On Monday I went to visit the school for the first time since I started shooting a
series of photos in Turners last September. I met with George, ran into Joan, spoke with Dick and then snuck into Stephen Wilkes' lecture for a minute.
I graduated in 2000. At that time digital was just a little more then a concept. Digital has come a long way in seven years and Hallmark has been ahead of the game ever since. This year Hallmark has given
EVERY student a
Leaf Aptus 22 Digital back to take home, sleep with, eat with, etc.
Not sure if you current students actually understand what you have. I am gonna turn into a dork right now and start talking about "when I was a photographer I had to use 'film'". But seriously, do you know what you have? Many talented photographers in NY, scratch that, all over the world, would die to have access to this. You must use it! Shoot the shit out of it, get on it like its crack! sleep with it! destroy it! whatever you have to do to get full use out of it - cause it is not coming with you after you graduate. Trust me, you will miss it and you will regret not spending every waking moment shooting with it.
A high end device like that in the palm of my hand while I was attended Hallmark would have been crazy, it would have literally changed my life! While I was there I spent the majority of my "spending" money on film, film, film and then paper. I was shooting so much that my mother stopped sending me money for food cause I would use it on film. She started sending me Wendy's gift certificates instead. First off, I was only 18 OK. Second, bad idea mom; once my roommate, notorious for forging shit, got a hold of a "one dollar food coupon" for Wendy's, he decided to copy it, manipulate it and then print out a bunch of "five dollar food coupons". Cut to interior of Wendy's: "Sir, we don't make five dollar coupons". "Really? That's weird". Wow, I'm way off target here. My point is that rather then spending your allowance on a shit load of film and paper and then spending 8 hours a day in the darkroom, you can simply shoot, shoot, shoot and then burn. OK, you get my point, I'll stop preaching.
Anyway, the school not only has a sweet camera set-up but a really amazing new building that houses, well, everything. Lots and lots O digital shit, a huge studio area, lecture hall, blah, blah - take a look at it
here. We're all visual people anyway.
The commercial photo industry is drastically changing and it looks like Hallmark is doing a great job of staying one step ahead of it. It was nice to be back.
