Pre-Digital Photographic Technology

The rotogravure was part of a pre-digital photographic technology era that really made printing what it is today. The rotogravure can be said to be an example of intaglio printing. Intaglio means gravure in Italian or engraved in other words. A rotogravure is" a printing system using a rotary press with intaglio cylinders, typically running at high speed and used for long prints, magazines, and stamps " according to Google. The first patent printing system dates all the way back to 1860 in France where a web fed printing on both sides - a process called rotogravure - whereas the first sheet fed machine was built in 1913 in Germany by Schnellpresenfabrik Frankenthal Albert & Cie. This was the start of something very important in photojournalism.

The rotogravure had affected photojournalism in a positive way with it's high speeds used for long prints, magazines, and stamps. One of the most positive things for a photojournalist at this time was that this printing system allowed for the photojournalists photos to be published in massive amounts. That means more people would be able to see the photographs being published by these photojournalist. Sparking more conversations between people and a discussion of what is going on around them. This was typically good for photojournalism because it had allowed more photographs to be printed creating a business for magazines, newspapers, and stamps. Professor Nordell had said " Sundays were a special edition with photographs and they were the most read pages of the newspaper,  or the most looked at pages in the newspaper, and for companies that advertised in that newspaper in those pages where there were photographs those ads sold much more. " It's more enjoyable to view a picture instead of reading words. That is why I think photographs are so important to these newspapers and magazine companies because photos are what make them successful ultimately. Professor Nordell said " facebook if by land and tweet if by sea." This quote, similar to Paul Revere's, makes us realize how easy it is to post our photographs to social media. Easy access to photographs is important to photojournalism because then interest sparks. Photojournalism had changed for the better with the rotogravure because was so talked about, you couldn't escape from it.

Pre-digital photographic technology was much harder to take a photo unlike the photo I had taken today. My smart phone allows for me to take as many photos as I want. Photos back in the day made it harder for the photographer to take a photo because there was so much that went into a perfect shot. According to Professor Nordell, " a Like a camera, made in Germany, came out around 1925, they use very small rolls of 35 mm film, so with one roll you could take 24 to 36 pictures." Which is incredible for that time period, but today we would think that was a joke. Some people take that many photos in a matter of a minute. Those cameras would take a little bit longer as they take the photo and restart the process. But also, sometimes you would just get blanks while taking those photos. With smartphones today, you could press the button on the camera as fast as you''d like and it would take the photo.

According to Weegee, " the subject as news photography is the most wonder experience of any man and or woman to go through, it's like, ... you push the button and it gives you what you want.  News photography teaches you how to become fast . " Weegee realizes the importance of news photography because just by the press of a button you get what you want. He realized you have to think fast and to always be on your feet or you won't get what you want. It amazes me that through all the difficulties that were presented at that time, that they realized how important photographs actually are in telling the worlds its story.

Photo by : Jason Wegiel

Photo by : Maurice Guibert

Image Source : http://twistedsifter.com/2012/09/photo-manipulations-before-digital-age-photoshop/