Black and White

Barcelona Dark VI

Nighttime Street Photography in Barcelona on Film
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Continuing the series of night-time street photographs in Barcelona. This time I have tried using a 28mm lens, which has proven very difficult. You might expect that the wider angle would mean needing a lower shutter speed, but in practise if you try to get closer to the subject to compensate for the wider field-of-view there is no real advantage. Add to this the practical limitation that my 28mm is a stop slower than my usual lenses, and it is very hard to catch images successfully. With the typical light […]

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Black and White

Barcelona Dark III

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A short set of new images in the Barcelona Dark series. I am gradually managing to tame the processing and also gradually migrating away from 50mm to 35mm for the shots – largely because the 35mm is noticeably easier to focus and hand-hold. Some of this might just be psychological, but fear of failing to get rapid and accurate focus with a 50mm means that I seem to have more close-up images of subjects with the wider lens. These are also somewhat more randomly framed than usual. Not sure if […]

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Landscape

August

Sunset and yacht on Lago di Como, Italy.
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  A short set of Italian alpine landscape images, which seems appropriate for the time of year. These were shot in several locations, from Vall di Mello to Lago di Como, and are a pretty good summary of what August should be like. Unfortunately for us, August is going to be a busy month, and I am putting the blog on hold now until things settle down in September, when it might also be cool enough to process film again…

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Black and White

Pushing Delta 400

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After six months away, the M7 is back and seems to be working. These are the last of the test images used to check that the camera was working correctly. All the images were shot here using Delta 400 rated at EI1600 and push-processed in DD-X 1+4. Everything was shot with either a 50mm C-Sonnar or Summilux lens with manual exposure and manual focusing.

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Black and White

Back to film?

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The M7 is now back from its latest repair attempt in Leica, and I have shot a couple of test films to re-check the focus calibration and metering. So far, it looks promising. The metering is now usable at ISO 400, and ISO 1600 looks ok down to about 1/8th second (a huge improvement from before, where it was failing at 1/125th). But…

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Architecture

Walden

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A quick set of images of the Walden 7, an innovative high-density housing block in Sant Just Desvern, on the edge of Barcelona. These were taken on the way back from a walk along the hills at the edge of the city, with a conscious detour to see the block that was just possible before heavy thunderstorms arrived.

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Black and White

Snapshots from Berlin

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A set of tourist snapshots captured while on a short trip to Berlin. It is a fascinating city with a rich, complex and often tragic history, and it would be interesting to have time to undertake a more in depth photographic project there. All images shot with the Leica M10 and 50mm Summilux. I did take a wide-angle lens as well, but never used it because 50mm always just seems right.

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Black and White

Storm Warning

Stormy beach scene, Masnou.
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A set of stormy beach scenes, shot along the coast from Badalona to el Masnou, north of Barcelona. These were part of a film shot as part of a processing test for Delta 400 exposed at EI1600 and processed in DD-X 1+4 as if shot at EI 3200. The resulting grain is quite harsh, but also quite fine compared to faster films. The film was scanned using an E-M1.2 with a macro lens, which tends to de-emphasise the grain compared to standalone (non-flatbed) film scanners.

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