Iceland with a 4x5
Walking around iceland always does feel like you are in the setting that inspired so many sci fi and fantasy stories - this photo, is what communicates that for me.
I never got around to making this post, but I find myself with excess time today and in need of a distraction. So here we go. A few years ago I brought a yashica tlr to iceland, though on my first exposure the shutter stuck and I was without the tools to fix it. So I made do by taking all my photos with a DSLR instead. They came out great, I love them dearly. But I always wanted to shoot iceland on film. So a year later My wife and I planned another trip because we just wanted to get back there! This time, I took a 4x5. My 4x5 is my most reliable film camera I own, mostly because its operation is so simple, less moving parts means less things that can get messed up! The negatives we got from this trip are truly wonderful.
This image is one of my favorite frames from the trip (back in 2023). In any other image, the two silhouetted hikers in the top left would be the focus point, but here they are nothing more than a punctuation mark against the landscape. On the upper third horizon line, centered in the frame is the sun, masked behind an otherwise impervious wall of cloud. Here it works as a guiding star, drawing your eyes down the river into frame and out toward the sea. The green moss rises up the mountain side like fog rising in the air, and the river twists and tumbles on its path out to the ocean. The low, half sun reminds me of views from the moon, or another planet. It hangs in the air, low and misshaped, as if it is not the sun at all, but another celestial body orbiting the strange landscape. The way the cliffs reach outwards at odd angles, collecting never seems to make sense. There is always something that breaks the pattern, there are few clean lines here, nothing has had time to truly begin to erode. Growing up in the appalachian foothills, this is completely foreign to my eyes. Walking around iceland always does feel like you are in the setting that inspired so many sci fi and fantasy stories - this photo, is what communicates that for me.
Fall 2024 - Color film photos
The following are some of the 35mm and 120 format color film I shot this fall and into winter. All shot on Kodak Gold 200. The 120 film was pushed 1 stop
Cascade Falls
This is a location I could keep returning to. While the frames I took last weekend did not come out as great as I expected, I know the views are ripe with potential. I could do a photo book of this location entirely. Just need to keep photographing it.
All frames shot with a Mamiya RB67 Pro S. 65mm Lens.
Film: Ilford HP5+ Pushed to 1600.
First roll on Mamiya RB67 Pro S
I am overall very happy with how this roll turned out. There were a few exposures I took an educated guess on because I shot without a light meter. There are others I didn’t expect to turn out well and actually became one of my favorite from the roll. An Accidental double exposure that is just so dang crispy it makes me want to shoot an entire roll of double exposures. But mostly, because its made up of a bunch of people I see on the daily at work. None of them are engineers or scientists, but they all make NASA happen every day. I am excited to share their portraits with them.
A new batch
Haven't quite figured out how I want to organize my film photos. The workflow is much different than digital. In the meantime, here are some film scans from my yashica. I will add more to this post as I scan this batch of film. It's quite a process just cleaning up the dust from the negatives.
I would like to make this blog the home for all of my new photos. I will still use instagram, but only for the featured photos.
Portraits of friends
One of the curses of life post-military experience is that the friendships which remain are often separated by physical distance. Fortunately we still find excuses to come visit even if only for a short period of time. Dan and Hannah both share a love of art and creativity almost as strongly as they love each other and were there for some of the best sitters I could ask for. This impromptu portrait session was created using my Intrepid 4x5 camera and a couple new film holders loaded with ilford hp5 ISO 400. One of the film holders I discovered after development had a light leak, but I think it added a very pleasant flair to the final image.
Also, I cannot get over Hannah's expression in her portrait. After I set up the camera, I asked her to look at her husband, clicking the shutter as soon as the expression formed.
First batch of film processed at home
Hello everyone!
I am very excited to share my first batch of negatives processed in my garage. This process was incredible simple to do at home. The biggest challenges to overcome were the question of what to do with the chemicals after the processing, and finding a place to hang/dry the negatives when they come out of the wash.
My solution for the chemicals: I looked up the dates/times my county has home hazardous waste drop off sites, purchased a couple 2.5 gallon jugs to safely store the chems and will drop them off so they are properly disposed of.
The drying the negatives I have not found a good solution for yet… the biggest issue is the negatives started sliding out of the clips I was using. This was weird because the clips themselves are very strong! I did not expect them to slip out. So I've opted to keep them in the reel… as the 4x5 prints don't touch while in the reel. I then place the real in a cardboard box so that the negatives don't get dusty or get my pets hair stuck to them. I think in the future I may try to clear out a cabinet that they can sit in.
Without further Ado here are the first negatives. All were shot on my intrepid 4x5 camera with Nikon 150mm lens.
Getting back into film.
Goooooooood morning everyone.
Today I am scanning in some 35mm film shot on my Minolta x700. I intend to begin uploading my film here, and maybe… maybe if I feel like it at some future point in time, upload to IG or twitter. I am starting to lose interest in the hustle and bustle of IG, these photographs, the ones I shoot on film are for my own love of photography.
The Kodak portra rolls below were shot back in Rochester, I finally found them in some of the boxes we unpacked since moving out of state. The black and white (Delta 400) film was shot at or around our new home.
So, without further ado, here is the latest batch, some Kodak Portra 160, some Ilford Delta 400.
