Down a Dusty Lane

Wickedly hot….. not normally a time I enjoy shooting. I picked up my legs though and slugged along down the barrio of South Tucson. Door country…..window country….. with a Spanish flair.

While not my usual shoot….I shot. The old barrio of Tucson has a shot around every bend, for each house being unique and covered with character. Cobwebs on some cringe along the wood. The rod iron that twists itself along each house and over, and thru…and around and on. I love iron. Rust….matte black…...tweaks of color from lost paint. Together with the doors and window I shoot in this area, I can find enough character to showcase a culture, still being defined as it passes with age.

But….dusty….a lane I take to the right soon stops, no where to go yet to backtrack. I twirl around and face the other direction and see a new dimension of view, as now I am returning, as opposed to going. A small door rests itself within an alley barely a foot in width behind a bush and between two walls. Seemingly to no where, a side door lays. Where does it go? It can’t open outwards for it would just bang into the wall opposite. Must be an inner door but who can fit in here? Who can slice their way thru a foot of space and then have the know-all to enter. Push the door open…. And does it open, or is it locked.

No knocker…..and no, no doorbell. Just a door caked with an outer layer of dust that tells time has passed without a visitor. I take a reading on the alley and take a snap or two with my camera & 35mm lens. I hope to. capture a span showing distance as well as peripheral. Does it turn out using my film?….not sure. But I have a memory and sometimes when I walk about, it isn’t always about the shot, but the memory that leads up to that shot.

Egads

I was with a friend today….to whom we just met in physical form as he came up from DC. to Philadelphia. Up until now, we have zoomed…texted, and shared images.

But a realization became apparent; that was he is a ‘digital’ nomad while I am a ‘film nomad’…. Not a lot of either of us blends to the others likeness when it comes to the end product. It is like I prefer an old dusty spy novel from the 1940’s and he prefers the latest from Lee Child or the like.

I eat up on random noise….I enjoy a scratch or two on my film….stray dust particles are a welcome site….water marks from developing is an imperfection element of perfection. Even stray light from an accidentally opened film canisters are a thing of beauty. … To me, sharpness is a bourgeois concept …blur is character. I enjoy shooting ‘into the sun’…. or purposely exposing wrong.…. or speed set too low to create a blur…. expired film…. The list of what can be done continues, not to mention the fuzziness of wide contrasty subjects and a general feel of messiness inherent in film.

My friend…. ‘none of that’….. No, none. He enjoys nose hairs on his images to be perfectly sharp. In fact, ‘sharpness’ is central to his thinking as focus peaking is key. Auto-mode is necessary. Using ‘live view’ and adjusting some toggle switch to set exposure and end product. Or, taking 5x the number of images I take and still end up with one good shot. Now I know he has knowledge, so don’t get me wrong. He has an excellent understanding of photography and I know that includes camera basics as he goes back in photography time, as long as I do.

But somewhere near Albuquerque we each took another turn and haven’t looked back. We both grew up in a film world….both embraced the Digital age as it hit upon us like a surfing wave. But yes, somewhere, sometime…our paths as photographers separated. He kept going down the Digital Nomad path and now has and believes in having the best camera and lens one can get. As he says, you only live once. And yes, I agree. I took the path back to the ‘film nomadic’ approach…..While on occasion I do ‘look back’ to that time we both were in Albuquerque (metaphorically speaking), yet each time I go out to shoot, I grab the film camera. Like him, I want the best….and have deemed my Olympus OM series from the late 70’s to mid 80’s as best; coupled with my vast array of Zuiko lens. And to boot, I do have a Leica MA plus lens if I prefer that route. All film though.

Now, we both go out and find approaches to viewing a scene or subject….we both look for light and wait for the scene to appear. Nothing really different. Just that the nomadic approaches we each have become married to, has been dictated to us almost via osmosis. Digital and Film… equally as different as painting with Acrylic or Oil or Water Color. That is recognized in the painting world, and now, we need to recognize that same difference in photography.

Creating Art

I still find myself in Australia, just five more days….. My Leica 1 ‘ate’ my film and split it. As I advanced the film with each shot, unknown to me, the leader splice on the film was being torn in half as it advanced. Eventually it clogged the advance mechanism leaving me no choice but to open up the back and rip it out. Within that ‘process’ of splitting and advancing, the shutter is now not working so a soon to be, CLA is in order. My Leica model 2, ….with my Russian 50mm, ended up being my main squeeze.

This past week saw me in downtown Melbourne doing some street work. Extremely enjoyable as I find Melbourne to be very conducive to Street work. My Model 2 with a Russian lens had me wondering but I quickly became familiar with it. And like most film cameras I shoot, it forces me to slow down….I was relegated to a 50mm which is not my preferred street use, as I enjoy 24-28-35…But hey, it all worked out. With those few days I shot around three rolls of film. Lots of alleys, lots of architecture and some interesting people I chatted with. . In a month or so, Christmas will come as I develop my film.

Yesterday though as well as today I turned things on end by taking out my Ricoh 11. This experience proved to be a remarkable difference in what I shot, how I shot….and the experience. Let me explain…..

First…. with film….I ‘create art’….. With digital, …I ‘take pictures. Indeed yes…there is ‘that’ much of a difference. With film, the process of determining exposure and honing in with focus, composure, framing ….all add to ‘creating art’. It simply takes time and it takes creativity. When I print my images I know the image I view is all because of what I did from the start. No light meter, no AP, no P mode…no exposure comp…nada. Just my wits.

With digital (Ricoh in this case) the process just felt rushed, a bit contrived even. I already know what my end result is as I can view the shots on the camera before I take it (Live view) and obviously after the fact. With ’ live view’ i visually set my composure comp and style even beforeI press the shutter. It is that easy. While the images come out strong, the process, the experience….the feel…..all differs in that it simply ‘lacks’. I follow Sean Tucker on You Tube who shoots with his Ricoh on the streets of London (not that much different in feel from Melbourne). He shoots ‘live view’ and knows he can visually gauge exposure and contrast etc just by looking at the screen. It is pretty easy. Even though I need reading glasses, in this case…I am not here to read the photograph in terms of sharpness etc….rather, I take a wholistic approach and view the ‘LCD’ screen for composure, how light is hitting it etc. It is all about the visual ahead of time.

Now I obtain nice shots…. yet surprisingly when I look back on my shots I still get about 1 out of 36 that just hit me as being those WOW shots…not much different from my film. But shooting digital has me leave the day with ‘a lot of shots’…. as opposed to 2 full days of shooting with film and only a few rolls. Digital is just taking shot, after shot after shot. After all, a benefit is that those shots are ‘free’….yeah! But with that lack of expense outlay, I find myself being less picky, less thinking….less experiencing each shot.

Bottom line…. as I have stated in previous blogs….my film shots just make me more creative and less reliant on just snapping away. The end result in numbers of WOW shots is about even, but that experience, oh that experience of film is the greatest intangible I can think of, and is what continually draws me back to photography.

For this recent trip to Australia, I am a bit remorseful in that I didn’t bring my Leica MA or my Olympus OM-1. Next time….they are in the bag.

I still have a few days left but not sure if I will get much of an opportunity to shoot, with the exception of ‘family’ like shots. I envision a few with my Leica with grandkids and scooters and yes, film..

Why I enjoy my film cameras....(again)

What gives?…. I usually find myself on the opposite end of any fashion, be it clothing, cars….pop culture and yes, photography. I love film.

Don’t get me wrong for I have shot digital since it came out, just like many people. I can recall when I worked in sales/business, where I won a camera as a prize for winning a sales contest, and I was given this modern camera that had “auto mode” …The tech was fabulous and that was in the early 80’s.

I can remember dumping my film cameras and picking up tech from that point…digital camera’s…yeah!!!! But something happened between that time and lets say…..13 years ago. I dumped my digitals and picked up film once more. Yes film…… and let me layout a me reasoning here. First…what eventually were ‘bugging points’ about digital and second, what are my ‘love handles’ for film.

Digital Bugging Points:

First….I got tired of a 1000 shots (or seemingly) every time I would venture out with my digital camera. Like a machine gun; ratta-tat-tat….ratta-tat-tat….ratta-tat-tat, ratty-tat-tat. But I remember distinctly (during and after the capturing process) telling myself that somewhere within that ratta-tat-tat, that there was bound to be one good photo.

Second…photography became easy. Even 13 years ago the ‘skill’…the ‘challenge’…the process of taking a shot was just stale. Like an old lady…a dry piece of bread. Not sure how best to describe but the word ‘stale’ comes to mind. I walk out the door and just press the button and, yes….place in auto-mode please. Auto-focus, aperture priority….ISO at 20,000 or whatever….take a shot. Wow, wasn’t that fun. Let me pat myself on the back or….should I say, pat the camera on the back.

Third….I would have those same 1000 images to go thru in photoshop. I might spend days on the computer pouring over shots that were essentially the same and yet taken ‘nano-seconds’ apart…. “Let me see, which one of these exact same 20 photo’s looks better than the others. Okay, that one, I guess. Now for the next grouping of 20, and the next and the next until I get to the end of what that memory card holds. Now, how to store all of these and where and how and will I really ever look at them much again? I am imaged out man….It is like the postal system and never runs out. More mail….mail today, mail tomorrow and mail the next day. Images now, a 100 tomorrow, 500 the next day, 200 the day after ….. I am going “postal’….Help me…..

Fourth…no character, just looking for total sharpness. Can I see that person’s nose hair? Blow up the shot to 200% on photoshop and what does it look like? Perfect, right? If not…toss it. Is the image in correct exposure? Do I need to do something in photoshop that might take me hours to produce, just so I can gain perfection…total sharpness….anality to the nth degree in all aspects…. EEEEEEK…. turn off that computer. Stand up and say “I am as crazy as hell and am not going to take it anymore. “….

Now….for the Aspect of Wanting FILM:

Those and other reasons just led me to film. Film demands for me to not only ‘be in the zone’ when I take it, but film provides a very tactile experience for me and film simply has character. Let me speak to that first—-character.

Character…. what is it? It can be deep shadows…..roughness in how they look and play against the whites and grays. Just look at that photo I have to the left, or just go thru my ‘pages’ and view my projects. Do you see the difference between my film and your digital? If so….you have found character. Oh, scratches, and dust and water marks are also character. Together, they represent an image that just has mood. I love it. It is like being forgiving with your lover who might be carrying a bit more weight than normal, or ‘goes off on a dime’ and freaks out about some odd thing she/he heard about. Sure, they drive you nuts but ….you still love them. You make love to them despite the flaws because it is those same flaws that allow the hormones and juices to flow for desire and lust.

How about tactile feel….. The minute I open up the canister with the film and just exist…(look ma, no hands)…. I smell the film. mmmmmm, it smells rich. It immediately takes me back to my entire 60+ years of life when I would load film and that ‘odor’, so unique to film, connects me to my past. Then I load the film….stretch it out, …hit the sprockets….feel it catch and take a few blank shutter presses. I haven’t even taken a shot and yet, look at the tactile-ness I have hit upon. Like feeling your lover’s body….knowing their skin…knowing their spots that emit a sharpness of breath, a gasp…a moan….a release. Without your sense of feel making love….you lack that pure lushness within.

Now….in taking the shot—-depending on my camera but since I use old film camera’s …well, I do it all. I go thru the steps of the entire process….… Know how connected I become to each image I shoot. I don’t press the shutter just to press. Rather, I approach each shot as a piece of art. Carefully I craft the image with settings, scene….composition etc. One shot….not 20-30 ratta-tat-tats…..no, one shot. Then I move on. Sure, I might move around the scene a bit and take another shot, but not 20 in the same area. I slow down…my mannerisms are keen to what is around me more so as I take only one shot. What will work best. My tactileness of knowing the situation and scene. I bend low….on my knees….I turn sideways or cramp into a corner. I take a step back or forward. I take a shot…..one shot. I take my time as I take one shot, I caress the scene and merge with the light. I make love with my eyes as I am captured by the beauty in front of me as I have control….I manipulate my hands and fingers onto the camera and settings. Hago amor….ah, one shot.

That shot…the pressing of the shutter….a snap, a mechanical noise of a ‘click’…. Each camera of mine has a different click…The Olympus OM-1…Canon AE-1…Leica MA…. Barnacks model 1 and 11…. ooooooo, that click is so unique. When I press the shutter I know, ….I just know I took a shot. I feel it in the release of the shutter let alone that sound. But that sound….oh that sound. My senses are enlightened….my breath is faster…. I am drawn to that sound. It is like a moan during an erotic intense love act…. I am drawn to wanting more. That click….that sound, so akin to my lover releasing ….a shallow groan, a drive for one more….not over yet…one more…… It just draws one to do more. …..hmmmmmm.

In the zone…….establishing a quiet mind. You can’t do any artistic project and not have a quiet mind. One always needs to shed themselves of worries, ….work, family stress etc before doing photography. This is no different for digital as it is for film. But, the process of getting into the quiet mind or ‘the zone’, for me….is partially developed in the beginning. You know I love the forwarding of film as I twist the knob 360 degrees…. Then it stops. I am ready. I have advanced the film and I am ready. I am in the zone my mind is quiet. My brain is totally on the next ‘one shot’ …Is it just ahead, or around the bend, or on the sidewalk, or above or to the side. Not sure, but I know I am in the zone, I have a quiet mind. This is why I hardly ever take good photo’s when out with a group, big or small…..I just don’t get in the zone. I also don’t get in the zone when I know I have endless shots. No sir….with my film, I have at most….36 and that is if the roll is brand new to begin with. But usually I shoot at most 12 or so images in a 2-3 hour walk. Twelve (12)…. for I force myself to be in a zone. With digital, I take a 1,000 or even a 100 but I don’t take just 12. Now, I can…..but I don’t. It is just the culture behind digital as opposed to the culture of thought behind film. If you are in love with a person, you know what it is like to be in that ‘true zone’.. The mind stays in focus, your brain becomes one-dimensional and you slow move in unison with scene as you undress it…play with it…. make the scene come to you…allow it to open, be open…. be vulnerable.

All done…… the roll is done, when that might be. I have to now rewind the film and reload. Again, tactile….smells, feel, sense…..touch….grabbing and pulling and turning. When home again, …..the entire experience of the developmental process. Some people complain that for every few rolls (two per tank) that they have to spend 30-40 minutes in the dark room. Complain..? What….this is fun time for me. This is creative time…..judging and calibrating my time I want or the shots I have and how much I might want to add to the contrast or development of each roll…. I love this ‘me time’…again, my ‘in the zone time’ but at the other end…… This is when I am spent…..I lie almost in a corner, tired….my energy at a low…. ready to rest. I have captured a love.

And of course when all is said, it is pulling the film from the tank, unraveling it from the spool and catching that first glimpse of actual images on the negatives. Too light? Too dark? Just right? ….either way I pull and hang. I run my fingers over to get rid of most of the water drops and feel it as I snap the water off at the end of the strand. I leave my film to dry, like a pair of women nylon stockings hanging in the bathtub…..an allure that makes me return. Left over cuts of film lay on the floor like underwear torn off in a rage of want and desire.

I love film………

Barnacks Down Under

“Been Down’ a week….have shot about two complete rolls using my Barnacks Model 1 and Model 2. They differ slightly so I have decided that I need to only take one of them with me on a shoot. When I brought both along, to compare…..all I did was confuse myself as the ‘set-up’ of each differs slightly.

Never-the-less….. I do miss my MA but these two are well worth it. In my part of Melbourne, I must admit…..it lacks a certain flavor that begs for street photography, hence perhaps why I have only shot two rolls in a bit over a week. I intend to venture to downtown Melbourne where I have shot prior and know the lay. I am looking forward to that. In neighborhood’s such as I am in now, I walk…I find…I have to be very creative in my approach and then, well……will see once I develop these rolls in a few months from now.

Yes, a few months….. I can live with that. I think of it as Christmas…… I have a present to open in terms of rolls of film, and I will get there. One day, sometime…eventually, soon, down the road…. Yes, at not too distant future.

Jan 18th 2023 Pima Air and Space

First blog of 2023….New Year!

Today I am going into Pima Air and Space in Tucson, Arizona to do a shoot. I was going to go with the wife as she could shoot her Canon AE-1 ( which she has had since it was brand new) and I with my Leica MA. We could have a competition of 50mm. But she banked out, so…..I will be able to most likely get in the ‘zone’ a bit easier now.

But I am looking forward to the angles, the sun….shadows…odd views, both inside and outside. I have a few rolls of 400 Fomapan and my MA….

UPDATE: January 23rd, 2023. I spent 4 hours at the museum and went thru 3 rolls of film. You can view my images on my project pages under Air Space.

I came in to this project wanting images that were unique, and not the everyday Plane snapshots that offer little creativity. My images were taken with “Geometry’ in Mind….’Shadows’….”Pieces of Planes’…. I wanted something that offered a perspective where I could document uniqueness.

This first attempt underexposed my indoor shots. I shall return and re-capture those.

The outside images were taken on a day were most were shot in the F8 and F11 @ 1000. I liked the result in which they present themselves. My lens was a 35mm Voigtlander instead of the 50 Summicron I had initially planned. I am happy with that decision as a 35mm allowed me a bit of expanse in the images. If I would have used a 28 or 24 I felt I might have cropped too much. A 50 would have allowed for little ‘expanse’.

The film I used was 400 Fomapan where it “illicits” a noisy…rough….gritty feel to it. Again, my style…my intent. I enjoy creating Zines and I can see where this project will eventually turn into a Zine.

Barnack's Update one day later

I had a quick go at the Barnack’s. I loaded up a 24 roll of 400 film and managed to escape the house before the wife had me do more Xmas chores or cooking. Sometimes she just gets a bit too carried away. So a well needed break for me.

Just walked our downtown neighborhood in Philly as this is a condo we have here on the east coast. I love Philadelphia for the ‘ street shooting ops’ as I can’t get this character of a city back west. I shot 9 shots which is rather high considering I was only out shooting for 30 minutes before I made my way to the grocery to pick up stuff (never quite got away from chores).

Within that time frame of 30 minutes…my 9 shots were not of anything I would call as shots I might normally take but, I want to run thru this roll of film to see how shutter speed is, light leaks etc. I shot at around F11 although the dial goes from F9 up to F12 but there seems to be play in between and I can visually observe the opening and closing so suspect I was at F11 or just under. I was at ISO 400 and speed of 500 since it was a nice ‘cold’ but sunny day. I eventually moved down to F9 as well.

My distance calculations was set at 30 feet as I wasn’t stopping too much to talk or grab shots. Perhaps that is for tomorrow. But 30 feet was fine, and a few even at 50 feet as I took from a top of a building looking down. The distance markers on this camera start at 1.5 feet min focus and work up to 50 feet and then to infinity. My Barnack shows distance in ‘feet’ and doesn’t show meters so must have been a camera meant for America.

Impressions? Pretty easy. I have to manually advance the film and that is easy with just a complete turn. The camera provides me with a warning of sorts as the winding mechanism gets a bit ‘tight’ when it is shows 10 + over the actual number I should be at. So, if I shot 9 shots and I advance the film, as I advance the mechanism should tighten up a bit around 20, which is 10 above where it actually should be. Then just keep advancing until you get to your number.

The “F stop is a bit more difficult to adjust. It isn’t impossible but does take a bit of doing as the lever to chance on the lens is small, difficult to grasp, difficult to turn. They should have made that bigger but, hey….I am not Leitz/Leica and obviously this camera was a winner so who am I to judge.

The shutter knob is easy to use.

The optic viewfinder is clear and bright although it took some getting used to as I had to ‘think’ where to place my eye as I am used to M cameras and the placement of the viewfinder. I will get used to this I am sure. Framing in the viewfinder was no issue.

Moving the ‘distance’ to match what I want is not difficult either but one does have to be in good light to see the slotted dot where it corresponds to the distance number. In fact, I have found that I have to turn my camera to bring some light to not only that, but also the small arrow on the film advance as well. Maybe thru years of use, those became less pronounced.

Tomorrow will bring a more productive day as I will have more time to actually work with the camera and walk around more. I want to play with shorter distances and become more proficient at dialing in the F stop, and getting used to the viewfinder placement.

All in all….a positive. I love the uniqueness of it….relying upon distance for focus….the compactness of this camera, lightness….look and feel that I get from shooting it. Again, not going to replace my MA but will provide a twist upon shooting.

Barnack's

In my continued quest to expand my ‘challenge’ ….to push my 35mm learning curve etc…. and of course to do so using film; I purchased a Barnack 1930’s Leitz 1 Model A camera.

I am off digital…..well, with the exception of taking ‘snapshots’ of my grandkids with my iPhone, or perhaps roaming the streets with a Ricoh GRD or GR2 or GR3…. Digitals are a different species, simply put. The enjoyment I get from my Ricoh’s is capturing the human in the wild, their expressions…their mannerisms etc… Yet I find myself not being driven to digital with any substance, depth. Frankly, most people who shoot digital or even film; lack impact…lack depth, lack subject matter. They are purely snapshots at best.

As I having been shooting my Leica MA lately, I have enjoyed it all. Love film. It has been a bit cold outside with the windchill and all, so I have been ‘Ebaying it’ and perusing my Leica books and ran across the older Barnacks. In the past I haven’t given them a thought as I was too focused on the latest, as opposed to earlier models which might actually be better. I found a few Barnacks and put myself thru the ‘history lesson’ of learning the family tree of Leica’s from the word GO. Model A or B or C, or 1, 11, 111, or F or G or Compur or Standard or or or or….. Go ahead, look em up…. It is quite the family tree and all of this occurred within 20-30 years. (1925 thru the 50’s). I settled on not getting the Leica 111 in any ‘letter’ which might follow. They were simply too close to the M3 and M2.

I narrowed it down to the Barnack version 1 or 2 (and there are sub-versions in between). I’ll let it go at that but did see a few on Ebay that I ‘watched’…never pulled on though, just watched. Today, as I walked around with my MA, I needed to ‘relieve my bladder’ so went into the local Unique Photo Store (Philadelphia) as they always have len’s I like, or more importantly, they had a bathroom I could borrow. On the way to the bathroom I started talking to the staff and they said they had Barnacks to sell… A Leitz 1, Model A…..a Leitz 11 and a Leitz 111F. Wow, all 3!I immediately perked up my energy to take a look but knew from the start that I didn’t want the Leitz 111F. That left me with the Leitz 1 and Leitz 11 as they stared at me on the counter. Pick me, pick me please. I picked up one, then the other. Tried this, pulled it to my face….pressed the shutters etc…. Gees ….which one? If they just had one of them it would have made a decision earsier.

Ultimately I decided that yes….screw Ebay….It would be better to buy one from the local camera shop who is aware of the camera’s history. Both of these came from the same collector so I knew they were in good shape. Sure, will most likely need a CLA but heck…who cares. I went back and forth and just decided I wanted the Leitz 1 Model A. No rangefinder….nothing, as opposed to the Leitz 11 which does have a rangefinder although not all what we think of what a rangefinder is, as we compare it to the current crop of focus models in the M line.

I liked the Leitz 1 Model A….. I focus by distance only. So, tonight I was grabbing my measuring tape and practiced distance…. How many feet from here to there? For, that is how I focus the Model A. I set the shutter, the ISO is film so already set, and I move my aperture and most likely to either F6.3 or F9, but they as those are the options. If I know the distance, and plug it in, I win….I get focus.

Does it work? Not sure……. I will play with it and expect some off-focus images until I know distance. If I can keep the shutter at 500 and F8 or F9, I should have enough depth of field where I can be ‘off in distance’ and still have focus. Again, will see…. More to come.

Barnacks Leitz 1 Model A, circa 1930. Black Paint with 5cm (50mm) lens.