It is said the best camera is the one you carry with you.
I have had Fuji x100 for 9 years but always found the 35mm lens limiting but now I appreciate that it is light and has a neat macro setting. It has a fault that means it does not always power off but it can be set to automatically shut down after 2 minutes which is how I leave it. I carry several batteries and all is well.
Just when you think this has become a zombie blog, I post something to suggest it has a pulse that still flickers. I am still a haphazard tinkerer, blown like a leaf in the wind. The world remains in a permanent state of strange; none more so than in the last 12 months. We were warned it was coming; we knew it was coming; and, from one of those stories in a side bar that usually disappear without trace, it blossomed. I remember the last film I saw with friends was the magnificent ‘Parasite’ in a crowded Chapter cinema in Cardiff. We knew trouble was afoot by then but on that 21st February night I doubt many saw the extraordinary year that was yet to unfold.
There was a brief respite last summer with eating out, an all too brief thing, and in late Autumn I managed to setup a TV in the garden so friends and I could watch some cricket together . It is only in the last week that rules allowed me to do that again and, thanks to Spring coming on at a snail’s pace, it was bloody freezing. I am by nature a fence sitter so I have accepted whatever measures have been put in place but the fact we have not been able to have friends in our homes for over year is really quite mind boggling.
I have regaled my son with tales of strikes and power cuts in the seventies but for young people this has knocked that into a cocked hat. I confess in the heyday of punk, some friends and I jammed on a song called ‘Kill Your Parents’, obviously in jest, but today’s youngsters could accidentally bring that about. So, yeah we had it easy in comparison. The positive side of lockdown is I’ve enjoyed every game Plymouth Argyle have played in a season for the first time in my life, or maybe that is endured. I shall miss it when it goes.
Anyway here I am emerging blinking into the light and meeting people for the first time since before Christmas to discover, even a relative recluse like myself, is a social animal. I may babble; I may rant; and, in Ben Gunn style, I may request if you have a piece of cheese but it just means I’m glad to see you.
And here are some pictures taken with my favourite small camera, the 2009 Panasonic GF1 and it’s diminutive 14mm f2.5 lens and hefty 25mm f1.4. A very modest 8MP by today’s standard but it’s unobtrusive and a lovely thing.
As readers of my last blog will know, I misplaced a film during the windswept expedition to West Wales and, as a lover of a happy ending, I am pleased to report its return.
Gather round….
I went walking yesterday and took the Mamiya 7II out but didn’t take a single shot. When I left, I took a new box of spare film as I have a fear that aliens will descend from the sky suddenly or Lord Lucan will appear strolling on the promenade and I will be stuck without enough film.
On my return, as I took the spare film from my pocket, I had one of those problem solving revelations that used to strike me quite often as a computer engineer. I’d be trying to fix something for hours (I’d confess to days but that would make me sound completely hopeless) when suddenly inspiration would strike and the opaque would become transparent.
In this case, the moment I noticed the spare film box was open I knew what some idiot had done and that I would find the lost film inside. This is something I ordinarily never do but in extremis, like a war zone or a little wind and rain on a welsh hill, the centre cannot hold.
As I pulled the film from the box, I still couldn’t quite believe it; had I not brought the full weight of my man looking skills to bear on the search? Had I not looked several times; would my wife not present this to a jury of my peers as evidence that I cannot find a damn thing?
A man without my moral courage might have just overlooked the whole thing, but when I processed the film in Illford HC 1/31 @20 degree for 6.5 mins I had four images I liked well enough to share.
I made a visit to West Wales where the stereotype that it would rain the whole time was confirmed by plumes of spray on the motor-way and low cloud pressing down on the hills. I patiently followed a cement mixer along the winding country roads for many a mile, hypnotised by its slowly turning drum as the rain continued to fall. I’d come to visit a friend in Cardigan and mount a photo expedition with my Mamiya 7II. We dined on Shepherd’s Pie and red wine that night; a sound preparation it turns out for the next day and a wet and windy Pentre Ifan.
The following morning, the BBC Weather app normally so unreliable proved accurate as their picture of a cloud with two drops of rain could be confirmed by a drawing back of the curtain. But a couple of eternal optimists like our good selves were not to be discouraged by the predictions of a supercomputer and so we found ourselves leaning into the wind and rain, my Mamiya 7II wrapped in a plastic bag.
One thing I can confirm is that the ancients did not erect these stones for the purpose of shelter although, when combined with a decently placed umbrella, you can change a 120 film with reasonable speed. Unfortunately it does appear that you lose the film you take out at this point and it has not as yet turned up. An enquiry into who was at fault in this matter is yet to be convened.
I normally don’t wander about in the rain with a camera so that may explain why some pretty basic stuff becomes something of a challenge. Taking the lens cap off and focusing, it turns out, are somewhat essential to photography even when you are trying to keep the damn camera dry.
The ancient gods smiled upon us for our efforts and the cloud base did lift enough that we could see the coast from our lofty position. We then visited the beach north of the river at Parrog, where the remnant of Storm Brian had left seaweed in great quantities giving the appearance that it was making an attempt to become a land based creature. It didn’t appear to be raining but the air was full of water, pleasantly warm while clouds hung upon the higher ground. I imagine in summer it would prove to be rather idyllic. We breakfasted late or lunched early in the Vic North Cafe an establishment of some pedigree and highly recommended.
Then next day as I drove home the autumn sun shone, mist hung in the valleys and the mirth of the photographic gods could be heard echoing through the hills.
I still had 5 shots left in the camera and so, on my return to Penarth on a completely different kind of autumn day, I finished the roll. I’d processed the two rolls of HP5+ in Ilford HC 1/31 @20 degrees for 6 mins before remembering there must be a third roll I’ve misplaced. Gratification delayed for an eternity I fear and possibly the greatest images taken but never processed, I like to think.
In a radical move I tweaked them in Lightroom using a colour preset.
The last days of summer are upon us and in a break from the everyday 35mm I took out my Mamiya 7 MkII with its 80mm lens. Only ten frames of 6×7 on a roll of 120 generate a feeling you need to make every frame count but on a sleepy afternoon in Penarth, it’s not so easy. I’ve done this walk hundreds of times so I don’t expect to find anything new but a different camera always has other ideas. Few things in life are as lovely as a large black and white negative fresh out of the wash, shiny and wet offering up its delayed satisfaction. You know I might even print some in the darkroom.
This is the whole roll of Ilford FP4 processed in Ilford HC for 6:30mins @ 22 degrees and then tweaked in Adobe Lightroom.
I delayed the gratification so long on this roll of Rollei Retro 100 that I’m not entirely sure of the camera used. Processed in Illford HC for 6.5 mins @ 20 degrees (1+31 dilution). Given an Antique preset in Lightroom.
I took a Rollei B35 for a walk around Penarth. It is a small pocket camera from 1985, which is about as simple as it gets. A roll of film in a tin with a 40mm lens on the front. Distance focusing with a simple meter. I used my first roll of Kentmere 100 film developed in Ilford HC (1+31) for 7mins. I rather enjoyed the results.
Antique preset added in Lightroom
Less is more they say and I’d like to agree with them. The infinite monkeys who were writing Shakespeare. put down their pens and picked up cameras and some are really great. They ones who stumbled on ‘To be or not to be’ now do a pretty good Cartier-Bresson while I see myself as more of a ‘Exit stage left pursued by a bear’ kind of monkey.
I’m slowly working through the rolls of exposed film sitting in the darkroom. It’s not quite the 2500 rolls that Gary Winogrand left but given a fair wind with my health and a continued need to click a shutter, a small mountain might yet be in my grasp.
I’m currently processing one at a time just to get a feel for how the chemistry is working. Using Ilford HC instead of Rodinal gives slightly better grain with Ilford HP5+ to my eye though that is using the Epson V700 rather than darkroom printing. I will fire up the enlarger at some point if only to see the difference.
I used a more concentrated Ilford HC this time at 1+31 instead of 1+47 which at 20degrees only takes 6:30. The HC has turned a tinge of brown in the bottle but still seems to have some potency. A lot less dust this time but I kept the windows closed (I’m a bit of a genius on the quiet) which is somewhat easier with autumn coming on. I changed back to the Ilford wetting agent and scanned the film as soon as it was dry. Still the odd blob but not the blizzard I had been getting.
This roll is shot on the south coast around Emsworth and Chidam. Nothing exciting tweaked in Lightroom with a bit of noise reduction and an Antique preset. Likely shot with Leica M3 and 50mm Summicron.
Yammerman's Blog 