Yes, sometimes I still shoot film (remember film?) and this week I dropped by my friendly neighborhood black and white lab here in Toronto, the conveniently named Toronto Black and White. There was a great print on the wall and I asked, Who did that?
Michelle Quance was the answer.
This was actually the second time I'd asked about a cool print at the lab, and the other time it had been done by Michelle Quance as well. I'd even looked her up on the interweb that other time and seen there was lots of fine work on her site, but after that I forgot the name. As anyone who knows me can tell you I have a terrible memory for names. I can remember the scores of Blue Jays' games from ten years ago, but names? Nope. It's a bad habit I admit. I'm sorry about it.
Anyhow, this past week after visiting Toronto Black and White and re-learning the name I googled up Michelle Quance again, and what did I see, besides her (still very impressive) site? A just-posted review of Michelle's work by a disgruntled consumer, saying she was bad, bad, bad, extremely bad, possibly a member of Al Qaeda and really just generally bad. The review was on several sites but always worded exactly the same way and so clearly written by exactly one person. A person who didn't even have the courage to post a name and was complaining just this week about work done three years ago.
That's unfair.
No one likes the internet more than me, especially all that music I illegally download (whoops, ignore that). But when someone posts anonymous ancient complaints it's awfully suspicious. Of course I can't tell you the circumstances of a photo shoot done three years ago by someone else however I can tell you that photographers don't go around inquiring about other photographer's work very often. Especially not twice. Consider that if you read the complaint about Michelle's work somewhere on the 'net, and consider that this is coming from a potential rival. Except for the weddings part, because, well, I don't do those. They make me cry.
And please don't mention to anyone about the music stuff.
