I brought all my analogue cameras to the AAS conference in Philly, but must report via iPhone.
Archive for March, 2010
Irony in Philly
Friday, March 26th, 2010Phun with Photography
Monday, March 22nd, 2010I haven’t blogged lately mainly because days have been spent writing my manuscript and evenings building pinhole cameras (so far so good with designs), developing paper negatives (test shots done, ready to roll for real), making contact prints (finally a couple good ones), and now developing my own B&W film. I shot a roll of 120 film (Fuji Neopan Acros 100) with the iPhone Pinhole and decided to take the plunge developing the negatives. I probably should have made the maiden voyage with a real commercial developer, like Dektol or Tmax or Diafine (all of which I have on hand), but figured that a true test would be to try homemade Caffenol-C. I have been quite successful using it to print paper negatives on Ilford MG IV RC glossy despite that paper’s inherent contrastiness (Arista paper doesn’t work with it, thus the Dektol). So, in a fit of inspiration this evening I whipped up a batch of Caffenol-C and read up on developing technique and times when using it with Neopan Acros 100. Well, I couldn’t find anything on developing times with Caffenol (normally it’s around 13 minutes with other developers), so I had to wing it. First step, however, was unwinding the exposed film and spooling it onto a developing tank spool in a changing bag, completely blind. I read a lot about the difficulty of doing that, but these snazzy spools I have made it super easy–done within a couple minutes. BUT, I missed taking off part of the tape that’s on the end of the film. I find the edge of it easy enough, and thought I had stripped it all off, but I accidentally slit the length of the tape in two and took off only half of it. The remaining half stuck to the film explains why the fixer and the following washes were tinted purple-pink when I dumped them — the chemicals (I think the fixer) reacted with the gum on the tape, turned it purple-pink and streak it all the way down one half of the strip . So, it seems I may have gotten half frames with visible (maybe even decent) images on one side and a purple-pink-white strip on the other. The uniformity of the line down almost the middle of the film strip is odd; it almost looks like a half-frame mask, cutting the exposures in half horizontally. So, bad news is that missing a small strip of tape on the film ruined what might have been pretty good negatives for the first time developing film from a homemade pinhole with a homemade developing solution. Good news is that Caffenol-C seems to work well with Fuji Neopan and my basic chemistry and developing technique, while rough, is all right. I’ll have to sacrifice more rolls to trial-and-error experimentation (with pinhole exposures, developing times, concentrations of Caffenol), but the principle is sound and I fell comfortable with the process. I’m determined eventually to develop most if not all of my own B&W (except rolls I think might have such great exposures that I would want a pro to develop them). It would mean a big savings in development costs, as well as fun and fulfilling.
The negs are drying now, so I can’t scan and post the accidents quite yet, but in the meantime, here is part of the cool backing paper to 120 Fuji Neopan Acros 100 film:
For National Pi Day
Sunday, March 14th, 2010
My latest paper negatives
Saturday, March 13th, 2010These are with photo paper (Arista Ultra Semi-matte Graded) that simply will not develop in Caffenol. So, on a tip from Chris Keeney, I mixed up some proper developer (Dektol) et voilà! They developed. I was gauging different exposure times of the same test shot under cliudy conditions wirh the Anyway35 Pinhole. From left to right: 90 seconds, 120 seconds, 180 seconds. I’ll post the positives later once I scan and invert the negs.
Pinhole + Paper Negative + Caffenol C
Friday, March 12th, 2010
I’ve been testing out the “Anyway 35″ Pinhole camera I designed the other day with paper negatives and developing them in instant coffee crystals + washing soda + vitamin C (so-called Caffenol C), which is a heckuva lot cheaper than a photo lab or normal developing chemicals. And the results are pretty/interesting. Next up is an 8×10 paper negative pinhole….
Lessons I learned today
Tuesday, March 9th, 2010A box from Freestyle Photo came via FedEx today, which meant that the photo fixer I ordered arrived, which meant that I could try to develop the paper negatives I exposed yesterday in the Anyway35 pinhole camera I made. Granted, I have never developed anything in my life and didn’t even know what a paper negative is until a few days ago. But, TGFTW (Thank God For The Web). After a bit a googling and great advice and encouragement from a real photographer, Chris Keeney, I decided to experiment. The Anyway35 Pinhole is designed to take 3.5×3.5″ paper negatives. The first thing I learned is that it’s hard to cut accurately 5×7 photo paper to 3.5×3.5 in a darkroom.
Lesson #1: build template for paper cutting and make it a little bigger than 3.5x.3.5
With untested pinholes and photo papers the science of exposure times and focus and framing is turned into a crap shoot, albeit an educated by trial-and-error crap shoot. So, I set up a shot that would be in sun and shade at the same time and have differently-textured objects at different depths of field. I also did a shot of the same scene after it clouded over.
Lesson #2: 30-40 seconds in afternoon sun; 120 seconds in cloudy; shade exposure time not yet determined, but I’m guessing at least 3 minutes.
Lesson #3: Developing film/prints takes patience and a modicum of precision (unless you what to pass off mistakes as “artsy”); i.e., fix and wash your prints better!
Lesson #3 was learned when I forgot/was too lazy to double check fixing and wash times. I woefully underestimated the length of time and the amount of agitation necessary for fixing and washing. As a result, I got a mess of spots and streaks on my negative.
Lesson #4: Developing paper negatives “Caffenol” (Folger’s instant coffee crystals, Arm & Hammer Washing Soda, Vitamin C, and water) works and it doesn’t smell like “grim death” as one guy put it. Normal developing chemicals smell worse.
I want to do contact prints from the negatives (the positive “prints” you see below were produced by scanning into Photoshop and inverting the image), but need a 15w bulb and some plate glass. I also need to be more careful adhering the photo paper to my camera back, using less adhesive. Sticky gunk was left on the back of the negatives and that’ll mess up a contact print. Patient rubbing got the gunk off (afraid to take Goo Gone to it), but there are better ways,.
Lesson #5: Digital photography is FAR more efficient and instantly gratifying and easier and everything else, but this low-fi alternative process photography is interesting and gratifying in its own alchemical way. I’m not even considering it photography per se; rather, it’s playing with the play of light on material surfaces and with substances to produce images (I guess that’s what “photo-graphy” means…). Of course, Sara has known this for ages with her analog cameras, but to build a camera from scratch and develop the exposure you took with it goes even further. Yeah, I screwed up the developing, but I got some images. It worked — the Christmas gift tin I made a pinhole camera out of and the Folger’s Crystals mixed with Washing Soda and Ascorbic Acid produced images on paper where there had been none:
#1 (35-second exposure in sun and shade):
#2 (120-second exposure in mostly cloudy):
The Anyway 35 Pinhole Camera
Sunday, March 7th, 2010My latest invention pictured here is called the Anyway 35 Paper Negative Pinhole Camera. It's called that because you can photograph with it in any orientation because it's a more-or-less symmetrical square and it is structured mathematically/optically around the number 35: the pinhole diamater is .35mm, it takes 3.5in square photo paper, and it focal length is 2×35 = 70mm. Theoretically, these are optimal dimensions for a pinhole camera this size as far as focus is concerned. The effective f-stop is approximately 200. The main part of its body is a Christmas gift tin (approx. 4x4x2 inches) unto which I attached another cardboard gift box (3.5×3.5x.75inches) in order to stretch the focal length. The pinhole/shutter mount is a Canon drilled out camera body cap that is flipped around so that I can screw on a Canon lens cap as a "shutter." (Brilliant idea if I do say so myself). The Anyway 35 is designed for paper negatives that I intend to develop myself with so-called Caffenol-C (Folger's Instant Coffee, Washing Soda, water, and vitamin C). I'll try it out tomorrow if I have time and the weather cooperates.
Gakken TLR Camera
Saturday, March 6th, 2010Volume 25 of the Japanese magazine Otona no kagaku (Science for Adults) contained a kit 35mm twinlens reflex camera. They sold out quickly when released in fall 2009, but I found one at Light Leaks online (for twice the newsstand price). It came today finally and I just put it together. Very brilliant yet simple design. I’ll try it out tomorrow.
Another cool Tokyo vid
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010Browsing through Vimeo turned up this pretty neat Tokyo-inspired video:
Rapid Eye Movement from POWSKII on Vimeo.
The iPhone 3GS Box Pinhole Camera
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010Between writing and reading, I’ve spent the past week building a pinhole camera from an empty iPhone 3GS box. The inspiration struck when I was looking around my study for containers to make a camera from and when I saw the box and opened it, it was decided. Remarkably, the height of the interior perfectly fits a 120 film spool. There are even compartments that fit the spools well (including 35mm canisters). The quality of the box — well, it’s an Apple product, so it goes without saying that it’s slick and sturdy. It’s made of stiff smoothly finished flat black cardboard, with the lid covering the entire height of the inner box, enhancing its light-tightness. The interior dividers are black foam core. One could almost simply poke a pinhole in it and use it as is, but it would be nice to have a film advance (and, in the case of 35mm, rewind) mechanism. And a better-than-electrical-tape shutter mechanism. And a padded, grippy base. And a frame count window. So, I found and bought parts (balsa wood, dowels, dowel plugs, metal shelf holder peg, furniture felt pads, some random rubber collar that was from an opened lamp conversion kit at the hardware store, electrical tape, thin flat black sticky back foam, a red frame count window taken from the third Hawkeye Brownie I have). I gutted part of the interior to accomodate both full-frame 120 and 35mm film. I drilled and scraped out holes for dowels that serve as spool holders, as well as holes for the pinhole and shutter mount and the frame counter window. Designed and cut out of balsa wood a sliding shutter. Painted and sharpied all light spots black. Etc. The result is aesthetically very pleasing — worthy of an iPhone box. The almost-too-recessed pinhole might cause vignetting, but that could turn out to be a very good thing. It’s loaded with Fuji Provia 100F right now, ready for testing. If the weather is better tomorrow I’ll give it a spin. In the meantime you get photos of the camera, not from the camera:
I just need to paint the knob silver and make some masks so that I can shoot normal frame 35mm and maybe 24mmx24mm. As is, it’ll expose 56mmx35mm edge-to-edge, across the sprocket holes. Can’t wait to see what comes out of it.
