Overdevelopment

I was riding my bike yesterday and out of the blue I started thinking about photographic development and other kinds of development I know.

It seems to me that everything that gets or performs a development is either an organism or an encounter of organisms. A body, a piece of music, a situation, knowledge – all these things can (be) develop(ed). The word literally means “untangle”, “bring from confusion to order”.

Developing negatives is no exception. As well as people and music and events, they are pre-informed with what should be happening. During the developing stage the crucial factor happens, the execution of potential.

Every outcome will be different depending who is involved in a situation, who plays the music and how one develops the negs. It underlines the thing that makes photography such magic – it is soaked with a life of its own.

To make a long story short I then got home and realized that I had overdeveloped my last negative, and that if I could just forget about what could have been I could maybe see the results in a better light.

So I looked again, and I liked what I saw. The contrast is really aggressive and the images very hard. I would make things differently but I can’t, so I will file this under :fortunate mistakes. Which is better than :trash.

On top of this, one of these shots is just perfect and I adore it.

So all in all, rock and a saved roll.