to)

By Ctein

Last summer I wrote "Why I Needed an iPad (and You Might Not)," which explains why the iPad is an invaluable tool for a traveling photographer like moi. Well, as soon as the pipeline refills, and who knows when that will be, I plan on moving to an iPad 2 (missed getting one on the opening day by 20 minutes, dagnabit). But, I think most if not all of you can safely ignore it.

There are three reasons I'm buying the new iPad 2:

1. I think this is the wave of the future and, as a writer and reviewer, it's a technology I want to stay on top of. There are also some iPhone camera apps I'm anxious to write about, like SynthCam, and the built-in camera will let me test those out, regardless of its lackluster specifications.
2. Space and weight are really at a premium in my shoulder bag. I'm right up at the absolute limit of what I can port about. The iPad 2 with its Smart Cover/stand is half the thickness and half a pound lighter than my current iPad plus its shell/stand.
3. Paula is really hot to buy my iPad, so I'll save a good part of the cost of the iPad 2.

I'd be very surprised if any of these reasons would matter enough to most of you. (Especially number three, seeing as Paula only needs one iPad.)

All the other improvements of the new iPad 2? Pretty much irrelevant.

More or less doubled processor power is nice, but honestly I haven't lacked for horsepower in my current iPad, with the exception of trying to watch HD movie files. I'm told the new iPad 2 will handle those better, but I do this maybe six times a year when I'm on an airplane. I bet it happens even less for you folks. In the meantime, anything oversize that I want to watch on my iPad, I run through Handbrake to reduce it to a manageable file. An inconvenience, to be sure, but such a minor one that I'd not be willing to throw away hundreds of dollars to avoid it.

Video-out is nice if you do presentations. I don't. How many people do? Remember that the iPad itself will almost always have a better quality screen than what you're projecting with. Unless you're showing to groups, you're better off just handing the client your iPad to look at.

If you've already got an iPad, there's little reason for you to buy into the second generation. If you haven't seen the need for an iPad, there is little in the iPad 2 which is likely to seduce you. For that matter, if you're ready to take the iPad plunge and you haven't yet, you're going to be able to buy used iPads at attractive prices—there are an awful lot of people on the same upgrade path I'm on who will have them to sell.

Will I get the iPad 3? Maybe, maybe not. I'm sure it will have its own set of cool new features, but whether any of them will matter to photographers is another matter entirely. We are not exactly the main audience.

That's my take on it: Save your money.

Ctein

Ctein's regular weekly column on TOP is published on Wednesdays.

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Future Print Sale Plans

Our next print sale is going to be something completely different from the last one. I just don't know exactly what it will be yet. One thing I do know is that I don't want to get into any kind of "rut" with our offerings.

If there's any commonality to our offerings so far, the theme has been fine printmaking, coupled with several "by popular demand" pictures that initially got a lot of response here on TOP. I've also mainly found print sale photographers from among my friends, or people I know or have worked with in the past.

There's a very good reason for both the "printmaking" and the "friends" trends. The #1 thing I need to know is, is the artist going to be dependable? People who've been in business for some time making and selling prints are already well versed in what it takes to produce and distribute large numbers of prints. And when I know people, I know what kind of people they are—I have a good idea going in that they can come through. So far, we've been really lucky with that—knock on wood.  As I mentioned yesterday, Charlie Cramer made and shipped more than 400 prints in 26 days. Nobody will ever surpass Ctein's epic labors for his first sale, making 760 dye transfer prints in less than two months. Truly Herculean. Carl Weese is a close runner up—if there is any printmaking method that doesn't lend itself to mass production, it's platinum/palladium. But every photographer we've featured has come through with flying colors. But so far all of our print sale artists have been very professional. Knock on wood, again.

With the success of our recent sales, I've been reaching out a little more, looking for interesting possibilities. Believe it or not, it's not a trivial problem to find just the right kind of photographer. To begin with, many famous or well-established photographers are already locked into contracts or obligations with galleries or other traditional outlets. I contacted one well-known sports photographer who replied simply, "Not a possibility for me." He's bound up in exclusive contracts with his galleries, and that's that.

Some people don't own the rights to their own pictures (some photojournalists, especially, have sold the rights to their archives to picture agencies). Other don't have the right to make studio sales (a "studio sale" is a personal sale between the photographer and a private party that doesn't go through the photographer's gallery or other representation). Others just don't have the time—it takes a lot of work to make and mail a lot of prints, and they're too busy. 

Another problem is that money is...relative. Our most successful offers have earned into six figures for the photographers. That's a lot of money to me, and it might be to you, but there are people out there to whom it's not enough to bother about. To photographers who currently sell their prints for $5,000 or $10,000 or even more, a print sale on TOP would simply dilute the value of their work too much—it would be "slumming" to an unacceptable degree. A sale on TOP would offer them neither profit nor prestige. There are not a whole lot of people like that, but they exist. I spoke to one photographer (a fashion guy) whose day rate (that's the fee required to hire him, not counting his expenses for the shoot) is over $20,000. I literally can't make a sale worth his time.

With others, the problem is the opposite—it's that TOP can't add any value to the proposition. Unless a photographer has already established a value level for their prints, we can't offer their prints for less! There's one photographer in particular who I would definitely do a print sale with, but for one snag—he already sells his work for less that I possibly could. He charges $30 for a print at his website. I can't beat that.

Finally, there's the matter of interest. It's not just a matter of finding pretty or competent pictures. Everyone has some of those. There's got to be something about the picture, the artist, or the print-as-object that's interesting or unique or different—something that makes the offer into a real opportunity for people. That's the key, for me.

Mike

P.S. This is going to sound a little obnoxious, for which I apologize in advance, but, if you'd like to suggest a picture or a photographer for a future print sale, please leave your suggestion in the Comments. And, for form's sake, do not suggest yourself. Please don't email me privately with suggestions; especially, please do not send me private emails asking if you can be the next print sale photographer! 

Unless of course you're Elliott Erwitt or Mary Ellen Mark or Steve McCurry. :-)

If there are suggestions in the Comments, I'll look at as many as I possibly can.

Note: Dave Beckerman, on his blog, wrote a plea for his friends and followers to come here and leave comments proposing him as a candidate for a TOP sale. Dozens of them did so. I didn't publish most of those comments, since it's technically someone proposing himself, albeit indirectly...which I asked others to please not do.

We'll try to do something fun with Dave in the future.

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Featured Comment by Arthur: "Killjoy. Until I read your postscript, I was going to graciously offer up myself as your next print photographer; so long as you dropped those silly requirements for things like 'fine print making,' 'dependable,' and 'professional,' etc. Hmph!"

Richard Prince in His Own Words

There's an interview with Richard Prince at Russh. Here's an excerpt that covers the subject of work that was the subject of the lawsuit:

Copyright has never interested me. For most of my life I owned half a stereo so there was no point in suing me, but that’s changed now and it’s interesting. I’m actually in the situation where I am being sued at the moment (by a French photographer I might add) for taking his original images and turning them into paintings. It’s something that’s really problematic for me because in a strange way now I find myself censoring things that I look at and it’s almost like I can’t do it anymore, because people know who you are. So sometimes it’s better not to be successful and well known and you can get away with much more. I knew what I was stealing 30 years ago but it didn’t matter because no one cared, no one was paying any attention. It was an attitude to do with the fact that I didn’t think there was a future. Unfortunately that didn’t come true. I’ve now done these paintings based on Rastafarians. Basically I like the way things look; that’s all my decisions are about—if it looks good, it is good. So anyway, unfortunately I took too many of these Rastafarian (images) from this guy and I didn’t really even think to ask. I don’t think that way, it didn’t occur to me to ask him and even if I did and he said no, I still would have taken them. I figured I’d do them and maybe if he objected I’d deal with that later. I really like the Rasta paintings and that was the last body of work that I have done. I only pay attention to the negativity that people have [as] a way of explaining their feeling towards my work. I think they were described as 'garbage,' 'the worst' and 'vomit.' It’s funny because if this guy had let it alone, well it was a very unsuccessful body of work and it would have gone away....

—Richard Prince

Richard Prince by Craig McDean

You can read the whole comment (and the whole interview) at russhmagazine.com.

Mike
(Thanks to James B.)

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Featured Comment by Koert: "There is of course another reason why what Prince did is wrong and probably also one of the reasons Cariou sued him. The people Cariou went to photograph for his book Yes Rasta are 'true,' as in very strict, Rastafarians living high up in the mountains of Jamaica. They are shy and it took Cariou quite some time and effort earning their trust. If you read the book you can see that one of the things they worried about was why Cariou photographed them and what was going to happen with those photographs? These are people who have made the decision to live a life apart from western society and in all probability wouldn't like what Prince did with the images taken of them. Just a thought...."

Cramer Prints Have Shipped

I'm happy to pass along that as of last Wednesday, Charlie Cramer completed the mailing of all the prints from the last print sale. If you haven't gotten yours yet, it's still too early to worry—please allow up to another week for your package to arrive. It should get to you soon, if you haven't already received it.

We'll be able to replace any packages that might have gotten lost. If you haven't received your package by this time next week, please contact me using the email contact link in the right-hand sidebar, and I'll look into it.

...But please, not yet! All I'll be able to tell you if you contact me now is, "give it a little more time."

It took Charlie a grand total of 26 days to make and ship more than 400 prints, which, as you may or may not know, is not a trivial task. And he prepared and taught two workshops during that time! Behind the scenes of these sales, professionalism is paramount. Charlie may be artist who works mainly for himself, but he's a pro.

Mike

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Random Excellence: Chema Madoz

Some of these conceptual still lifes by the Spanish photographer Chema Madoz will make you laugh, which of course means they can't be art. (I'm kidding.) Simple and elegant but very inventive; if you're in the mood, delightful.

A further sampling here; his site is here. All the books except this one are out of print.

Mike
(Thanks to Phil Aynsley)

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Featured Comment by Dennis Ng: "A master of the minor!"