early butterfly photography

[Jack Harrison]

I was sorting through some old photos (and negatives) I took as a teenager in the early 1950s.

Attached is one from circa 1954. It was taken with a fixed focal length medium format (6 cm x 6 cm) camera with a supplementary lens. Of course, without the benefit of through the lens focussing, it was hit and miss. I used a wire frame attached via the tripod bush to get the right distance. I did my own developing and printing then but colour was prohibitively expensive.

Things have moved on a bit in the last 50+ years. The camera I use today is probably only about a quarter of the cost (in real terms) of that old one I used all those years ago. 2007 picture also attached.

Jack

[Padfield]

Very interesting! I started in the 70s with a good single lens reflex and now produce far better pictures with a cheap compact.

What still awes me, though, is that while human reproduction of the butterfly has changed so much over the years, nature has duplicated that beautiful pattern year in, year out, almost flawlessly, for centuries and centuries.

During the winter months I think of all that butterfly DNA around me in one form or another (though the small tortoiseshells, of course, are hibernating as adults), waiting to be turned from blueprint into living print.

Guy

[JKT]

I can't resist...

Sometime in the late 80's:


Canon AE-1 and Tamron 80-210.