(originally written March of 2008; minor edit Oct 2012)
I remember -
FONDLY - the radio newscasts of the now late Paul Harvey, with captivatingly distinctive storytelling style.
Back in the mid-1980s, one particular broadcast stands out. Not because of whatever stories he was sharing that day, but because I thought it had indirectly contributed to the odd impact on a roll of film in the camera.
Back then, I always had the habit of stopping what I was doing in a pause just to take in his mid-day radio report. One was over an extended weekend in the Eastern Sierra, around Mono Lake/Basin and Mammoth Lakes/Long Valley to the south. This specific mid-day pause came while doing some black-and-white infrared imagery of the desert granite rockscapes and northern White Mountains, along the California-Nevada boundary country, from along Hy. 120 well east of Mono Lake's southern shores.
My pause was literally, just standing alongside my truck, camera hanging from the strap around my neck, with the high sun blazing overhead. I think it was May, but could just as easily have occurred in July or September.
The film frame sitting just-exposed in the camera was a wonderful, typically over-dramatic infrared black-and-white contrast, looking east-southeast toward the White Mountains. The negative, however, also showed an odd pattern of evenly-spaced rows of dots across the even-toned sky. It had the effect of "alien space dots" that were not so easy to overlook while enjoying the rest of the b&w print.
I didn't "connect the dots" (playing on the obvious pun... sorry) to a culprit until maybe six months later, while cleaning the Pentax MX 35mm camera. Those "sky dots" matched the hole pattern of the camera's film pressure plate. I was convinced my standing in the direct sun, with it "baking" the back of the camera had exposed the film through those little holes.
Some time after this, I realized if this
had occurred, the dot pattern would have been white, rather than a black darker than the sky tone. Darker implies
less light than
more, finding the negative. Alas...Paul Harvey didn't help me fog my own film frame. It was light coming through the lens that simply didn't reflect back off the pressure plate where the holes were.
Anyway, that's my long-standing favorite story for this wonderful news radio broadcaster with the distinctive storytelling style. Page one, two, or whichever you may prefer, and the rest of the news.
...ps...(still true in 2012 as in 2008) I spent the day looking for the print to re-photograph or the original 35mm film neg to scan. This digitized reproduction will be added when found, with this journal story linked to it.
Artistic
