Showing posts with label Schneider 90mm f8 Super Angulon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Schneider 90mm f8 Super Angulon. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 04, 2022

Big Meal, Full Plate

Morning folks - before I start this FB I'd like to mention that the excellent Turkish photographer Omar Özenir has started a new English language blog - his previous one being Geldurkal
It is always worth reading his insights and looking at his sublime printing and photographic skills - highly recommended. 
Anyway the new one - in a stroke of genius - is called "Intermittent Agitation" and you can find it HERE.

Well, a couple of weeks back in a sort of gotta-get-out-of-the-smell-of-paint-fumes-and dust sorta way, I hauled out the Wista DX, Super Angulon 90mm, some ancientally expired film and walked less than a quarter of a mile from my house, to take some photos.

Incredibly you can fit an entire, small, 5x4 set-up, including camera, lens, 2 DDS's AND a dark cloth, loupe, ancilliary equipment etc. into the highly versatile and brick-outhouse built Think Tank Urban Disguise 40 V2. shoulder bag. 
It is quite a remarkable wee thing that packs easily to one side whilst you're under the dark cloth and removes the horror and hassle of a backpack/bumbag set-up.


Wista DX,© Phil Rogers Dundee,Schneider 90mm f8 Super Angulon,TMX 400,Kodak HC 110 Dilution B



Wista DX,© Phil Rogers Dundee,Schneider 90mm f8 Super Angulon,TMX 400,Kodak HC 110 Dilution B


The above were an exercise in using a 'new' paper - the "Full Plate" size of 6.5 x 8.5".
I wanted to try something that could balance economy with weight if you know what I mean - an inch and half all round bigger than my recent experiments with 5x7" paper, the 'Arfur as I now lovingly call it, delivers the balance that I wanted. 
It is a satisfying size to print 5x4 onto, and I think the same will be so when I get around to printing some 6x6 negatives too.

The above negatives were Kodak TMX 400, rated at EI 200. The film expired in 2012 (I have no idea why Kodak film is more expensive than Gold these days - seems a fecking stupid move. Luckily I have about 75 mixed sheets of TMX 100 and TXP 320 to use - all expired 2013.)
It was developed in some truly ancient HC110 (at least 10 years old) Dilution B, and remarkably, they came in at 6 minutes development time. 
I find that utterly astonishing.

The prints were Grade 3 on Ilford's "New" MGRC - I don't know whether it is my eyes, but the "new" paper looks slightly more contrasty at Grade 3 than the last lot. 
Who knows. 
Eyes can be deceptive.

And that's it - briefer than a pair of briefs.
Today I go back to even more painting - it will end eventually I am sure, just have to keep our heads down, keep going and keep the faith.
Till the next time, stock up on film now - a year further on and you'll regret not doing so.
H xx











Thursday, January 14, 2021

The Good, The Bad And The Fiddly

Morning - I hope everyone is keeping well and safe and greeting the shit-storm of a New Year with typical British stiff upper lip and a tough set to your shoulders. 

Ha, this is nothing like it was when I was a boy.
They used to beat us to bed in the dorm and we'd be awoken by a bugle call at 3.30am for a 16 mile run.
Then it was weights, a hose-down and just as the sun was beginning to rise a luverly runny egg for brekfast,
Cooo, gosh . . . . 
Eugh, gosh!

Made us Britons wot we are. 
None of your Jonny Forener muck round here, all that garlik and unyons and stuff.
Oh no, it's boyled beef, spuds, carots and grave from here on in.

Also just for this year, theres going to be extra reeding, more words, and, chiz, tests at the end.
Coo gosh.
Pleez Sir can we go home Sir . . . .

Anyway, you might recall that at the end of last year I said I was going to have a bash at using a Large Format camera again.
The Wista has been sitting in its rucksack for a few years and there was a likelihood I could punt it over the posts on the games field. 
I won't even mention the Sinar F which is currently safely packed away in a box in a chest in my study . . . no doubt plotting something Swiss.
It was all a bit daunting to be honest, but you know what, I had a go . . . and I enjoyed it too.

So carry on reading whilst your erstwhile blogger has a breakdown and rebuilds opinions as he types!


Haunted Lane


Y'see, whilst having a clear out, I found myself with a surfeit of well-expired 5x4 film - I'd always known it was there, but I just hadn't realised there was so much:

Delta 100 - 12 Sheets

TMX 400  - 7 Sheets

TXP320 - 30 Sheets

TMX 100 - 45 Sheets

So what do you do with so much film? 
Yes that's right - you use it! 

I also decided that rather than hang about in the dark for hours on end (if you're tray processing a sheet at a time, believe me there are better things to do) I would try and find a different developer that might  shorten processing time. 
Bruce from t'OD suggested Adox FX39II, so I gave it a go.

As you'll know, it is generally recommended practice when you footer photographically that you only try one thing at a time, just to see how you get on with it. 

You absolutely do not thow the baby out with the bathwater and change everything at once.

Not me though.
Oh no.
Why do anything by halves?

So:
New developer.
Well expired (2012 some of them) films.
A format I'd forgotten how to use, as the last exposures I had done were in 2016.
Cold weather - nothing better for testing the mettle of a proto-LF photographer.
PVD-affected eyesight, which makes a lot of things (like focusing!) more difficult than they could be.

Oh yes, I was ready . . . but before we get to the main monkey-business, here's some backfill. It's long and no doubt boring, so if you fancy a yawn or are in need of a good sleep, please read; if not just skip it all till you get to the bit that says:

You Can Carry On Now

A long time ago, when I first started taking Large Format photos, I threw myself into it.
I had a Sinar F (for Field, or for those of us who have actually used them in the field, F for Feck Me That Weighs A Fecking Ton!); a 150mm Symmar-S; the world's Biggest Tripod and Head (Linhof Twin-Shank and Gitzo SERIES 5); a Sinar loupe, and couple of nice Toyo DDS
Oh and Gumption
I carried it all neatly wrapped in a Tee-Shirt Dark cloth, packed in a Deuter 22 litre (!) rucksack, with the Dark Slides in a lunchbox.
Oh boy was I dedicated!

My initial practice exposures were done on cut-up Ilford MGRC slotted into the holders, just to get an idea of things. Those were the days before you could buy the likes of pre-cut Ilford's Direct Positive.
It was a total bastard trying to neatly cut MGRC down to an accurate size under a safelight with a scalpel . . . well actually I didn't even have a proper safelight either, just a Philips red bulb.
But I was dedicated!
I then moved onto film and Kodak's HC110, coz I woz no longer just dedicated, I was serious too y'ken.
I lugged that set-up all over the shop, urban, suburban, haunted sites, woods, hills and one notable trip into the wilds that very nearly killed me (though that is a bit of an exaggeration).

Becoming frustrated by trying to produce contact prints I wanted to print something, so a call to the lovely man at the much-missed MXV Photographic resulted in £375 well spent - a DeVere Bench 504, 150mm Rodagon, all inserts and hand delivered too!
Printing was fun, but I still felt a need to break free, so hunting around I found a new friend.
I have to say, looking back, the acquisition of the Wista made the biggest difference - it was like carrying a kitten as opposed to a struggling bull-mastiff.

Looking back now I wonder where all that vim came from. 
Was it just a younger man's energy and enthusiasm, or was it something else?
From 2007 to 2014 I was like a man possessed, it was pretty much all I could think of.
And then it stopped dead.
For some obscure reason, my enthusiasm wained and I let it drop like a stone . . . right after the acquisition of one of the last 90mm, f8 Super Angulons ever made.
A final 4 more exposures were taken in 2016 and then nothing till this Christmas.

Why did I drop the ball? 
I have no idea. 
It might well have had to do with Hasselblad lust (a known affliction) but I've never really thought about it until, this holiday period, whilst kneeling in the dark for an hour loading all my film holders, I pondered why on earth I had actually taken up LF photography in the first place. 
And it sort of struck me, like a box falling off a top shelf, that it was (I think) a yearning for Validation.

Ah yes, the Heffalump in the room.

I believe I thought (in my Oh-so-SERIOUS-LF mind) that if only I approached photography with a BIG idea and a BIGGER format, I could validate my creative attempts and be taken seriously. . . as a . . . as a . . . ahem, coff coff:

Photographique-artisté

Make that a small herd of Heffalumps.

You see in those days I cherished an idea that someone somewhere would actually like my stuff enough to say:

Here y'go Sheepy! 
Go forth and make photographs you poor unrecognised thing! 
Here, have a grand!
Go and buy some nice gear, you poor thing. 
All these years labouring with a knackered old Rollei T - how on earth did you manage dahling?
I think you're GREAT and that world out there deserves to see your work

Or something like that.

I think we all feel like that don't we?
Maybe it's what drives the hunger for gear we all have.

If only we had better stuff we could make better work.

Tempting isn't it - you could be recognised, or even, gasp, appreciated!

That's a younger man's dreams right there, and fortunately, such a thing never happened.
No one came knocking and nowadays I just beetle about being creative in my own way without anyone asking where the work is.
Self-funded creativity is the only way I think.
An understanding and patient partner is a massive help too.
If you're happy - great, that's the most important thing.
If others like it - great.
And if they don't - well so what.

But back to the main banana, WHY THE MADNESS?
Because, I have to say (rather like me old mate Bruce) I do find a large portion of Large Format photography relatively dull.
I know, because I've taken most of it, so don't get insulted and chuck your Dagor out of the pram.

It's a controversial statement, so let me justify myself. I've railed against it many times on here.
Just as a f'rinstance:
 
Buachaille Etive Mòr from that angle again, on an 8x10 camera and in colour too

Jings, just because someone famous took an iconic image of it, why copy? 
That single £20 sheet of colour film is sent off to be processed and printed (roughly a further £10 for dunking and another £10 for printing). 
Approximately, £40 for one colour image.
It's like owning a Rolex
Nice, but really expensive and almost pointless, because at the end of a day is it a craving for validation or something else? 
Does spending enough to cheaply feed a small family for a week on one image really make you a

Photographique-artisté?

Don't get me wrong - I'd love to have a go on the likes of a really nice 8x10" camera, and to be able to print it . . . Sorry for knocking a hole in upstairses staircase darling but the DeVere 8x10 enlarger wouldn't fit! 
But I don't necessarily think that having all that gear is going to make your work any better.
By the way, please notice the sarcastic use of work there; it's all over forums and gatherings and I loathe it. 
It's an effette term that's elitist and has all the hallmarks of Art School Bullshit
Work often hurts, can be mind-numbing, satisfying, exhilarating, soul-sapping, enjoyable, rewarding, stressful or a form of modern slavery. 
But please don't say photography is work, because it isn't.
Photography is a pleasurable experience that you do because you (hopefully) enjoy and are enthralled by it.
 
At the end of the day, no one is forcing you to take a picture.

So when you finally do decide to go all Ansel, mortgage your kidneys, leave a weeping family group and lug an 8x10 a couple of miles from the car, then give up because you're knackered; plonk your tripod down and think:

This'll do . . .

That is not work! It's Large Format photography.

Is it a form of masochism? Possibly.
Is it an urge for justification of the image? Possibly too.
Is it a craving for validation? Yeah possibly.

I'm not knocking anyone with the hunger to do it - after all I've been there, I can sympathise - you must have iron constitutions, but I am just pondering the reason we do it out loud in an effort to explain things to myself.

Maybe (and you can take this with a pinch of salt) most Large Format compositions are a result of the (not so) complex equation:

Weight + Distance = Image

I had to chuckle when I thought of that one; you see something promising, however, whereas with smaller formats you have the liberty to move around a bit and find something that looks exciting in the viewfinder, you are inexorably tied to that tripod (unless you're using a press camera), so you plonk it down and go through the rigmarole.

You fit camera to tripod; check camera; erect camera; lock down; open lens; compose and focus; get happy; check shutter; check meter; check f-stops; check film holder; double check composition; check focus on groundglass; make sure the corners are sharp if you want them that way; close down lens; stop down; cock shutter; insert film holder; remove slide; wait for fleeting light; take exposure; insert slide; remove film holder and place it somewhere safe; tear down set up, or else, more likely, carry it around (dangerously) on a fully erected tripod to the next place.

All the initial enthusiasm you felt for an image (well all my enthusiasm) can be rendered null and void by this activity.

Phew, is it just me or is there a pontificating twat in this room?

Anyway, again, WHY THE MADNESS when you could have just skipped in with a Medium Format camera and got pretty close to the same image?

I have thought about this a lot over the past few weeks, and I think this is where I (that's ME) am coming from now.
You see it isn't just a question of the ritual, though that is a huge part of it, but rather like doing Yoga or Tai Chi in a park, I think that the whole process gets you into a zone whereby you are entering some transcendental state of consciousness
The procedure is part of one whole thing. 
It's almost like a form of meditation and the image is the result of your concentration. 
Weird thought eh.
I am constantly surprised after immersing myself in taking 4 sheets of film, that a couple of hours have passed and all I have done is concentrated my attention on doing that.
Nothing else has mattered.

If you do make LF images though, please, these are just my thoughts, mad though they are - I'm really not having a pop at you - it's kind of addictive isn't it.
I'm there (behind that misted-over groundglass) with you.
There really is something rather satisfying about seeing the world on a groundglass in an upside down and reversed way and gathering all that conflicting information together so that it makes sense to your brain and ultimately to the final image.
It is certainly a challenge to do it well.
I don't know if I'll ever get there.
It actually just struck me, that it has a lot in common with my favourite TV series of the 70's, Kung Fu.

Anyway, you're not here for the pontifications of an old twat are you Glasshopper, you're here for photography . . aren't you?

You Can Carry On Now

The contacts below look utterly shite, and I would agree with you too, but that's what happens when you are trying to ease yourself back into something and trying to remember the process at the same time. 
It wasn't easy.


Gargh!
Delta 100 and TXP 320
90mm f8 Super Angulon


The 90mm f8 Super Angulon was like looking through a misted (it was very cold, the ground glass became condensationy immediately!) black net curtain. 
I hadn't a scooby what was going on.
Giving up all hope, I pointed the camera in a general direction, adjusted focus a bit and let rip.
Compositionally I have committed visual suicide as you can see.
You'll never take me seriously after this.
Developer was Adox FX39II. 
It has made me go hmmmmmm in a high-pitched way . . bit like a mozzie really.


Gargh 2!
Delta 100 and TXP 320
90mm f6.8 Angulon


It was slightly warmer - well the sun was out briefly and the wee 90mm f6.8 Angulon, whilst barely covering 5x4, did the job and I could see the ground glass a bit better, however it doesn't excuse the visual ghastliness of the above.
Maybe it IS that 5x4 thing.

I don't know.

All I do know is that the proportions of a 5x4 image are probably the most difficult to compose with - well they are for me, and strangely, unlike other formats, they seem to imbue the whole pantheon of Larger Format Photographers out there with a similar look - it is very weird.


Is it that the inherent proportions of a sheet of 5x4" or 10x8" are locked against the wider view of an increasingly widescreen world? 

Think about it, we all viewing everything in effectively Panavision.

Your TV is big and widescreen - you're so used to it that anything older than the mid-2000's looks cramped and small.

The world is 16:9 mad.


Over the past couple of years, cosying up with some old boxsets (Frasier, Cheers and Only Fools And Horses) it made me think that the old 4:3 ratio that the world lived with for so long, has far more in common with a 5x4" negative than modern 16:9.

Like the best advertising, auto-suggestion is subtle. Ergo, if you are viewing something W-I-D-E then you are thinking wide. It colours the way you view the world.

Maybe . . and it is a big maybe . . . that is why Large Format photography looks a tad out of kilter to modern eyes.

It is just a thought.


Again the sheets were developed in Adox FX39II. 
Anybody want some? 
OK it is optimised for T-Grain films (lower speed ones) but even with Delta it has produced muddy looking negatives.
Don't mention how it acted with TXP 320.
Look, don't mention it right!


That's Better!
Kodak TMY 400 (Expired 2012!)
90mm f8 Super Angulon


I had come close to deciding to wear the 90mm Super Angulon like some sort of 1990's rapper's neck attire. MC Sheep in the House, or something like that.
Fortunately I chose to lug it and the gear back to the Art College and try again.
I thought I'd better use the TMY 400 because it was the most ancient of the ancient ones I had - it expired in 2012.
The sun was out again, but really low and seeing as the whole slant of the Uni campus is South facing . . . well, what could I do but invoke the gods of flare!
Developer? 
Hmmmm - I stroked my chin - the thought of processing one sheet at a time in Pyrocat for my nominal 14 minutes leant an air of total ghastliness that I couldn't even contemplate it.
I thought again, and herein lies more madness.
It certainly wasn't going to be FX39II!
I've had 2 small containers of HC 110 (the old original un-f***ed-up stuff) sitting in my darkroom for 10+ years. It's gone a bit orange but I thought, why not, so tried it.
My reason there, is that I'd had a bad load on a sheet of film - fingers all over it trying to get the little bugger into the holder - so I thought why not try the developer and if the load was buggered up, I had nothing to lose. 
So, one 5x7 tray, 9ml of HC 110 and 295ml of water at around 20℃; 6 minutes in the dark for development, 1 for stop and around 4 for fix and bingo! A result.
I was so chuffed that it actually looked normal (compared to the mud the FX39II had produced) that I decided to process the rest of the sheets in it.
To say I was delighted would be an understatement.
HC is a nice clean-working developer and the time is very convenient, although these are now salient points as Kodak changed it entirely a few years ago. Plus it is now nearly £40 a bottle!
God bless 'em.
I think if I continue along this route I'll just use Ilfotec HC which is supposed to be virtually identical.


Phil Rogers, Dundee, Wista DX, 90mm f8 Super Angulon
Haunted Lane (again)


Phil Rogers, Dundee, Wista DX, 90mm f8 Super Angulon
Him (again)


Phil Rogers, Dundee, Wista DX, 90mm f8 Super Angulon
The Planet Takes Over


And that's about it really - the above are scans from work prints, quickly done on Ilford MGRC, Grade 3.
I quite like them actually - it's enough to make me want to persist with the Super Angulon's dimness.
By all accounts,  the Super Angulon design is a Biogon derivitive and seeing as you've seen a lot of that courtesy of the SWC/M on these pages, well maybe there'll be an air of uniformity to the images.

Anyway, I'll let you go now - you've read a lot, and they'll be coming around with your cup of tea and scone soon.
Remember to say hello to that nice lad Herman, he might look a bit funny but his heart is in the right place.

TTFN.













Sunday, July 12, 2020

PVD Blues

OK - a slightly more serious tone than usual and about something you maybe know nothing about - I know I certainly didn't until it happened.

Life can be strange sometimes - after a break of approximately 5 years, I decided I really must trundle out the LF gear and start using some of the expired film I still have left before making an ultimate decision on what to do with all the gear that is clogging my study like a deep-fried pizza in the arteries of a 60 year old.
So there we were, eating our tea (coincidentally - home-made pizza) and literally like a bird crapping on your chips a cloud of black smoke appeared in front of my left eye.
At first I wasn't sure at all what it was - had someone set fire to the piece of pizza I was holding?
Why just one eye?
Had the dining table burst into flame?
Had I just expunged a rare and deadly black wind?

I looked sideways and the smoke followed.
Up.
Down.
Sides.
Periphery.
Every way I looked it followed.

I had by this point stopped eating and was trying to understand what was going on.
I'd also stopped talking, which my family knows meant something was up.
In truth I was shitting myself, not literally, but more along the lines of:

Oh FECK,  am I having some sort of small stroke?


Everything felt alright. No droops or dribbles. All limbs functioning. To all intents and purposes everything was fine . . . except for the smoke.

The sun broke through and looking out of my periphery, the smoke took on the colour of deep black blood.
I panicked, left the room, followed by my wife and son, who were trying to work out what was going on.
I sat and explained, or at least tried to explain what the heck was going on.
I tried to calm myself down - there was no pain, but everywhere I looked the smoke followed.
I waited to see if anything else would happen.
I opened and closed my eyes a myriad of times; looked every which way; focused; de-focused and thought to myself if I didn't know better I would say it was like all the floaters I'd ever seen in my eyes coming to life at once and doing a lovely little smokey dance.
No pain though.
That was the thing that kept me going and stopped me battering around the house like a headless chicken.
To say I was severely worried though, would be an understatement.
My wife's advice was to remain calm and sit and see if anything else happened, which is exactly what I did. 
And it didn't.

Sounds pretty scary doesn't it, well it felt like that too.

Everything remained fine that night and the next morning I phoned the doctors, who immediately said phone an optician, which I did. 
Fortunately there is one quite close to us, so he asked me to come in for an inspection . . so there I was a few hours later, up on the ramps, mask on and some interesting optical toys to look at - Topcon!
I was glared at, blinded, flared and generally given a most thorough going-over, and was told that what I had had was a PVD and that it was very common (he was averaging around 3 a week) which surprised me, especially seeing as I'd never heard of it.
Here's a run-down on them:

Posterior Vitreous Detachment (PVD) is a natural change that occurs during adulthood, when the vitreous gel that fills the eye separates from the retina, the light-sensing nerve layer at the back of the eye

SYMPTOMS IN DETAIL
Mild floaters in the vision are normal, but a sudden increase in floaters is often the first symptom of PVD.
During PVD, floaters are often accompanied by flashes, which are most noticeable in dark surroundings. Most patients experience floaters and flashes during the first few weeks of a PVD, but in some cases the symptoms are hardly noticeable. if pvd is complicated by vitreous hemorrhage, retinal detachment, epiretinal membrane, or macular hole, the flashes and floaters may be accompanied by decreased or distorted vision. Floaters are most bothersome when near the center of vision and less annoying when they settle to the side of the vision. They may appear like cobwebs, dust, or a swarm of insects—or in the shape of a circle or oval, called a Weiss ring

Over time, the vitreous gel that fills the eye becomes liquid and condenses (shrinks) due to age and normal wear and tear. Eventually it cannot fill the whole volume of the eye’s vitreous cavity (which remains the same size during adulthood) and so the gel separates from the retina, located at the very back of the eye cavity.
Over the next 1 to 3 months, the vitreous gel further condenses and the sides of the gel also separate from the retina until the PVD is complete and the vitreous gel is attached to the retina only at the vitreous base (see Figure 1). Clear vitreous fluid fills the space between the condensed vitreous gel and the retina.
If a PVD progresses gently, gradually, and uniformly, the symptoms are typically mild. However, if the forces of separation are strong or concentrated in a particular part of the retina, or if there is an abnormal adhesion (sticking together) between the vitreous gel and the retina (such as lattice degeneration), the PVD can tear the retina or a retinal blood vessel.
Flashes and floaters are typically more obvious when PVD is complicated by a retinal tear or vitreous hemorrhage. These conditions can lead to further complications, such as retinal detachment or epiretinal membrane, which can result in permanent vision loss. However, about 85% of patients who experience PVD never develop complications and in most cases, the flashes and floaters subside within 3 months. 


So where does that leave me a month down the line?
Well, it is testing - I think my right eye has had one too though to a lesser extent. 
If you can imagine you're looking into sunlight using two early uncoated Cooke portrait lenses, you'll get the idea of how the world looks - soft and flarey in places, marvellously sharp in others, and it changes all the time.
I hope to goodness it does settle, because it can be testing at times, especially using a camera. 
It's fine with anything that has a focus aid like a split prism, or else requires guess-work like the SWCM, but for something which requires heavy duty oggling like a 5x4 then it is nigh impossible. 
I say impossible - if I had a mind to do it I am sure I could, but it would take even longer than usual and it always takes bloody ages anyway.

It's haunting me though.
What if it doesn't clear up?
I can't get past that question because it is a big one. 
Bright sunshine can be problematic, and I dread to think how it'll be in Winter, especially driving on a wet dark night . . . if it stays like this I won't be driving and that means no more visits to the hills at that time of year (not that I do it much, but all the same).

Anyway, I'll keep you posted - I guess the whole point in writing this is that as a photographer your eye health is primo. 

Look after your beady mincers!

On the subject of hauntings, not that I've captured anything spooky, but I think I might have captured some atmospheres. 
They hadn't been obvious before, but maybe it is my blurry vision . . I dunno.
Anyway, as I was stirring into action about the Wista, I was looking at a bunch of contact prints from about 2014 and they sang to me. 
Scouting around I also came across a couple of prints that seemed to have the same feel - see what you think.

The first two are scans off of prints.

The first was taken with the 16-On kit on the Rollei T.

The second was a Sinar with a mid-60's single coated 90mm Angulon - a lovely lens.

Everything after that is a mix of 90mm Super-Angulon and 127mm Ektar on the Wista DX  - the scans are off 5x4 contact prints.


Pilgrim's Way

Ghillie's Bridge (Broken)

Railway Bridge Piers

Time and Warer

Grove and Spring

Lone Tree

Edge of Grove

Twilight and a Weird Feeling

Old Oak and Time

And that's it really.

Be aware of your eyes and I hope it (or the worse things that can come from it) doesn't happen to you - it is a big worry, and typing this, this morning, through a light fog of mistiness I hope to goodness it clears soon. 
It's taken me a while to get enthused about using 5x4 again and I've got around 75 sheets of film to use up before it turns back into oil!

Take care.

Monday, March 02, 2015

New Lands, Sleeping Bags And Big Cameras Part Four (Go On . . Pull The Trigger Now)

Well folks - the Karavan Khronickles is back!
Wot's that Sheephouse? I hear you cry
Blimey - haven't you been paying attention? 
Oh, you haven't have you. You dozed off didn't you (and I don't blame you actually, because I did too . . . and I was writing it). 
If you want to bore yourself rigid, you can read the lead-up to this one here, here and here.

This Khronickle though is a little different (and you had better be wearing a stout pair of rubber pants, because the tale I am about to tell is faintly** hair-raising . . and if you aren't particularly scared, then it's OK to take the pants off and pass them onto someone else, just remember to give them some talcum powder too - they can get awful squeaky as we well know). 
** Oh go on then . . . it isn't remotely hair-raising in the slightest

Anyway, as a famous man once said 'Enough o' me shite . . onwards!'
Right, as you'll no doubt now know, I spent a week on holiday, making 5x4 photographs . . . 20 of them. 
Fortunately for me, there's was little lugging of gear for miles . . I was able to stroll out in my wellies and have the camera set up in under 20 minutes - this was pure luxury
And as you can maybe see from the two stitched digi-things below, I was lucky with the lie of the land - this was a two minute walk from where we were staying.





Yes I know they don't fit the frames . . but they were too small otherwise



In the top photograph, you see the uprise of land with trees on it at the left-hand side? That was my destination, and whilst there I encountered something, how shall we say, unusual
The second photograph is what it was like on the top of that piece of land - certainly its loveliness gives little away to the depth of feeling that lurked in the surrounding tonsure of ancient woodland..
Now if you're looking closely (and of a curious mind like me) you might be thinking there is something rather strange about this parcel of land. It isn't obvious from the wide-angled nature of the stitches, however it is entirely walled off from the surrounding country with proper dry-stane walls of approximately 200-odd year old heritage.
Doesn't mean anything to you sitting in a Starbucks with all the world has to offer at your fingertips?
Thought not, and understandable, well let me explain: despite the fact that the rest of the surrounding farmland is lush and well-cultivated, this piece of land has been blocked off. It's a no-go area and it is very unusual these days to find total wildness. Land is too precious, farmers like to have it farmed.
What you can see in the first panorama is a true mix of ancient bog and wood, and I would say little unchanged (obviously apart from growth and die-back) for millenia - the trees are small and grubby, stunted by poor soil and the bog itself is a mish-mash of proper peat and ancient tree roots. I suppose that is maybe why it hasn't been upgraded. However, its isolation picqued my curiosity and made me want to explore. 
The land rises from right to left in what the Scots call a 'shank' . . yep . .a leg. And it's like that, a leg of land heading upwards. 
So suitably prepared for adventure with a Wista and all my gear I set off to ascend via The Shank, however my travail was stopped dead pretty quickly by the sheer amount of difficult walking - gorse and dense trees, stones and boggy bits - in fact it was so dense that I stopped, turned back and skirted the walls instead.
Anyway, after a short, steady climb up through a mix of Oak and Apple and Alder and Beech I made it to the top. 
Now, according to my memorised map, this might have been the remnants of a Norman Motte, however it wasn't - for a start I was way off in my reading of the land and it was way too large. And secondly, it just didn't feel right.
I'm not sure whether you've stood on top of a Motte, but they are pretty much devoid of feeling - all history is gone, bar the massed earth of the footings. They are interesting places, but you can't get a true feel for the history of a place from them (at least that is my experience) - but this was different.
I place a lot of value on feelings and especially so in the countryside. My inner countryman comes to life and keeps me right and on the top, I was thrilled by a sense of peace and wonder, however that wasn't all - there was something tickling at my subconscious that I was initially entirely unaware of. 
The light was falling to a proper gloam, but it was a beautiful evening and very clear. I surveyed the top, thought about making some photographs, dropped my rucksack and tripod, scouted around a bit more and set up. 
There was still a reasonable amount of sun behind my back and I felt that I could capture some of the very real atmosphere that I was feeling. 
With camera set up and a suitable tree selected, image composed, light acceptable,  I paused for a moment from my pottering and tinkering.
And that was when it hit me.
If I could have voiced it, it would have said this:
"Begone!"

Now I know you're out there scoffing and stuff, but to my inner countryman it was a real command, enjoined with a feeling like I was being watched.
My hackles arose and I felt (from that bit of land you can see in the second photograph on the left hand side and to the right of the tree) a very definite 'presence'. 
That's the only way I can describe it. 
And I wasn't welcome.
I fumbled, inserted my film holder, called myself stupid and started to make an exposure, only to realise that I hadn't closed the shutter and was exposing the film whilst removing the darkslide! 
I HAVE NEVER EVER DONE THIS (not even after the time I nearly killed myself lugging a Sinar up a Munro). 
I always double check everything
Ergo, something had unnerved me. Not just unnerved me, but had downright made me break out in a bit of a sweat. 
I cursed, closed the slide again, reversed it and made a proper exposure and then, collecting myself and my stuff made off with haste into the oncoming twilight with my camera still affixed to the tripod.
The stupid thing was that I still had to photograph though, so I searched for somewhere as photogenic but with less weirding.
The thing is, no matter how much I searched, the feeling still came with me. 
You know when you feel like you are being watched? that was how I was feeling, and the more the gloam settled the worse it got. 
Frank Herbert's Bene Gersserit saying 'Fear Is The Mind Killer' came to me . . . I tried to talk myself out of my funk, but after surveying a massed collapse of ancient dried trees, and desperately trying to find the correct angle and then feeling it again, I settled to fate, took my camera off the tripod packed everything away as fast as possible and headed downhill as quickly as I could.
Reaching the bog at the bottom of the hill, I set up again and tried to make another photograph - you can see the shite results here (it's the fourth contact print down).
There was a real sense of time being erased in that bog - if a mounted horseman carrying a short sword had galloped up, I wouldn't have been surprised.
Panicking a bit more and stumbling off from the bog, I knew had one more chance to make a photograph that day, so in near darkness and using a small torch to check my focus (honest) I set up by a wall, composed (with extreme difficulty), took a meter reading, was astonished at the reciprocity characteristics and exposed for as long as I could (1020 seconds - 17 minutes to you and me was the corrected exposure - No Way Hosepipe, I thought . . so I opened up the lens and made it about 5 or 6 mins. Luck wasn't with me though - it wasn't nearly enough (and even selenium toning the negative hasn't raised the highs above their deep, dark roots) - the hundred or so sheep that were watching me must have been laughing all the way to their troughs.
As a crescent moon arose and the night settled in proper, I made my apologies (for trespass) and packed up with a quiver in my hands (no, not a quiver of arrows y'berk), thoroughly bristling hackles and exited as quickly as possible, only slowing may pace as I got into the caravan park . . but even then I didn't really want it to be known which van we were in . . .
Oh I know, you are laughing quietly to yourself . . but you know what . .when I lived in the middle of nowhere, some nights you could sleep with your curtains and windows open . . other nights you battened down the hatches and didn't look out till morning - the countryside can be a very weird place, but then again, inside my head is weirder still . . .


***


Anyway, holidays finished, back home and reviewing the results. I did the processing, did the stitching and had a bloody good think. That think has taken months actually, but I've come to a sort of conclusion.
You see in the second stitched photo, what you are seeing is a flattened hill top, with a circling of trees around the edges, Alder, Crab Apple and Oak. The top of the hill has at least two springs. (that I was aware of - they weren't rinkling tinkling ones either but big solid invisible ones - you knew they were there though).
You probably don't get where I am going, but the varieties of trees alone (and there were many and very old) suggested something to me.
Now I've thought about this (and I am not going to voice my absolute conclusion in public) there was a very definite feeling to the place that was both uncanny and protective, unfriendly and yet tolerant. It toyed with me. It rejected me with power, and yet when I returned during daylight the day after, I felt welcome. Well, not entirely welcome, but tolerated.
What ever presence I had felt was still there, but dozing . . that's the only way I can put it.
I was able to enter the grove from where I had felt something and make some photographs and as I explored the area and gave thanks for it's overwhelming peace and feelings of security (! really), I felt accepted and at one with the Earth Spirit.
There . . . done it now.
How is that for flying against rationale and reason?
Sounds fanciful?
Sounds like New Age Shite?
In a world where everything is known, where everyone is connected?
Fanciful notions from a middle-aged man desperate for quieter times?
You know what? the stone-age man in me says "Ug!"
We know what we felt - it was older than anything and demanded our full attention and awareness . . .
And we weren't the first - the trees and walls and land told that story. There was something here that I felt sure had drawn people other than myself over the centuries.
Having given it a good long thunk, our reverence remains unashamedly unabashed.
UG!
We're shamelessly unapologetic, so get over it.
(That's a lot of un's isn't it!)


***


And so the KK's comes to an end - to be honest folks, I have struggled to print the photos from that week - that has been a major delay in finishing this series off.
I can't figure why either - they're fairly decent negatives . . . OK, the pics aren't brilliant, but they (to my eyes) seem to have captured some of the atmosphere from that wonderful time.
I think the problem has been my ongoing love love/find difficult relationship with the 5x4 negative.
Printed at 10x8 it just doesn't look right - I daresay it would at 11x14 and larger, but nope - my standard size (10x8) just doesn't quite cut the mustard . . so to that end, I ended up contact printing everything on old Agfa MCC of approximately 5x8 size (a torn-in-half sheet of 10x8) and you know what? It fit. they work as contact prints.
They are funky, tatty, physical objects that invite handling and close viewing (they are small after all). they're archivally toned in Selenium too, so all I need is some sleeves to sort them out nicely.
Below is how they look and then cropped-in images to enlarge things a bit.
Hope you like them.




























OK - in hindsight I think I would use a little liquid lightning just to tickle up the highs . . . and if I could actually print as large as my enlarger can print (it's a DeVere 504, so can print really huge, but unfortunately I can't - no sink for trays, I just have them on small shelves, so 9.5x12" is my maximum!) I would print a fceckin massive print of the last one. That was made (as were all these images) with my Super Angulon f8 - it is an incredible lens, however just a tad dim on the olde GG, but failing eyesight is another story. 
Anyhow, to my eyes at least, it has captured the atmosphere of that late Autumn evening, as the gloam was falling on a special Scottish place, and the berk behind the camera found himself in a state of rising panic.

Well, that's it - you've done well.
Next time, less reading, more photos . . promise . . and yer Uncle Sheephouse says to remember to write to Aunty Bee and to keep taking the tablets.

Sunday, December 21, 2014

The Nature Of The Complainte

Morning folks and apologies to you if you were expecting Part 4 of the torturous Karavan Khronikles, however I have been beset by a modern problem . . lack of time. C'mon, Christmas is nearly here - what do you do when you have a few spare weekend hours . . yes you go and do normal things with the family, not lock yourself away in the dark and curse . . .
So, to that end, and being of the mind that I wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas anyway, I thought I would provide a reflective theme for the end of the year.

Cap'n Bruce (Robbins) of the Online Darkroom fame and I have been having on/off emailed discussions recently - he's complained of little time and a wish to slim down his vision to something a bit more simple; I have expressed a desire to purchase yet another camera, or failing that, get something like a 50mm Summicron for the M2 just to see how far I can exploit the 35mm negative. Quite a difference!
To excuse myself a little I will say this - for many years I have wanted a Hasselblad - simply because they are beautiful and the lens quality is superlative, however they are not a cheap camera, and actually when I start to think about it, can I go back to ye olde square again? I've spent years making square photographs with the (currently in need of a service) Rollei T - I have beaten the format to death - can I really dedicate a huge chunk of money to it again?
Besides I find I like a more oblong format these days, however (besides 35mm) I do actually have two options in my arsenal with regard to that shape - the Koni Omega 6x7 and my Wista 5x4. "Great" you're thinking, "lucky bugger to have two nice cameras like that," however (and here is The Nature Of The Complainte) as a photographer, one is never satisfied! 
Weird isn't it? 
There's always a hankering for something else; these being, in no particular order:

Quality Of Negative
Quality Of Lens
Ease Of Use
Sharpness
Out Of Focus Characteristics
Fun Quotient

It's terrible really, because I believe that rather like that itch under the plaster-cast you got when you broke a limb at the age of 14, this photographic hankering is an un-scratchable thing.
Go on. How many photographers do you know who own just one camera and one lens? Is the HCB ethic of one camera/one lens really alive and kicking these days? I sincerely doubt it, and I am open to someone pointing me in the right direction of someone who does do it.
Bruce wonders whether he could just slim himself down to a rangefinder (yeah I know, they'll have to bury him with an OM2, so I can't see him getting rid of them) and a couple of lenses. He's even talking about selling his SL66 . . . and you know what? I can't see it - the man loves cameras!
Me? Well a new camera is always a rather nice prospect, but do I need one?
And here folks things get weird, because you will be hard-wired into my thought processes and it isn't pretty:


- = Bad
- = Confused

OK, so the pocket money is beginning to mount up nicely . . what do you fancy buying?

Well, the M2 is the one camera I could never get rid of, but one lens?

Bloody difficult. You couldn't live with just the 1934 Elmar, or the 50's Canon 28mm and 50mm f1.8. And superb though it is, could you really spend the rest of your life just photographing with the 90mm f4 Elmar? I think you know what the answer is.

OK . . M2 and 90mm Elmar . . that's a given.

Well, yeah, it's a start, so a 50mm Summicron? Would that satisfy things? Oh and on the wide side, a 35mm Summaron or Summicron?

You see what I mean?
It is impossible to be satisfied.
And then I go from there to:

Well, for all I know I moaned about it (a lot) but the Pentax 67 had a fantastic selection of lenses - maybe I could get one of those again, but wait a minute I've already got a 6x7 in the Koni and that is great.

But you haven't got a wide for it!

Yeah, a wide . . maybe a wider format would do the trick, maybe 6x9? 

Well yeah, so how about a 6x9 back for the Wista? 

Too cumbersome really, and I want something I can walk around with easily.

OK, so a Fuji 6x9? yeah nice, but a fixed lens - could you live with a fixed lens?
 
Nope - deffo couldn't, well the only option would be a Mamiya Press - you get a few different focal lengths for them.

Yeah, nice, but didn't Bruce say they were a little 'agricultural'?

He did, but those photos of his taken with them are really nice, and then there's John Davies and his UK landscapes, and also Don McCullin.

You've got a point there - stick it on the list. Of coures, the real deal would be AN ALPA!

Shit, yeah, an Alpa! But isn't that more expensive than a house?

Well, nearly, but you've got two good kidneys, and you can just survive on one apparently.

Go for it!

And I leave for work, bouyed by the thought that in a couple of years with one less kidney, I'll be traveling around taking amazing photos with God's gift to the photographer, The Alpa
However, this conversation is replaced a day later by:

You know, 6x12 is a bloody interesting format isn't it?

Too right. Are there any decent cameras out there? And how about a 6x12 back for the Wista?

Too cumbersome.

OK, so it's Linhof, Horseman or bust?

It certainly is, but then don't you think 6x17cm provides a greater sense of space?

Hmmmm - yeah, too right.

OK, so how do you feel about a Linhof or a Fuji . . or how about a Hasselblad X-Pan? You wouldn't need a bigger enlarger for that!

Anyone got a scalpel?

To be replaced a day later by:

You know I really like the look of those Eisenstadt New York photos he made with the old Rollei Standard.

Beautiful aren't they - and they're pretty cheap too! But then again a Zeiss Ikoflex is another option.

Yeah, I'd forgotten about Zeiss . . well how about a Super-ikonta? You can get them in 6x9 too!

You're brilliant, but of course you realise that the Voigtlander is more highly regarded, especially with a Skopar . .

Oh FECK, I forgot about that . . .


And that is The Nature Of The Complainte folks - it is a never-ending circular conversation that questions the use of every format and the quality of every considered camera. I even found myself discussing 645 and Sony NEXs with Bruce and that shows you the madness.
Basically every photographer wants to spend money on new gear and make that one photograph that, when the relations come to clear their house out, might cause someone to pause and say "that's a NICE photograph" before everything gets chucked in the skip.
We, as photographers, are afraid of death (to paraphrase Moonstruck) and we want to be remembered, and only by spending as much money as we can on gear, can we go some way to assuage our subconscious that indeed, our travail on earth as captors of light hasn't been a total waste of time!


Leica M2, 50mm f1.8 Canon



Leica IIIf, 1934 Leitz 50mm f3.5 Elmar



Olympus Trip, 40mm f2.8 Zuiko


Rolleiflex T, 16-On Kit, 75mm f3.5 Tessar


Rolleiflex T, 16-On Kit, 75mm f3.5 Tessar


Rolleiflex T, 16-On Kit, 75mm f3.5 Tessar

Rolleiflex T, 75mm f3.5 Tessar


Rolleiflex T, 75mm f3.5 Tessar


Rolleiflex T, 75mm f3.5 Tessar

Pentax 6x7, 75mm f3.5 Super Takumar


Pentax 6x7, 75mm f3.5 Super Takumar


Koni Omega 6x7, Super Omegon 90mm, f3.5


Agfa 6x9 Box Camera


 
Wista 5x4, Kodak Ektar, 203mm f7.7

Wista 5x4, 150mm f5.6 Schneider Symmar-S

Sinar 5x4, 90mm f6.8 Schneider Angulon

Sinar 5x4, 90mm f6.8 Schneider Angulon


All of the above are physical prints, printed by me - and blow me, can you see much difference?
Nope, me neither - truth be told, for the maximum print size I can make in my tiny darkroom (11x14 at a push) any format will suffice, and yet The Nature Of The Complainte dictates that I should still hunger after a camera/lens combo that is satisfying, sharp, easy to use, high quality, capable of capturing light with a unique signature and all round FUN TO USE, when in actuality, I have any number of them already!
Elsewhere it is known as GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome) - I'll just call it MAD (Mental Acquisition Dither) because nothing seems to satisfy that need for more gear. 
I genuinely thought that when I bought the Leica M2, that would be it, but it wasn't . . same with the recent late-manufacture 90mm Super Angulon, a lens so perfect that it makes you want to cry . . . I've barely (sic) scratched its surface and I am already thinking about something else. 
Those rare beast photographers with refined vision and a sense that more cameras means more responsibility, are lucky, for they have no chains to bind them to the earth and can fly into visual legend, but in reality, do they really exist? Do you??
For the rest of us toiling away at the coal-face, the need for more stuff pretty much dominates the hobby. And why not. There's something about a camera, especially a mechanical camera that says This Is It. Mankind's ingenuity and engineering finesse distilled into one perfect machine. A thing to be admired, acquired and used; to be loved and loved again. 
In short it's just about perfection, and a desire to render the world in a perfect way. 
Aside from just snapping away at any old shite as the majority of photography seems to be, surely as a concerned and dedicated photographer half our ouevre is to render an imperfect world in a way which hopefully serves as a reminder to the rest of the herd that (under the right circumstances and with the right machine [and ultimately under our control]) the world can be a perfect and visually beautiful place. 
Like some lost ancient tract, impossibly discovered, a good and symbiotic camera can be that key to the kingdom we all desire.

And so folks for the New Year I fear the search, like some Biblical quest, will go on. But in the meantime, may I take this opportunity to wish you the best for the season.
God bless and thanks for reading.