Madonna
From somewhere in the mountains of Italy. Ilford Delta 100 in Ilfosol 3 1+14 4:30, 26c.
Mountain Life
Still-life, from the Italian Alps. This was taken with Ilford Delta 400 processed in Ilfosol 3. It seems to be marginally sharper than HP5 but otherwise very similar – I think that a lot of the more subtle differences between films (particularly tonality and differences in grain) are lost after scanning and processing digitally. As an aside, you might have noticed that almost all the films we shoot now are from Ilford. Unfortunately, it is becoming harder to find good films at a reasonable price here in Spain. And online prices for […]
Movement
Scooters are to black and white film photography as cats are to the internet…
Ghost Town
A short set of photographs of an abandoned town, a short-lived remnant of western north American gold rush. All except for two images were shot on HP5+ film, with the Zeiss Sonnar 50mm. The remaining images were taken with the Ricoh and processed in Lightroom to try to recreate the Sonnar “look” (in as much as 28mm and 50mm focal lengths can look the same). Aside from adding simulated grain, the Ricoh images needed much reduced overall clarity and contrast, and also a circular graduated clarity filter to further unsharpen the image away […]
Bridge
The tree gives a very good sense of how strong the Pacific Wind was… Zeiss ZM 1,5/50 with Ilford HP5+ and an orange contrast filter.
Strip
New York, Las Vegas.
Beach
Baker Beach, San Francisco. Sun-burn and freezing winds all at the same time :-/
Strip
Paris, Las Vegas.
Beach
Strip
The Las Vegas Strip. Zeiss ZM 1.5/50 with Ilford HP5+.
Beach
Ocean Beach, San Francisco. On a particularly cold and windy day… Finally catching up with the film scanning and post processing. It is somewhat ironic that the film images take much more time and effort in Photoshop than the digital images – largely thanks to patching up scanner dust and defects on the negatives.
Road Trip II: Fruits and Nuts
A larger than usual set of images, taken through the passenger window while driving. The images capture snapshots of things which are often passed but seldom visited, showing areas of Native American “reserves”, roadside stalls, advertisements, churches, and the ongoing Californian drought. All the photographs were deliberately taken perpendicular to the roadside, using a fixed 28mm lens. This helps lend some visual consistency that counters the intentionally random and disconnected content. As many of these images do not work well when viewed at a small size, there is a more traditional version of the gallery, with […]
Road Trip I
A short set of cinematic style images taken during the driving. Very often we focus so much on the destinations that we miss much of beauty or interest along the journey. The images are all compressed telephoto shots cropped and processed to try to give a cinematic sense of space and other worldliness. The hope was to try to convey the sense of emptiness and scale that pervades much of the United States, away from the densely packed urban and coastal areas.
The Many Faces of Death Valley
Sand dunes, Salt flats and storms – all within a few hours of passing through Death Valley. We passed through on the way back to San Francisco, and were not quite expecting to see so much variety on the lowest (-86m ASL) and hottest place in the United States. Sunburned and rained on in the same hour. Running somewhat slowly with the post updates at the moment, due to work related travel – and the need to rebuild the computer after a dodgy installation script wiped out permissions and ownership […]
Hiking in Zion National Park
A set of photographs taken from a day’s hiking in Zion National Park, Utah. The park is centred around another wonderful water eroded red sandstone valley, cut through the same sedimentary depositions that resulted in both the Grand Canyon and Bryce Canyon. Ascending from the bottom to the top of these sites you can see more than 200 million years of fascinating geological history (pdf) – as well as the spectacular views. The photograph below shows the trails we followed. We originally intended only to walk to Hidden Canyon, but the route was much easier than expected and so we […]
Tourists of Bryce
Tourism in Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah. We only had a short stop here – just enough to undertake the Peek-a-Boo trail from Inspiration Point. Oddly this is classified as a “strenuous” hike, although for Europeans used to hiking in the Alps this is actually quite an easy and quick walk. The paths are well made and maintained, as an essential part of preventing erosion in the fragile park landscape. There seemed to be a trend for tourist coaches unloading passengers at Inspiration Point, who would then walk briefly down and […]
Transient Eye 