Re: News from Green Bay

[Paul Talbot <ptww@xxxxxxxxx>]

Paul Talbot wrote:
 
> I've just returned from Green Bay and have a couple news
> items to report.  Headlines only for now, details after
> a good night's sleep!  ;-)
> 
>   Don Lopp (whom I had never met) spent almost all day
>   Saturday at my table at the trade show I was quite
>   pleasantly surprised to see him, given the health
>   problems of his that have been reported in this forum.
>   And I was blown away by his seemingly endless supply
>   of stunning MF slides.

Don helped keep me entertained between customers, not
only with his gorgeous images, but a lot of stereo chat
as well.  While looking through his images, I noticed
most of his slide mounts were not taped shut, requiring
a bit of extra care to drop them into the viewer slot.
I asked him why he didn't tape his mounts shut, and he
indicated it is because he has been out of mounts for
about a year and a half.  His solution?  He "rotates"
images in and out of his existing mounts!  I could not
imagine how anyone could take this approach and retain
their sanity!  I told Donn that mounting MF slides is
such a painstaking process that it would drive me crazy
to be unmounting and mounting images over and over.  He
said other people have told him the same thing, but that
mounting is easy...it only takes about 10 seconds he
says.  "10 seconds??!!"  Well, 30 seconds at the very
most, Don replied.  I told him he should go into the
MF slide mounting business, as several of us on this
list have expressed an interest in using such a service.
At $.50/slide he could make $60/hour (if we could get
enough film chips to him).

Later when I had a chance I told Donn I *still* did
not believe anyone could mount MF images that fast,
and asked him for a demonstration.  He removed one
chip from one of his slides and, working on a solid
table top with no light source behind the image, and
no mounting gauge, proceeded to replace it in the
slide mount.  I didn't put a stop watch on him, but
he was pretty quick.  I'd guesstimate over 10 seconds
and under 20.  He didn't reposition both chips, but
of course it's aligning the second with the first
that is the most difficult.

When I told this story to Dwight Cummings, Martha McCann,
and Boris Starosta the next evening, Dwight added "and
you never see any mounting errors in any of his images,
either," and asked if I concurred.  I mentioned that I
only noticed one slide with even a hint of a mounting
error, and that was a *tiny* window violation.  Now that
might be because I was so absorbed in the gorgeous images
that I never got around to carefully checking for mounting
problems, but there certainly weren't any significant ones.
(As opposed to mine, most of which still need mounting
problems fixed.)  Perhaps someone in a folio with Don
has had more of an opportunity to judge Don's accuracy.

Now the sad part of the story: Don handled that slide
chip with his bare fingers!  I thought I felt a dagger
through my heart when I saw that!  How could anyone
handle such spectacular images so cavalierly?  Could it
be that when you have many hundreds (thousands?) and
the ability to make many more at any time...??  I don't
think I'll ever know.

Paul Talbot