Never Underestimate...

...The power of a charity shop!  I'm a big fan of charity shopping - some people turn their nose up at it but i dont mind owning second hand stuff and if the money i pay for it can help someone else then thats even better.  Lately though charity shops have seemed a bit "dry".  There was a time when you could wander in and pick up great used cameras and darkroom stuff for next to nothing, but it seems that since film has had a sudden resurgence in the past few years, so have charity shop camera sales.  But yesterday i struck gold!

  As some of you may have read i have recently moved house to an area called Kirkham which is just outside Preston.  It's only 20 minutes away from where i used to live but Jess got a good job here and she doesn't drive, plus we were over here 5 times a week anyway so it made sense.  We moved at the weekend and i booked Monday to Wednesday off work (which means i'm back in today unfortunately).  We got our friends and families to help us shift everything over to the new house and then we blasted out most of the unpacking and did a little decorating.

  Yesterday we decided to have a little wander into the village which is literally 1 minute walk away from our new house.  It's quite strange having every shop you need so close to your doorstep.  There's hardware stores, a Morrisons, a greengrocers, cobblers, banks etc; and, of course, charity shops.  We decided to pop into the first one you come to on the high street and lo and behold sat in the display cabinet was this:

  And it came in a camera bag!  All for £20.  Needless to say i bagged it immediately.  As you may know i dont usually shoot 35mm but i thought i may as well get this camera as i have a box of 35mm film i got given when i bought my darkroom and sometimes you just want rectangles instead of squares.  So, whats in the kit i hear you ask?  Well...

• A Yashica FRI camera body with TTL metering (complete with manuals)
• A Yashica 50mm f1.9 lens
• A Yashica 28mm f2.8 lens
• A Tamron 80-210 CF Telemacro f3.8 lens
• A Tamron 500mm SP Telemacro lens (with hood)
• A shutter release
• Cokin ring adapter with linear polariser
• A camera bag to keep it all in 

  Not too bad a haul in my opinion.  Im not too sure if the camera or lenses are any good but i cant complain at £20 can i?!  I shot a quick roll of Ilford Delta 100 yesterday afternoon with it and developed it and the negatives look good.  I did a quick scan and got this:

   Focus is a bit off but i think it came out ok.  I hate scanning film though and im sure the darkroom prints will come out way better (once the darkroom is set up).  Speaking of which - although there's no room in the house to create one, Jess wants met o get a shed and convert it.  No doubt that's a project ill be doing a few blog posts about soon enough.  But for now, hit those charity shops!  It may take a while but you'll eventually find something awesome!

The Curse of the Big Print

  Months and months ago i made a 16 x 16 lith print on a sheet of Afa MCC 118 paper which turned out perfect.  I plan on framing it and (hopefully) getting it into the Harris Museum open exhibition which is where "artists" in and around the Preston area get to submit a piece of their work for display in the museum.

  Meanwhile i have literally spent the past two months trying to get this print scanned.  Big print and small scanner is not a good combination.  I am using an Epson V500 to scan with and i will take a sheet of A4 size paper, so i'm having to scan the print in several separate sections.  The problem comes when trying to stitch them together in Photoshop.  I have been having computer issues lately (its getting old and i think i just need to wipe it an reinstall everything again) and so Photoshop keeps having a sulk whenever i try and do anything with large files.  It's a shame really as the negative i made the print of is one of my favourite ones to print, i love everything about the image; plus, it works great in lith.

  Anyway, in the end got so fedup im decided to relith it using some smaller paper (7 x 7 Orwo BN 118 to be exact) and post it here and on Flickr.  So here it is, finally online:

  The print on Agfa paper has a more yellow colour to it than this pinkish one but i think it still works.  Im looking forward to framing it and getting it displayed.

PPPP (or, In a Preston Park Photographing with Paul)

  As many regular readers of this blog will know i live very close to one of Preston’s largest parks.  This park is brilliant as i can walk straight through it to work, cutting my daily commute by half.  Last Wednesday was a truly beautiful morning, the sun was low in the sky, the dew was still hanging on the cobwebs and the mist was rising from the river.  I promised myself that the next day we had weather like this i would be in the park with my camera

  Well Thursday was a horrible day, the clouds had rolled in and the rain was coming down at every conceivable angle.  Friday followed suit and all the rain was causing the river to rise a bit too high for my liking.  As i was coming to out of my slumber on Saturday morning though i noticed a strange warmth to the room accompanied by an orange glow from behind my curtains.  Sun? Surely not! YES!!  After seeking permission from my loving wife (sometimes she reads this blog – i must dish out the flattery) i leapt from bed, grabbed my bag, stocked up on film and hit the pavement running. 

  Just like the previous Wednesday the morning was clear and warm with rising mist and hanging dew.  I couldn’t wait to get into the park and start shooting, especially as i had a few new bits of gear to try out.  I had won a 150mm S lens for my Bronica SQ-A a few weeks earlier on EBay for an absolute steal and today would be a great time to try it out.  Also i had managed to grab hold of a Pentax Spotmeter V which i was dying to try out.  For those of you that don’t know a spotmeter basically lets you take a meter reading of a tiny part of your frame.  Do a few of these across your shot and you can see how best to judge your exposure.  Armed with my new and old kit i power-walked into the park and got shooting.  I called a friend who lives nearby (even though he is an evil digital shooter) and got him to meet me inside as sometimes it’s just nice to have a bit of company.

  We had a great time, there were plenty of nice shots to be taken, especially with the dew evaporating in the sun.  I tried to focus very carefully on my use of filters and on my metering.  I have always struggled with metering.  It should be very simple but for the longest time i have never been able to get exposures i am happy with using my incident/reflected meter.  My new spotmeter was a joy to use though.  Having done a fair bit of reading up on the zone system i was prepared on how to use my new meter to its full potential.  It was so easy to use and get accurate readings from.  For those of you unfamiliar with the zone system ill probably be writing a post on it at some point soon in the future.

  Anyway, on with the narrative.  We walked up the river taking some photos of the spiders webs hanging between the undergrowth and then headed over the footbridge to take some photos of the mist rising over a farmers field.  One handy thing about the spotmeter here was that i could see how much more exposed the sky would be compared to the foreground and then apply the appropriate grad filter.  A simple thing but a joy to do.  We then carried on up the river towards Waitrose where we stopped for supplies before heading back into the park to shoot the trees and leaves as the sun had risen higher in the sky.

  All in all we spent about 3 hours wandering the park, up and down the slopes and through the muddy puddles.  Then we headed home for food and a sit down.  We ended up spending the rest of the day playing risk, watching dvds, developing film and doing some printing.  Im pretty happy with how my prints came out.  The one of the triangle shaped web was a pain to make and i wasted so much paper but i got it how i wanted it in the end.

   Its really nice to look back over the roll you have shot, developed and printed and know that at every single step you were making something for yourself .  I really love the feeling that you have made something with your own hands that is unique to you, even if no one else gets to see the finished product.  Im thinking i may print some of these photos on bigger paper and maybe even try some subtle toning but thats another post for another time...

Rides, Reserves and Rodinal

  What better activity to do on a sunny Sunday afternoon than go on a lovely bike ride?  It was our first wedding anniversary earlier in May and one of the gifts i got my wife was an old Raleigh bike.  I stripped it down, sprayed it up, stuck a wicker basket on the front and re-assembled it.  I wasn’t sure how well it would go down with her as she had a nasty accident on a bike when she was younger and has feared riding ever since.  All credit to her she got out and now she loves it!  

  As part of the ongoing Guild celebrations in Preston the council have decided to create the Guild Wheel which connects new and old cycle paths around Preston to create a 21 mile ring of green and pleasant roadway.  Fortunately this wheel passes right outside our house so we decided to check some of it out.  

  We were having such a pleasant time that we went 4 miles and ended up at Brockholes Nature Reserve.  If you’re ever in the area it’s well worth a visit as there are lots of hides to watch wildlife and a lovely floating visitor centre and restaurant.  We parked the bikes up and had a little wander around – fortunately jess had brought one of her other anniversary presents, a Holga 120 CFN.  We had great fun pottering about and shooting a roll of Tri-X 400.  We had a drink and some Chorley cakes and then set off on the ride home.  After riding 8 miles we were pretty wrecked (due to general unfitness) and spent the rest of the evening working our way through the Lost dvd boxset (what the heck is going on on that island?!?!).

  Monday night after work i developed the film in Rodinal (i had to give a little push in development as i thought the film may be a little underexposed) for about 13 minutes and left it hanging to dry.  A couple of hours later we were in the darkroom getting ready to print.  We decided to work on 2 shots from the roll which make a nice little mini-set together.  After making some test strips we had figured out what exposure we wanted to work on and what dodging and burning was required.  An hour or so later and we had 2 prints that we were very happy with.  Jess loves to print and i must confess that there is something rather exciting about placing some paper in a tray and watching an image slowly develop.

  Were planning on going out again this weekend (weather permitting) so hopefully we will take some more shots and have a pleasant ride.

(The scans dont really do the prints justice i'm afraid)

And the Streets Run Red...

  Last Sunday saw some of the heaviest rain we have had in a long time.  I woke up unintentionally early and couldn't get back to sleep.  My wife was still soundly asleep beside me, undisturbed by the heavy patting of the rain against the partially open window by our bed.  After playing around on my phone for a while i decided to just get up and walk into town to take some street shots of people in the rain.  I grabbed my Lubitel and decided to opt for a roll of the Lomography redscale xr 50-200 film.  I have attempted to use this film twice before; the first time the photos came out a kind of sickly yellow colour, the second time i developed it myself and it came out blank, but i decided to give it another try anyway and hope for the best.

  My walk into the town centre is via a rather nice park.  In one part of it there is a long tree-lined path which is very photogenic.  Two elderly men were out having a run together down this path.  SNAP.  I carried on into town pondering where to head to and eventually ended up in a large open flagged area outside the museum.  A family rushed by fervently grasping their brollies, trying to shield themselves from this unprecedented shower.  SNAP.  An elderly couple saunter by unperturbed by the downpour.  SNAP.  I decide to head towards the market.  Two strangers pass each other by, brollies held firmly above their heads.  SNAP.

  I carry on like this for an hour or so before decided to head home.  Just before i reach the entrance to the park i catch the reflection of the tall buildings across the road in a roadside puddle.  I crouch down just as a car passes.  SNAP.  My roll finished i hurry home and push through the door, removing my soaking jacket and hanging it on the coatstand.  I decide to be gentlemanly and wake my wife up with breakfast in bed.  We sit and chat for a while then i decide to get my developing gear heated up.  A few hours later and my negative is hanging from the shower rail waiting to dry.  Upon holding it up to the light i can see the development has been patchy and some of the shots arent going to look very good.  Something has gone wrong with my developing.  But never mind, we live and learn i guess.  Still, it gets frustrating when this happens, but at least i should have some salvageable shots from the roll.

  One day ill get some redscale that comes out perfectly.  But for now the streets run red, and i've got work to do.

Parklife

  I am very fortunate in that I live about ten minutes walk from a park bound by a large river which leads directly to the city centre.  This is my route to work (when its dry enough to walk) and a convenient shortcut to the town shops. But on the hot humid days we have been experiencing lately its also a great place to take an evening stroll with a mandolin, a wife, some cider and a camera...

  Now go find a park near you and get snapping...