Sunday, December 4, 2016

Retro Photo: A Personal Selection of Vintage Cameras and the Photographs They Take by David Ellwand [Review & Giveaway - US/CANADA]

With exquisite original photos and boundless enthusiasm, David Ellwand offers a love song to film photography and the vintage cameras that capture it.

ISBN: 9780763692506
Hardcover $45.00
My thoughts: Growing up, it was quite the norm for me to see a camera in my father's hands and to be the subject of his many creations. Our family had a real treasure trove of photographs taken by Dad.

I even had the experience of helping him and learning from him in our old garage where half of it had been converted into a photo processing lab. Dad had a contact printer and an enlarger. He had rolls (huge rolls) of photographic paper. He had large jugs of the processing liquids, white enamel pans for bathing the pictures in the processing liquid, and a line stung at the end where the wet pictures where hung to dry.

Yes, photography was part of Dad's and my lives.

The opportunity to review Retro Photo: A Personal Selection of Vintage Cameras..... was one I simply couldn't pass up. I truly hoped to see Dad's argoflex in there. And he had one of those large "newman's" cameras that used plates for the images.

Retro Photo.... was a real treat to stroll through visually and mentally picture my Dad's enjoyment of his cameras and the pictures he took. No, I didn't find Dad's Argoflex nor his German  camera pictured in the book. But treasures they are.

About the book: With exquisite original photos and boundless enthusiasm, David Ellwand offers a love song to film photography and the vintage cameras that capture it.

From the pinhole to the Pentax, Retro Photo: An Obsession is a visual journey through the history of photography, highlighting some of the iconic cameras of the analog era. Appealing to those new to film photography as well as the seasoned professional wanting to explore new avenues, this beautiful keepsake volume showcases more than one hundred cameras from the collection of photographer and author David Ellwand, along with photographs he has taken with them. At once an accessible guide to vintage cameras, a highly personal take on photographic history, and a celebration of classic design, here is a book that takes the fear out of old-style photography and puts the fun back in.

And now some pictures of my Dad's cameras that I have saved.

My brother brought this back from Germany in 1958 for Dad.

Additional filter lenses from Argoflex and some
Dad had ground locally.  Also his light meter.

Dad's Argoflex that he used prior to my birth in 1939.
A treasure.
GIVEAWAY
Begins December 5
ENDS December 13 @ 12:01 a.m. ET
Open to USA & CANADA addresses only. NO P.O. BOXES

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Find it at Candlewick-click here Or Amazon.com-click here
DISCLOSURE: I received a complimentary copy from Candlewick Press to facilitate a review of my honest opinions which are freely given. I was not compensated. Giveaway prize copy is provided and sent directly to the winner by Candlewick.

22 comments:

  1. My folks had an old Polaroid camera and vintage photos have always fascinated me. I've been a shutterbug ever since.

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  2. I learned David Ellwand has been a photographer for more than 30 years. I'd like a copy of The Mystery of the Fool and the Vanisher.

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  3. Absolutely! My very first camera was a Brownie which was quite simply a box that held film, a lens, and a mirror. I just thought it was the most awesome thing!

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    Replies
    1. Yes I do enjoy taking pictures, but it is just not the same on a cell phone.

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  4. 1. David Ellwand began his career in photography at the age of eighteen and uses a variety of formats and techniques in his books: black-and-white photographs, collage with hand-tinting, and full-color photography of handmade objects.
    2. Fairie-ality The Fashion Collection from the House of Ellwand

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  5. Yes, I enjoy taking pictures.

    1. David Ellwand likes the delicate beauty of flowers.
    2. David Ellwand has written "The Mystery Of the Fool and the Vanisher."

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  6. I tend to use my cell phone or iPad to take pictures. I enjoy taking pictures.

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  7. I learned that David Ellwand is the author-illustrator of more than twenty books for children.

    Fairie-ality Style sounds appealing.

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  8. My grandfather was a newspaper photographer for the AP back in the 1940's and 50's. He had a basement photo lab where he'd develop his non-work film on the weekend and I used to love to "help" as a kid. He gave me my first camera when I was a teen, an old Nikon Nikkorex, and I've been hooked since.

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  9. I do enjoy taking photos. There's something really magical about it. My Dad has a collection of all of his Dad's old cameras.

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  10. My daughter collects these cameras and I remember my Dad having one.

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  11. My grandad had a vintage camera and yes I enjoy taking pictures

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  12. I learned that David Ellwand has more than 100 cameras. And I thought my daughter had a lot!

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  13. I love taking pictures, but not with vintage cameras. i have a best friend who is into EVERYTHING photography though

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  14. He's been a phtographer for more than 30 years and another title is Fairie-ality

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  15. I don't have any vintage cameras, but I love taking pictures! :)

    mia2009(at)comcast(dot)net

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  16. We still have my Dad's cameras. I love taking pictures, but use a (slightly) more modern camera than my Dad's.
    patricia dot mariani dot esq at g mail dot com

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  17. i lov epictures. i want my dads cameras so bad!!!

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  18. I had my Polaroid camera that takes photos and prints them right there the old way. I used to have a picture collage but it got lost somewhere in the fire it stinks, but new collages to start soon. I love this old vintage so amazing.

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  19. I enjoy viewing photographs more than taking them.

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  20. One of his other titled books called The Mystery of the Fool and the Vanisher seems really interesting and good. I love mystery books.

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  21. He is a versatile photographer, who works with both digital and film cameras. He also wrote Fairie-ality.

    patricia dot mariani dot at g mail dot com

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