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This will be a poem about photography – its history, current state, types, features, social effects etc, together with any personal views, recollections, anecdotes or witticisms.

It will be of 20 lines, in iambic pentameter, rhyming ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH IJIJ. As the early history of photography is particularly associated with Frenchmen – e.g. Niépce and Daguerre – line 1 and every third line thereafter (i.e. lines 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 16 and 19) shall include a French word/phrase commonly used in English. This should be shown in bold.

Here are the title and first line:

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory
Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck,

Note: Before you add a line, please check to be sure that it is in iambic pentameter, which has 5 stresses (da DUM da DUM da DUM da DUM da DUM). Iambic pentameter occasionally drops an unstressed beat, as in the new line below, but alway has five beats).

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
(AU-di-EN-dus, GET us BACK on TRACK)

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
(AU-di-EN-dus, GET us BACK on TRACK)

That magic box of wood or Bakelite

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
(AU-di-EN-dus, GET us BACK on TRACK)

That magic box of wood or Bakelite
Could capture our best moments contre-jour

I have also changed the eighth line:

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
And polychrome trumped white-and-black.

That magic box of wood or Bakelite
Could capture our best moments contre-jour
But lacked a meter to decide how bright

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
And polychrome trumped white-and-black.

That magic box of wood or Bakelite
Could capture our best moments contre-jour
But lacked a meter to decide how bright
The light should be to make the image sure

For the sake of symmetry, I have decided to make the fourth stanza 8 syllables per line, like the second.

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
And polychrome trumped white-and-black.

That magic box of wood or Bakelite
Could capture our best moments contre-jour
But lacked a meter to decide how bright
The light should be to make the image sure

These days no add-on is de trop

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
And polychrome trumped white-and-black.

That magic box of wood or Bakelite
Could capture our best moments contre-jour
But lacked a meter to decide how bright
The light should be to make the image sure

These days no add-on is de trop
Cases, lenses—on and on

THE CAMERA

Technology has made us all blasé
About the nature of photography
The old flash powder, plate and darkroom tray
Are now the bric-à-brac of memory

Then film came next along the trek
Pushed the most by Eastman Kodak
Dont le film made the rest a wreck
And polychrome trumped white-and-black.

That magic box of wood or Bakelite
Could capture our best moments contre-jour
But lacked a meter to decide how bright
The light should be to make the image sure

These days no add-on is de trop
Cases, lenses—on and on
Replaced by cellphones alas and alack