Caroline's Kitchen: 1939

Thanks Ken, i read the whole story about your way to improve the quality at the "Jailhouse Rock: 1941" photograph

http://www.shorpy.com/jailhouse-rock#comments

great work from you guys (at least i found a name new to me: Ken, most of the time i see Dave!).

I think you have to consider that Lange was almost invariably using a view camera. Most digital cameras are 35mm or less. Large format can be had for many thousands of dollars. Digital images are every bit as sharp as those of Lange's time - if you know how to develop them.

This photograph is just plain exquisite. Shorpy has an embarrassment of pictorial riches, but even in such estimable company, this is a standout.

I am veering far too close to obsequious gushing, so let me just say once again, "Great job, guys!"

Looking at the detail in her dress, the wood - everything makes it so clear how much we are losing right now in this stage of digital photography. I look at the photos here daily and I sometimes feel sad that although digital has brought us an explosion of photographs - it lacks the richness of a photo like this.

I want to go inside and have a cuppa cawfee with Aunt Caroline. And listen to her reminisce about when she was a girl.

Don't forget to go to bed every now and then!
Thanks for the great job you do at Shorpy (day & night), and your nice comments!
How is it possible that all your pictures have such a great resolution? If I Google around and come at several places about American history I will find (quite often) the same picture as you deliver us, but never at such a resolution.
Pure magic! Could you reveal the secret behind that?

[The original photographs don't lack for resolution. In fact the large-format cameras of 100 years ago generated higher resolution photographs than 35mm film and today's digital SLRs. The secret is taking the time to work with the high-resolution scans in Photoshop to pull out the details - Ken]