[LargeFormat] A Longer View of the Larger View

[rstein]

Dera Friends,

     Emerging as I have from the fumes and thrashing bodies - it is darkroom
night at the studio and you would be well advised to wear adequate knee and
groin protection, not to mention heavy rubber gloves and a radiation
monitoring badge - I have wandered to the computer to surf over to the
Photokina site. It is nice, if somewhat pixelated, but doesn't really tell
me what I need to know.

     I am poor this year. What with purchasing a Shen Hao and several boxes
of colour paper and the family clamouring for gruel and all, I don't think I
can contemplate a trip to Koln this time round. But it has always been
presented as the ultimate trade fair for photographers, and I have always
cherished a desire to visit it.

    But with the rapid advances of digital into the photo world and the
equally rapid retreat of me from it....well, am I going to find anything to
see when I do go. If I spread fear and despondency, not to mention gold
crowns and root canals, for the next couple of years I might be able to
afford the trip. Can anyone who has been there tell me whether it is worth
the journey? Remember that will be travelling cattle class from the
Antipodes and there has got to be some adequate reward for being folded like
a carpenter's rule for 13 hours. Is there enough to see apart from the
digits?

     Please note I shall endeavour to cadge invitations from photographers
in Britain and Europe as a housepest so be warned. Lock up your darkrooms.


    Uncle Dick