I USED THREE ROLLS OF FILM BEFORE I TOOK A PHOTOGRAPH WITH THE WIDELUX F7

I have owned this camera for about 10 years now and I have an admission to make, I only really bought this camera as I was influenced by the actor Jeff Bridges when I stumbled across his black & white photos taken on sets, between takes, with a panoramic Widelux F7 camera. Films like Tron, True Grit, Crazy Heart and The Big Lebowski.
More photos can be found on his website https://www.jeffbridges.com

I found one on eBay, bought it, loaded it, shot a roll of film and had it developed…the results…nothing! The negs were all black. I thought it must be me, maybe I didn’t load it correctly. So I carefully loaded a new roll and shot more photos, had them developed and the same thing…nothing, so I put it on the shelf to gather dust.
Fast forward a year or so and I picked up the camera again, convinced it was user error previously I watched a video on youtube to check I was loading the film correctly. I took my third roll of film and had the same results as before…nothing. Not giving up this time, I did an online search to see who might be able to repair or at least service the camera, this is when I found Precision Camera Works in Chicago (he is now based in Texas) (https://www.precisioncameraworks.com). As luck would have it I was going to be in Chicago a few months later with work, so I reached out to Bob and he agreed to look at it. I sent the camera off and arranged to pick it up when I arrived in Chicago.
After the various work meetings I drove over to see Bob and to pick the camera, he said it was all working now and would be okay (I forget what he said the issue was). Then I had to fly to Los Angeles, so the first time I used it was at the Donut Derelicts early morning car meet at Huntingdon Beach https://www.donutderelicts.com/. I had no idea what to expect or even if the images would come out given my earlier trials with the camera…but it worked and here are just a few photos from the car show.

For those that don’t know, the camera works by rotating the lens through a 180 angle as you take the photograph, if your too close to your subject there can be some distortion. When you’ve taken a photo, the act of advancing the film is also the way the lens is reset to the original position. There are only three shutter speeds (1/15, 1/125, 1/250 sec), the view finder is pretty accurate but your own eyes are a better view finder and you will find it relatively easy to take good pictures without using the view finder at all.

The second time I used the camera was on a trip to Fez in Morocco, I had decided to just take rangefinder cameras with me, so I had the a Mamiya 7ll, a Leica M9-P and now that I was feeling a little more comfortable with the Widelux I took that too. Unfortunately the airline lost my luggage with the battery charger for the Leica and most of my 120 film (big lesson learnt there). So I had limited use of the Leica, a roll or two of Ilford HP5, Kodak 400TX and some Shanghi GP3…I ended up buying a few rolls of Fuji print film locally (not much choice).

The first few days we were exploring the old city of Fez and I was able to shoot a few decent photos of the local tannery with the Mamiya 7ll.

I was also able to borrow a Fuji x100s as I wanted to keep some of the Leica battery life for later in the trip. I won’t show all the photos here as this is about the Widelux, but here is a photo from a project I was doing on a local boxing gym.

The other camera was the Leica M9-P. This was taken at a local Fantasia event, the brown smoke in the air is gunpowder from the recently fired guns.

Fantasia is a traditional exhibition of horsemanship performed during cultural festivals and celebrations in Morocco. The performance consists of a group of horse riders, all wearing traditional clothes, who charge along a straight path at the same speed so as to form a line, and then at the end of the charge fire into the sky using old muskets or muzzle-loading rifles. The following photographs were all taken with the Widelux F7 and either Fuji 200 or Kodak 400TX 35mm film.

I tried to play with perspective and hope I captured the atmosphere of this event. I still have a lot to learn when using this camera but it was a fun experience and I was very happy with the results given this was just my second time using the camera.

Thanks for reading and liking the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop a message.
Peter

WET PLATE PHOTOGRAPHER IAN RUHTER HEADS TO SLAB CITY WITH HIS GIANT CAMERA

Ever since stumbling across Ian Ruhter’s film ‘Silver & Light’, I’ve been fascinated by his journey of buying and then converting a van into the largest camera to make the world's largest ambrotypes (also known as a collodion positive).

He has travels all across America for several years documenting landscapes and people on this journey. For the last two years he has traveled to Slab City in California for ten days at a time to create 46x59 inch portraits alongside Will Eichelberger. A recently released documentary short by Lauren Vance called The Carnival of Dreams gives a behind-the-scenes view of this fascinating photographic process. In this film he is there with Gary Oldman who is also shooting ambrotypes but on a smaller scale.

https://vimeo.com/ianruhter

Thanks for reading and hope you liked the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop a message.
Peter

Gary Oldman© Ian Ruhter

Phyllis© Ian Ruhter

Baby Aiden© Ian Ruhter

RIDE SLOW! TAKE PICTURES

Erik Mathy is a photographer who bicycles. Or maybe he’s a bicyclist who takes pictures. Or perhaps he could be best described as a roaming photojournalist, shooting on film and using vintage equipment and handmade lenses to bring traditional craft and art to modern subject matter. In any event, he rode his bike from San Francisco to Tucson, Arizona, lugging 40 pounds of photo and camping gear, and Adobe Create followed along.

I found this article on the Adobe website, here is a link to the original article:
https://create.adobe.com/2019/10/9/ride_slow_take_pictu.html?fbclid=IwAR0FXX7LkNOFPcyCK4bZJRfGO-yvV8MI8uufdh2esiB_eWWhWJc0A3JzZ-4

Thanks for reading and hope you liked the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop a message.

Peter

FIRST TIME USING THE FUJI FUJIFILM GA645W PROFESSIONAL

I recently bought this Fuji GA645W as I wanted to try a medium format camera with automated focus, it’s very light to travel with (unlike my Mamiya RB67 or RZ67. It was launched in the mid to late 90’s and aimed at the professional photographer amateur with a little more money to spend.
It has a 1:4 f=45mm lens which is about a 28mm lens in 135mm format. The view finder takes little getting used to as you hold the camera horizontally but the view finder shows your image vertically.

So I took it on it’s first trip recently, a road trip on Route 66 in California, here are some of the photographs.

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Those were just a few photographs from the trip, I carried on using the camera back in Copenhagen, Denmark. This time I thought I would try some black & white Kodak Trix 400.

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I enjoyed using the camera, the auto focus was great…but a bit loud. I look forward to taking it on the next trip.
Please hit the like button and subscribe to our instagram, Facebook, Instagram or Youtube pages too…any questions, please feel free to drop a message.
Peter

ON THE ROAD - MAGNUM PHOTOGRAPHERS

Explore the great American road trips made by Magnum photographers.
Click on the photo for more information.

A RECENT ACQUISITION IN HONG KONG - MINOLTA ALPHA 9

On a recent trip to Hong Kong this Minolta Alpha 9 35mm camera took my fancy. I have to admit knowing nothing about the camera before buying it. Once I picked it up it felt very easy to use, very comfortable to hold with a grip on the right side of the body, clear view finder (for someone with glasses) and auto focus too.
It came with a 50mm lens, but I ended up buying a 24mm lens as the streets of Hong Kong as so tightly packed together I wanted to capture as much as I could.

So I just shot a few rolls of Ilford Delta 100 and very happy with the results. I've attached a selection of images from my limited time doing some street photography.

I didn't use all the function of the camera, but I think to just to pick something up and shoot with it and not have to worry that my images were or weren't in focus or if I'd used correct aperture... was a lot fun and such a pleasure to use.

I look forward to taking some colour film with me the next time I use the camera.

Thanks for reading and hope you liked the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop an email

Peter

TWO WEEKS WITH A LEICA M TYP 240

I have recently been back over in England and wanted to give my Leica M TYP 240 a proper spin.  I had planned on using more film than I did and did not really want to get used to shooting too much digital, but the truth is it was such a joy to use I could not help myself.

I used it in conjunction with a Summicron 40mm F2 lens and shot in DNG and Black and White Jpg mode.  I found it a little tricky at times to get the exposure right, especially when shooting dark subjects against the bright sky, but all in all, I was happy with the results.  I set it to single shot to force me not to become trigger happy.  I still go back and forth with digital, I find it's a completely different type of photography vs. film.  Having it set to one shot really forced me to slow down and consider what I was shooting.  The lens coped well with low light situations, but sometimes shooting at F2 the depth of filed was tricky to get the right part of the shot in focus.  

I charged the battery to full and it pretty much lasted the whole of the two weeks, and I only changed the battery on the last day of my holidays.  I was shooting with an M7, a Mamiya 7ii, and a Widelux too, but the M TYP 240 quickly became my go-to camera.

The one thing I took away from the trip was I need to slow down even more than I have and really take time to think about the shot, but sometimes that can be a challenge.

As soon as I get the film back from the developers I will follow up with a post on the other cameras, but fr now I thought I would share the shots from my vacation to illustrate what this great little camera can spit out.

Thanks for reading.

Gary

Good times catching up with old friends in the garden of the grade II listed cottage where we were staying. View taken from the bedroom window.

Old Post Office at the top of Steep Hill in Lincoln.

One of my oldest and best friends...

Waiting for a "Full English"

Union Jack apple boxes waiting to be picked up by the bin men.

Lincoln Cathedral

Gargoyles at Lincoln Cathedral, "The Greedy Banker"

Not many of these around now, so I could not resist this shot.

I loved this old building and especially loved the signage either side..

Never found time for Fish N' Chips

View of Lincoln Cathedral taken from the Castle Walls. I was lucky here as the sky was really overcast and the shone threw on the other side and illuminated the cathedral.

ROLLEI CN200

I don't know about you, but I love trying new film and exploring the possibilities it has to offer. Last month when I was browsing a few of my favourite Instagram pages I came across a new film I had not heard of before. Rollei CN200. I instantly Googled it and took a look at some of the examples that people had placed out there.  Excited by this, I thought I would hunt some down and give it a go.  It took a while to find, but eventually, #camerafilmphoto came through for me and I received 10 rolls.  

So, I loaded some in my Hasselblad 500CM and took it out to try the film and here are some examples of what I got back from the developers.

Here is one of the first frames I shot, the weather was overcast and the film seemed to pick up on that and do a good job of capturing it. No Photoshop, here, straight from the developers onto this site. The one thing I did notice though is the film has a tendency to give off a warmer hue, which gives off a red tint and seemed to get stronger the closer to the spool the film got. You will see what I mean as you pan through the photographs, which are in chronological order.

This was taken on the same day on Delmar Blvd in Saint Louis. Again, the film did a great job of capturing the gloom of the day, as well as the subtle tones and colours.

Delmar Blvd, Saint Louis MO.

Taken a few days later on Route 66, Saint Louis MO. T. Hargrove Fly Fishing. This is a really cool shop and from time to time I purchase my fly fishing supplies from here. Tom is a really cool chap and there is a great ambience in the shop, with lots of characters to meet and share stories with.

This was a sunny day and the film did not cope that well with the sun. I added a haze filter on my Hasselblad too, but this did not seem to help.

American Locksmiths, Route 66, Saint Louis, MO. This was taken on the same sunny day as the previous shot. In the sun the film seems to give off a really warm rich look and tone. I actually don't mind it, but it does get funkier the further on the roll goes.

Same sunny day, shot into the sun and the film really takes on a whole new look. The yellow of the van shifted to a much more muted yellow and the lovely blue sky took on a slight magenta tone. The magenta tone kicks in the further on from here.

This one was taken away from the sun and the blue appeared a little better. I love the geometric patterns of the old building on Route 66 contrasted against the tree and electric cables.

This tree was taken in the similar direction as the last photograph, taken facing away from the sun. Now you can really see the reds and magentas appearing in the tones.

The same shot taken from the opposite direction and the hues completely shifted. Now there is a really heavy magenta tone. This was the second to last shot too, so very close to the spool if that has any significance.

Finally, the last shot. I have no explanation for what is happening here. It is at this point I would open this discussion up to the readers and ask their opinion or thoughts on what might be happening here. I did contact Rollei but was bounced around a lot from number to number. I tried calling the number they gave me in Germany, but all I got was a constant engaged tone.

All in all, I am very happy with the film, despite the hues shifting towards the end, I love the differentiation it offers compared to some of the other more established and standard films. I will definitely pack this into my kit bag for my next adventure over in the UK. Stay tuned for more posts and my apologies for not posting more regularly.

Happy shooting and please contact us if you'd like to write a guest post.

Gary

MY FUJI G617

I'll be the first to admit that I've not been the best at adding to the OR&C blog or website this past 12 months, with a change of jobs and another change of countries it went down the list of things to do next. But I plan to change that...firstly by talking about a camera I bought a year ago.
The Fuji G617 with a fixed 105mm lens, it uses 120 roll film but only 4 image per roll! I first used it in a local forest one foggy morning (with a tripod), I shot both colour and black & white to see the type of images I might get from this massive panoramic camera.

So this was my set up and below are some of my results from using the camera for the first time.

My next adventure with the camera was down by an old boat wreck near the shoreline.

Then I saw a trailer for Josef Koudelka: Shooting Holy Land, there I saw him with a Leica M series over one shoulder and a Fuji G617 over the other...and all hand held. This was the inspiration I needed as I was just wondering which camera to take with me on an upcoming trip to Iceland.
These are just a few of the photographs taken on that trip with my G617.

Then later in the year I took it with me on a trip to Joshua Tree National Park, California.

Yes, you can use the camera on a tripod...maybe when the light is low or if you find it too heavy to hold and carry around with you. But I loved it, I found it a great camera to shoot with. Be sure to take lot's of film with you'll as you'll be surprised how much film you go through. All the photography from Iceland and California were hand held and not a tripod in sight.

Thanks for reading and hope you liked the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop an email

Peter

This is me in Iceland with the Fuji G617, taken by my good friend Vish from @vsonili

LEICA M TYP 240

I recently acquired a Leica M Typ 240 after having watched a video by a photographer called Dotan Saguy.  I already owned a few Leica's including one of my favourites; the M7.  But after having watched his video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgCOyDKXhow  I became intrigued and wanted to try one for myself.  Plus, the positive thing was I could use all my existing lenses on it too.  So after doing my research and slowly establishing which digital Leica to invest in, I chose the M Type 240.  Leica had recently released the the M10 and the M9 was well out and established and already at very good prices on eBay.  However, when I considered all the pros and cons, the M Typ 240 made the most sense.

I have been using it for a  little over a month now and it is quite the quirky beast to use.  The first thing I was advised to do was to upload the latest firmware, so after doing that I went out and started shooting.  My first trip did not go too well and I came back with little to nothing to show for it.  I then reset the camera to all factory defaults and started reading up and doing more research.  It was also a huge help talking with Peter too, as he had the M9 and between us we figured out  a few things that made a huge difference.  

The first thing was the film mode settings, I had originally had them set to vivid colour, which I thought would emulate some of the Velvia and Provia films.  Some of the shots would indeed do this, but in some cases they would also be very contrasty and saturated, resulting in a lot of loss of data and tone.

I quickly read up and discovered that the camera is best set to DNG with fine jpeg and black and white film mode.  This leaves you with a colour DNG file and a black and white jpeg file.  Kind of the best of both worlds.

I am still working with this camera and overall, it is very quirky and high maintenance, nothing like sticking a roll of tax in the M7 and off you go.  I will push through and when I have time will share more, but for now these are a few of the shots I have taken so far...

Thanks for reading and we'd love to hear from you guys too on your experiences so drop us a line on our Facebook page too.

Thanks and happy shooting..

Photograph taken at a book fair in Saint Louis, with camera set to black and white mode. i spotted this chap sat alone at the top of the bleachers with the cardboard boxes in front of him. I also like to contrast of all the rigid squares of the windows and panels again the chaotic patterns and geometry of the boxes.

I could not resist his shot, this guy looked like he was in heaven amongst all the books and on his own.

I wanted to get a closer shot here, but was one row too far way and would of run the risk of being noticed, it's hard to capture those moments before someone notices you. Once they do it's all over.

I photographed this lady watching the solar eclipse this year and it looked like she was praying for something, not sure what but pleased with the shot.

This was a colour shot I converted to black and white to compare. I later learned you can get both and don't need to convert. I now have the camera set to DNG with fine jpeg.

Much happier with the results here, this is the jpeg set to fine, with no conversion and straight off the camera with no photoshop. Much happier.

This is the DNG file with no Photoshop too, i cropped it for framing, but no adjustments. Though I wish Photoshop had an ironing board....

Solar Eclipse on Film

This year I plan on photographing the Solar Eclipse using Kodak Ektar 100 colour negative film.   I scanned the internet for a blog or article on film and the solar eclipse but could not find one.  I thought I would venture forth and write one myself for anyone crazy enough to attempt this.

The first choice was what camera to use, that actually came quickly for me as I love my trusty Hasselblad 500CM and decided to use that.  There are many other equally as great film cameras, but I wanted to shoot medium format and the 6X6 aspect ration made all the sense in the world to me.  

Next was the type of lens choice.  i did not have too much extra cash to splurge on this, so  I found a relative cost effective way to get to the size lens I wanted.  To really do a good job photographing the solar eclipse and filling the 6X6 frame I would need something at 500mm to even get into the game.  So i picked up a good used 500mm Tele-Tessar F8 lens and bought a 2x Tele-Convertor to bring it up to 1000mm.  I know this loses me some f-stops, but I thought I would give this a go and see what happened.

Next was the most important piece of all; the filter.  because I wanted to photograph the lead up as well as the total eclipse i was going to need a good quality filter.  For this I used a Star Guy 105-135mm White Light Adjustable Solar Filter.  It cost $79.00 plus shipping and is something I can use again if I ever find myself in the path of totality.  My first Eclipse was in 1999 and I drove with my buddy Chris from Nottingham in the UK to some random little village in Northern France to get the best shot at taking a photograph.  We drove all the way there and when totality happened we had huge clouds wander through and block your view.  Fortunately I managed to pick up a photograph that the ferry driver took on his camera and had developed on the ferry.

This year, clouds and weather permitting I hope to be in the right spot at the right time and not miss the experience.  

Earlier this month I took a test shot with the above set-up and this is what I got: This photograph was taken using the following settings.

F16 @1/60th of a second using a cable release and sturdy tripod.  Be mindful to use mirror lock-up if you have it and be sure to let you camera come to a complete rest before firing the release.

Taken using a Hasselblad 500CM with a 500mm Tele-Tessar and  2xTele-Convertor.  Also used in conjunction with Kodak Ektar 100 Colour Negative film and a Star Guy White Light Adjustable Solar Filter on Tripod with cable release and mirror lock-up enabled.

Here's the set-up minus the Solar Filter.  Be sure to use a sturdy tripod as the Sun will be high and  if like me you are tall you will want to the tripod set up at it's highest height.  I also used a really sturdy ball head, but am considering using a 3 axis geared head to eliminate any movement.  

Here's another I took using my digital SLR and a Tamron 150-600 mm and a 2x Tele-Convertor also.  I used the same filter and got a different look and feel here, much sharper and warmer, but honestly I prefer the result I got from the Kodak Ektar.

Taken using the Hasselblad 500CM with a 500 mm Tele-Tessar and a 2xTele-Convertor by my youngest son using cable release and tripod.

Where I am located I am only going to get 58 seconds of totality and have not metered or tested for this, so I will be shooting blind.  All settings I shared on this post are minus the lost f-stops due to the tele-convertors, so please be mindful of that.  I think in conclusion I will be shooting somewhere around F11-16 at either 1/60th or 1/125th of  second with the filter on during the lead up to the total eclipse and then without the filter during my 58 seconds of totality most likely F8 at 1/30th.  I plan on using my digital SLR too and will use the light meter in that to guide my film settings.  

I hope this was somewhat helpful to all you film photographers and that you are successful in your quest to get a shot.  Please ensure you use a safe and quality filter, there are many eclipses all over the world but only one set of eyes...

Have fun and I will share my results on here as a follow up post.

SIncerely

Gary

Black & White Development

This last month I thought I would turn my hand to trying some film developing.  This impulse was fueled further by the fact New55 had produced a new type of film developer called R5 Monobath.

The Monobath from New55 is super simple to use and really loves 35mm.  I never really got to give it a fair run on 120 film and plan on doing so later next month.  I developed several types of film through it, Kodak TX400, Kodak TMax and some Ilford HP5 400 Plus too.  I managed to get about 6 rolls in total out of it on the last roll the developing was really flat and I had to modify it a lot in Photoshop to compensate.

It's super simple to use and produced some good results, i am going to explore the Kodak D76 developer next month and will try to write about that on here too. 

I have been reading up on the D76 Developing and it seems to be a lot more involved compared to the R5, but cannot compare the finished results yet.  It will be interesting to see how they contrast and compare.

I shot all of the following photographs on my Leica M7 with a 40mm f2 lens.  I did experience a strange situation with the Leica and the Ilford HP5 film; it kept jamming up at frame 20/25 on a 36 exposure roll.  At first I thought there was something wrong with the camera, but when I ran Kodak film through it, it worked seamlessly.  Not sure if anyone else has experienced this, if so, please share as I still have not ascertained what is happening.

Thanks for following and hope you give the New55 a go, it's about $25 per container, shipping is a little high, so I think i will save up and buy a few more containers to make the shipping worth it.

Thanks

Gary

WHY I BOUGHT MY WIDELUX

Peter and I decided to start a small project per month called The Power of ONE Challenge.  A simple project where we would use one camera with one film for one month. We decided to do this to develop a deeper understanding for some of the cameras we own, as well as enabling us to share and pass on the learning to those who follow. Aside from the cameras, it also allowed us to really get to know some of the film we use too.

My choice of camera for January was the Widelux F7 and I used it in conjunction with some Ilford XP2 400 speed. I was really pleased with the combination and learned a lot along the way. I chose XP2 film because it had a higher ISO rating and would allow me to shoot at higher f stops. Due to it using C41 developing, I was also able to get the filmed processed faster than I would if I were using traditional black and white.

The film was actually lovely to use and responded well in the Widelux,  Obviously it loved the natural daylight of outside, but also faired reasonably well indoors too when I tried it.  I found it to be a little grainy, which for a black and white film I did not mind.  Had it of been colour, I would of probably not been pleased with the grain. All in all, a lovely film and one that I will return too later on with other challenges.

As for the Widelux, it was a complete joy to use, once I got used to the idiosyncrasies it has. Firstly, due to it's lens and nature of the camera, it has a lot of distortion. Sometimes the distortion can work for you depending on subject matter, but there are a few rules of the road. If you are like me and shoot organically, expect to get a lot of distortion as it likes to be kept level. I went back and forth with this and in the end learned to read the subject and zerod in on whether it would distort or not. I found that man-made objects like building and other structural things will display the distortion a lot. As I said, in some cases it can really play to your advantage, but in other instances, it can be a royal pain in the arse. 

Next the f-stops, the Widelux has a limited set of f-stops; f2.8 to f11 and if you shoot at lower stops, it produces blurred images unless you have a rock solid tripod and the camera is steady. Even then with the tripod, it will be more blurred than shooting with the F11 setting. I know this is really common sense, but you can easily forget when metering the light and slip back into the lower f-stops.

What I was surprised at is that it produced some really great shots at 1/15 of a second shutter speed. I thought this would result in blurred photographs, but it did not and I was able to get some great indoor results.

The cold weather, for some reason, this camera did not like extreme cold weather. I took it out a couple of times when it snowed and the mechanism jammed a few times, I decided to bring it back in and wait for a warmer day. I found that because I was shooting a lot of film through the camera, that a residue of the film built up on the inside and would sometimes drop down onto the negatives, I learned quickly to give the inside a clean after I had ran a few rolls through it to stop this from happening.

There is also a discrepancy between the viewfinder and what you get.  I never really managed to figure this out, but if you decide to use one, be aware that there is both a horizontal and vertical shift the closer you get to the subject. I suppose again, this is blindingly obvious as it is a rangefinder of sorts, but still something to keep in mind. It does come with a lovely set of filters that clip in too, and I used the yellow filter a few times and this really helped with the contrast of the XP2.

Overall a really great combination of film and camera and I already miss using them, but now we are focused on using the Hasselblad 500 series in conjunction with some Kodak Ektar 100, so stay tuned for that post in a month or so....

Please also feel free to join in the challenges and stay tuned on our Instagram page On Roads and Cameras.

Thanks for reading.

Gary

TIPS FOR A GREAT ROADTRIP

Found this article on Wanderlust Travel Magazine when looking for road trip ideas:

JASON LEE'S PHOTOGRAPHY OF A DUST-COVERED AMERICA

I came across this article from Format magazine on Jason Lee and his new limited edition book.

JAMES BARKMAN TRAVELS AROUND THE USA WITH HIS VW VAN AND MOTORCYCLE TAKING PHOTOGRAPHS

Just when I have the itch to do a road trip again I read see this short film on James Barkman and his travels in his 1976 VW van. I now want a van or maybe an old Land Rover to hit the open road again...anyone up for a road trip?

SHOOTING WITH THE WRONG EXPOSURE SETTINGS

I shot these a few weeks ago in Portugal...it was early in the morning before the sun had risen and so was still a little misty. I was using Kodak Portra 400 with my Hasselblad 500cxi, but like an idiot I had forgotten to change the little cardboard tab on the back, so I was in fact shooting with Portra 100 not 400.
All of my light meter readings were wrong, and to add to my woes I forgot to wind the film on fully before opening up the back...this comes from shooting with two backs and wanting to catch the mist before the sun came through the clouds.

I have to learn to slow down and be more careful. I'll post these photos and wonder what could have been...and hope I get better at this photography thing.

Thanks for reading and hope you liked the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop an email

Peter

The Mamiya 37mm Fisheye Lens

I took the first two photography somewhere on the road between Monument Valley and the Grand Canyon on our roadtrip in April.
It was my first attempt at trying out my newly acquired Mamiya 37mm Fisheye lens for the first time. I have a slight distortion in the first image, but the second one isn't as noticable (mainly in the foreground).

But you can really see the distortion here at a veiwing point at the Grand Canyon.

This is Gary at Zabriskie Point in Death Valley, I seemed to have had a light leak on this roll of film.

And finally an image taken at the Sequoia National Forest in California, I tried to catch the shaft of light hitting the trees. You can see how the trees either side of the main tree curve.

So, overall impression would be that I liked the lens a lot, but I have to find the right subject matter to shoot. If I'm honest I didn't use the lens as much as I thought I would because of the distortion, I eventually sold the lens as I could never find a reason to shoot with that much distortion..

Thanks for reading and hope you liked the blog…any questions, please feel free to drop an email

Peter

THE FOG

This summer I was lucky enough to find myself in Cape Cod on family vacation and even luckier to find that a huge wall of fog was moving in over the sea inland.  i had always wanted to shoot fog before, but never really had the chance to do it in such a great setting as this.

Here are a few shots from the roll I shot, more to come.  I used the Hasselblad 500CM with a 80mm lens.  The fog moved quickly and also was tough to shoot due to it misting up the lens and camera ll the time.  Next time i would recommend a large Zip-Lock bag and see if that helps.

THE GOOSE (6OOSE)

I recently I purchased a Polaroid 600SE AKA The Goose.  It earned its name due to a mis-print in a magazine when it was first introduced to the market.  I must admit, of all my Polaroids, this one has the sharpest and clearest resolution of all.  It was made by Mamiya in Japan and as well as using Fuji FP3000B and C it also uses 120 and 220 film too.

Such a great camera and such a shame that Fuji has stopped making its instant film. We will add this camera to the list on our website and ensure we add the photographs we shoot with it.

Thanks for following.

Gary