Kaufmann's Camera Store Closes

 

The Best Of Times: My friend Shawn and I would be getting together for a long lunch and some serious camera talk. We've been covering each other's backs since 1979 when he became the third teacher at the mixed level classroom at a elementary school near San Mateo. When not talking about student performance issues, we discussed photography, cameras. and darkroom techniques. Through the years, we had many adventures that almost always included a trip to a camera store or favorite lunch counter. Our accidental encounter at a Palo Alto alter to photography (a.k.a. Keeble and Shuchat) lead me to adopt Domke F-2 as the Official Tom Jung Camera Bag.

The Worst Of Times: News leaked out that Kaufmann's Cameras would be closing forever. I remember that the flagship store was in Stonestown, a shopping center near the San Francisco / Daly City border in the early 1970s. While Al was the senior driving force in San Francisco, his two sons, Warren and Ronald, would be my contacts when the store was on 25th Avenue in San Mateo, and again when they were forced to move to its final location in San Bruno. The store was a must visit because you never knew what might appear on the shelves. For example, my favored camera bag of the time, the  Vanguard Veo 37, eventually wore out and was no longer in production when I sought a replacement.  I made do with other bags until, low and behold, I found a new-old-stock Veo 37 on one of Kaufmann's shelves. My credit card almost melted from the speed with which I extracted my credit card, and my new bag will eventually house my  Sony A7 and some additional lenses when I finally decide to take the camera more seriously.  Into every life a little joy must fall, that the day I received more than just a sprinkle.

A Dirge To Customer Service: I remember one specific incident where I was in desperate need of both a Nikon D90 body and a Nikon SB900 speedlight. I knew that the staff was very particular about checking the merchandise before it left the store, so before I left San Francisco, I called the store with a simple request:

"Hi, this is Tom Jung. You might not know my name, but you'll recognize me as soon as I walk in the store. I'm in a hurry, and I need a Nikon SB900 and a Nikon D90 body. I am driving down from San Francisco, and wonder if you can do the checkup before I arrive. I'll hand you a credit card as soon as I walk in."

After receiving a response equivalent to "Roger That", I drove to the store to find my purchases checked and bagged, and as I requested, the purchase was immediately processed.  I was in and out in a few minutes, and arrived at the location well-prepared and fully equipped. 

I will miss the store and the welcoming feeling I always got. And there was always a bowl of Hershey's Miniatures by the cash register, and the 1960s era music from the boom box CD player.

And The Winners Are...

Cloverdale: Nothing remarkable this weekend. There was a competitive event in Cloverdale, and I was asked to make some quick photos of the winners for the club's blog page. I found this an easy thing to do if you do some basic planning before the winners start lining up.

I have one basic rule about lighting, and that is the position of the light is more important than quality. These photos were made with a single speedlight mounted on a light stand and triggered by a small radio controller. The height of the flash was about seven feet off of the ground, and the head was angled slightly downward. I verified this by placing a small toolbox where I wanted my subjects to stand, positioning myself beside it, and then staring directly at the speedlight. If I wasn't perfectly aligned with the flash head, I would adjust the head angle until it was. The flash-to-subject distance was a bit under ten feet.

This alignment technique ensures a constant subject-to-flash distance, and that the flash output will be centered on the face while fading slightly on the scorecard and the hands. The normal inclination is to aim the flash at the middle of the subject, which could have resulted in overexposure of the scorecard and underexposure of the face. A subtle difference to be sure, but one that would be noticed by a careful observer.

Expose For The Background: To prevent squinting and uneven exposure, I positioned my subjects so that they faced away from the sun. Exposure was set to 1/125 second, F 9.0, ISO 200. I started at 1/250 of a second, but dropped it a full stop when the background was too dark. The sky was a bit overexposed, but the hint of clouds was good enough. I could then adjust the flash output to get the proper exposure on the face.

Tipping Your Hat: I should have noticed that the shadow cast by the wide brim of this hat was a bit intrusive, but since both of the eyes were lit, I let it go.

Speaking Of Backgrounds...:I was using an APS sensor FujiT2 with a zoom lens set to 55mm. This provided a slight telephoto effect, giving me a nicely out-of-focus background. Granted, the cars in the background were a bit large (foreshortening effect), but sufficiently out of focus as to not draw attention away from the subject's face.

Where's The Sky? It had not occurred to me at the time, when photographing the Juniors, I was able to completely eliminate the sky while retaining the rim lighting provided by the sun. I just realized that because my subjects were now shorter, my camera was aimed slightly downward, thus removing the sky from the frame. I could have achieved the same effect by rotating the LCD viewfinder downward and raising my camera over my head in the classic "Hail Mary" position.

In the end, this fifteen-minute exercise taught me something important about the subject height and how it affects the background. I guess I learned a lot more than I realized.