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Monday, October 15th, 2012
Back in May I was invited to do some photography during the dress rehearsal of a theatre production called Killing Hitler by the director of the production. Unfortunately I couldn’t make it so instead I went along to the opening night to try to squeeze in a little photography during curtain up. You’d think I would have learnt my lesson from trying that during a production of Cabaret with not a huge amount of success but I felt it was worth a try. Needless to say the cast and crew had more important things on their minds than to make time for my photography so all I managed to get was these three shots. It’s a shame because the set for the opening scene looked really good with the lighting. My thanks go to the director, Lucie Dawkins and the cast and crew for putting up with me.
[Tech info:] Mamiya M645 1000S, 80/f1.9 lens, loaded with Fuji Acros 100 film, processed in Kodak HC110 (dilution b).
Posted in film, Oxford, Portrait, students | No Responses »
Tags: 645, acros, backstage, drama, film, hc110, keble college, o'reilly, oxford, portraits, students, theatre
Saturday, September 22nd, 2012
Some photo shoots can start off with with trying to plan every last detail, others have the room to breath and experiment to see what happens. This photo shoot falls in the latter. Helen sent me an image for inspiration and from there I decided I would only use black & white film and I took along four different cameras to experiment with (3 medium format and a 35mm). On the day Helen brought various outfits but I think it was a coincidence that we only ended up using black and white clothing. The images have a feeling of going from light to dark which was perfect as we raced against the fading sun. This is a story of a girl who’s man ‘did her wrong’. It was a fun shoot and I hope to do more of these.
[Tech info:] I used the following cameras, Pentax 67 with 105/f2.4 lens, Mamiya C330f with 80/f2.8 lens and a Mamiya M645 1000S with 80/f1.9 lens. Film used was Kodak Tri-X and Fuji Acros 100. All of these shots were processed in Rodinal 1:50 (Acros for 10:00, the Tri-X for 13:30).
Posted in film, Oxford, Photo shoot, Portrait | 1 Response »
Tags: 645, 6x6, 6x7, acros, black&white, c330, film, helen, pentax, portraits, rodinal, Tri-X
Friday, September 14th, 2012
These images are from a roll of film I shot at the beginning of my Pandora’s Box photo shoot earlier in the summer. I just came across it and realised that it had never been scanned. You can see part 2 here.
[Tech info:] Mamiya M645 1000s with 80mm/f1.9 lens, loaded with Fuji Acros 100 film, processed in Kodak HC110 (dilution b).
Posted in film, People, Portrait, students | No Responses »
Tags: 645, acros, black&white, film, hc110, oxford, pandora, people, portraits, students, summer
Monday, June 25th, 2012
These images are from the first test shoot I had with Helen during my lunch break. At this time of year the light between 12 noon and 2pm is not particularly flattering so it can be a bit of a challenge to find nice natural light to use during my lunch break which falls between those times. My mantra is there’s always good light to be found, you just have to find it so it’s something I’m constantly looking for on my photo walks around town. A slight difficulty for photography at this time of year in Oxford is the volume of tourists around so it can sometimes take a while to wait for them to clear from the background of a shot and because I only usually have around 30 mins for photography during my lunch break after I’ve travelled to and from the centre of town from my office my test shoots are usually fairly rushed. There isn’t much time for my subject to ease into the shoot but fortunately Helen was ready from the first frame and a complete natural in front of my camera. It was difficult to reduce the amount of shots to post here.
I’m very pleased with the tones in a lot of these images and I put that down to the possibility of using a slightly different agitation method when I processed the film. There seems to be slightly more contrast. I also scanned these images slightly different from my normal method so that’s probably a factor too.
[Tech info:] Mamiya M645 1000S, 80/f1.9 lens, loaded with Fuji Acros 100, processed in Kodak HC110 (dilution b).
Railings.
Passageway.
Against the wall.
Around the corner.
Railings.
Steps.
Bottom step.
I really like this kind of light where you're in the shade but there is bright sunlight being bounced up from bright stone.
Last frame.
Posted in film, Oxford, Photo shoot, students | 2 Responses »
Tags: 645, acros, black&white, film, hc110, oxford, people, portraits, students
Friday, May 25th, 2012
These shots are from my last test shoot with Hai Lin it’s just taken me a while to process the roll of film because it was colour. With black & white film you can mix up the quantity of chemistry you need to process a single roll. With colour the chemistry is different because you can reuse it so I save up some colour rolls so that I can do them in batches. These shots were made on Kodak Ektar 100 film which I haven’t used very much. I like it so far.
[Tech info:] Mamiya M645 with 80/1.9 lens. Kodak Ektar 100 film. Processed and scanned by me.
Late afternoon sunshine.
Broad Street. I like the shadow in this shot.
Fading light. In the shade the colours look a little funky.
The light level was really low after the sun had gone down behind buildings.
I like the bokeh in this shot.
Posted in film, Oxford, People, Photo shoot, Portrait | 3 Responses »
Tags: 645, film, people, portraits
Sunday, February 19th, 2012
It feels like ages since I did any street portraits so getting back into it this week has given me a real buzz. The weather in January was really bad so I didn’t get many opportunities to do much street photography. The shots here are all from the same roll of film shot during the past two days which makes them the fastest turned around images (from my camera to this blog) so far. The film I used is one of my favourites (Fuji Acros 100) but for this roll I decided to test out a developer that I haven’t used with this film before (Kodak HC110). I was a bit nervous because I had shots that I was very excited about and didn’t want to lose but nothing ventured nothing gained as they say. I’m pleased to say that it all worked out well and I’m very happy with this film/developer combo.
[Tech info:] Mamiya M645 and 80mm/f1.9 lens loaded with Fuji Acros 100 film. Processed in Kodak HC110 dilution B for 5mins at 20c.
I love the outfits this couple are wearing (I think they're a couple) and I hope I get to photograph them again.
- I photographed this smartly dressed gentleman last summer on Cornmarket Street and when I saw him walking towards me on Turl Street I had to photograph him again.
One of the security guards where I work.
There's something very classic about the way this gentleman is dressed with his wax cotton coat and scarf. As he came walking towards me I had the feeling that he wouldn't want to be photographed but I was happy to be wrong.
On the steps of the Clarendon Building. The first time I passed this guy he was eating some lunch so I decided not to interrupt him. By the time I'd done a circuit of my usual haunts he had finished. Funnily enough someone else had asked to photograph him the other day.
These builders are working on the Walton Street site at the corner of Little Clarendon Street. When i approached them they didn't want to be photographed but after I explained my street photography project they were happy to. I think there's something about using a film camera that shows people you're serious about photography in a way that digital cameras don't.
I think this camera is a Leica. All of the logo's have been covered in black tape. It reminds me of what I did with my first Nikon SLR to prevent it from attracting attention.
Posted in film, Oxford, Street portraits, Street style | 1 Response »
Tags: 645, acros, black&white, oxford, people, portraits, street style, students
Monday, August 29th, 2011
Here we have a bit of a mixture of shots from the same roll of film. I was trying out a new type of film, Kodak Portra 160 rated at 100 and then processed normally. The first two images are of my daughter, the colour difference is down to me testing different scanning software. I prefer the one on the left made with Silverfast SE. Over the past few years I’ve made so many images of Nya with digital but recently I’ve mainly been using film. There’s something wonderful about having images of Nya on physical media compared to bits and bytes on hard drives.
All shots made with a Mamiya 645 1000S and 80mm/2.8 lens.
Nya loves swings
A student from Taiwan with his mum's old Nikon FM and 50/1.4 lens. This is the first SLR camera that a dear friend of mine (thank you Susie Barker) handed me in 1986 to use. How many DSLR's will be in use 25 years from now?
I never tire of photographing this worn out bicycle.
I've got a thing for photographing beaten up bikes
These buildings have been marked for redevelopment in the next month. More student accommodation, more people for me to photograph. I like the red and black in this scene..
I don't usually stop anyone that isn't an adult because of how controversial photographing children can be. On this occasion I thought this guy looked so cool waiting with his dog so I decided to ask him. I like how his trousers match the colour of the stone and the blue signs echo his top.
Window display in vintage furniture store Liscious, Walton street, Oxford.
Posted in Oxford, Street portraits | 5 Responses »
Tags: 645, people, Portra, portraits, summer
Friday, August 19th, 2011
A few weeks ago I went to Antwerp and Brussels with my family for a holiday. I took only film cameras with me, hoping to do lots of photography, especially street portraits but the weather wasn’t always on our side so I didn’t get as much done as I had hoped. Overall I shot more colour than black & white but I haven’t developed any of the colour yet.
[Tech info]: Mamiya M645 1000S loaded with Kodak Tri-X film, exposed at ISO 400 and developed in HC110 for 13mins at 20C.
Fellow photographer and huge inspiration, Jan Scholz.
This gentleman said he didn't usually like being photographed but was kind enough to oblige. He was backlit by the sun and I liked how the flare looked.
There was no shade around so the harsh evening sunlight is not very flattering here.
This gentleman was watching the sun setting as it made its way down to the horizon.
Posted in Street portraits, Travel | No Responses »
Tags: 645, brussels, people, portraits, Tri-X
