Scribblings

I shot this one back in September.  This is the interior of one of the buildings at the Nordegg Mine Site.  The scribblings on the wall are really interesting as they note the date that the mine closed, some inclement weather, and some maintenance notes all dating back to the 1950's.  Even the modern grafitti at the lower edge is almost 20 years old.  I think this would make a great large print because then all these writings would be more legible.

It was really dark in the building and I could barely see my ground glass to focus the view camera.  I shot this with my Ebony 4x5 view camera and a 125mm lens on Ilford FP4+ and gave plus development in HC-110 to increase contrast.  The exposure was quite long at 1 minute.

Abraham Lake

Here's my film version of the waters of Abraham Lake taken back in early October.  Its hard to imagine that a month later there is a foot of snow and it is -25C.  I wonder if the lake has frozen over yet..? I didn't get a chance to drive up that way and have a look when I was out a Nordegg recently.  Usually the lake does not freeze over until late December or early January.

I shot this with my Ebony 4x5 view camera and a 300mm lens.  I used a #25 Red Filter to cut through the smoke hanging in the valley, from forest fires burning in BC and Jasper National Park.  The filter also increased contrast somewhat.  Development was in PMK developer for 9:35 minutes at 20C.

Back to Work in Nordegg

I headed out to Nordegg on Sunday October 30th.  I had to play hockey on the 29th, and didn't want to miss another game.  The Renegades played the Knights at Clare Drake Arena and we won... 10-3.  We are in second place in our division with a record of 7 wins and 1 loss.  The first place team has 7 wins and one overtime loss, so they are just barely ahead of us.

Hailey and Anna went to see a show in Calgary on October 29th, and then headed over to the cottage afterwards.  So, when I arrived on the afternoon of the 30th, they were already there.  I made them a dinner of Mexican food... enchiladas, mexican rice and refried beans.  Later that evening they jumped into the ATV and headed over to the historic cemetery in town.  I think they were kind of hoping they might experience some Halloween ghosts, but I'm told there were none to be seen.  By the time they made it back to the cottage just before midnight, it had started snowing heavily.

The next morning the girls hit the road for home.  Hailey had to work later on the evening of October 31st, and Anna needed to get back to school.  I understand that the highways were snow covered, but they made it home without incident.  I had some treats ready to hand out for Halloween, but no kids came around.  Last year there were about a dozen or so that came around... but nothing this year.  I later found out that the community association had a sign up sheet so that those that were handing out treats could be on the list.  They did a crappy job of letting residents know as I only found out about it second hand.

On Tuesday November 1 I did a dump run in the morning and got rid of some garbage.  Although the dump had been open for a couple of hours by the time I got there, the attendant told me I was the first visitor of the day.  With temperatures fairly mild I installed the steel gate that I had brought out, onto the driveway of the guest cottage.  My contractor had poured a couple of concrete footings for me earlier in the fall.  I brought Margarit's Epoxy slab full of pebbles out with me.  The mold has now been knocked off, and it looks pretty good.  I used my router to round over the edges.  That's the reason I brought it out to Nordegg, because the router and most of my tools are out here.  Now Margarit can finish it by sanding it all out, and then doing one final pour of a thin top coat of epoxy.

On Wednesday it remained fairly cold and snowy so I just puttered around in the guest cottage.  I installed an extra light down in the basement, and drilled through a cable for an internet antenna.  Then I worked on finishing up the aspen paneling on the main loft.

On Thursday I blasted in to Rocky Mountain House and picked up an antique dresser that Margarit had purchased last time she was out.  The highways were snow covered, but driving was pretty good and traffic was light.  With the temperature fairly mild I pulled out my tablesaw in the afternoon, once I got back to the cottage, and cut up some trim boards, and the top partial row of paneling for the last two walls.  Later in the evening my neighbor Dan came over.  We had a bunch of chicken wings that I made on the grill, and then visited for a while.  I got him to give me a hand bringing in the cabinet, and carrying it upstairs into the living room.

On Friday it was heavily overcast and felt rather ominous, but the temperature was very mild and peaked near zero.  I got three coats of lacquer applied to the trim that I had made the day before, and then cleaned out the second bedroom.  I made enough space to be able to install most of the subfloor.  While I was working three loads of fill dirt got delivered and dumped in the driveway.  I guess it remains to be seen if the weather allows this to get spread this fall, or if that will have to wait until spring.  The heavy mood of the leaden skies carried into my work ambition and by the time the day was done, I felt like not much had been accomplished.

I plan on staying out for a few more days so hopefully I'm able to accomplish a little more before I have to go back home to the city.

Fall Photo Weekend - Day 4

Monday October 24th was the last day of Fall Photo Weekend 2022.  Once again, we had breakfast in the hotel restaurant, and then afterwards we packed up all of our gear and checked out.  This was the first unsettled day of the four day trip, and it was good that it happened on the last day.  It was very cloudy and overcast in the morning.  It snowed a little overnight, and by the time we finished breakfast it was turning to a drizzle.

After checking out of the hotel we took a drive up to Pyramid Lake.  This is just a short distance up above the townsite and the winding road passes Patricia Lake before ending at Pyramid Lake.  There was more snow as we got up a little higher.

The devastation that the Mountain Pine Beetle invasion has inflicted on the pine trees in the park is notable.  We saw it everywhere we went over the weekend but it was particularly bad up by Pyramid Lake.  There is barely a pine tree left alive, except for a few young ones.

We stopped along the road and attempted to shoot the aspen trunks in fresh snow.  This is a composition that I have attempted many times in the past, with little to no success.  It seems another attempt was in order, but it probably met with the same fate.  It remains to be seen once I get to processing the film.  There were a couple of trunks that showed scars from bear claws, but I couldn't seem to work them into any of my compositions.

Once we finished up with the aspens we took a group portrait and then hit the road for home.  The portrait is included below and left to right includes Nigel, me, Steve, Gord, Fred and Meghan.  

We attempted a couple of stops along the highway on our way out of the park, but it was blustery and windy and the light was not very good.  The cameras never made it out of the vehicles.  We did stop at a small roadside family cemetery near Hinton and it was quite interesting.  It was very sheltered in the trees so shooting was not an issue.  All the grave markers shared two or three family names, and there was no signage associating it with any church or community.

That stop at the cemetery was our last.  After that we just pounded the highway back home, and arrived in the city in time for dinner.  I dropped Steve off at his place and then headed home to the girls.

It was a very successful weekend photographically.  I shot 66 sheets of 4x5 Black and White film over the four days.  I also shot a couple of sheets of color film, and six sheets of 8x10 with my big Chamonix view camera.

We will definitely plan for another Fall Photo Weekend in 2023 as these events are always so much fun and lead to some really great images.  I always find it interesting to see the work of the others as they always end up with a different take on the subjects that we all tried to capture.  Some years in the past we also did a Spring Photo Weekend and perhaps that is in the cards for 2023 as well.

Fall Photo Weekend - Day 3

The third day of the Fall Photo Weekend began with a repeat performance of Day 2.  We were up early and had breakfast at the hotel restaurant.  As soon as that was behind us, we hit the road for another day of adventure and photography.

It was very cold first thing in the morning, and there was a dusting of fresh snow.  It takes quite a while for the sun to get up over the peaks, and shine some light down into the valleys.  The cold air from overnight seems to settle in the valleys as well.  By afternoon it became really mild and pleasant but the cold mornings are always a little painful for the fingers while taking the first photographs of the day.  We headed out on the Maligne Road, which runs generally south from the townsite, and there is a significant gain in altitude all the way up to Maligne Lake.

The road follows the Maligne River to Medicine Lake.  There it skirts the shore of the lake for several miles, and then follows the river again to Maligne Lake.  Medicine Lake is very interesting, and a favorite location of mine.  The lake was formed in ancient times when a rock slide off of the adjacent Colin Range dammed the Maligne River.  In summer months there is enough water flow into the valley, that a lake forms behind the natural dam.  But by fall, when water flow declines, the lake slowly drains away through the rock and becomes an almost empty lake bed laced with channels and strewn with boulders.  If you go down to the edge of the lake, right by the rocks, you can actually hear the water draining in several places and it sounds like a bathtub draining.

We shot at the lake for most of the day, including a stop along the lakeshore where we shot the backlit channels down in the lake bed.  We briefly drove further up towards Maligne Lake.  I made a stop along the river where I had shot a few times before.  On two occasions in the past, shortly after setting up my big view camera, a pair of moose walked out into the river and posed for me.  I set up the camera again this time, hoping for the hat trick, but there were no moose to be seen.  Some of the others in the group continued on up to Maligne Lake but I returned to Medicine Lake and spent the remainder of the afternoon shooting there.

As the day came to an end we returned to the townsite.  We walked over to Earls Restaurant and had a great dinner and then later returned to the suites and visited for a while before eventually turning in.  Another great day spent in the mountains and there would still be one more to go.

Fall Photo Weekend - Day 2

On the second day I was up early, had a shower, and headed over to the hotel restaurant for breakfast.  A couple of the others headed over with me.  After breakfast we hit the road with our camera gear.

The clouds were hanging low in the valley and it looked really cool as some of them swept around and over the peaks.  We rushed down the valley to try to find a good vantage point, before they burned off.  As it turned out the clouds hung low for pretty much the entire day.  Our first stop was at the bridge where the Icefields Parkway crosses the Athabasca River, just south of town.  I attempted to shoot the morning sun burning through some of that low cloud.  I also found a spot where some water have frozen overnight and made for some really cool ice patterns among some beach pebbles.  It was very cold at this point in the morning, at least by recent standards.  My fingers were painfully sore from the cold and I was reminded that winter photographer would soon become the norm for the coming months.

Once we finished up here we continued south down the parkway.  We made a stop at on of the higher vantage points along the highway and shot the clouds and peaks near Athabasca Pass.  Here we met up with Michael Chesworth, who saw us along the road and stopped.  Michael is an Edmonton photographer and friend to many of us, but he shoots digital and is not active with film and darkroom printing.  He was out visiting the park with his son.

Later still we moved on to Athabasca Falls and shot there for a while.  It was moderately busy, but nothing like it is in the summer.  After a couple of hours here we moved on to Horseshoe Lake.  It was beautiful, as it always is, and the water was still fully open.  We shot here until the light faded at the end of the day.

Once the light dropped off we packed it in for the day and headed back into town.  The gang all wanted to go for Japanese food, and I reluctantly joined them.  Japanese is not a favorite of mine, and I don't do well with chopsticks, but I played along.  It turns out that most of them were not overly impressed with the quality of the food that they ordered.  Mine was OK... some sort of thick noodles with chicken and a few vegetables... I think it was called Yakiudon, or somthing like that.  But I stuggled with the chopsticks.  After dinner we went back to the rooms and visited for a while.  We had a few drinks and did a print viewing session of the work that many of us had brought along.  It was a fun evening that capped off a great day.

Film/Developer Combinations - Agfapan 25 verses Kodak Tri-X Pan 320

Here is an example of two different films and developers.  Obviously both were shot at the same place, moments apart.  The one on the left was shot on Agfapan 25 and developed in Rodinal 1:50.  The shot on the right was taken on Kodak Tri-X Pan 320 and developed in PMK Pyro.  The images look very different.  Obviously a much slower shutter speed was used on the slower Agfa film, and the water in the background is softer and more blurred.  But other than that, the tonality, grain, shadow values and highlights are quite distinct.  Whenever I am out shooting with my view cameras I always make a point of exposing two sheets of film.  The films are always different, as is the development.  This provides a number of benefits.  First it gives me negatives with two different looks.  It also gives me experience working with different film and developer combinations.  Finally, it gives me a backup negative, in case I mess something up in exposure, loading, unloading, handling or processing.

Fall Photo Weekend - Day 1

The Fall Photo Weekend is a tradition that started over 20 years ago.  My friend Jon and I traveled to Jasper National Park in late October of 2000.  We discovered that the hotel accommodations are really affordable at that time of year.  The summer tourists are gone, and the ski season has not yet started.  The park and the townsite are very quiet, and its easy and enjoyable to get around and take photos.  The only downside is that the days are quite short, and it can get fairly cold.  Fast forward over 20 years later and the tradition is still alive.  The members of the Monochrome Guild have been taking a fall trip, usually to Jasper, every year since the first one in 2000.  We were interrupted by Covid for two years, and could not keep the streak alive.  In 2020 a bunch of us managed to get out for a couple of day trips around Edmonton, but in 2021 it did not happen at all.  This year was our return to the old tradition and six of us headed out to Jasper on Friday October 21st.  Sadly, had it not been for the Covid interruption, this would have been the 23rd annual event.  But, counting the day trips in 2020, at least we have managed to get the Monochrome Guild Members out in the fall for 22 of the last 23 years...!

My friend Steve arrived at my place at about 7:15AM that Friday.  We loaded his gear, and the rest of mine into the truck, and hit the road for Jasper.  Traffic was fairly heavy getting out of the city as the morning rush was underway.  But once we got past Spruce Grove and Stony Plain, it was a nice easy drive all the way to Jasper.  We stopped for a coffee and some fuel in Edson, and continued on our way.  

Once we got into the National Park we stopped at Jasper Lake.  This was one of those rare occasions when the wind was very light.  It was almost non-existent when we first arrived, but kicked up to a light breeze as we wandered around the dunes and on the lakeshore making some photographs.  Fred and Nigel met up with us there and also took some photos.  The dunes are becoming a lot more overgrown then they were 20 years ago, and we ended up shooting mostly along the shore of the lake.  There was some smoke in the air from the forest fire that has been burning north of the townsite for the past couple of months.  At one time this fire took out the power supply to the town and for a time and it was closed to tourists.  The fire is now under control, though it continues to burn.  We saw and smelled smoke off and on over the weekend, even some distance away from town, but it was largely dependent on the winds.

Later we took a drive on Highway 93A.  Unfortunately the road was closed for the season at the Whirlpool River and we could not continue all the way to Athabasca Falls.  But the main highway is open year round, weather permitting, so we were able to access the Falls later in the weekend.  We scouted around a little and did some shooting at the Meeting of the Waters, where the Whirlpool and Athabasca River meet, and also along the Astoria River.

After that we headed into town.  It was now about 4:30PM and we were able to check in to our suites and drop off all of our gear.  Meghan and Gord met up with us there.  We had two suites reserved at the Jasper Inn and there were three of us staying in each one.  This made for a very affordable weekend and the final cost was under $300 each, for three nights.

Later we walked into town and had pizza at a restaurant called Something Else.  It was very good, and has become a favorite spot of ours.  After that we walked back to the hotel and stayed up visiting for a couple of hours.  I've attached a gallery of phone snapshots below, and will post some scans of the film negatives that I shot, in the coming weeks as I develop them.