Show us your photography

[Doctor Strange]

Let me break up the digital image parade with some old-school b/w film shots I took a few days ago around Beacon and Cold Spring, New York.

I shot these with my just-repaired seventies Olympus OM-2 with same-vintage 24mm and 100mm Zuiko lenses, on Ilford FP4 Plus film that I developed in Kodak D-76, then I scanned the negs at 1200dpi with minimal cropping and contrast adjustments. I am not a big fan of this particular film (I find it very contrasty and not all that fine-grained for a 125-speed film), but it yielded some lovely stuff:

 

[Zombie_61]

Let me break up the digital image parade with some old-school b/w film shots I took a few days ago around Beacon and Cold Spring, New York...

Absolutely beautiful! You clearly have an eye and mind for finding the beauty in things that most people would consider mundane.

 

[Doctor Strange]

Thanks, Al.

Traditional photography is a through-line of my life. Having grown up in the 60s/70s working alongside my pro photographer parents, I learned the nuts and bolts of b/w photography in a very technical, pragmatic, craft-oriented way. Starting in the mid-90s as part of a mini midlife crisis, I began consciously working on developing a more artistic approach to taking pictures. Since retiring - not to mention Covid - I've had lots of time to indulge myself with the classic equipment and techniques: I don't shoot that much (e.g., just eight rolls of film last year), but I carry a film camera on nearly every walk and excursion.

I've got nothing against digital imaging, it's amazing. But for me, with my lifetime of shooting film, there's just a lot more satisfaction in going old school!

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Widening project over the 91 freeway?

405 Freeway at Brookhurst in Fountain Valley.

 

[Zombie_61]

...I've got nothing against digital imaging, it's amazing. But for me, with my lifetime of shooting film, there's just a lot more satisfaction in going old school!

Before he died, one of my brothers-in-law would have agreed with you. He and his wife were/are amateur shutterbugs and much prefer film over digital photography because of the clarity of image that film offers.

 

[Doctor Strange]

I don't think it's about "clarity" per se. Modern digital cameras with good sensors and good lenses can capture just insane amounts of detail and resolution... even higher-end smartphone cameras are utterly amazing. To get comparable detailed results on film you need something bigger than 35mm negatives - medium format or 4x5 sheet film shot with top-class lenses.

Where film really shines is in its look, which is visibly different from nearly every kind of film emulsion and every kind of camera and lens combination. Some of these looks are achievable with filters and post-processing if you're a PhotoShop master. Some are just unique.

Personally, I've always been drawn to cameras that produce small negatives but have great lenses: I carried Minox "spy cameras" daily for decades, and more recently, I've been shooting with an Olympus Pen F SLR that produces "half-frame" negatives, twice as many on a roll as a standard 35mm camera. This yields more visible film grain from the smaller negative, but also a unique look because of the way that the different-from-full-frame focal length of the lenses creates the image.

Here are some of my recent half-frame shots, from the vintage-1963 Pen F with its 38mm lens (equivalent to a 55mm on a full-frame camera), made on Kodak Double-X, a motion picture negative stock unchanged since its introduction in 1959, and developed in Kodak D-76, which was formulated in 1928. Brilliant 20th century inventions!



Anyway, I still shoot film mainly for the love of the vintage equipment and classic processes. I would never make the argument that 35mm cameras produce images that have more clarity/resolution than even a mid-price contemporary digital camera. Rather, that they produce images that are sufficiently different to be their own reward.

 

[Blare]

I don't think it's about "clarity" per se. Modern digital cameras with good sensors and good lenses can capture just insane amounts of detail and resolution... even higher-end smartphone cameras are utterly amazing. To get comparable detailed results on film you need something bigger than 35mm negatives - medium format or 4x5 sheet film shot with top-class lenses.

Where film really shines is in its look, which is visibly different from nearly every kind of film emulsion and every kind of camera and lens combination. Some of these looks are achievable with filters and post-processing if you're a PhotoShop master. Some are just unique.

Personally, I've always been drawn to cameras that produce small negatives but have great lenses: I carried Minox "spy cameras" daily for decades, and more recently, I've been shooting with an Olympus Pen F SLR that produces "half-frame" negatives, twice as many on a roll as a standard 35mm camera. This yields more visible film grain from the smaller negative, but also a unique look because of the way that the different-from-full-frame focal length of the lenses creates the image.

Here are some of my recent half-frame shots, from the vintage-1963 Pen F with its 38mm lens (equivalent to a 55mm on a full-frame camera), made on Kodak Double-X, a motion picture negative stock unchanged since its introduction in 1959, and developed in Kodak D-76, which was formulated in 1928. Brilliant 20th century inventions!

View attachment 403182 View attachment 403183 View attachment 403184

Anyway, I still shoot film mainly for the love of the vintage equipment and classic processes. I would never make the argument that 35mm cameras produce images that have more clarity/resolution than even a mid-price contemporary digital camera. Rather, that they produce images that are sufficiently different to be their own reward.

I fully get you. I worked in the camera business when digital was moving from a phase of not a real viable alternative to film both in quality and convenience…. to equal or better… to surpassed. And watched it reach a level during that time of even If you make the argument of film could be more superior in quality the convenience factor far outweighed film.

The store owner was set in his ways that digital would never surpass any film camera let alone his old Leicas. Me.. while I still to this day appreciate the quality and engineering of the old cameras and have a love for the nostalgia. I always saw cameras for what they are. Tools. And if a better tool came along that made sense for me or my business then that is the way I went.

Even back then though…. I loved to pull out my older at the time Medium format twin lens cameras and shoot around St Augustine. Great conversation starter for sure. I’d like to do it even now,,, just haven’t justified the expense on the film and processing

 

[Trenchfriend]

Down by the riverside...

 

[MisterCairo]

Mini-get away during March break to the Big Smoke - Toronto.

Up the CN Tower for the first time since 1979 for myself, since about 1990 for the wife, and first time ever for my daughters.

The one day this week the weather did not cooperate. We booked in for supper at 360, the rotating restaurant. We were above the fog and clouds !

Going up the elevator at 22 klicks:

 

[MisterCairo]

At the restaurant, 351 metres or 1151 feet above ground level:

 

[MisterCairo]

View from the base. It now changes colour, yellow bottom and blue upper for the Ukrainian flag, just missed it:

 

[MisterCairo]

^^^

The lighted bits at the bottom of the main pod are the glass floors they installed some years back. Two levels, the lower indoor observation deck and the outside deck, were closed as they are renovating both. We made it to the third deck, which also has glass floors. Again, the view was minimal owing to the snow and fog.

 

[Bushman]

 

[deadlyhandsome]

Cathys Valley, California:

 

[Trenchfriend]

@deadlyhandsome

Outstanding!

 

[Bushman]

Some recent snaps:

 

[deadlyhandsome]

Mount Bullion, California:

 

[clementishutin]

Let me break up the digital image parade with some old-school b/w film shots I took a few days ago around Beacon and Cold Spring, New York.

I shot these with my just-repaired seventies Olympus OM-2 with same-vintage 24mm and 100mm Zuiko lenses, on Ilford FP4 Plus film that I developed in Kodak D-76, then I scanned the negs at 1200dpi with minimal cropping and contrast adjustments. I am not a big fan of this particular film (I find it very contrasty and not all that fine-grained for a 125-speed film), but it yielded some lovely stuff:

View attachment 402711 View attachment 402712 View attachment 402713 View attachment 402714 View attachment 402715

Love them all.

 

[Bushman]

Hope everyone had a relaxing Memorial Day weekend!

 

[Zombie_61]

Hope everyone had a relaxing Memorial Day weekend!

Wait a minute. There aren't any palm trees in northern Illinois...at least I don't think there are. Where were these taken?