students
...now browsing by category
Wednesday, January 28th, 2015
Here are some medium format shots I made during my recent lunch time session with Tori. I previously posted a couple of Fujiroid bleached neg shots here. The format for these shots was 6×9 which is one of my favourite medium format aspect ratios but I only have one camera that was designed to use that format and these shots reminded me that I don’t use it enough. You get 8 shots of 6×9 on a 120 size roll so it’s not a format for the trigger happy. For this shoot I decided to use fresh film stock for a change and while I can’t see a huge difference compared to some of my expired film shots I do think that the contrast was handled better on the contrasty back lit shots. We were a bit rushed in this session because I wanted to use medium format, 35mm and Fuji pack film all within 25mins which is not easy when you’ve got lots of people moving around during lunch time and you have to keep stopping to wait for a clear background but Tori was very patient despite the cold weather and we got everything done in time.
[Tech info:] Mamiya Universal, 100/2.8, Kodak Tri-X 400, processed in Kodak Xtol 1+1.
Posted in film, Oxford, Photo shoot, Portrait, students | No Responses »
Tags: 6x9, black&white, film, mamiya universal, oxford, people, students, tori, Tri-X, xtol
Monday, January 19th, 2015
Today was a glorious sunny winters day here in Oxford and I made good use of it by doing some photography with Tori during my lunch break. I had three different film cameras with me today and here are two shots from the Polaroid Land Camera I took (the b&w shots are drying in the darkroom overnight so they’ll follow at a later time). There’s something really nice about winter sunshine and how it can make colours pop, it can also be very harsh and contrasty so it’s a nice challenge to look at how the light is falling on your subject and how the smallest of movements can mean the difference between nice and not so nice. Tori was incredibly easy to photograph and I hope we can do some more photography with different cameras and film. There is zero retouching on these two images, no Photoshop fakery, no filters, no plugins, just straight scans from the film.
These two shots were made on Fuji FP100-C instant pack film that expired 9 years ago. When you store it carefully and pay attention to how you expose it it’s capable of creating some fantastic results. I tend to underexpose it by a stop which results in a darker print but a nice negative that can be recovered with bleaching the black carbon layer off. The negatives are much sharper than the prints and you also get 2 stops of more detail in the shadows compared to the print.
[Tech info:] Polaroid Land Camera 190, Fuji FP100-C (expired), recovered neg.
Posted in film, Oxford, Photo shoot, Portrait, Street portraits, students | 2 Responses »
Tags: film, fp100c, fujiroid, oxford, polaroid, polaroid 190, portraits, students, tori
Thursday, January 15th, 2015
Spilt is a short film written and directed by Alvin Yu and I was asked if I’d like to do some portrait photography while they were filming in Oxford a couple of weeks ago. Due to timing conflicts I was only able to make it to set on their final day of filming after it had gotten dark outside so I made these portraits indoors with the available light (a bulb hanging from the ceiling in the hallway). The crew were setting up for a shot so I had to work quickly, one frame on each person, no re-takes and no second shot. What you see here is the entire roll of film, uncropped. Apologies to any crew members that I didn’t manage to include, hopefully I’ll get you on another project.
[Tech info:] Rolleiflex 2.8F, Zeiss Planar 80mm, Kodak Tri-X 400 rated at ISO 1600, processed in Kodak Xtol 1+1.
Posted in film, Oxford, People, Portrait, students | No Responses »
Tags: 6x6, backstage, black&white, film, filming, oxford, people, portraits, rolleiflex, spilt, students, Tri-X, xtol
Tuesday, December 2nd, 2014
It’s been a long time since the last time I can remember pushing Kodak Tri-X film to ISO 1600 and processing it in Rodinal developer so that’s what I decided to do a few weeks ago. There are a mix of images on this roll ranging from some night portraits that I made during a photography class I was teaching to Ruskin art students on the High Street during their drawing sale to raise funds for their end of year degree show. I’d like to do some more work with Art students but they seem to be an illusive bunch so it’s currently a work in progress.
[Tech info:] Nikon FM2, Zeiss 50/1.4 lens, Kodak Tri-X 400 (expired), rated at ISO 1600, processed in Rodinal 1:50 for 18 mins.
Posted in Art, film, Oxford, People, Street portraits, students | No Responses »
Tags: black&white, film, fm2, oxford, people, portraits, rodinal, students, Tri-X
Saturday, November 29th, 2014
These are the first shots from my Voigtlander Nokton 50/1.5 lens which I tested during my lunch break yesterday. Technically this is the second roll of shots with this lens – the first roll was unusable because I forgot to close the back door of my M2 properly so the film wasn’t flat and the whole roll was out of focus. That’s what can happen when you’re excited to use a lens you’ve been looking forward to for quite a while. Lesson learnt. The weather was heavily overcast sky with a really gloomy feel everywhere. It’s the kind of light I would never usually waste a roll of film with but I really wanted to see how this lens performed so I decided to go out regardless and I must admit I do like the results, especially the bokeh, this lens is definitely a keeper. My thanks go to Jason Howe for all of his help and advice about this lens which I prefer for b&w over my Summicron 50/2. I’ll be keeping the Summicron because I shot some slide film with it and the results look fantastic so I can see it being useful for colour (as suggested by my friend Anthony).
[Tech info:] Leica M2, Voitlander Nokton 50/1.5, Ilford Delta 400 (expired), processed in Kodak D76 1:1 for 14 mins.
Posted in film, Oxford, People, Portrait, Street portraits, students | No Responses »
Tags: black&white, d76, delta 400, film, leica, m2, oxford, pakon, people, portraits
Tuesday, November 25th, 2014
Recently I managed to pick up a roll of quite unique film and these are some of my first test shots with it. The roll is 350ft long and 5 inches wide so it’s perfect for being cut down to 5×4 inch sheets to use for large format photography. The film is Kodak Plus-X Aero film that was developed for aerial photography – this is stock used by the M.O.D. and expired in 2000. During my lunch break yesterday I went into town hoping to make some test portraits because the tonal range in this film is more like what you find in wet plate photography and I wanted to know if it was going to be usable for portraits. I’m very happy with the results which look very smooth tonally and the grain is almost non existent.
[Tech info:] Polaroid 110B (modified for 5×4), Kodak Plus-X 2402 Aero film, ISO 100, processed in Rodinal 1:50 for 14 mins.
Here’s the camera I used (shown below with a roll film back). Modified by Randy at HolgaMods.com
Posted in Oxford, People, Portrait, Street portraits, students | No Responses »
Tags: 110B, 5x4, aero, black&white, film, oxford, people, plus-x, polaroid, portraits, rodinal
Friday, November 21st, 2014
In between lots of wet weather over the past couple of weeks we’ve had some nice dry spells and I managed to finish off a roll of film in my M2 during my lunch time photo walks. A bit of a mixed bag here including a shot of me from the generous photographer with the Polaroid camera. I spotted him crossing beaumont street while loading in a fresh pack of Impossible b&w film so I stopped him to ask if I could make a quick portrait of him and he was happy to oblige (picture at the bottom of this post). I don’t know what caused the bright white patch in the middle of the picture but it does make it a bit more mysterious.
[Tech info:] Leica M2, Summicron 50/2 (rigid), Ilford FP4 (expired 12/99), processed in D76 stock for 8.30.
Posted in film, Oxford, People, Street portraits, students | No Responses »
Tags: ashmolean, black&white, d76, film, fp4, impossible, leica, m2, oxford, people, portraits
Wednesday, November 12th, 2014
Now that winter is here and the weather is getting colder and wetter I think it’s the perfect time to start posting my coverage of the trashing that happened here in Oxford during the summer when it was a lot warmer and sunnier. This was such a lot of fun to photograph but also quite difficult, not only because I had to avoid getting in the firing line of the various liquids that were flying around but also because I kept getting accused of being from the Daily Mail after they published an article about binge drinking and used pictures of Oxford students getting trashed to illustrate it – the two things couldn’t be further apart. It’s hardly surprising really because if the Daily Mail are good at one thing it’s publishing lies – just ask George Clooney.
[Tech info:] Nikon F100, Agfa Vista 200 (Poundland) film, processed and scanned by ASDA Swindon.
Posted in film, Oxford, students | No Responses »
Tags: agfa vista, asda, exams, f100, film, nikon, oxford, students, summer, trashing
Sunday, November 2nd, 2014
At my office I keep a Zenit TTL camera, it’s my go to camera to use during my lunch hour when I haven’t taken in anything else to use. Sometimes it can be pouring with rain in the morning which is when I usually decide not to take a camera with me to work but then it might clear up and be nice at lunch time and that’s when I dust off my trusty Zenit. As a result of this inconsistent use the film in the camera can end up being in there for quite a few months so it’s always exciting when I finish the roll and process it because I never quite know what’s going to be on it. The shots here span approximately the past five months.
[Tech info:] Zenit TTL, 58/2 Helios lens, loaded with Kodak TMAX 100, processed in HC110 1+31 for 6mins.
Posted in film, Oxford, People, students | No Responses »
Tags: black&white, film, hc110, oxford, people, students, tmax, zenit
Tuesday, October 21st, 2014
One of the things I enjoy about photographing drama productions is being able to test out films that I wouldn’t usually be able to test out during my lunch hour because they need low light conditions. These shots are from a roll of expired Ilford Delta 400 which I rated at ISO 800 and pushed one stop in the processing. It looks a lot different to the Kodak Double-X that I shot in the same conditions but rated at half the speed. Once again my Yashica Electro 35 proved to be the right camera for the job and I’m becoming a bigger fan of it the more I use it.
[Tech info:] Yashica Electro 35, expired Ilford Delta 400 (ISO 800), pushed one stop in Kodak D76 1+1.
Posted in Behind the scenes, Drama, film, Oxford, students | No Responses »
Tags: backstage, black&white, d76, delta 400, electro 35, film, oxford, students, yashica
Monday, October 20th, 2014
This is the first set of pictures from my time backstage at The Oxford Playhouse while the cast of The Furies were getting ready. There isn’t a lot of space in the dressing rooms so I did my best to keep out of the way while still making pictures – notice my reflection in two of the shots. Before arriving I didn’t know what the light levels were going to be like inside but I wanted to test out some Eastman Kodak Double-X motion picture film (the same type that was used by Spielberg for Schindler’s List) so I took a gamble and rated this roll at ISO 400 which is a 1 stop push from box speed. Overall I’m very pleased with the results considering how much contrast there is in these shots – bright lights and black clothing is a torture test for any film. A quick shout out to Charles Graham, the director, for allowing me access and a big thank you to the cast for being so accommodating which always helps to make my job a little easier.
[Tech info:] Yashica Electro 35, Eastman Kodak Double-X film rated at ISO 400, processed in Kodak HC110 1+31 for 6:30.
Posted in Behind the scenes, Drama, film, Oxford, People, students | No Responses »
Tags: backstage, black&white, double x, drama, electro 35, film, hc110, oxford, students, yashica
Thursday, September 18th, 2014
Christ Church College is such a grand venue for a summer ball and back in July the summer’s evening light was absolutely perfect for the occasion. After doing the promo photography I was really looking forward to this ball and it was worth the wait. These shots were made with a little point and shoot compact camera and I really like the snapshot feel to them. After the sun went down for a time it was so dark in Tom Quad that I could hardly see who I was photographing but somehow the camera still managed to focus. Many thanks to Tori for inviting me and for helping organise such a wonderful event.
[Tech info:] Canon Sureshot Supreme, Fuji Superia 200 film, processed by ASDA in Swindon, Pakon scans.
Posted in film, Oxford, students | No Responses »
Tags: ball, christchurch, film, fuji, oxford, people, students, summer, superia 200
