(012) Days Gone down

This image is a product of two very different technologies. The original image was captured on a glass plate negative in 1954 and the 'positive' image you see here was captured and processed with my smartphone in a matter of minutes this evening. The ease with which we can create and manipulate images now is unprecedented but I wonder how many of our photos will survive for future generations. I imagine that if stored in fairly dry conditions the glass plate negatives could last for many more decades, if not longer, but will our digital equivalents of today survive for as long? 
The photograph shows the 'new' laboratory at the Burntisland alumina factory and is one of several hundred glass negs that I found in a drawer in the days before the plant closed. I've digitised most of the images but there are still a few to do. 

Also today, I attended the funeral of a colleague and friend from the same alumina factory, though from not quite as long ago as the 1950s! The crematorium was filled to capacity to remember the life of a thoroughly decent man. RIP Bob.

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