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...

There's Life in the Old Girl Yet...

  There has been a lot of negativity (pun partially intended) around film lately.  Prophets of doom have been heralding the end saying film is on the decline and we all need to stock up before we can’t get it anymore.  But it seems to me there are some positives going on and I thought we would focus on them for a while to cheer us all up a little in these dark days.

  Firstly yes, Fuji have discontinued Velvia 50 in a few formats and now Kodak have just discontinued TMAX 3200 but to be honest I don’t shoot large format so the Velvia discontinuance doesn’t affect me (for now anyway) and I don’t like TMAX 3200 anyway.  Now I know some of you reading this may use these films and i'm not saying i’m glad they are gone or anything – just saying I don’t use them.  The TMAX cancellation I can understand – it wasn’t selling well so they cut it because it was becoming too costly, fair enough.  The Velvia is a little strange however because most of us will know that Velvia 50 is pretty much legendary – there is nothing like it out there.  Since Fuji announced the discontinuance there has been no end of petitions to stop it from occurring – let’s hope the people in charge at Fuji listen.  But let’s just think about why films get cancelled.  When it comes down to it photography companies are still companies.  They make a product and sell it, when it doesn’t sell well enough they stop making it.  Maybe we as consumers are partly to blame – with the rise of EBay it is so easy to just buy second-hand and out-dated films on the cheap; but if we aren’t buying new films from stores then the companies making films are going to suffer.  Just a thought to bear in mind.

  Anyway, I promised positivity didn’t I!  Well, first of all amid all the ambiguity of what’s going on with Kodak I recently saw a message on a forum from Ilford who simply said their films are selling strong, there is plenty of stock and they are going to keep making emulsions.  I must confess it was so refreshing to hear a company come out and simply state exactly what was happening.  I’m a huge fan of Ilford films and papers so to me this was great news.

  More positive news came to me this morning when I received an email from AG Photographic.  They are a UK – based company that (in my opinion) consistently offer very competitive prices on all their products and offer superb customer service.  The email I received stated that they have just opened an on-site lab offering a range of services including C41, E6 and black & white development and wet printing.  Now we hear of labs shutting all the time and large stores like Asda and Boots slowly stopping their film development so this news is most welcome.  It’s great to see that those of us who still shoot film are putting back into the industry and supporting stores like AG and companies like Ilford.  If we keep doing that I don’t see any reason why film production should cease for a long time.

  Also think about companies like Lomography.  Although not everyone’s favourite you have to agree that they are promoting film usage to a younger generation and getting them started.  Speaking personally my first camera was a Lomography Diana F+ camera and I still use it even now.  That camera got me into film in a big way and even though I use a medium format SLR most of the time now and do all my own darkroom work I will never forget that it was down to the Lomo movement that I first got into film.

  Another positive that shows there is still a dedicated user-base of analgoue materials are such internet forums as www.apug.org and www.fadu.org.  These are forums dedicated to film/paper/darkroom work and there are thousand of subscribers putting up hundreds of new posts every day.  Even photo sharing sites such as Flickr have film photography groups brimming over with enthusiastic contributors.  There is a strong analogue photography community and it is reassuring to know that there are so many who continue to support the industry by shooting film.

So even though there is some bad stuff going on in the industry these days try to remember the good – new labs are opening, companies like Ilford are still going strong and “new blood” is taking up film photography with every passing day. 

 I know i'll always shoot film.  For me digital processing will never top standing in a darkroom and watching your image appear on a print.

Prints

  So i’ve been doing a lot of printing since getting my darkroom setup.  The only problem now is that i have almost run out of negatives i want to make prints off so i guess ill have to get back out with the gear and get shooting.

  I thought i would share these prints which i am pretty happy with, they were taken on a recent trip to the Lake District and are close-ups of a rotting tree i found fallen next to a river.  Im sure in ten years time ill look back and think they’re terrible but at the moment im pretty happy with them (apart from the occasional hairs that keep cropping up in a few places).  I’d love to hear what you think about them.

How To: Make Your Own Dodging and Burning Tools

  Ok lets face it, for those of use who print in the darkroom sometimes using your hands to dodge and burn just isnt enough.  Sometimes you just get that one print that you cant seem to get right no matter how much you wave your hands around in the path of the light.

  I have one particular print i am working on that is proving to be a major pain.  Its of a lovely 's' shaped tree i found by a river in the Borrowdale Valley, up in the Lake District.  I spent a good length of time setting up the shot and making sure i got the depth of field i wanted.  When it came to printing i found that around a 5 second exposure at grade 3 gave me the texture i wanted in the rocks at the trees base and in the light bark of the tree.  Some mild dodging and burning in a few places brought out some extra detail too.  The problem, however, lies in the fact that the top part of the tree has a very similar value to the hills in the background.  The result being that the bottom 3/4 of the tree stands out from the frame except for the top which blends in.  This makes the whole shot just seem ‘off’ to my eye.

  Obviously some dodging on the tip of the tree is required.  But, i cant use my hands without affecting other areas of the image eg the sky/foreground because whilst my fingers will block the light from hitting the tree, my hands will be blocking light from hitting the extremities of the print.

  So, i need to use some dodging and burning tools.  A quick look online will bring up a few hits of companies that make them but i can see a few problems.  Firstly you can probably make your own for about a millionth of the price (im a huge fan of home-making things if i can, it saves money that can be spent on other materials), and also there will come a point when the shape of the tools you have just won’t fit the dodge or burn you are trying to do.  So to my mind it just seems better and easier to make your own tools.
Now, some people just tear up some cardboard and use that – and to be honest i have done that in the past, its great for when you have large areas of open sky/landscape which you need to work on but its not very good for more intricate details.  Some people recommend using some coat hanger wire and attaching cardboard to the tip.  Again, totally fine if it works for you.  But i began to try and figure out my own solution which would work best for me.  I like the idea of things attached to wires but i knew that the thinner the wire the better as a wire too thick would make a difference to the amount of light hitting the paper under its shadow.  A couple of days of pondering ensued until i hit upon an idea.  Suddenly “pipe cleaners” just popped into my head.  You remember pipe cleaners form primary school?  Long-ish wires covered in fur – originally intended to clean pipes but adopted by schools for use in arts and crafts.  If i could strip all the fur off a pipe cleaner then the wire would be perfect.

  I went to my local hobby craft store and got 250 pipe cleaners for £2.99 and started stripping all the fur off the wires.  At first i just picked it off with my fingers but after about an hour i only had 3/4 of one cleaner stripped so it wasnt a particularly time-efficient method.  In the end i hit upon the idea of burning off the fur.  I got a metal tray from my oven and used the hob to start them cleaners burning before taking the tray outside.  If you do decide to do this yourself be very careful, fire is dangerous and the smoke that comes off these things looks pretty toxic.  Burn them outside, wear gloves and preferably a mask.  I dont want people mailing me saying they got burned because i told them to set pipe cleaners on fire - i wont be accepting any liability for what you do to yourself!  Once all the fur is burned off run the wires under water as there will be crispy bits still attached to them.  Be careful of these - i was running the wires through my fingers to pull the crispy bits off and ended up slicing my finger open (like a paper cut).  Again, wear gloves and take care.  Once the wires are all stripped dry them out by laying them on some kitchen roll/toilet paper.  Then get some used paper from old test strips and discarded working prints to cut out the shapes you require to attach to the wires with tape or glue.

  The great thing about this is its very cheap and you can make any shape you want to fit any dodge and burn circumstance.  One thing i should say is that the paper/card you attach to the tip of the wire should be white on the side facing the enlarger and black on the side facing the print.  If you have a white side close to the print you risk light reflecting off the tool and back onto the paper which would alter your exposure and you dont want that, do you?

  This was meant to start out as a quick tip article but i have kind of rambled on a bit.  Anyway, hope this helps some of you out there and if you make any tools of your own i’d love to see some photos and hear your experiences about using them.