via flickr.com
Blimming brilliant. One of my aims for 2010 is to make sushi on a more regular basis – and this beautifully shot Christmas tree made by bananagranola is great inspiration!
Tuesday 22 December 2009
Monday 21 December 2009
Wednesday 9 December 2009
The Digital Harinezumi 2
That is what the Harinezumi has brought back to video. It had all become too clean, to perfect. High Definition, crystal clear focus, rich sound. But just like the warmth of a vinyl record is more soothing then a compact disc- there was a need to have that warmth in the videos that you were creating of the special moments now.
via nicnichols.com
A very beautiful and convincing piece of writing that's also a review of the new Harinezumi 2 digital camera. Worth clicking through to the website as there's some beautiful videos and images on there.
It's getting tricky not to buy this camera – along with this lovely piece of writing, I'm also fending off emails from a very dear and knowlegable friend who's ordering me to sell all my film gear and buy a Harinezumi as soon as physically possible.
Ho hum. Maybe after Christmas...
Tuesday 8 December 2009
An appreciation of the 50mm lens
So what is the alternative? Well, you could do what most of today's pros and some ambitious amateur photographers do and buy a "professional" 28-70mm zoom lens with a fixed f/2.8 aperture. These lenses are reasonably fast, quite sharp and well made. But they are heavy, bulky and very very expensive. For most people I believe there is a better alternative: the classic 50mm "normal" lens.
via vothphoto.com
A great piece by the photographer Gary Voth on the wonders of shooting with a 50mm f/1.8 or f/2 – I only just started shooting with a prime about six months ago (there was one with my Olympus E-P1 that my Dad gave/loaned to me) and the difference is remarkable. 50mms are the epitome of "keep it simple". If you haven't got one, get one, and your photography will improve almost overnight.
Holga & Diana Camera Workshop @ Garage Studios
Earlier this year I went on a course at Garage Studios where I learned the ins and outs of my LC-A camera – they've just started offering Holga and Diana courses as well. Can't recommend these Brighton-based chaps highly enough – they're friendly, helpful and you're guaranteed to come away very happy with your camera.
camera camera bag at japan exposures
Clever idea for a camera bag. Well, I like it, but if you were trying to be discreet about your photography it might be a giant screaming beacon that you're taking pictures.
There's several other designs on the website, including some small ones for compacts that look like Olympus Trip cameras. Nice...
Monday 7 December 2009
Snarkmarket - The Tidal Bore of Meaning
Stanislas Dehaene tries to explain how when we read a word, the brain gathers and relays information to multiple networks:
Take the verb “bite.” As you remember what it means, your mind briskly evokes the body parts involved: the mouth and teeth, their movements, and perhaps also the pain associated with being bitten. All of these fragments of gesture, motion, and sensation are bound together under the heading “bite.” This link works in both directions: we pronounce the word whenever we talk about this peculiar series of events, but to hear or read the word brings on a swarm of meanings…
Perhaps the easiest way to describe how activation spreads through the dozens of fragments of meaning dispersed in the brain is to compare it to a tidal bore. Some rivers are subject, twice a day, at high tide, to a peculiar phenomenon whereby the leading edge of a massive wave reaches deep into their estuaries. If conditions are right, the wave can travel dozens of miles upstream. No salt water ever reaches this far inland—the tidal bore simply relays a distant rise in water level that spreads in synchrony into the river’s entire system. Only an airplane or satellite can get the true measure of this beautiful natural phenomenon. For a few minutes, a whole network of streams is simultaneously swollen by a powerful surge of water, simply because they all flow into the same sea.
A written or spoken word probably activates fragments of meaning in the brain in much the same way that a tidal bore invades a whole riverbed.
via snarkmarket.com
Just stumbled on this seemingly excellent blog and the top post (quoting a blog quoting a book, so many frames of reference) refers to the idea that thoughts are like ripples in water, rebounding off objects and other memories - made-up words don't mean anything, but resonant words will grow in magnitude and impact, depending on your own personal experiences.
Fascinating idea. Must go make more tea and ponder.
Sugru
via sugru.com
This is such a brilliant idea for a product! Sugru allows you to "hack things better" and fix objects or add new appendages to make them work better for your life. My first thought is improving on cameras' grips – adding finger slots, etc – or maybe just fixing my graphic tablet's pen... wow. Mind expanding...
via @brokenbottleboy, again
Newspaper Club
Brilliant idea of a website that lets you make your own newspapers. This'd be really fab for local (I mean REALLY local) papers – might put the team in charge of our village magazine in touch with them.
I also like their hugely honest blog. Yup, call me a fan! Now all I need is someone to make a magazine with..
Friday 4 December 2009
Beware Social Media Snake Oil - BusinessWeek
Over the past five years, an entire industry of consultants has arisen to help companies navigate the world of social networks, blogs, and wikis. The self-proclaimed experts range from legions of wannabes, many of them refugees from the real estate bust, to industry superstars such as Chris Brogan and Gary Vaynerchuk. They produce best-selling books and dole out advice or lead workshops at companies for thousands of dollars a day. The consultants evangelize the transformative power of social media and often cast themselves as triumphant case studies of successful networking and self-branding.
The problem, according to a growing chorus of critics, is that many would-be guides are leading clients astray. Consultants often use buzz as their dominant currency, and success is defined more often by numbers of Twitter followers, blog mentions, or YouTube (GOOG) hits than by traditional measures, such as return on investment. This approach could sour companies on social media and the rich opportunities it represents. "It's a bit of a Wild West scenario," blogs David Armano, a consultant with the Dachis Group of Austin, Tex. Without naming names, he compares some consultants to "snake oil salesmen."
via businessweek.com
Interesting comment piece on the dangers of throwing money at social media. I like the comparison between social media and high-risk investments, that may pay off but also may backfire.
I've never been entirely happy with being billed as a "social media expert" and prefer to describe myself as someone who understands and uses social media to network. Jonathan Worth's piece about how social networking is just the 21st century version of standing awkwardly in a room, holding a cocktail glass, reassured me that it's definitely worthwhile using these tools, but over the past couple of months, I've lost focus somewhat and have had the creeping feeling that spending time on Twitter and Facebook is literally just a form of procrastination.
As a result, I've started setting myself goals for each time I log in to one of the sites – four more followers for Photo Pro, contact a certain photographer, get retweeted by ten people, etc. As this excellent article in Business Week winds up summarising, having a fixed idea of what you're trying to achieve through your online efforts will definitely help keep you on the straight and narrow path towards your own vision of success.
Thursday 3 December 2009
an amazing home page
via giacavalli.co.uk
very simple, but ever so effective. Reminds me of JKRowling's desk-in-the-shed...
Pictory
via pictorymag.com
Pictory is a new online photomagazine from Laura Brunow Miner, former Editor-in-Chief of JPEG magazine. This is brand new, but it's already easy to see that it's a beautifully designed piece of work and a fantastic way to display images.
Wednesday 2 December 2009
Wednesday 25 November 2009
what's inside a Polaroid picture
Great photo from The Best of LIFE (via @brokenbottleboy's tumblr) that shows the different layers in a Polaroid.
Tuesday 24 November 2009
Behind The Scenes
via olympususer.com
Our "Behind the Scenes" video where I interview Kevin Spacey. Crazy stuff
Good god
via crave.cnet.co.uk
Love it when Olympus does this to their cameras – apparently this is going to cost £2000. Youch!
Monday 23 November 2009
did you ever take a photograph that looks like a memory?
via youtube.com
And if you look closely, you can see me reflected in his eyes just around 0.24. Kidding, natch, but I was definitely there...
Friday 20 November 2009
these are two of my favourite things
Friday 13 November 2009
a couple of stonkingly great photography and social media blog posts
an extract from “Getting paid to give things away” by Jonathan Worth (@Jdubbyah on Twitter) “Up to now, I'd always always thought "Networking" to be a hollow and crap term, which summed up what vacuous Trustafarian Socialites did and whose sole motivation was personal gain in a fashionably fair-weather world of parasitic exploitation. “I've never understood it as a variable sifting through, of all the friends, colleagues and acquaintances one had come across, to find those who, at that particular moment you have the most in common with. I don't now think there's anything sinister in this practice as I did before. It's just great.”
http://jonathan-worth.blogspot.com/2009/10/getting-paid-to-give-things-away.html And a bit from “In The New Media World, Photographers who Embrace Change Will Succeed” by Wayne Ford “Working in the business, it’s easy to get despondent about all this — because change is hard. But once you move beyond denial to acceptance, it can also be energizing. We are entering an era in which the photographer and art director can explore many more creative opportunities and visual solutions, no longer limited to just print or television. “Not all of our explorations will end in success. Like Edison, we may fail 10,000 times for every victory. But there is a thrill in the challenge.”
http://rising.blackstar.com/visual-creativity.html
http://jonathan-worth.blogspot.com/2009/10/getting-paid-to-give-things-away.html And a bit from “In The New Media World, Photographers who Embrace Change Will Succeed” by Wayne Ford “Working in the business, it’s easy to get despondent about all this — because change is hard. But once you move beyond denial to acceptance, it can also be energizing. We are entering an era in which the photographer and art director can explore many more creative opportunities and visual solutions, no longer limited to just print or television. “Not all of our explorations will end in success. Like Edison, we may fail 10,000 times for every victory. But there is a thrill in the challenge.”
http://rising.blackstar.com/visual-creativity.html
Thursday 12 November 2009
New media, Old media (tags:quotes, social media)
“Being the first is old media, while being to the point is new media.”
The Guardian’s Mercedes Bunz <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2009/nov/11/rules-if-boss-follows-you-on-twitter-etiquette>
The Guardian’s Mercedes Bunz <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2009/nov/11/rules-if-boss-follows-you-on-twitter-etiquette>
A photo a day with Shuttercal
Another brilliant photography project site where you can post a picture every day and have it turned into a calendar for the next year – lovely gift idea or just something to do for yourself. I tried to take one photo a day for a week and failed miserably around day four, and am currently failing to get to photography class once a week, so I don’t think this is for me, but love the idea never the less. Definitely worth a peep. http://shuttercal.com/
Wednesday 11 November 2009
welcome home
Or, why I really really need a dog. These videos of dogs greeting their soldier owners make me smile and want to cry at the same time.
This, this I love
How beautiful is this? It’s one of Olympia Le Tan’s embroidered clutch bags made to look like a novel from the 40’s or 50’s. Olympia LeTan
(via BoingBoing)
Monday 2 November 2009
cats with cameras
Aww. Love them, love the camera too... maybe I could ask for one for Christmas to supplement my growing Polaroid habit while the Impossible Project gets those films on sale...
Friday 30 October 2009
camera containers
My ever-expanding collection of cameras has caused a slight problem that's finally come to a head. I need one bag to put as many of my Lomos, Polaroids, DSLRs and SLRs in so that I can sling it in the back of the car and have everything I need to take photographs, where-ever I go. I was thinking about using one of the old bags lying around the office, but half-remembered something I'd heard once - and one little tweet is all it took:
And I got flooded with creative and beautiful ideas for camera bags. Here's the front runners at the moment:
Lee's Luxury Bag from Artisan&Artist (via @PolaroidGirl)
Sprout Diaper Bag from Chickpea Baby also via @PolaroidGirl
And the Classic 550 Billingham... from the ever-lovely @Pebble8
I'll add more as more appear. Feel like I've opened Pandora's Box...
And I got flooded with creative and beautiful ideas for camera bags. Here's the front runners at the moment:Lee's Luxury Bag from Artisan&Artist (via @PolaroidGirl)
Sprout Diaper Bag from Chickpea Baby also via @PolaroidGirl
And the Classic 550 Billingham... from the ever-lovely @Pebble8
I'll add more as more appear. Feel like I've opened Pandora's Box...
Monday 28 September 2009
the problem with vintage cameras no.3476
is that sometimes the technology that they need to work has been outlawed - genuinely!
To power my exposure meter and give my photographs a hope in hell of working, my OM-1n needs a Mercury battery - unfortunately these batteries got banned for being, I don't know, a bit deadly - so now us old-school Oly shooters need a workaround. Step in the 675 Zinc-air hearing aid battery, which I'm told promises to be just as effective to within a bit of a stop.
More here at Silverbased.org
ouch
"Um... I know you said we should come to class without any film in our cameras, but I tried to rewind mine at home and the film tension's just disappeared - I was hoping you could help me.." and I held out my OM-1 with black and white film elusive but still interred safe within, containing shots from Italian villages, sunkissed portraits of my extended family, countless sleepy mornings back at the cottage, fiddling in the garden with lavender blowing in the breeze and earlier that day, experimenting with tones in the gritty lanes of Brighton's backstreets...
"Hmm," she said, turning it over in her hands, "did you try rewinding it already?"
"Yeah, I think so," I said, doubt creeping into my voice, "but there's just no tightness - the wheel just goes round, look," and I demonstrated.
"Ah," she said, and before I really knew what was happening, she popped the back on my camera and showed me the film inside. I looked up at her.
"Holy... what the....?!" I thought. My eyes widened, hugely puzzled by this new 'technique' for safely removing film from cameras.
"Your film's snapped, see?" she said, and began pulling my film off the spool as I sat, mutely gaping at the reams of now-past-saving negatives wheeling out, piling up in her hands like some awful, grey celluloid intestines. I felt sick.
"Um... ok... er..." I said, not really sure what to do and groping for comedy to pull me through as the rest of the "photography for beginner's" class watched, obviously blind to the horrific disemboweling taking place in front of them.
"You ok? We can always use it for practise film!" she grinned, bouncing the grey strip into the bin and handing me my now-empty camera while the class laughed, cheerily. I struggled for a weak grin and blinked into space. All I could see were the shots that had just vaporised like slasher-movie vampires in the sunlight, 'poofing' into nothingness. Sure, I was just trying the camera out for the first time, and the lack of any proper exposure meter meant that all my shots were probably pointless, but... wow. What a way to go.
I think I'm still in shock. On the last film photography course I was on, my LC-A got stuck mid-shoot and it was rushed across Brighton to a friendly dark bag for the necessary surgery: the harsh realities of a "real" photography course seems to mean that there's no room for emotion on this particular learning curve.
Wednesday 23 September 2009
wow
In the last ten days, so much has happened that I barely know where to start. Let's try this:
- started my darkroom course and learned how to load 35mm onto a developing wheel (don't even know the technical terms for this, that's how early on I am) - smelt the weird chemicals, grinned at the other people on the course and am hooked. That is all.
- adventures with film continue: bought an old SX-70 Polaroid from eBay on a real whim, shipped it over from America (enduring customs taxes on the way) and was hugely delighted to discover that it's a complete, working set including manuals, flash cubes, macro lens and gorgeous leather case. (photos of the beautiful beast to follow soon, genuinely think it's a stunning piece of design)
- ordered SX-70 film from The Impossible Project, plugged it in and took my first Polaroids.
Fell in love with this ridiculously expensive format. Something hugely magical about pressing a button, catching the print and seeing a photograph develop in front of your eyes - it's a really personal, intimate format that I think I'll save for just me. And him, of course :)
- On the same day I liberated my SX-70 from Parcel Force, I also shot my first wedding! Well, one third of the wedding, just the getting-ready shots before the pro took over, but found myself really enjoying photographing one of my best friends and making her look even more beautiful than she actually is (well, trying to, anyway)... now working on her album, uploading images in breaks from article writing/photographer wrangling.
- knee deep in work at work and so much going on back at the cottage it's unreal. Time off soon, hopefully...
- started my darkroom course and learned how to load 35mm onto a developing wheel (don't even know the technical terms for this, that's how early on I am) - smelt the weird chemicals, grinned at the other people on the course and am hooked. That is all.
- adventures with film continue: bought an old SX-70 Polaroid from eBay on a real whim, shipped it over from America (enduring customs taxes on the way) and was hugely delighted to discover that it's a complete, working set including manuals, flash cubes, macro lens and gorgeous leather case. (photos of the beautiful beast to follow soon, genuinely think it's a stunning piece of design)
- ordered SX-70 film from The Impossible Project, plugged it in and took my first Polaroids.
Fell in love with this ridiculously expensive format. Something hugely magical about pressing a button, catching the print and seeing a photograph develop in front of your eyes - it's a really personal, intimate format that I think I'll save for just me. And him, of course :)
- On the same day I liberated my SX-70 from Parcel Force, I also shot my first wedding! Well, one third of the wedding, just the getting-ready shots before the pro took over, but found myself really enjoying photographing one of my best friends and making her look even more beautiful than she actually is (well, trying to, anyway)... now working on her album, uploading images in breaks from article writing/photographer wrangling.
- knee deep in work at work and so much going on back at the cottage it's unreal. Time off soon, hopefully...
Thursday 10 September 2009
the trouble with snapshots
(bit lifted from PDN interview with London College of Fashion professor Ken Miller, about his new book of snapshot photographs)
PDN: In your essay for the book, you talk about photographers choosing to keep photographs that most people would discard, and how that makes the photographer the subject as much as what’s in the photograph. Do you think that there’s a danger of snapshot work becoming overly self-conscious to the point that it’s more about photographers challenging viewers to figure out the value in increasingly mundane images?
KM: Yes, there’s definitely a risk of that. If anything, I think that very well could be the logical conclusion of this. I’m not going to name names, but I think there are certain photographers who are already going there.
PDN: In other words, the composition of an image is becoming secondary to the photographer’s insistence that the image has value?
KM: We are already seeing that. It’s funny: you could almost say that snapshot photography is starting to reach its decadent phase. To go from saying, “Ok, there’s this image that other people don’t find attractive, but I sincerely do find it attractive, and I’m going to present it so that they develop an appreciation for it,” to saying “I’m just going to throw whatever out there because I think that every image is valuable,” I think there’s validity to that, [but] it starts to get a little bit flat and it also starts to get a bit risky when it becomes so self-reflexive on the photographer. Again, I’m not going to name names, but there are definitely people who are doing that.
more
PDN: In your essay for the book, you talk about photographers choosing to keep photographs that most people would discard, and how that makes the photographer the subject as much as what’s in the photograph. Do you think that there’s a danger of snapshot work becoming overly self-conscious to the point that it’s more about photographers challenging viewers to figure out the value in increasingly mundane images?
KM: Yes, there’s definitely a risk of that. If anything, I think that very well could be the logical conclusion of this. I’m not going to name names, but I think there are certain photographers who are already going there.
PDN: In other words, the composition of an image is becoming secondary to the photographer’s insistence that the image has value?
KM: We are already seeing that. It’s funny: you could almost say that snapshot photography is starting to reach its decadent phase. To go from saying, “Ok, there’s this image that other people don’t find attractive, but I sincerely do find it attractive, and I’m going to present it so that they develop an appreciation for it,” to saying “I’m just going to throw whatever out there because I think that every image is valuable,” I think there’s validity to that, [but] it starts to get a little bit flat and it also starts to get a bit risky when it becomes so self-reflexive on the photographer. Again, I’m not going to name names, but there are definitely people who are doing that.
more
Monday 24 August 2009
Extreme Testing: Canon Ixus 200 IS Vs. The Hen Night
In amongst last week’s Canon-related camera excitement about the G11’s sensor having less megapixels than its predecessor and the pro-looking Powershot S90’s focus wheel, the touchscreen and compact Digital IXUS 200 IS also slipped into the pool. Having managed to get my hands on one of the first models in the UK, I thought I’d put this little compact to a real-life test, in the sort of situation that the IXUS's style-and-substance-conscious target market reguarly find themselves in.
Yes, Canon, I took your press sample on a hen weekend...
Friday 7 August 2009
a photo I couldn't take
this morning saw a grey, damp mist settling over the roads and fields that lined my route to work - the kind of weather that makes you pull an extra jumper from the cupboard before leaving the house "just in case".
The final leg of my commute sees me driving through the suburbs of a small country town, where the speed's limited and sleeping policemen rudely punctuate the tarmac (helps jolt me awake if the coffee hasn't done the job)
on this particular drive, some odd combination of weather, light and time of day meant that at the exact moment of my passing a bus stop, another commuter waiting for his ride exhaled on his cigarette and sighed into the thick, grey air – and instead of dissipating into the atmosphere the breath of smoke hung in front of him like a tiny cloud, crystal-like and beautiful.
I couldn't take my eyes off the scene and kept my head locked on him and his companion cloud, so the upper-half of my body looked like a pirouetting ballet dancer in slow motion. In what cannot have been more than two seconds, this ran through my head: Did I have a camera? no. Should I stop? No. If I was a better photographer I'd have stopped. Yes. Why didn't I stop? I should stop. I'm going to stop.
With that final thought, I had to swing my head back round to the front to stop from crashing horribly, and the sudden movement broke whatever spell had been cast by the commuter and his cloud companion - I peeped at him in my rear view mirror before he slid out of sight as I turned off the main road into work. I sat in the car for a few minutes, thinking about the light and the smoker and how I should have stopped to take his picture.
then I came indoors, and wrote this.
The final leg of my commute sees me driving through the suburbs of a small country town, where the speed's limited and sleeping policemen rudely punctuate the tarmac (helps jolt me awake if the coffee hasn't done the job)
on this particular drive, some odd combination of weather, light and time of day meant that at the exact moment of my passing a bus stop, another commuter waiting for his ride exhaled on his cigarette and sighed into the thick, grey air – and instead of dissipating into the atmosphere the breath of smoke hung in front of him like a tiny cloud, crystal-like and beautiful.
I couldn't take my eyes off the scene and kept my head locked on him and his companion cloud, so the upper-half of my body looked like a pirouetting ballet dancer in slow motion. In what cannot have been more than two seconds, this ran through my head: Did I have a camera? no. Should I stop? No. If I was a better photographer I'd have stopped. Yes. Why didn't I stop? I should stop. I'm going to stop.
With that final thought, I had to swing my head back round to the front to stop from crashing horribly, and the sudden movement broke whatever spell had been cast by the commuter and his cloud companion - I peeped at him in my rear view mirror before he slid out of sight as I turned off the main road into work. I sat in the car for a few minutes, thinking about the light and the smoker and how I should have stopped to take his picture.
then I came indoors, and wrote this.
Thursday 6 August 2009
more quotes I like that justify collecting cameras
"I don’t think about what camera I should use that much. I just pick up the one that looks nicest on the day."
William Eggleston
"If you want to change your photographs, you need to change cameras. Changing cameras means that your photographs will change. A really good camera has something I suppose you might describe as its own distinctive aura."
Nobuyoshi Araki
Wednesday 15 July 2009
ciao!
am off on holiday tomorrow for a well-earned break in the sun - hopefully will return with armfuls of blurry photographs and rambling stories. see you in a week or so!
Tuesday 14 July 2009
how to completely fail (and then succeed) at loading 127 film
Following my last post, I thought it'd be appropriate to record my first attempts at loading 127 film into my new/old Kodak Brownie 127. 35mm, not a problem - but this 127 looked like it was gonna be tricky.
I'd managed to get hold of two rolls of Efke R100 from retrophotographic.com, and they'd set me back £5 or so each. Youch. It'd be worth it, I reassured myself.
Even the outside of the film didn't look easy. I was going to need some help. Enter the ever-wonderful FrugalPhotographer.com, and their downloadble PDF guide to getting this dastardly roll into your retro 127-takin' camera.
I also reached for my new-found-best-friend, my roll of black electrical tape. I knew I was going to need this once the film was loaded, to cover up the little red hole where the film numbers pop into view on the back of the camera, but it turned out I was going to need it sooner than that...
Snipping through the sticker that held the protective paper casing (or so I thought) around the film, I also happpily snipped through the VITAL PIECE OF FILM that fed into the take-up spool. Cue electrical tape. Also, there was no protective paper casing as the PDF guide had suggested, which flummoxed me a bit. (post-finishing edit: Ha! I thought I was flummoxed then?)
The film roll had a notch in it where it clipped into the advance wheel on the top of the camera. Or, again, so I thought. Turns out my camera actually had an empty roll in the place where the film's meant to sit, and no take-up spool - this actually makes sense, as when shooting 127 finished film is left on the take-up spool and removed from the camera without winding back to the first roll as with 35mm - but I didn't know that at the time. So, I happily loaded my film into the wrong side of the camera, connected it to, again, the wrong side of the camera, and sat back to admire my handiwork...
Hmm. Why was it upside down? And why, when I turned the film advance wheel, did the film not go anywhere, and simply start to pile up (and look worryingly loose around the spindle)...oh...
...And, the big, backwards-shaped penny dropped. It looked wrong because I'd loaded the film backwards, that's why. Sigh. This gaping maw in the centre of the picture is where the film should be. Yes, I'm a prize doofus.
And then, to add insult to injury, in the process of reloading it correctly this happened - the PDF was littered with warnings about "hold onto the springy film" and "DO NOT let go of the film", which of course I ignored - and then the film sprang out of my grasp and light flooded in between the rolls of paper. SIGH.
Having resigned myself to ruining this roll (that's £5 down the drain) I decided to go ahead and load it properly anyway, to make sure I was doing something right.
That's better! Starting to look like the camera in the PDF now...
...plus the advance wheel actually advances the film. And for my final trick – the little red window, complete with electrical tape and shot number. (I thought I'd use the flash through the red window, just to make properly sure the film was ruined)
Now all that remains is to pretend to take several pictures, get to the end, get the film out of the camera, load the damn thing properly and start taking pictures for real. To be continued...
I'd managed to get hold of two rolls of Efke R100 from retrophotographic.com, and they'd set me back £5 or so each. Youch. It'd be worth it, I reassured myself.
Even the outside of the film didn't look easy. I was going to need some help. Enter the ever-wonderful FrugalPhotographer.com, and their downloadble PDF guide to getting this dastardly roll into your retro 127-takin' camera.
I also reached for my new-found-best-friend, my roll of black electrical tape. I knew I was going to need this once the film was loaded, to cover up the little red hole where the film numbers pop into view on the back of the camera, but it turned out I was going to need it sooner than that...
Snipping through the sticker that held the protective paper casing (or so I thought) around the film, I also happpily snipped through the VITAL PIECE OF FILM that fed into the take-up spool. Cue electrical tape. Also, there was no protective paper casing as the PDF guide had suggested, which flummoxed me a bit. (post-finishing edit: Ha! I thought I was flummoxed then?)
The film roll had a notch in it where it clipped into the advance wheel on the top of the camera. Or, again, so I thought. Turns out my camera actually had an empty roll in the place where the film's meant to sit, and no take-up spool - this actually makes sense, as when shooting 127 finished film is left on the take-up spool and removed from the camera without winding back to the first roll as with 35mm - but I didn't know that at the time. So, I happily loaded my film into the wrong side of the camera, connected it to, again, the wrong side of the camera, and sat back to admire my handiwork...
Hmm. Why was it upside down? And why, when I turned the film advance wheel, did the film not go anywhere, and simply start to pile up (and look worryingly loose around the spindle)...oh...
...And, the big, backwards-shaped penny dropped. It looked wrong because I'd loaded the film backwards, that's why. Sigh. This gaping maw in the centre of the picture is where the film should be. Yes, I'm a prize doofus.
And then, to add insult to injury, in the process of reloading it correctly this happened - the PDF was littered with warnings about "hold onto the springy film" and "DO NOT let go of the film", which of course I ignored - and then the film sprang out of my grasp and light flooded in between the rolls of paper. SIGH.
Having resigned myself to ruining this roll (that's £5 down the drain) I decided to go ahead and load it properly anyway, to make sure I was doing something right.
That's better! Starting to look like the camera in the PDF now...
...plus the advance wheel actually advances the film. And for my final trick – the little red window, complete with electrical tape and shot number. (I thought I'd use the flash through the red window, just to make properly sure the film was ruined)
Now all that remains is to pretend to take several pictures, get to the end, get the film out of the camera, load the damn thing properly and start taking pictures for real. To be continued...
Monday 6 July 2009
another new toy *sigh*
As my boyfriend and I walked back to the car I happily clutched my new Kodak Brownie, turning it over and over in my hands, grinning from ear to ear. Yes, I'd just found out that getting hold of 127 film was going to be like tracking down the horn of a unicorn, but it felt so nice - so fat and so curvy and with these awesome 1950's Mad Men style lines. It looked like a piece of design. Ooh.
I turned to him with a new idea and said, "Wouldn't it be nice to put all these cameras in a display cabinet? Then we could see them properly. They're pieces of design, after all, and...what?"
He'd stopped dead a few paces behind and was staring at me, smiling.
"About three months ago you said - you said with your very own mouth, that you would never need a proper display cabinet for your cameras because your uncle collects cameras, and you didn't want to end up with hundreds of film cameras lying around the house like he had, and that your Fisheye and your Smena were enough for you. That's what you said. I thought I'd just remind you of that."
"Well... well...."
I trailed off into silence, half-thinking and slightly bemused. And with that, we simultaneously started walking again, my happiness bubble slightly punctured but also reinforced by the odd, warm feeling that this camera collecting was a weird, recessive genetic trait that was always going to rear its wicked head at some point.
I'm going to need some more disposable income. Especially if 127 film is going to cost in excess of £15 a roll (motherhubbard!)
I turned to him with a new idea and said, "Wouldn't it be nice to put all these cameras in a display cabinet? Then we could see them properly. They're pieces of design, after all, and...what?"
He'd stopped dead a few paces behind and was staring at me, smiling.
"About three months ago you said - you said with your very own mouth, that you would never need a proper display cabinet for your cameras because your uncle collects cameras, and you didn't want to end up with hundreds of film cameras lying around the house like he had, and that your Fisheye and your Smena were enough for you. That's what you said. I thought I'd just remind you of that."
"Well... well...."
I trailed off into silence, half-thinking and slightly bemused. And with that, we simultaneously started walking again, my happiness bubble slightly punctured but also reinforced by the odd, warm feeling that this camera collecting was a weird, recessive genetic trait that was always going to rear its wicked head at some point.
I'm going to need some more disposable income. Especially if 127 film is going to cost in excess of £15 a roll (motherhubbard!)
Thursday 2 July 2009
so much going on...
I may just have to do a lame post like this:
Spent two weekends on a HotShots Course at Garage Studios in Brighton with Lomokev learning how to shoot with my LCA+ // Went to Berlin for the launch of the Olympus Pen and had a brief fling with the new Micro 4/3 camera // Found this photographer and love her // Finally met my web-pen-friend, the Webponce, who then used one of my shots on his homepage (woo!) // Bought this cookbook and sighed, a lot, about how nice it would be to own a deli // Rescued some tomato plants which were "free to a good home"...
will add more anon. too much to write, too little time!
Spent two weekends on a HotShots Course at Garage Studios in Brighton with Lomokev learning how to shoot with my LCA+ // Went to Berlin for the launch of the Olympus Pen and had a brief fling with the new Micro 4/3 camera // Found this photographer and love her // Finally met my web-pen-friend, the Webponce, who then used one of my shots on his homepage (woo!) // Bought this cookbook and sighed, a lot, about how nice it would be to own a deli // Rescued some tomato plants which were "free to a good home"...
will add more anon. too much to write, too little time!
Monday 22 June 2009
Thursday 11 June 2009
on saturday I bought myself some flowers
Yes, taking arty pictures of peonies makes me a giant walking cliche.
To tell the truth, I've never had a bunch of peonies or, indeed, actually encountered a peony in the wild - I've just gazed at picture after picture of perfect, dreamy, petal-heavy blossoms on Flickr and the delicious design blogs that I lurk on inbetween writing techy articles for the magazines...
...and dreamt that one day, I too would get up early, throw on a plaid shirt dress and pumps and ride my racing green bicycle with battered wicker basket to the market, where I would count out my pennies to buy a huge, billowing, intoxicatingly-scented bunch of the most delicately petalled pink peonies - and the smiling florist would wave my money away and hand me the bunch, and I would beam back at him in return before tucking the flowers into my basket between some freshly baked pastries, a paper bag of raspberries and a well-folded newspaper, and hop back on my bike and be on my way....
or something like that, at least. Well, ok, not much like that at all - it wasn't that early, I haven't bought a bike yet (despite having that on my to-do list for months), the florist was grumpy and I certainly didn't get them for free - but even though the peonies were tightly closed like painted ping-pong balls they were absolutely beautiful, and they made me smile from ear to ear.
Over the past week it's been a delight to come downstairs in the morning and see the five peonies open more and more – plus spending a few hours photographing them (and then a few more in Photoshop, swearing about the processing speed of our ancient home Mac) was a lovely way to pass the time.
Although these pictures are "nice", I haven't quite managed to take the peony photographs that I have in my mind's eye - but even that makes me smile. All it means is that I'll have to buy another bunch when these ones fade, and give taking my cliched "perfect peony" shot another go. Oh well...
To tell the truth, I've never had a bunch of peonies or, indeed, actually encountered a peony in the wild - I've just gazed at picture after picture of perfect, dreamy, petal-heavy blossoms on Flickr and the delicious design blogs that I lurk on inbetween writing techy articles for the magazines...
...and dreamt that one day, I too would get up early, throw on a plaid shirt dress and pumps and ride my racing green bicycle with battered wicker basket to the market, where I would count out my pennies to buy a huge, billowing, intoxicatingly-scented bunch of the most delicately petalled pink peonies - and the smiling florist would wave my money away and hand me the bunch, and I would beam back at him in return before tucking the flowers into my basket between some freshly baked pastries, a paper bag of raspberries and a well-folded newspaper, and hop back on my bike and be on my way....
or something like that, at least. Well, ok, not much like that at all - it wasn't that early, I haven't bought a bike yet (despite having that on my to-do list for months), the florist was grumpy and I certainly didn't get them for free - but even though the peonies were tightly closed like painted ping-pong balls they were absolutely beautiful, and they made me smile from ear to ear.
Over the past week it's been a delight to come downstairs in the morning and see the five peonies open more and more – plus spending a few hours photographing them (and then a few more in Photoshop, swearing about the processing speed of our ancient home Mac) was a lovely way to pass the time.
Although these pictures are "nice", I haven't quite managed to take the peony photographs that I have in my mind's eye - but even that makes me smile. All it means is that I'll have to buy another bunch when these ones fade, and give taking my cliched "perfect peony" shot another go. Oh well...
Saturday 6 June 2009
new york, new york...
This was my umpteenth visit to New York: I just can't get enough of it.
Unfortunately I fell sick with some sort of bug on the third day of our trip, which laid me up for two days. Still, inbetween bouts of sickness, I got to watch the "Deadliest Catch" Memorial Day Marathon - two straight days of crab fishing in the Arctic Circle. Will there be crab in the pot? Will it be big enough? Will they meet their quota? Weirdly, can't get enough of this program - reckon it's my seaside roots...
Er...anyway! What was extremely nice is that on the second-to-last day of our trip, which also happened to be my birthday, I woke up feeling much better and my significant other gave me the best present he could possibly have handed me - a Lomo LC-A+.
Back in the UK, three weeks later, I finally got round to developing the shots. I somewhat dismissively opened the packet that contained the negs and CD from my first roll and I (quite literally) found myself stopping dead in the street and staring, open mouthed, at the teeny-tiny contact sheet of images. Most of the shots hadn't worked, as I'd expected - but some, just some, seemed to sparkle with a life of their own - even if it was just the corners of shots that were in focus or the weird vignetting perfectly framing scenes.
As I peered at the contact sheet I held my breath - something clicked inside me and I completely, utterly, irrevocably fell in love with this tiny, crappily-built and horribly over-priced camera.
Damn it.
Damn it.
Tuesday 19 May 2009
want + ♥
I've tried, but I think it's completely impossible to quantify how much I love this ring by YellowGoat designs - it's a mini Polaroid frame for your finger. Genius.
I'm putting it in the Inbox section of Photo Pro magazine this month, and keeping my fingers crossed that the designer is so delighted with it that she ends up sending me one for keeps... stranger things have happened.
In slightly related news, how beautiful is this image? <- click here, press "fashion" then "fable" and go right 5 frames. Sorry for the runaround, I felt guilty sticking up a low-res of his image, no matter how small...
It's by British photographer Chris Craymer (who's just released a new book with Mulberry called "Romance" - something else that I'd absolutely love to have on my coffee table) and shows Johnny Depp and Mrs Depp-Paradis reclining lazily - it's part of a series of equally stunning shots of the couple and well worth flicking through if you get a few free minutes. I like to think that they're in Paris and it's a Sunday morning... *le sigh*...
The light is just completely incredible - this man is a ridculously talented photographer. I'm going to try and chase him for an interview in Photo Pro - fingers crossed I can navigate his agents and PRs...
I'm putting it in the Inbox section of Photo Pro magazine this month, and keeping my fingers crossed that the designer is so delighted with it that she ends up sending me one for keeps... stranger things have happened.In slightly related news, how beautiful is this image? <- click here, press "fashion" then "fable" and go right 5 frames. Sorry for the runaround, I felt guilty sticking up a low-res of his image, no matter how small...
It's by British photographer Chris Craymer (who's just released a new book with Mulberry called "Romance" - something else that I'd absolutely love to have on my coffee table) and shows Johnny Depp and Mrs Depp-Paradis reclining lazily - it's part of a series of equally stunning shots of the couple and well worth flicking through if you get a few free minutes. I like to think that they're in Paris and it's a Sunday morning... *le sigh*...
The light is just completely incredible - this man is a ridculously talented photographer. I'm going to try and chase him for an interview in Photo Pro - fingers crossed I can navigate his agents and PRs...
Tuesday 12 May 2009
the new arrival (or why I'm going to be spending all my paycheck on developing costs for the forseeable future)
Now we come to the slide-show portion of our program:
So today I got home from work (rushed home, as I'm halfway through this at the moment and can't wait for the next seminars) and found that this rather exciting package was waiting for me....
I'm no stamp-aholic, but this looks promising. Particularly loving the old-school twine approach to postal security.
Well, it's certainly wrapped well. I've never seen such incredibly sound packaging (and I get sent some pretty expensive camera gear on a very regular basis). Now to extract it from its polystyrene coffin...
Ok, polystyrene off – uncovered soft leather baglet... but what's inside said baglet?
YEAH! It's my new lilac Smena Symbol, fresh from the Ukraine via eBay – a well spent lunchbreak asking people on Twitter for user reviews while also researching different Lomo cameras and gasping at how much Urban Outfitters was charging for them vs how cheap they were on t'Bay resulted in this absolute gem of a camera.
Jeez - what do all these dials mean? Where's Aperture Priority? What about full auto?
I don't think we're in DSLR land any more, Toto... :)
Can't wait to try this out in NYC in two weeks time. That now brings the total kit-count to two 35mm film cameras, two DSLRs plus four lenses, two camcorders and a whole heap of chargers and adaptors. I'm going to need a bigger suitcase.
So today I got home from work (rushed home, as I'm halfway through this at the moment and can't wait for the next seminars) and found that this rather exciting package was waiting for me....
I'm no stamp-aholic, but this looks promising. Particularly loving the old-school twine approach to postal security.
Well, it's certainly wrapped well. I've never seen such incredibly sound packaging (and I get sent some pretty expensive camera gear on a very regular basis). Now to extract it from its polystyrene coffin...
Ok, polystyrene off – uncovered soft leather baglet... but what's inside said baglet?
YEAH! It's my new lilac Smena Symbol, fresh from the Ukraine via eBay – a well spent lunchbreak asking people on Twitter for user reviews while also researching different Lomo cameras and gasping at how much Urban Outfitters was charging for them vs how cheap they were on t'Bay resulted in this absolute gem of a camera.
Jeez - what do all these dials mean? Where's Aperture Priority? What about full auto?
I don't think we're in DSLR land any more, Toto... :)
Can't wait to try this out in NYC in two weeks time. That now brings the total kit-count to two 35mm film cameras, two DSLRs plus four lenses, two camcorders and a whole heap of chargers and adaptors. I'm going to need a bigger suitcase.
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