Bowers lighting RIP

RedLED

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This was some very high quality strobe equipment, and they are now gone. I Use Norman, however anyday, they could disappear.

Sad to see the industry with companies like Bowens going down and down.

I guess it will Just be phones in a few years.

Sonovabitch!
 

RedLED

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When it gets to phones for photography I will have sold the Beverly Hills house, I Just spent a month at, the desert Complex, Philadelphia, and our D.C. Townhouse, and I will be from the Maldives, the Predisent has granted me citizenship. Only problem is Cyclones, or is it Typhoons in the Indian Ocean
(Note: same as a Hurricane).
 
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NoNotAgain

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Speedotron is following closely behind on this curve.

When investment bankers purchase companies financially distressed and are unable to turn a profit, they sell the IP and move on.

More and more studio photographers are leaving the business than are getting in, so prices on used strobes and packs drop, no one purchases new, and more companies fail.

Companies like Rotolight fit the bill for portability in a lithium powered LED strobe and continuous light source. Studio only lighting is a dead market.
 

bykfixer

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^^ exactly.
Cannot remember the last time I entered someones house and saw "Olan Mills" on the recent family pictures.

They were HUGE when my kids were little. All my friends and acqaintances have potraits done using.... wait for it...
Celphones. :crazy:
 

NoNotAgain

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Yeah, it is winding down the new generation does not care about quality.

Red, they wouldn't know quality if it smacked them in the face. They're viewing 2x3" images, not 16x20 or 24x30 prints.

Most peoples idea of a family album is a Fakebook, Flickr or an Instagram account.
 

bykfixer

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I never dug getting all dressey bessie in September with Christmas cloths (including a winter sweater), spraying on what ever kept my hair looking combed and driving the car with family in tow to an out of town Olan Mills, setting in a waiting room with a bunch of strangers with sick children all uncomfy in their winter duds so we could all pay too much bread for portraits to clip then put in Christmas cards in December...
I can see why the studio photographer is defunct.... it's just too easy to photoshop everybody in and send in an email these days...

Several years back I did a photo of a family reunion for a lady at work where she had about 90% of her family in a photo, then the wife and I photshop'd the missing grandkids in there to send to the lady's 95 year old grandma. Even removed the point & shoot redeye.
We printed out a nice 8x10, a few 4x6's and charged her $10. Win-win. She got a set of photos cheap and I got paid for an ink cartridge.
 
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KITROBASKIN

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Seems inappropriate to deride others about their choices regarding the taking of photographs. Perception of quality is an opinion. Bitterness is unbecoming don't you think? Sad to see people lose their jobs because of change.
 
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I never dug getting all dressey bessie in September with Christmas cloths (including a winter sweater), spraying on what ever kept my hair looking combed and driving the car with family in tow to an out of town Olan Mills, setting in a waiting room with a bunch of strangers with sick children all uncomfy in their winter duds so we could all pay too much bread for portraits to clip then put in Christmas cards in December...
I can see why the studio photographer is defunct.... it's just too easy to photoshop everybody in and send in an email these days...

Several years back I did a photo of a family reunion for a lady at work where she had about 90% of her family in a photo, then the wife and I photshop'd the missing grandkids in there to send to the lady's 95 year old grandma. Even removed the point & shoot redeye.
We printed out a nice 8x10, a few 4x6's and charged her $10. Win-win. She got a set of photos cheap and I got paid for an ink cartridge.

:laughing: Made CG laugh. :laughing:
 

RedLED

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I don't travel for less than five figures for even a day, and our major corporate clients, some of the biggest and best in America, pay over six figures, on a trip. I have six portrait stations and production manages a ballroom at the hotel as an office, and printing area, so yeah I laugh all the way to the bank. 25 years on 10-16-17.

Wife bought me a platinum Rolex Day Date, Gave it to me a day early. I do it because I love it. In reality , I retired at 40, I'm now 58... Like Chico Rodriguez on SNL: Photography been very, very good to me, and my wife is Mexican so no deletions here. What a wonderful world it is!

Often they send the corporate jet for us. You have to know to know what to do in the the photo business!
 
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bykfixer

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Without going into who can appreciate quality and who can't I'll say this...

As mankind evolves they figure out how to solve problems that end up favoring form over art.
Take the Egyptians for example. Many a structure still stands after centuries. The centuries later it takes a few months to build a giant hotel. Does that mean quality isn't there? In terms of old ways, certainly not but modern marvels allow things to progress much faster.

Old world artists applied dye to surfaces in ways we would not fathom anymore. The egg yolk method has been replaced with acrylic. Instead of waiting months for something to cure it now takes minutes. Michalangelo would probably be estatic.

The MP3 was the death of the audiophile to many as a generation later many of the nuances of the full fledged audio experience is not even known of much less missed but... 5000 songs fit on a chip the size of your thumbnail. Quantity galore while quality is good enough for the current music lover.

Same with photography. If you don't know, you don't know. Doesn't make you wrong, it's just as the old saying goes "a sign of the times" like hotels being built in a few months versus decades. Ansel Adams would probably use an iPhone cam sometimes. Dialed to black and white of course....

Digital is here to stay and some still prefer to take it back in time in terms of film appearance and detail. Others opt for instant gratification. Some were happy with a megaphone shaped funnel next to the needle of a gramaphone. Mr. Macintosh, Mr. Klipsch and Mr. Marantz did not. But I'd bet a Pepsi they'd own a CD player and MP3 player.

What seemed like a good idea once is now replaced with what seems like a good idea now. No more, no less.

I have about 1000 albums and a Bang&Olefsun turntable with a needle that costs as much as some cars with sound fed through a Macintosh tube amp to Klispch Hershey II speakers, but on any given Sunday my laptop computer plays music through a pair of satelite speakers with a woofer about the size of a bread box. I don't scoff at the kids walking around with $3 earbuds listening to the latest gangsta rap through a celphone... I understand things they don't. Does that make them wrong? Not to me it doesn't.
Like the now defunct photo studio, it's just a sign of the times.
 
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