This Week:
What: Sunday Best.
4.27.2015
Kodachrome Classic Monday #37
Every Monday, I'll be spotlighting a different classic Kodachrome slide that I've picked up, and trying where I can to detail the who, what, when, where, why, and how (much) of the image:
4.24.2015
An X-Pro Project - Four Experiments in One
"So, um, how do you like that restaurant down the street?"
"I don't care for it?"
"Really?!? How many times have you been there?"
"I never have."
"Um.... Alrighty then!"
Such could very well be akin to the narrative defining my feelings on cross processing of slide film using C-41 chemistry. I'd never tried it, and never really intended to do so either, as the idea seemed little "hipster gimmicky" to me, and I'd considered myself a photographic purist. In an almost defiant move to the notion of the idea, I'd even happily developed two rolls of Agfa Crossbird, a film that readily promotes use as a cross processing medium, in conventional E-6 chemistry.
In early April, while reading one of my favorite photo blogs, the Casual Photophile, I happened upon a post detailing the basics of X-Pro. In short, by the time I finished reading the article, the engaging Photophile managed to break it all down to the point where the idea of shooting a roll of film and then cross processing it actually sounded like FUN. That is, after all, a big part of why I like to shoot film. After posting my comments on the excellent article, he encouraged me to give it a try, hence the post that you are reading now.
I had a few rolls of recently expired Velvia 100F 120 slide film lying about whose color rendition (when processed in E6) about which I wasn't exactly over the moon, so this seemed the obvious choice for a film medium. I also certainly had a few dormant medium format cameras sitting about waiting for their next assignment. I elected to choose the most "Lo-Fi" of them all, the humble Agfa Billy Record I, one of the very first folding cameras that I ever picked up. With a slow and modest f/6.3 lens and only 3 shutter speeds, it seemed to be the ideal conduit for this part of the experiment.
Since this was a project centered on experimentation, it seemed like this would be a nice opportunity to broaden my experimental horizons in the process. Since my Olympus PEN E-PM2 offered a "Cross Process" creative filter, I figured I would shoot comparable images on it using this mode to compare to the film results. Finally, since I was going "Lo-Fi" with my look on the analog side, it seemed only natural to use an adapted manual focus lens on the digital body instead of an AF lens. To closely match the composition of the focal length of the film shots, my most suitable choice was the widest of these in my possession, a 24mm f/2.8 Promaster lens that I've rarely used.
Therefore, this one experiment actually wound up consisting of four experiments rolled into one!
\
"I don't care for it?"
"Really?!? How many times have you been there?"
"I never have."
"Um.... Alrighty then!"
Such could very well be akin to the narrative defining my feelings on cross processing of slide film using C-41 chemistry. I'd never tried it, and never really intended to do so either, as the idea seemed little "hipster gimmicky" to me, and I'd considered myself a photographic purist. In an almost defiant move to the notion of the idea, I'd even happily developed two rolls of Agfa Crossbird, a film that readily promotes use as a cross processing medium, in conventional E-6 chemistry.
In early April, while reading one of my favorite photo blogs, the Casual Photophile, I happened upon a post detailing the basics of X-Pro. In short, by the time I finished reading the article, the engaging Photophile managed to break it all down to the point where the idea of shooting a roll of film and then cross processing it actually sounded like FUN. That is, after all, a big part of why I like to shoot film. After posting my comments on the excellent article, he encouraged me to give it a try, hence the post that you are reading now.
I had a few rolls of recently expired Velvia 100F 120 slide film lying about whose color rendition (when processed in E6) about which I wasn't exactly over the moon, so this seemed the obvious choice for a film medium. I also certainly had a few dormant medium format cameras sitting about waiting for their next assignment. I elected to choose the most "Lo-Fi" of them all, the humble Agfa Billy Record I, one of the very first folding cameras that I ever picked up. With a slow and modest f/6.3 lens and only 3 shutter speeds, it seemed to be the ideal conduit for this part of the experiment.
Since this was a project centered on experimentation, it seemed like this would be a nice opportunity to broaden my experimental horizons in the process. Since my Olympus PEN E-PM2 offered a "Cross Process" creative filter, I figured I would shoot comparable images on it using this mode to compare to the film results. Finally, since I was going "Lo-Fi" with my look on the analog side, it seemed only natural to use an adapted manual focus lens on the digital body instead of an AF lens. To closely match the composition of the focal length of the film shots, my most suitable choice was the widest of these in my possession, a 24mm f/2.8 Promaster lens that I've rarely used.
Therefore, this one experiment actually wound up consisting of four experiments rolled into one!
- Cross Processing Slide film, which I've never done before.
- Using the previously unused Cross Processing filter on my Olympus Pen.
- Shooting with the under-utilized Agfa Billy
- Shooting with the under-utilized Pro Master 24mm lens.
4.20.2015
Kodachrome Classic Monday #36
Every Monday, I'll be spotlighting a different classic Kodachrome slide that I've picked up, and trying where I can to detail the who, what, when, where, why, and how (much) of the image:
This Week:
What: Springtime in the park.
4.17.2015
Portland (OR) After Dark: A Film Photo Project
Learning is an interesting animal. There are times when one spends considerable time learning new things in bits and pieces over the course of many months. Then, there comes the time when one must draw from what they've learned to achieve a desired result in a far shorter period of time.
In the past several months, I've been able to learn a lot about film photography at a leisurely pace, and to apply bits of this newly found knowledge at an incremental rate. Usually, as I've taken photos in the region, I've been able to experiment on my own time and pace, knowing that if I made a technical error in my photos, I could return to the same site at a later date without too much in the way of inconvenience. Unique or rare lighting and weather conditions were about the only factors that created much of a sense of urgency to "get the shot right," but even then, there was always some possibility of a return visit to get a better photo if needed.
In the world away from my home in the mid-Atlantic, those same rules of forgiveness do not readily apply. So when I had to book a trip to Portland, Oregon to assist with some family business, I realized I could (and should) take along some film to shoot as a means of decompressing from the business at hand. If I had any free time, it would be in the evenings, and since I remembered some cool old neon signs that I loved in the City of Roses, it seemed this would make the ideal setting for some classic film photos.
Given that I've worked with several kinds of film as well as numerous cameras over the past few months, the possibilities of what cameras to take, what film to shoot, as well as what combinations of film and camera would work most ideally seemed pretty daunting. I was looking at two evenings at most with which to do this, with no idea when I might be returning, so it was time to pull all I'd learned together to achieve the most of this opportunity.
First, I had to do a little reconnaissance with Google Image searches and Street View to map out photo opportunities. I'd remembered a few signs from previous visits to the Rose City, but as I looked deeper, I discovered many more worthy photo subjects awaited me. Some were spectacular, some were quite nice, and a few were a bit more basic, but still worthy of my time. I took to Excel to list these sites, their locations in the area, and try to prioritize them by interest level.
Given that, I then had to make the decision of the cameras I would take as well as the films I'd use. This proved to offer some challenge, but as I had managed to get a good degree of experience with each, the choices I ultimately made gave me no heartburn. I got obsessive to the point of looking at each possible visit site to determine if there was any special film or camera that I'd specifically want to use for any of them.
Ultimately, I took along about a dozen rolls of film of at least 6 varieties, as well as cameras to capture results in a range of formats. Though I'd hoped to give all the cameras use for this project, some, such as the Franka Solida, were never loaded with film at all during my stay, while others were also used at other parts of the journey back.
Ultimately, the lit neon photos were captured on Velvia 50, Provia 100, and Agfa Crossbird 200 using the Balda Pontina, Zeiss Ikonta 521/2, Zeiss Super Ikonta 531/2, and the Kodak Autographic 1A 116 format camera. I began adhering to a pre-planned regimen of taking specific scenes with specific cameras and film, but had to abandon this notion as the whole process of unmounting and remounting various cameras on my single cheesy tripod proved to be extremely infuriating in the limited amount of time I had at my disposal, and the increasingly limited patience. I had expected to be recording exposures on my exposure notes, but that too went by the wayside quickly, as I interacted with my brother during our ride along through the streets of Portland.
With all that was going on, I began to realize that I might be overexposing the shots by the end of the first evening of shooting, and had generally corrected this by the second night, though both the Pontina and Super Ikonta had some quirk of their own regarding the shutter closing after bulb exposures that I had to continually catch and correct. Upon returning home and sending off the four rolls of film for processing, my initially high expectations started to wane a bit with worry between exposure issues, and some of the equipment quirks.
Quite fortunately, most of those worries proved to be unfounded, and the results that arrived just a week later from Old School Photo Lab were quite nicely done. Even one of the flub shots turned out to give a very interesting, and usable result. Though framing issues hindered the results I got from the Autographic 1A, I was elated to find that the Super Ikonta 531, a camera which had previously provided me some very disappointing results on its initial test roll, delivered some very good shots this time. Perhaps some of this had to do with me foregoing the use of the rangefinder, and relying instead on my distance estimates.
Results from the Trioplan equipped Pontina were generally wonderful, though some of my favorites came from the more humble Ikonta 521, into which I fed a roll of Crossbird 200, processed simply in E6 chemistry. But enough with my jabbering already. It's time to let the photos do the talking. Enjoy!
In the past several months, I've been able to learn a lot about film photography at a leisurely pace, and to apply bits of this newly found knowledge at an incremental rate. Usually, as I've taken photos in the region, I've been able to experiment on my own time and pace, knowing that if I made a technical error in my photos, I could return to the same site at a later date without too much in the way of inconvenience. Unique or rare lighting and weather conditions were about the only factors that created much of a sense of urgency to "get the shot right," but even then, there was always some possibility of a return visit to get a better photo if needed.
In the world away from my home in the mid-Atlantic, those same rules of forgiveness do not readily apply. So when I had to book a trip to Portland, Oregon to assist with some family business, I realized I could (and should) take along some film to shoot as a means of decompressing from the business at hand. If I had any free time, it would be in the evenings, and since I remembered some cool old neon signs that I loved in the City of Roses, it seemed this would make the ideal setting for some classic film photos.
Given that I've worked with several kinds of film as well as numerous cameras over the past few months, the possibilities of what cameras to take, what film to shoot, as well as what combinations of film and camera would work most ideally seemed pretty daunting. I was looking at two evenings at most with which to do this, with no idea when I might be returning, so it was time to pull all I'd learned together to achieve the most of this opportunity.
First, I had to do a little reconnaissance with Google Image searches and Street View to map out photo opportunities. I'd remembered a few signs from previous visits to the Rose City, but as I looked deeper, I discovered many more worthy photo subjects awaited me. Some were spectacular, some were quite nice, and a few were a bit more basic, but still worthy of my time. I took to Excel to list these sites, their locations in the area, and try to prioritize them by interest level.
Given that, I then had to make the decision of the cameras I would take as well as the films I'd use. This proved to offer some challenge, but as I had managed to get a good degree of experience with each, the choices I ultimately made gave me no heartburn. I got obsessive to the point of looking at each possible visit site to determine if there was any special film or camera that I'd specifically want to use for any of them.
Ultimately, I took along about a dozen rolls of film of at least 6 varieties, as well as cameras to capture results in a range of formats. Though I'd hoped to give all the cameras use for this project, some, such as the Franka Solida, were never loaded with film at all during my stay, while others were also used at other parts of the journey back.
Ultimately, the lit neon photos were captured on Velvia 50, Provia 100, and Agfa Crossbird 200 using the Balda Pontina, Zeiss Ikonta 521/2, Zeiss Super Ikonta 531/2, and the Kodak Autographic 1A 116 format camera. I began adhering to a pre-planned regimen of taking specific scenes with specific cameras and film, but had to abandon this notion as the whole process of unmounting and remounting various cameras on my single cheesy tripod proved to be extremely infuriating in the limited amount of time I had at my disposal, and the increasingly limited patience. I had expected to be recording exposures on my exposure notes, but that too went by the wayside quickly, as I interacted with my brother during our ride along through the streets of Portland.
With all that was going on, I began to realize that I might be overexposing the shots by the end of the first evening of shooting, and had generally corrected this by the second night, though both the Pontina and Super Ikonta had some quirk of their own regarding the shutter closing after bulb exposures that I had to continually catch and correct. Upon returning home and sending off the four rolls of film for processing, my initially high expectations started to wane a bit with worry between exposure issues, and some of the equipment quirks.
Quite fortunately, most of those worries proved to be unfounded, and the results that arrived just a week later from Old School Photo Lab were quite nicely done. Even one of the flub shots turned out to give a very interesting, and usable result. Though framing issues hindered the results I got from the Autographic 1A, I was elated to find that the Super Ikonta 531, a camera which had previously provided me some very disappointing results on its initial test roll, delivered some very good shots this time. Perhaps some of this had to do with me foregoing the use of the rangefinder, and relying instead on my distance estimates.
Results from the Trioplan equipped Pontina were generally wonderful, though some of my favorites came from the more humble Ikonta 521, into which I fed a roll of Crossbird 200, processed simply in E6 chemistry. But enough with my jabbering already. It's time to let the photos do the talking. Enjoy!
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
Among my first sign captures were images of one of the best of the batch, the Palms Motor Hotel on Interstate Avenue. While my first shot, above, shows some tripod movement, that while not bad, is a little odd, the second capture seen below manages to render this lovely classic sign in its best light, both literally and figuratively.
4.13.2015
Kodachrome Classic Monday #35
After too long of a hiatus, my classic images return! Every Monday, I'll be spotlighting a different classic Kodachrome slide that I've picked up, and trying where I can to detail the who, what, when, where, why, and how (much) of the image:
This Week:
What: Business district on a very lovely Spring day.
3.27.2015
Fun with Film: Rollei RPX 25
In a world dominated by speed, sometimes, it can be a little refreshing to slow things down. The world of cameras is no different. Today's digital equipment can shoot at ISO speeds unheard of just 20 years ago, when 3200 speed was a pure adventure in graininess. My two digital cameras will actually shoot no slower than ISO 200, which I am not always thrilled about.
The reason is that I sometimes would like to shoot sunny scenes at a wide open aperture to get thin depth of field and good bokeh, and the 1/4000 top shutter speed doesn't always cut it at an aperture of f/1.4. The only alternative is to put on a ND or polarizing filter to cut off the light coming to the sensor.
So I was naturally intrigued to see an ISO 25 speed film among the options available when I got back into shooting film, and snapped up a roll to give it a try. Only later, after getting a 120 camera with an f/2.9 lens, and finding that it actually worked pretty well, did it occur to me that I had a perfect combination of film and camera to test, and I wasted little time loading up my Franka Solida with this neat find.
This, my friends, is Rollei RPX 25 film.
The reason is that I sometimes would like to shoot sunny scenes at a wide open aperture to get thin depth of field and good bokeh, and the 1/4000 top shutter speed doesn't always cut it at an aperture of f/1.4. The only alternative is to put on a ND or polarizing filter to cut off the light coming to the sensor.
So I was naturally intrigued to see an ISO 25 speed film among the options available when I got back into shooting film, and snapped up a roll to give it a try. Only later, after getting a 120 camera with an f/2.9 lens, and finding that it actually worked pretty well, did it occur to me that I had a perfect combination of film and camera to test, and I wasted little time loading up my Franka Solida with this neat find.
This, my friends, is Rollei RPX 25 film.
3.13.2015
Imitation Perle: Whispers of the Welta
It is often said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. This definitely rings true for consumer products. It was often with much amusement that I would see "COBY" headphones done in a style and typeface that looked just like those from "SONY." There are many more examples to be sure, but I don't need to belabor the point.
But what about products that look just like another established brand, but lack any markings whatsoever, leaving you to wonder if they are made by the brand itself? Is that flattering, or just downright odd?
And herein lies the mystery of my latest acquisition. It minces no words when it comes to who made the lens and shutter, but is totally "hush hush" on the actual manufacture of the camera itself. Still, it is close enough in form to a Welta Perle to make me think it might be a product of this German manufacturer. Thus, I can't resist the play on words in calling this new acquisition my "Imitation Perle." It turns out that this may be a Welta made camera marketed as either the Rodenstock Citonette, or alternately a Schaja 100, but I'm not entirely sure. In any event, I'll stick to my moniker for now.
I stumbled across this camera upon perusing classified listings at the Analog Photography Users Group. The seller listed the camera as an "Antique 120 Folder With Rodenstock Trinar 75mm 4.5 Lens," quite possibly also seemingly baffled by the lack of a maker to the camera itself. Initially listed for $37, the price for this working camera had just been dropped to $22 including shipping. It seemed like a good buy with no big risk, and I'd been contemplating getting a second 645 folder to supplement my Ikonta A 521, so I wasted no time in making contact with the seller to make the purchase.
The camera arrived quickly and safely, and looked to be in good working condition. It showed some signs of use, but considering it was over 70 years old, it was to be expected. A gentle cleaning and some checks of the shutter confirmed that it was at least ready for a test roll. The shutter sounded like it fired pretty accurately, but instead of color transparency film, I elected to test this camera using a roll of Kodak Ektar 100 color print film to allow some degree of exposure latitude if the shutter speeds were off.
The "Imitation Perle" on the left bears a lot of striking resemblances to the real article, seen at right, and has a nearly identical form factor despite a few interesting differences.
But what about products that look just like another established brand, but lack any markings whatsoever, leaving you to wonder if they are made by the brand itself? Is that flattering, or just downright odd?
And herein lies the mystery of my latest acquisition. It minces no words when it comes to who made the lens and shutter, but is totally "hush hush" on the actual manufacture of the camera itself. Still, it is close enough in form to a Welta Perle to make me think it might be a product of this German manufacturer. Thus, I can't resist the play on words in calling this new acquisition my "Imitation Perle." It turns out that this may be a Welta made camera marketed as either the Rodenstock Citonette, or alternately a Schaja 100, but I'm not entirely sure. In any event, I'll stick to my moniker for now.
I stumbled across this camera upon perusing classified listings at the Analog Photography Users Group. The seller listed the camera as an "Antique 120 Folder With Rodenstock Trinar 75mm 4.5 Lens," quite possibly also seemingly baffled by the lack of a maker to the camera itself. Initially listed for $37, the price for this working camera had just been dropped to $22 including shipping. It seemed like a good buy with no big risk, and I'd been contemplating getting a second 645 folder to supplement my Ikonta A 521, so I wasted no time in making contact with the seller to make the purchase.
The camera arrived quickly and safely, and looked to be in good working condition. It showed some signs of use, but considering it was over 70 years old, it was to be expected. A gentle cleaning and some checks of the shutter confirmed that it was at least ready for a test roll. The shutter sounded like it fired pretty accurately, but instead of color transparency film, I elected to test this camera using a roll of Kodak Ektar 100 color print film to allow some degree of exposure latitude if the shutter speeds were off.
The "Imitation Perle" on the left bears a lot of striking resemblances to the real article, seen at right, and has a nearly identical form factor despite a few interesting differences.
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