"TIS DONE!

West Boylston, Massachusetts May 2001

This image is the last of my 8x10 negs -- to be scanned. There are no more in the files. 'Tis done. As I think back over all those years I shot with the 8x10, I now find it strange that I suddenly stopped using that camera. I have not exposed a piece of 8x10 film since May of 2001. Part of the answer is my love affair with the Pentax 67 started about then. Another part of the answer is I got more serious about teaching at about that time. And then in 2003 I bought my first serious digital camera -- a Canon D60. AND since time was short, most of my traveling was by plane rather than by driving my truck cross-country. Very difficult to carry an 8x10 and all its associated baggage on an airplane. I flew with the Pentax 67 and digital. And the past two spring trips to Texas, I flew only with the digital. Even my eight week trip to the west coast and back in 2007, I only carried the 4x5, Pentax 67 and digital. Truth be known, I have exposed any film since that 2007 trip. But I have to say, lately I've had a hankerin' to get the ol' 8x10 out and see if I can still make decent meanful images with it. Scanning all those 8x10 negs probably has had something to do with the longing for the black focusing cloth being slung over my head and viewing a full eight by ten inches of image up-side-down on the ground glass. We'll see what happens when the weather begins to warm in the spring.