It's been a while

For anybody following this blog - my apologies for the obvious lack of input since February. It's been a quiet time on the photography front. But I'm back making shapes again.

Over the next couple of weeks I'll be making a few changes to this blog and also to my website. I'll be adding the feature to buy images from my site but that'll mean restricting images from that part of my site to sale-able images. On the other hand it'll give me a reason to update this blog a little more.

So watch this space for the changes and thanks for hanging in there.

Film...the story so far...

A friend says to me "So, wonky...where's all this film stuff you've been doing". Well, it's been an adventure. First I got a Kiev 88CM...I was warned they could be difficult or might not work at all...but first shoot was quite good.

Then it went a little downhill. I went to Johnstown Castle and I found a little light leak...just a little one.

OK, this I could have fixed with a new seal. But then this black band happened on all exposures with the next back.

Ignore the scratching...I have that one sussed. But I thought this was a shutter problem so sent the camera back. Only tonight I discovered looking back at mixes (or soups...if you like) that I had only made a 500ml mix instead of 600ml...so the black band is not developed correctly. Ah well!

But in the meantime I had the Holga out for a run:

This turned out OK but in low light conditions it wasn't what I'd seen others doing...so slowly got disillusioned with this whole film thing. But I ran another roll through the Holga:

Faith restored. More recently I've run a roll through a pinhole and the Bronica GS-1 but got too brave and tried a stand development...stupid idiot...should have stayed with the basics first till I know what I'm doing. I have a film through the Holga drying at the moment run at Massive Development times and the negs look good. Now if I could only get to grips with the scanner!

To be continued...

SACC Printed & Projected Images

On Sunday 6th December the SACC (Southern Association of Camera Clubs) round of the National Printed and Projected Images Competition was held in Clonmel. This was the first year that I was placed in the Open section of the competition (as opposed to the Intermediate). In the Projected Images section I came in third. OK, not earth shattering but nice to get some recognition.

This was the image that took third.

Out of the 9 images I submitted 7 are going forward to the finals and the club had 18 out of 30 passed on to the National Final in February. Fingers crossed again.

Film Photography

"I'll never take up film photography"

It's funny how statements from the past come back to haunt you. I gave this statement about 18 months ago on Photography Ireland and got a few retorts that put me back in my box. It was an innocent statement but one I wholeheartedly believed in.

18 months later and I've put Ebay under stress as well as the bank balance. To date I've received a Nikon FG that I had given to my father over 20 years ago as he has "a digital camera and won't ever use film again"...some trends go up generations too.

So I've bought 4 film cameras...not content with 1.

The Brick (Argus C3 Matchmatic):

A "Zero Image" MF pinhole (6x6)

A Holga 120N

And on its way in time for Christmas is a Hasselbladski, aka a Kiev 88CM MLU

So, happy days!!

Please note - the images you see represent the cameras that I have purchased and these images are from other review and sales sites. If you click on the images you will be taken to these sites.

Bark

Woodstock, Inistioge, Co. Kilkenny. I'd never been there before and didn't know what to expect. "There was a house" was all I knew. I'd seen recent images of flowers...so there were flowers too. Other than that it was into the unknown.

It's a large park area with an old house and well kept grounds. The time that we ventured around the area (October) it was just turning yellow with leaves and we were blessed with the weather.

But from a photographic perspective this is a treasure trove, especially for myself when I'm in the Ansel humour. Trees, lining paths, bends, waterfalls, contrasting light, etc. And around each corner there's something different, a different challenge.

This shot was quite difficult and simple. I had to slap the camera into manual mode to measure the closest tree, then spot meter the background trees. There was a 6-stop difference so I went for the mid-ground. So at ISO200 I went to 55mm 1/60sec at f2.8 (despite what the EXIF data says this was a 24-70mm f2.8 lens). Then in conversion I had to pull back the nearest tree and hold the reigns of exposure while bringing out the background. Cloning out a few stray leaves to the left, burn/dodge the tree then dodge a few highlights in the background all complimented with a mild vignette. Then some selective sharpening of the ferns and grass to the foreground and hey presto.

As ever the original can be seen by clicking on the image above.

Competition win

I love competition. I was a competitive cyclist for many a year and when you change hobbies it sticks with you. Photography is different as it's soooooooo subjective. A couple of months ago I started actively seeking competitions and I won one...get that!!

The image above won first place in a monthly competition at www.trustedreviews.com where the theme was "Power of Nature". I was thrilled with the win and seeing what stiff competition there was I was equally bowled over. The prize was a Panasonic Lumix DMC LX3 (as seen below), a Sandisk Extreme III 2GB card and a card reader.

Here's to next Month.

Stoned

Bless me Father for I have sinned - it's almost a month since my last posting. Above is the aptly named "Stoned". I'm looking at film photography and I was blown away by an image taken on a Bronica SQ-Ai camera. I wasn't trying to replicate it but you get the idea of stones and DOF in your mind and you try.

As ever the original can bee seen by clicking on the image above. This one is just a crop, a conversion, a little curves adjustment (not too much - not too contrasty) a "Lens Blur" overlay with a horizontal mask to further emphasise the DOF then a little sharpening.