I've just been going through mine, packing them away in fact. I think the days of sending in laboriously labeled slides in plastic sheets may be over, thank goodness. When I think of the boxes of slides I threw away because they came out too reddish, or bluish, or yellow. And I DON'T want to think about all the money I spent.
Here's what I hated about taking slides:
THE PROCESS
• Finish your work at least a week before the deadline
If taking in natural light....
- Buy special ektachrome daylight film ($$)
- Plan the perfect day - sunny with shade, not too cold. (If in the winter, wait till the weekend since it's dark when you leave for work and return home)
- Prop the painting somewhere in shade
- Break off blades of grass that are sticking up in front of the picture
- Pick it up when the wind blows it over
- Buy special ektachrome tungsten film ($$)
- Find a neutral wall
- Set up lights and stands
- Check special color balanced bulbs ($$)
- Go to store to replace bulb that's burned out. Buy two so they match ($$)
- Angle lights to eliminate glare (ha!)
- Set up 35 mm camera on tripod
- Adjust camera so picture is perfectly square
- Notice glare on picture
- Put on polarizing lens
- Adjust aperture
- Take several exposures of each image
- Repeat
- Leave early to take film to 1-day ektachrome lab ($$) before work
- Fight rush hour traffic to pick up slides after work
- Look at them on their light table
- Throw away the box (too-blue, too-yellow, too-dark, too light, too-skewed, too-glarey)
- Start over
- Decide a slide is acceptable
- Mask out background with special silver tape ($$)
- Take the one perfect slide in to lab to be duped
- Estimate how many you'll need ($$)
- Wait 3 days then pick up dups
- Find out exactly how venue wants you to label slides
- Print tiny little labels good only for that venue
- Arrange in slidesheet
- Put them in a 9x12 envelope with a return postage 9x12 envelope inside
- Go to the post office to get it weighed
- Mail 3-4 days before deadline
Things I love about sending jpgs...
- Finish work up to 1 hour before deadline
- If it's small enough—scan it. Or...
- Prop up painting indoors or out (too blue? too yellow? No worries, Photoshop to the rescue! Glare? Take photo on angle, de-skew in Photoshop)
- Take photo with little digital camera
- Check it on your computer
- Adjust as necessary
- Bring into Photoshop
- De-skew it, color correct, crop
- Save original
- Resize version for venue
- Name it
- Attach to application and hit send
I had a whole filing system for my hundreds of slides, sorted by master copies, dups, titles and quality. Endless hours of organizing...but I suppose many of those packets I mailed out did return some great opportunities, so those little square calling cards had their day.
Anyone still using them? Anyone miss them?
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