A lot of people ask me where the name “Frame 37″ came from — what does it mean. Although other photographers who have been around long enough to know what a film camera is understand the concept, many of my clients just look puzzled. This entry is a brief attempt at describing what it means to me.
The negative is the equivalent of the composer’s score, and the print the performance.
Ansel Adams is famous for saying, “The negative is the equivalent of the composer’s score, and the print the performance.” For me, it’s in the performance where everything comes together as a visual artist.
It is from this concept — a fine photograph being analogous to the performance of a score — that Frame 37 has its roots. If a roll of film has 36 negative frames, then the 37th frame represents everything that happens to those frames to create beautiful images. While extreme care and diligence in recording those 36 images on a roll of film is important, it is in the interpretation of those raw images — each artistic step that goes into the creation of a finished work of art — where the 37th frame finds its meaning. It’s where I find the outward interpretation of what I envision a final image to be; the communication of my perceptions, the latent image brought to life, the making of a photograph.
