The Negative Positives Double-Exposure Film Exchange

I took part in a film exchange last month for the facebook group Negative Positives Film Photography Podcast. The plan was that we would be paired up with an unknown photographer and we would share a roll of film to create double exposures.  Shaun Nelson collected names and paired people up.  My photo partner was Sherry Christensen from Canada.  She supplied the film (Kodak Ektar 100) and shot the roll.  She then mailed it to me for me to shoot and I was in charge of processing and scanning the film.

I was pleasantly surprised how well these turned out.  There are a few that I really like that I have included here.  This was a great way to meet photographers and get a feel for what they like to shoot.  The only rule we set was we were to shoot all frames in landscape.  We also tried to line up our fame lines.  It didn’t quite work out but I really like the overlap.  She warned me her shots would be from around the farm house so I wanted to be be sure to add some color and urban scenes.  I really like the eye looking through the door of the grain bin above.  As I look at this image I’m reminded of the many many hours I spent inside these grain bins shoveling grain in the hot summer heat.  I wouldn’t pass growing up on a farm for anything these days.

Photographer #1

• Name: Sherry Christensen
• Location: Canada
• Camera: Pentax MV with 50mm lens

Photographer #2

• Name:Scott Smith
• Location: Utah
• Camera: Leica M6 TTL, 35 & 50 mm lens

We used Kodak Ektar 100 film.  It was developed by Replicolor in Salt Lake City, Utah.  I scanned the roll using a Epson Perfection V700 scanner.

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The Belly

First test roll through my newly acquired Leica M3. FPP Black and White Film Pushed One Stop

Trump Truck

Trump Truck – Salt Lake City, Utah, 2017

Vinyl

It’s an analog/old school kind of day. Spent a few hours looking for some new vinyl while shooting some black and white film in my #leica M3 in my newly rebuilt 1970 Ford F250 truck.

The Perfect Shot

 

What drew me to make this photograph was the expression on the woman’s face. She was trying so hard to get the “perfect picture” of Niagara Falls and making sure she held her camera just right. After developing the roll of film I noticed that the little girls shorts match the woman’s shirt giving them a connection.

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Selphie – Niagara Falls

These types of scenes are getting more common and easier to photograph.  These two had no idea I was right behind them documenting their experience at Niagara Falls, Canada.

Golden Spike National Historic Site

During the holidays I was able to take some time to go visit the Golden Spike National Historic Site.  It’s about an hour drive from my house and is located in the middle of nowhere Utah.  It was a cold, cloudy & snowy day but well worth the time to make the trip out there.  I won’t get into detail what the place is but it’s where the Central Pacific Railroad met up with the Union Pacific Railroad  in 1869 to complete the first trans continental railroad across the United States.  The conductor would drive the train down the tracks then back again to give the spectators a show.  I was able to capture some audio of the train as it went down the line and then returned.

 

 

 

Peach Days Car Show on Film – Part 1

In September the weekend following Labor Day, Brigham City Utah celebrates Peach Days. It all started in 1904 as a day-off from the harvest and time to celebrate the the best peaches in Utah.  It’s a tradition that brings in around 50,000 people for activities that the top of Utah and Southern Idaho residents look forward to each year.

I had just purchased a mint Yashica Mat-124G medium format camera and wanted to document the car show on film.  I’ve never seen so many cars at at car show at once, it was a photographers play ground.  I shot about three rolls and wish I had brought more film.  I brought my Leica M to capture all the color but really enjoyed capturing it on film.  No one noticed when I was shooting with my Leica M but when I pulled out my Yashica it seemed liked everyone stopped to watch as I shot these cars, it’s an attention getter that’s for sure.  I stopped counting how many people asked if they still make film the camera and where I get the film processed.  The kids love looking through the ground glass, I’m sure they haven’t seen anything like this before.

I will be sharing some color and black and white images from my Leica M soon, but for now enjoy the car show.

Technical Notes:

• Shot on a Yashica Mat-124G
• Film: Ilford Delta 400 Professional
• Developer: Rodinal
• Scanner: Epson V700

 

Yashica Mat 124G Sample Images

My last post talked about my new acquired film camera, you can check it out here. For today’s post I wanted to share a few pictures from my test roll that I had a local lab develop and a roll that I shot and developed myself. When I purchased the camera it had a working(original) battery that I verified was giving my the correct exposure. I don’t trust it 100% so I decided to get a replacement battery and keep the original working one as a backup.

For the first roll I wanted to try several lighting conditions. Shooting into the sun, shooting in part shadow and in broad daylight. The camera performed as expected in these conditions and I have to say I’m pretty impressed.  The second roll was more documenting our day in Jackson Hole Wyoming on the 4th of July.

One thing I absolutely love about this camera is it forces you to shoot in square format.  When I printed some of my favorite images my daughter promptly said “hey, these are square like Instagram”.  I quickly reminded here that Instagram is just like this camera, the square format has been around long before Instagram was just a concept.

For those interested I used Tri-X 400 and developed in Rodinal(adonal)

 

This was my first image taken with the camera, I managed to get a double exposure.  Not sure how that even happened but I liked the result.

Yashica Mat-124G

Today’s configuration:  Leica M(240) with a Summicron 50mm f/2.0 & Voigtlander 75mm f/1.8 Heliar Classic

Thanks to a good friend, I’ve been getting into shooting film more and more.  He and I headed to San Clamente California a few months ago to attend a workshop by the Film Photography Podcast hosted at thedarkroom.com.  I met some great photographers there and have really been wanting to shoot more film since then on a decent camera.   I own a couple of 35mm film cameras but haven’t been very impressed with the quality of the frames that they produce.  I’ve been wanting to get into medium format for quite a while but just haven’t found something that would work for me.  The camera’s I want are too expensive for the type of shooting I do.

I’ve always been intrigued with a the concept behind a TLR camera.  I’ve been following a great film photographer Bill McCarroll on Google Plus for quite while and I happened to run into him at the workshop in California.  He had his Leica MP and boy did it feel good in my hands.  One day I will own a Leica film camera.  About a month ago he posted some pictures from his Rolleiflex TLR and I was immediately hooked.  They had a different look and feel to them that I really liked.  I knew that a Rolleiflex would be too much for me to invest in.  I started researching and found that the Yashica Mat 124G or the Yashica Mat 124 was a good alternative to a Rolleiflex.  I jumped on our local classified site and stumbled onto the exact Yashica that I wanted.  After exchanging a few emails and a couple of phone calls we sealed the deal and worked out a place to meet for the exchange.

Harold was the original owner and treated this camera very well.  He and I chatted for about 30 minutes about how he got into photography and when he decided to buy this camera.  When he told me he has only shot 3 rolls of film through this I couldn’t believe it.  After a close inspection I couldn’t let this camera go, it was in mint condition.  I asked Harold if I could take a photo with him and his camera to send to him later.  He of course said yes and asked his wife to join him.  The last words he said to me was all I want is for this camera to go to a good home and to be used, not sitting on a shelf.  I assured him I would take care of it and use it.

I have since run a few rolls through it and have to say I’m very impressed with the quality.  It’s a fun camera and a great conversation starter.  More on that with images in a later post.

3/4 Frame

     Today’s configuration:  Nikonos-V Fujifilm Neopan 400

I don’t shoot a lot of film but I can only imagine images like this were common when photographers reached the end of the roll.  At first I was a little disappointed that the frame got cut off but after looking at it for a while I consider this a happy accident.  I like that the cut off is in front of the guy looking down and the guy in the back is looking at the empty space.  It makes me wonder now what was in that blank space.  I included a shot of the camera and film I used.  I was photographing sea turtles and fired this last frame before replacing the film with a new roll.