Accretionary Wedge #36 - Whad do you regret leaving behind at a geologic locality?

 On the Rocks over at Geosciblog - Science has put out this call.

Call for Posts, AW #36

July 9, 2011 by lockwooddewitt

“What do you regret leaving behind at a geological locality?” In other words, what samples, specimens, or even photographs do you regret “not getting enough of”?
Read the full description at Geosciblog- Science; deadline is ~July 16.

In case you haven't noticed I love looking at other peoples pictures and taking pictures for myself.  The thing I regret most is not taking more pictures when I could have at any place I visited on a field trip but most especially at my field camp and my thesis location. There were a number of reasons why I never got enough photos.  The main one was not taking my camera to certain spots because I didn't want to get it ruined or it was too heavy. (below is shot of the different cases I used to use to carry my cameras.)

( Old case verses new case, quite a size different and load.  The older I get the less I want to carry in and out of the field.)

Or not owning a good camera sooner than I did.
  When I first got into geology, I realized having a good camera was a must for me.  I wanted to have keepsakes of all the wonderful field trips I was taking.  Now I just want to have a camera that works-- anything is better than nothing at all.  The smaller and lighter it is the more I like it- the more photos to be had.  Here's the different cameras - old verses new.

  Back in the 1970's, there were very few photos in the text books I was reading.  To really understand what the books were trying to teach you, you just had to go out in the field and see for yourself.  I saw some absolutely amazing examples of  geology such as anticlines with s & z micro folding in them demonstrating some structural geologic concepts. Or seeing some thrust faulting verses normal faulting.   Or going and seeing the clues that glaciation was a major reforming feature of the region.  These things were explained in the book, and I understood what they were getting at but once you saw it in person, you never would forget it.  I'm a visual learner and that is how I learn by seeing and feeling things.  Words usually go in one ear and out the other and if I'm really lucky some may stay stuck inbetween the two ears, while a pictures with it's beautiful colors and patterns just say with me for a long long time.  I just plan learn better seeing things and that was why I loved going on field trips so much and taking pictures.
    So in the 70's I got a very nice Olympus camera from a friend that was updating and getting a more advanced camera for himself. Not only did he sell me the camera it also came with all the darkroom equipment I needed to develop the films and pictures that I took.  I quickly learned that darkroom projects and I were not compatible.  To work in the darkroom first you had to have a very dark room (preferably no windows or a very small window that you can tape aluminum over to block the sunlight and light) and running water.  I found a room in my house in our attic that fit that bill and it became my study area (very hot in summer no a/c, poor ventilation,  trouble was it was also a working bathroom.)  But to do dark room work you needed long blocks of time- minimum of 2 hrs -where no one will open the door or let light in,  with it being a working bathroom it was hard to keep people out, so if I did work in it I had to wait until the other members of my family had gone to bed. I missed my sleep too much to stay up late developing photos.  The other draw back with darkroom work was you could only take black and white photos.
   Here's an example of my darkroom work.  A picture of an ammonite I did a research paper on.

Epicenites loeblichi

  I would do darkroom work in black and white if I had to but I preferred working with color.  To do photos in color at that time cost an absolute fortune in equipment and chemicals.  No, dark room work just wasn't for me, so that left doing things commercially.
  
   At the time there were two ways of getting photos commercially.  One was to buy regular film, get it developed and then have photos printed up from the negatives.  The other way was to take slides and then print from the slides.  Different paper was needed for each way.  From negatives you needed reverse negative paper, because the colors on the negative were the reverse from the printed colors.  With slides you used positive paper, which meant that the colors on the slide were the same color of the prints.
   It was cheaper to get slides than it was to go with prints from negatives.  It broke down like this you had to buy the film type you wanted.  The more sensitive the film the higher the cost, but general outdoor film ran about $3.00 for 24 shots (keep in mind this was in the 70's and minimum wage was $1.65/ hr i.e. two hours of work for me to buy a roll of film.).  If you were lucky you could find 36 shots for that price.  This cost was the same whether you got slides or prints.  The most frustrating thing was planning ahead and having the right type of film in the camera for the type of pictures you wanted so you never wasted the film.  Taking pictures indoors required different film than taking them outdoors.  If you used outdoor - indoors you had to have a very good flash to use with the camera.  Most of the time I would use outdoor film.  I always felt I was limited by the number of shots I could take because I had to buy rolls of film in 36 or 24 quantity and the expense.    Because of that I never took as many photos as I wanted to. 

   You had to get the film developed.  This too ran about $3.00 and was the same whether you got slides or if you got prints from negatives. Even if the whole roll of film was ruined you still had to pay this amount to see what pictures you had gotten or not.   It was cheaper to go with slides because now you were done and could use the slides.  So I went with slides much to my regret.  At the time I did it, it was because I was a poor college student.
  Each slide ran you about 25 cents (which is about spending 1.25 today). So each roll of film ran you $6.  If you really liked the picture a lot you could always take it in and get a print made of it for about 75 cents (3.75) for an additional expense.  Needless to say I did not get very many prints made from my slides because it used to be so expensive too.  Much to my regret. 
  The other benefit of having slides was if you ever had to give a talk you could use them in slide projectors.  It seemed like every classroom I was in had slide projectors, plus you could check them out from the libraries. I never thought of the day when you couldn't find or use a slide projector.  I always thought they would be around forever.  

  Now getting back to printed pictures, you still had to pay the same for slides plus you had to pay for the actual printed picture.  That usually ran between 15 cents per print  for 3 week delivery or it could get even higher the faster you wanted it done - $.25 for 3 day and $1.00 for an hour.  I always went with the cheapest of .15 per print.  Again because it cost so much I never took as many as I wanted to.
   I also remember always hoping that the picture would turn out.  I would hold my breath when I would get the package back and say please let there be some good ones on this roll of film.  You had no way to know if they would turn out or not, not like today where you can see instantly on a digital camera.  The opportunity to take another photo would be long gone.  You had to be happy with what you got.  Frequently they could be blurry, or the lighting bad so they would be too dark or washed out.  You just never would know until you got them back or did your own developing.  I remember one time the film had been exposed to an x-ray machine and nothing turned up on the film.  Another time the film got jammed in the camera and all the photos were on the one spot.  Because you never knew how they would be I had a tendency to take very sparingly so I wouldn't be wasting money on things that were no good.  I knew some people who would only get the negatives developed and then get the prints made, but the trouble with that it was a lot more expensive like it was to get prints made from slides.  That's why I went with slides. 

  Now it is many years later and I have all of these wonderful slides but no way to view them easily.
  I always told myself one day I will have these slides made into prints, the trouble was when I had the time I didn't have the money.  And when I had the money I didn't have the time to do it.  I finally got to the point where I had the time and the money to do it but the store that used to do that has gone out of business. Now I'm just stuck with the slides at least they are better than nothing at all. I have hundreds of slides like this.

Here's what I'm talking about - one page of many, many pages:

 A page full of slides from my field camp days in Eureka, Nevada. 

Two photos from that page, One of Lone Mountain as seen from Highway 50 (I'm just glad Silver Fox over at Looking for Detachment has shared some of her photos of  Lone Mountain - Thank you Silver Fox!!!!), the other of the town of Eureka on 7-19-77.  Even though I could get another picture of Eureka, Nevada it will never be quite the same as when I was there back then in 1977.    And here's a closer look of that slide trying to scan it into my computer.  Not much detail.

 I've tried using different lighting for the same picture but it still is hard to get a good clean image of it but there is more detail than the one above but still not as nice as when you can properly view it.  Here's two more attempts. 
 

My thesis material has this same problem as my field camp photos they are mostly on slides.  I did have a couple of  slides printed up of the people who were helping me at the time.  I did that so they could have a keep sake and to show my thanks to them. I'm glad I have at least those few prints and can view them easily now in photo albums. 

This has been my biggest regret all these wonderful geology pictures that I can't share with others on my blog. 
If I could have done it over again I would have had some prints made to go along with the slides. If I had a digital camera back then I definitely would have taken a whole lot more photos.  It just boggles my mind that on one little camera I've taken over 600 photos on a SD card that costs less than $9 to buy and nothing to down load to my computer.

Now I'm musing about:  Be this as a warning to others to make sure you have backups and more than one way to access your images, because technology is changing so much, and what you once thought would last doesn't always.

PS -7-18 Here's more on the slides issue.