Spring is in the air or at least it was for a moment. Where I sit writing this, big wintery snowflakes fall from the sky. Back in rainy Biel/Bienne Silvan and the team are moving into T1 production of Lensman 1, but more on that further down the page.
In the last post, I shared a poll with a number of photographers whom we could potentially be working with. It was interesting to see the selections and it appeared that the community guessed correctly once again. Without further adieu let's learn more about our Lensman 2 partner Brian Griffin.
Professor Brian Griffin
Our partner photographer was born in the UK on April 13, 1948, and has a tremendous career in both photography and filmmaking. In 1988, he published the book “Work” with a one-man show at the National Portrait Gallery. “Work” was awarded the “Best Photography Book in the World” at the Barcelona Primavera Fotografica 1991.
In 1989, the British Guardian newspaper also declared Griffin “The Photographer of the Decade” for his portraits of musicians, including Depeche Mode, R.E.M., Iggy Pop, Ringo Starr and Peter Gabriel. Life Magazine even used his photograph “A Broken Frame” on the cover of a special supplement, “The Greatest Photographs of the 80s.”
Starting in 1991, Griffin all but left still photography to focus on directing film projects that ranged from commercials to music videos to short films. He returned to photography in 2002 and shot a project called "People and the City" that contributed to Birmingham's bid to become the European City of Culture followed by a retrospective at the Art Museum Reykjavik Iceland in 2005.
How influential is Brian Griffin?
Well, in 2004 he shot a documentary for Paul McCartney and created advertising campaigns for major brands like British Airways and Sony. The Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain awarded Brian the Centenary Medal in recognition of his sustained, significant contribution to the art of photography.
In 2014, he received an honorary doctorate from Birmingham City University. In 2016 inducted into the Album Cover Hall Of Fame and in 2019 became an Associate Visiting Professor at the University Of The Highlands And Islands, Scotland.
Selections From Brian's Archive
Brian Griffin Special Edition Lensman 2
Horage will be creating a special edition of Lensman 2. The Brian Griffin special edition will be unique in that Brian has preselected a dial and case back engraving. Also included will be some very collectible images from his archive. We, of course, will need your help narrowing down these images so next week I will post images from Brians's archive for you to all vote on.
Horage is honoured to be creating a special edition of Lensman 2 dedicated to the extraordinary life and work of British photographer Professor Brian Griffin. The majority of his archive was produced at a time long before digital photography and Photoshop. He is truly a pioneer of the mechanical art of photography and one that exemplifies the value of believing in one's light.
Be sure to join us next Tuesday, April 18th @17:00 CET for a very special live stream with Brian Griffin.
And check out so much more at Brian's website.
Lensman 1 Update
Machining and T0 are the most time-consuming of production and with those items out of the way, we can move on to T1 assembly for Lensman 1. As a recap from the last forum post T1 (Terminage One) is the assembly of all finished sub-assemblies and decorated parts in a movement. This is when the watchmaker starts putting all the pieces of the movement puzzle together. When the first T1 movements are built up they will then be regulated and have their power reserve measured.
Setting jewels in main plates is a part of T0
According to Silvan, we should still be on track for the first batch of watches to be completed by the end of April. This means the majority of Lensman 1 will be delivered throughout May.
Lensman 2 Pre-Order In May
Lensman 2 is well underway with Leon and I working on the details for the press release. It's a highly complex project with lots of details to consider, so the team here is providing feedback with revisions made daily. The press release provides watch media with a first overview of the project for them to write about. Following this we will start building out the web page for Lensman 2 with all finalized details.
Currently, we are aiming for a pre-order in May and will share more on those details in a future post.
Recap From Last Time
It was great to have all your help on the last post regarding the topic of a Lensman Series set. It appears the majority have agreed that a Lensman Series set be offered with 82% at the time of writing this voting yes. David and I have been working on the incentive details for the purchase of two watches as well as honouring those that placed orders for Lensman 1.
This means we will be offering a Lensman 1.1 tourbillon. There will be a dial change and the production run will increase, of course with Lensman 1 still being limited to 200 pieces. As well we are working on a new strap for this watch. Currently, we are finalizing these details and we will work to provide images of the new Lensman 1.1 soon. We understand that after seeing Lensman 1.1 those who ordered Lensman 1 might want to change and you will be able to do so if your watch has not yet shipped. If you want to change the delivery will be moved back as dials are still in production.
It's great to see our community growing! Hello to all the new subscribers who are discovering Horage or those that are anxiously awaiting more Lensman 2 details. There is much to share and despite my efforts to compress all that is going on into the forum, you are always welcome to ask questions in the comments.
Until next time...
Landon Stirling
@kwmickelson we are trying our best to speed up things on Supersede, but it is a movement with much more parts, COSC certification procedures and especially a first run of K2 in series production. We need to get through this pain staking time of fine tuning our workflow for this K2 GMT and this will not change much no matter if we throw more people at it. And honestly we also underestimated timing on getting K2 going. On the other hand we have more experience with the Tourbillon and we also learn some lessons when it comes to timing. Thanks for your patience and support and we continue to improve.
In between we enjoy this nice story with Brian Griffin emerging.
Must say it is more than a little disappointing to see assembly and regulation work progressing so fast on the Lensman 1 with the Supersede so very far behind schedule, and falling further behind every week. 🤔
we should see images of lensman1.1 as fast as possible, otherwise we really can't know if we want to switch or not...
Really like the Big Bang picture and the Soldier album cover!
Can’t wait to see the design 🔥🔥🔥
Humbled to be working with Brian Griffin. Definitely take some time to check out his back catalogue of imagery as it spans generations. Let us know what some of your favourite images are of his.