Forget Digital, Go Lomo

Originally published in Outpost Magazine

Ansel Adams once said, “photography is more than a medium of factual communication of ideas. It is a creative art.” With the age of digital photography solidly entrenched, the idea of creative art is sometimes forgotten, too easily overshadowed by all the cool doodads the technical geniuses at Nikon or Canon have developed. We can now crop, tweak, saturate, delete and upload—all with the click of a button. Sitting at the computer we can move the mouse pointer over a myriad of tools in our favourite photo editing program. But if you prefer lo-tech, the alternative to this digital fiesta is a small but growing party of Lomographers.

Never heard of them?

Not surprising. The name “lomography” is licensed from a Russian, former state-run optics company called LOMO, which is short for Leningradskoye Optiko Mechanichesckoye Obyedinenie (Leningrad Optical & Mechanical Enterprise). In business since 1914, the company is the largest optical device manufacturer for the Russian Army. It builds a variety of optical equipment from the most basic to very sophisticated multifunctional systems for science and industry. In the last couple of years, LOMO has developed new lines of products, ranging from biological, fluorescent, and polarizing microscopes to night vision devices.

But it wasn’t until General Igor Petrowitsch Kornitzky in 1982 that the seeds of “lomography” were sown. Kornitzky, a heavyweight in the Soviet Ministry of Defense and Industry, was a photography enthusiast. His interest in cameras led him to a mini-camera developed by the Japanese. He showed his new purchase to his comrade, Michail Panfilowitsch Panfiloff, a LOMO director and optics specialist. The two men conferred and Panfiloff was soon ordered to improve on the Japanese design and produce a camera that ordinary Soviets could use to record and glorify their daily lives. Although nobody outside the Soviet bloc realized it, the world of amateur photography had changed forever. The LOMO Kompakt Automat camera, or LC-A, was born, quickly selling by the millions within the Soviet Union and around the world.

By 1991, however, the LC-A’s popularity was fading, weakened by cheap imports from Asia. Soon it could only be found in second-hand camera stores. It was in one of these that a couple of Viennese students discovered this Russian camera. Its versatility and simplicity inspired them to create a new style of artistic, experimental photography. The “technique” consists of taking photographs (or lomographs, if you prefer) in a variety of situations from unusual positions, and then developing them as cheaply as possible. A typical lomograph is shot from between the legs or straight from the hip, preferably without looking through the viewfinder. The final result is colourful, off-the-wall and, every so often, brilliant images.

Similar to Kodak’s concept of the “Kodak moment,” the Lomography motto of “don’t think, just shoot” inspires spontaneity, close-ups and ubiquity, while de-emphasizing formal technique. Because of its small size and ability to shoot in low light with ease, lomography was made for candid snapshots.

Soon after the Lomographic Society (Lomographische Gesellschaft) was founded, the first international Lomographic exhibition was held simultaneously in Moscow and New York. Huge “Lomowalls” were installed in each city, displaying thousands of images, each created following the 10 rules of Lomography. It wasn’t long before the first Lomographic Embassy was established, facilitating meetings and local events in Berlin. Now there are approximately 60 embassies around the globe. “LomographicTours” an event put on by the society enables lomographers to arrange expeditions to exotic destinations.

From international art exhibitiors to the budding lomographer walking down the street, the art of lomography is inspiring an ever-growing community. The online home of lomography states, “the explicit aim of the Society is to study and document the world’s surface by taking millions of snapshots of it. The Society, founded on creativity and boundless energy, is open to everyone with a curious mind and trigger-happy shutter-finger. With Lomography, art is put in the hands of all, and extraordinary expression flows from ordinary circumstances.”

Just remember to follow Rule #10.

LOMO CAMERAS
The various cameras are inexpensively constructed and make use of rainbow-colored flashes, over-saturated colours and extreme optical distortions. Here are three popular models:

ActionSampler
A 4-lensed, photo-photo-photo-photo-camera that dissects a second into four parts and then puts it back together on a single print. When the exposure button is pressed four images are exposed going from clockwise on the negative, each a quarter second after the next.

Fisheye
A 35mm camera with a built-in fisheye lens with a 170 degree view. Huge depth of field renders both the foreground and background in focus.

Pop 9
A 9-lens camera designed to produce 9 identical images with a single shot on one print.

The very important 10 rules:
#1: Take your camera everywhere you go
#2: Use it any time – day and night
#3: Lomography is not an interference in your life, but part of it
#4: Shoot from the hip
#5: Approach the objects of your lomographic desire as close as possible
#6: Don’t think
#7: Be fast
#8: You don’t have to know beforehand what you captured on film
#9: …or afterwards either
#10: Don’t worry about any rules

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 2nd, 2006 at 7:00 pm and is filed under Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site. Add to del.icio.us.