cetan's weblog a man, no plan, a blog, golbanalponnama.

Further Demise

In July 2005, I was shocked and saddened to find out that Lab One, the film developing and printing lab where I was getting all my b&w and slide film processed had closed. (previous posts: one two).

On Thursday, I went out for a 3 mile walk during lunch. My route happened to take me near the former Lab One building. I noticed some construction materials near the building and a few formerly covered windows were now broken open. Poking my head through one of the holes, I was greeted with quite a site.

(click image for a larger view)

When it was a lab, customers only saw about 1/10th the total space. To see this open, vacant space was a twist on my brain. I was so used to being just in the customer space, that I never thought about the rest of the building. It never even occurred to me that it could, well, go beyond what I could see from my side of the counter.

The digital revolution has brought a lot of change to photography. Less and less is being printed, more and more is being saved to fragile hard drives with no backups. Images are shared around the world in seconds instead of languishing in boxes in a closet for years. Photography labs are closing and skill sets are disappearing. But more cameras are being sold each year than ever were sold during the high-point of 35mm film. Photography has been going through a great change. I hope, in the end, it is all for the better.

Interestingly enough, todays cetan.org photoblog post is a similar view but of a different building taken 2 weeks ago: http://www.cetan.org/index.php?showimage=16