Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Black & White


I managed to get into the "darkroom" the other evening - actually that's the 1/2 bath off the laundry room - and printed some things. The photo above is from the roll I shot with the Franke Jr. a couple of weeks back. All eight exposures came out good. There were a couple of compositional errors on my part but no cut-off heads, nothing out of focus and all the exposures were right on the money. All the negatives were shot within an hour of each other so the lighting conditions were all the same which made it easy to guess my exposures and easier still when it came time to print.

The shot above was printed on a warmer tone paper than the rest of the shots and I toned it a bit with some black coffee. The thinking being since my running buddy was standing in front of a log house, a little brown tone would look better than stark black and white. The effect is pretty subtle but I like it. The remainder of the shots were printed on heavy weight fiber based paper unlike this one printed on resin coated paper. Those are currently drying under some weights so they'll remain flat when dry.

I printed a couple of shots from my European vacation but they could use some help. It was getting late, so I just made straight prints to see how they would look. Next time I print, I'll do a bit of experimenting and see if I can improve on them. I think I can get a real good one of the Eiffel Tower.

Next up I want to get out the 4x5 field camera and shoot a couple of sheets of film with it. I've got some film holders already loaded with film but I'm not sure what the film type is and which of the holders are loaded and which aren't, it's been so long since I've messed with the big cameras. I'll wait 'til the sun goes down one of these days and take the dark slides out, see what I've got, mark them properly and go in search of a non-moving target. I'm sure it'll take me awhile to get comfortable using a camera that you have to focus on an upside down image with a black cloth over your head.

5 comments:

Surly said...

I still have some 4X5 film if you need any. Couple variants.

Shop Teacher Bob said...

I'll keep that in mind - thanks!

Traveling Pirate said...

Can't wait to see the Eiffel Tower one. I really regret that we weren't able to go to the top.

Shop Teacher Bob said...

Maybe we should go back? In addition to Paris, there's several other places in France I'd like to see, plus I'd like to go to Spain - Barcelona in particular. I've still go four states to go here in the US, however. I'm going to try and get to those in the next couple of years. Even if I never get back to Europe, remember what Bogey said to Ingrid in Casablanca: We'll always have Paris."

Traveling Pirate said...

Yeah, I need to replenish the vacation club account and then see some more of the world. I'm wondering if Barcelona will be part of Spain much longer. It's certainly getting interesting.