Triple Take Thursday 3: Plates, Film, and Digital

Variety is the slice of life.  While I continue to shoot traditional film stocks lately, I've been dabbling in some other mediums at the same time.  I've become increasingly involved in the use of dry plates coated by Jason Lane, that have allowed me to use a number of cameras designed for such plates, while also improvising their use into a many other roll film cameras as well. 

I'm also doing a little bit more with digital cameras, between early models with decent specifications and more recent ones with more bells and whistles.  While it's no replacement for a film camera, it does make a pretty easy tag along on my film (and now plate) photo outings.  

Here and there, as I shoot some plates, I'll be supplementing them with the same scene shot on both film and digital to allow for an interesting comparison between the blue sensitive media of the plates, the panchromatic, ortho, or color media of the film, and one or more settings on a digital camera that may mimic or differ from that of the non-digital media.  

Following are three takes of another scene in Baltimore.  Today's trip makes a stop at the Union Soldiers and Sailors Monument, and was taken the day after last week's shot along Linden Avenue.  Unlike the previous day, this Sunday emerged vivid and sunny, with remnants of the snow of the evening before still lingering.  The 109 year old monument has stood at this spot since 1959, after a relocation from nearby Druid Hill Park necessitated by highway construction.  The site near the Wyman Park Dell works well for this monument, and it has since seen its surroundings changed in ways more befitting it, as the southbound lanes of nearby Charles Street that used to curve into 29th Street encroached more upon this monument than they do today.  The change in traffic pattern has made this site more pleasant and relaxing as a result, and its a periodic stopping point for me to do for some quick photographic wanderings.  

With a few hours to burn as a loved one was at a medical appointment, I elected to make the stop past this monument to do my "triple take" as it glimmered resplendent in the noon day sun.  My plate camera was a 6.5 x 9 Zeh Zeca which has been something of a guinea pig among my plate cameras.  It came to me in a bulk auction sporting a basic lens mounted on a worn out shutter that was salvaged from a Univex TLR.  I'd tried a couple of "transplant" lenses upon this camera before electing to give the Meyer Gorlitz Trioplan 10.5cm f/4.5 from my Balda Pontina an indefinite home upon this platform. Supplementing this was the same rediscovered Yashica 35MC stocked with Eastman Double-X film that was featured on last week's entry, and the same Nikon J1 that I'd recently snapped up.  I fired off shots of the bright scene using all three cameras, with only the Zeca tripod mounted to accommodate the slow speed of the dry plates.     

Zeh Zeca 6.5 x 9 cm plate camera with Meyer Gorlitz Trioplan 10.5cm: J. Lane Dry Plate (Sixth Plate) shot at ISO 2, f/8 at 1/10 seconds, developed in HC-110 and scanned.

Triple Take Thursday 2: Plates, Film, and Digital.

Variety is the slice of life.  While I continue to shoot traditional film stocks lately, I've been dabbling in some other mediums at the same time.  I've become increasingly involved in the use of dry plates coated by Jason Lane, that have allowed me to use a number of cameras designed for such plates, while also improvising their use into a many other roll film cameras as well. 

I'm also doing a little bit more with digital cameras, between early models with decent specifications and more recent ones with more bells and whistles.  While it's no replacement for a film camera, it does make a pretty easy tag along on my film (and now plate) photo outings.  

Here and there, as I shoot some plates, I'll be supplementing them with the same scene shot on both film and digital to allow for an interesting comparison between the blue sensitive media of the plates, the panchromatic, ortho, or color media of the film, and one or more settings on a digital camera that may mimic or differ from that of the non-digital media.  

Following are three takes of another scene in Baltimore, this time on a fascinating remnant of Linden Avenue, once a pretty vital arterial street that was almost entirely swallowed up to redevelopment beginning in the mid-1950's.  The 1700 block has managed to survive, complete with streetcar tracks that have been dormant since 1955.  Since the block is punctuated with an island in the middle, the east side of the street acts as auto parking, and the streetcar track remnants abruptly end, the vintage photo possibilities are somewhat limited in composition, but with careful cropping, an image of nostalgic nature is entirely possible with this scene.  

As a wet snow began to fall, I stopped past this favorite haunt one Saturday afternoon with three cameras in tow.  Instead of using a "proper" plate camera for plates, I was using the Kodak Bantam f/4.5 that I'd inherited from my father, with a pre-seated J. Lane "35mm" size plate as a recording medium.  Supplementing this was my newly rediscovered Yashica Electro 35MC stocked with Eastman Double-X film, and the Nikon J1 that I'd recently snapped up.  I fired off close focus shots of the scene using all three cameras, with the Bantam tripod mounted to accommodate the slow speed of the dry plates.     

Kodak Bantam 4.5: 36x50mm J. Lane Dry Plate shot at ISO 2, f/8 at 5 seconds, developed in HC-110 and scanned.

Mighty Mini: The Yashica Electro 35 MC

Flea Markets can be an awesome thing, particularly when you find something unexpected that you never knew existed.  

It was my first (of since many) trips to the Feagaville Indoor Flea Market, and while my wife was more interested in seeing what salvageable furniture there was to be had, I simply had to look in the booth aisles of assorted odds and ends in hopes that I might find something of photographic use amid the clutter of decorative salt shakers and other assorted bits of bric-a-brac.  

While a few odd bits of photographic goodies could be found, one in particular jumped out at me as being of particular interest, even though I had little knowledge of just what it was, or even if it was any good.  I simply did a quick test of the shutter snapping, as well as a quick swivel of the focusing collar to confirm that it was in at least some semblance of working condition, and quickly paid for it. It wasn't a tough decision given that it was selling for a mere $15.  And within 5 minutes, I was now the owner of a Yashica Electro 35MC.

The Mighty-Mini: the Yashica Electro 35MC.