They say if you have good eyes, your vision is 20/20. That is, you can see clearly at 20 feet what a person with normal visual acuity sees at 20 feet (6 meters for the metric minded.) This concept of good sight even gave us sayings like “hindsight is 20/20,” meaning we may not know what will happen in the future but, looking back we can see what happened. At least some of us! So, happy 2020 to all of you, may your visual acuity be as good as 20/20, and even better.
There is another link to looking back that sparked this article. As a matter of fact, it is even broader than looking back. I am talking about the time machine that fascinated SciFi writers and scientists alike. The time machine would allow the user to travel to any time in the past by simply stepping inside the machine, cabinet, car, and whoosh! You are there, at that time. Well, I have realized that a photo or film scanner is a kind of time machine. I recently purchased a new scanner* and started scanning old photographs piled in boxes or albums and even a larger number of film strips and slides and I am moving all over time.
Yes, I know, simply looking at the photographs will serve as the same, at least a similar purpose as we recall the time, and live those moments again. But, other things await you if you scan old images. Invariably, they will need some cleaning, touch-ups to remove the dust and scratches, adjustment of the faded colors or tones, and you will do all this very carefully. I have always found digital editing of photographs quite meditative, especially those taken a while back. Sitting in front of the screen and looking at the scanned images sometimes larger than life so that I can see the specks of dust help me engage with that scene, person, place, and time. If some of the photographs are close to 70-75 years old, the time travel goes into warp speed. Engage!
Of course, this kind of time travel benefits from good memories. As I was talking with a friend a short while ago, I mentioned that we have been lucky to look back and have a good time because we have enough good memories to recall. Indeed, nostalgia is the reward for getting older, and you cannot have nostalgia without good memories!
Have a little time travel, at least by looking at some old photographs. If you have a scanner, fire it up, place those photographs on the glass and scan away. Time travel can be rewarding whether you see yourself as a little kid or a father holding his kid in his arms, looking at your family members, or looking at your pets. Memories will keep bubbling up, bringing a smile to your face and mind.
Happy New Year, and may your time travels back or forward be happy and healthy.
Now, travel with me at near warp speeds.
I took the last photograph in a very simple setting, then named it Entering Singularity which represents the ultimate time travel, perhaps to a different dimension and universe through a black hole. If you stare at the blue planet you may see it falling in, traveling in time.
* I would like to thank Garry Farber and his team at Hunt’s Photo and Video for giving me a very good price on an Epson V850 Pro. It is a very good scanner.
Haluk Atamal
Only fantastic photos yield fantastic scans; still I was intrigued by your scanner and looked it up. For one grand and a lot of desktop space, it should deliver for sure.
Beatiful photos as per usual. Thanks Cemal. I can feel what you feel for backwards time travel. I still have a lot of unscanned negatives though, waiting for my real pensioning :)
Türkan and I wish you all a healthy and prosperous 2020.
Haluk
A. Cemal Ekin
Best wishes to you, Turkan, and the boys, Haluk in 2020 and beyond. Even with a much less expensive scanner time travel can happen, pick up one and bubble up those memories.
Cemal
Ramazan KAMARI
Sevgili Cemal,
Nostalji yaşlanmanın ödülüdür ve iyi anılar olmadan nostaljiye sahip olamazsınız. Bu sözü çok sevdim.
Sevdiklerinizle birlikte sağlıklı, mutlu nice seneler dilerim.
A. Cemal Ekin
Ramazan, biriktir iyi anilari. Bir sure sonra sana cok iyi yoldas olacak onlar. Mutlu yillar 2020’de ve ileride.
Cemal
Ted Haley, Jr.
Hi Cemal.
I enjoyed your article on scanning old photos. I have also enjoyed scanning and fixing old photos. It helps to bring back old good times of our past. The sorry part is there were very few cameras in my younger age. I scavenge around to my brothers and cousins for old family images. I have a new hobby finding old bottles and inserting the rendered images inside old antique bottles. I give them to the family on occasion. I got the idea from an article in Yankee Magazine. Very time consuming but worth my efforts. The old bottles have small openings to get images inside. I have to roll the photos then unroll them inside the bottles. Not an easy project! But satisfying, to say the least.
I have dismantled our Wedding album (1960 B&W 8×10) and scanned all 58 images. It’s amazing looking at your digitized self on a monitor in real-time. Our 4 sons are amazed at my efforts. I gave a copy to my granddaughter Danielle to archive for nostalgia. She is an accomplished wedding and portrait photographer. She uses these photos to show her clients the importance of an album for generations to come.
Enough of my rambling. I wanted to say hello and wish you both well. Louise are I are enjoying each day. only getting out occasionally to do some drive-by shooting. We went North for 3 days, the first week in October for foliage images. The colors were amazingly awesome. Went to Woodstock Vt. to old stomping grounds, Jenne Farm, Cloudland Rd and the like. Hopefully to go again for winter images.
Hope all is well for you and Jan. Enjoy each day!
Ted & Louise
A. Cemal Ekin
Ted, it is very good to hear from you and Louise. I asked Dennis a couple of weeks ago whether anyone in the club has heard from you and Louise, he did not know. I don’t go to the meetings anymore, Jan occasionally goes to say hi to friends and I go with her. Good to chat with friends.
Your new hobby sounds very interesting. Maybe one day we can see a few samples. Keep doing the time travel via scanning old photos. I will have a more organized approach soon rather than grab-and-scan. I asked Jan to go through the photographs and separate them for me to scan, possibly in some time order. But, indeed, I feel as if I am with that person at that place when I work on the old photos. Time travel is good, especially if you are chasing good memories.
Please give our best to Louise, greetings to you both from Jan and I. Take care, be well. Happy new year.
Cemal