Grader

This scan if from the mixed batch of film that I ran on March 14th.  This is a 4" x 5" sheet of J&C Classic 200, rated at 200iso and given N+1 Development in HC110 Developer, dilution B, for 8:20 minutes at 20C.  

I took this shot on one of my many visits up to the Nordegg Historic Site.  This old grader remains up at the mine and obviously hasn't run for a long time.  It likely dates back to the final days of the mine, in the mid 1950's.  

This photograph was taken on September 9th of 2024, at about 1:20 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a wide Rodenstock 90mm lens.  A #8 Yellow Filter lightened the value of the grader, which was painted in Caterpillar yellow.  The exposure was for 1/2 second at F25.0.

End of the Seasons

Winter Hockey is done for 2026.  I played my last game in the Vintage league on Tuesday March 24th.  This level of hockey is much slower and more relaxed than the beer league hockey I have been playing with my Renegades team.  After a couple of seasons, I'm now getting to know a bunch of the guys a little better and really enjoying this.  I will be playing in the Spring/Summer season which starts in early April and runs until the end of June.  It will be mostly a bunch of different players that I will play with for the summer, though there are a handful that I know and have played with before.  I will be away in Saskatchewan for some Beer Parlour Project outings at the beginning of April, and will miss the first game.  But I expect to make most of the games after that.  We play every Thursday morning at 11:15AM.

The Renegades just wrapped up our season in the Alberta Men's Hockey League.  We made it to the playoffs after finishing the regular season in 5th place.  We played the best of three quarter final against the fourth place Gamblers, and beat them in two straight.  Then we moved on to the best of three semi-final against the first place Outlaws.  We took it to three games but came up short and did not advance to the final.  I am now scrambling to see if I can get enough guys to commit to summer hockey with the Renegades, though its not looking very good.  The summer season in this league runs from May until August.

Of course outside hockey in Nordegg has been finished for a few weeks already.  The mild spell in mid March ruined the ice and its too late in the season to consider working on it, despite the recent cold snap.  March sure is going out like a lion this year.  There was about a foot of snow in late March and it has been very cold.  It bodes well for the upcoming wildfire season.

These are two of the retro jerseys that I wore when I played outside hockey this winter.  One is a Montreal Canadiens - #9 Maurice Richard.  The other is a Charleston Chiefs #16 - one of the Hanson brothers from the movie Slapshot.

Butte End

This is a scan of another 4" x 5" sheet of Efke PL25M film that I developed in the mixed batch on March 12th.  This was in Rodinal Developer, 1:50, for 7:00 minutes at 24C.  Agfa went out of business years ago so the true Rodinal formula is no longer available.  But several other manufacturers produce the formula under various names.  I used the Adox APH-09 version for this batch.

This is a shot from the fall trip last year with the Monochrome Guild.  This is the trip that my youngest daughter Helena came along on... together with a bunch of old geezers...  Me, Nigel, Arturo and Gord.  She had a good time, as we all did.  We really enjoyed the afternoon spent at Dinosaur Provincial Park.  The weather was mild, but not hot, and there was some glorious clear fall light.

I took this shot on October 21st 2025 at about 3:20 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a Nikkor 200mm lens.  No filter was used.  The exposure was for 1 second at F32.0.

C-41 Processing

A few days ago I set up my Jobo Processor, and mixed up some C-41 chemistry.  C-41 is the process that is used to develop color negative film.  It is pretty straight forward, but needs to have the temperature maintained at 38C for the entire process.  The temperature controlled water bath of the Jobo processor is ideal for this.

C-41 is also used with chomogenic black and white films.  I believe that the only one that is still made is Ilford's XP-2.  The silver particles in the emulsion are converted to dye during the development process and this results in virtually grainless negatives.  I wish they still made this film in 4" x 5" format, but sadly it is only made in 35mm and 120 roll formats.

I don't shoot a lot of color film, and I generally save up the exposed film in the fridge until I have a large enough batch to justify mixing up the chemistry and setting up the processor.  I generally only shoot about 20 sheets per year of 4x5 and around 5 of the larger 8x10.  The film has become very costly and I am mostly just using up old stock that I have on hand.  New stock costs about $12 per sheet for 4x5 and $45 per sheet for 8x10, and the chemistry is about $65 per 1L kit.  Obviously I have to be very selective about what I shoot.  This time around I had accumulated 45 sheets of 4" x 5", five sheets of 8" x 10", and three rolls of 35mm.  One of those 35mm rolls was some XP2 black and white that I shot on a Beer Parlour Project outing.  I used two 1L kits to process all of the film.

The Expert Drums that I use on my Jobo hold 10 sheets of 4"x5"... and I have a larger one that holds 5 sheets of 8" x 10".  So this was five drums to run the 4x5 stuff, plus 1 for the 8x10, and a third tank to run the 35mm.  It took me a couple of days to get through all this stuff.

This scan is a 4" x 5" sheet of Kodak Portra 160VC.  This is the North Saskatchewan River, upstream of Abraham Lake, on the Kootenay Plains.  I took this shot almost two years ago, in 2024.  I used my Ebony SV45Ti view camera and a Fujinon 180mm lens.  No filter was used.  I took the shot on May 13th of 2024 at about 2:30 in the afternoon.  I seem to recall that my brother in law Shawn and I were out on an afternoon drive from the cottage.  The exposure was for 1/15 second at F29.0.

Dry Haven Creek

This is a recent photograph, taken last fall.  When I was running a batch of Rollei film on March 12th, I added a few sheets of Efke PL25M to fill the tanks.  This is one of those sheets.  I was using Rodinal Developer, the Adox APH-09 version, diluted 1:50 at 24C.  The Efke stuff was developed for 7:00 minutes.

Margarit and I were out for a walk along Dry Haven Creek, west of Nordegg, last fall.  It is a really interesting time as ice was starting to form on the creek, but there really wasn't much snow yet.  I took this shot on November 6th 2025, at about 1:30 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45Ti view camera and a 180mm lens.  The exposure was for 8 seconds at F29.0. 

Alsike Corner

This old service station was in operation for many years.  I remember driving by a few times, in the not too distant past, and it was still in operation.  By the fall of 2024, when I took this photograph, it appeared to have been closed for a little while.  A competitor had set up not far away, and it seems the old place couldn't survive.  This place sits at the junction of Highway 20 and Highway 39.  There is no town there, just a couple of businesses.  There are much larger centers to the east and to the west.  Even the old phone booth has been out of service for many years.  It seems we don't need these any more and the only functioning ones I have seen in recent years were in Saskatchewan.

I took this photograph on September 1st of 2024, at about 2:30 in the afternoon.  This is a sheet of Rollei RPX-25 that I processed on March 12th, in part of that mixed batch.  This was in Rodinal Developer, 1:50, for 11:30 minutes.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a wide Rodenstock 90mm lens.  A #25 Red Filter significantly lowered the value of the clear blue fall sky.  The exposure was for 4 seconds at F25.0.

Dinosaur Provincial Park

This is a scan of a negative processed on March 14th.  This was a mixed batch, developed in Kodak HC-110 Developer, dilution B.  This particular 4" x 5" sheet was Ilford FP4+, given N+1 development.  The film was rated at 160iso and developed for 14:20 minutes, to boost contrast.

I took this photo last fall when my daughter Helena and I travelled with some of the guys from the Monochrome Guild on our annual fall trip.  We stayed in East Coulee, and explored around the Drumheller area, as well as at Dinosaur Provincial Park, near Brooks.

I took this shot on October 21st at about 3:30 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a long 250mm lens.  A #8 Yellow filter added a little extra separation of tone.  The exposure was for 1/15 second at F22.0.

Miner's Grafitti

This is a scan of another negative from that mixed batch of film I processed on March 12th.  Like the previous shots, this is also a sheet of Rollei RPX-25.  I rate the film at 12iso, and develop in Rodinal 1:50 for 11:00 minutes at 24C.  It works well enough, but I find the film a little contrasty, and the exposures often become really long.  I'm undecided whether to keep shooting it after my current stock runs out.

I found these names and dates scratched and pecked in the wall of one of the buildings at the Nordegg Historic Site.  I toured the site with permission numerous times over the past couple of years.  I've been in this building at least a dozen times before, and never noticed this until the light hit it just right.

I shot this with my Ebony SV45Ti view camera and a Fujinon 180mm lens.  A swing on the front standard helped to hold the image plane a little better in focus.  This photograph was taken on September 24th of 2025 at about 1:45 in the afternoon.  The exposure was for 4 minutes at F20.0.  

Shoreline Pebbles

This is another negative from the mixed batch of film that I processed on March 12th.  This is a scan of a 4" x 5" sheet of Rollei RPX-25 that was developed for 11:00 minutes in Rodinal 1:50, at 24C.

I shot this image on the shore of the Blackstone River, along the Forestry Trunk Road.  The photograph was taken on June 2nd 2024, at about 3:50 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45Ti view camera and a long Fujinon 300mm lens.  The bellows had to be drawn out to almost 400mm to focus this close, which required exposure compensation of an extra 1/3 stop.  The exposure was for 8 seconds at F64.0.

Dinosaur Park Rills

This is another negative from that mixed batch of film I processed on March 14th.  The developer was Kodak HC-110, Dilution B.  This is another sheet of the now defunct J&C Classic 200 in 4" x 5".  The film certainly has a bit of grit and harshness to it, particularly in this developer.  I think it was probably the Foma 200 film that was just custom branded for J&C Photo, but that is only a guess.

This shot is from the fall trip to Dinosaur Park with the Monochrome Guild.  This shot is NOT from the trip last fall, in 2025.  Rather it is from the year prior, as we also went to southern Alberta in the fall of 2024.  This shot was taken on October 17th 2024, at about 12:45 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a Fujinon 125mm lens.  A #25 Red Filter lowered the value of the sky, and the shadows, and added contrast.  The exposure was for 1/4 second at F29.0.

Another Old One

This negative is from the mixed batch of twenty sheets that I developed on March 14th.  The developer was HC-110 Dilution B.  The batch included one sheet of Arista EDU, four recently exposed sheets of Ilford FP4+, and 15 sheets of J&C Classic 200.  The Arista and J&C received 8:30 minutes of development at 20C.  The FP4+ was developed longer, for plus development.

J&C Photo was a film supplier based in the midwest States.... Kansas City I believe...?  They were great to deal with and I bought a bunch of film from them.  It seem to recall it was in the late 1990's.  Then, they suddenly went out of business.  Rumor was it was some sort of frivolous lawsuit filed by a disgruntled customer.  Fortunately most of their product line was picked up by other suppliers.  At the time they were in operation they were the only source for some rather unique film and paper.  I miss them....

This shot was taken at the Leduc Number One historic site.  It is the interior of an old International Truck.  This particular film, the J&C Classic 200, does not do a great job of handling shadow detail, at least in combination with HC-100 developer.  It was probably a poor choice on my part to select it for this particular image.  The shadow areas were spot metered at an exposure value of around 9 to 9-2/3, which the highlights on the seat and the windshield fell as high as EV15 to 16.  I exposed at EV 12, which held the highlight values alright, but the shadows fell right off and didn't hold very much detail.

I shot this image on June 21st 2022 at about 12:40 in the afternoon.  This is pretty much exactly the summer solstice, so no surprise that the light was rather harsh.  I used my Ebony SV45TU view camera and a 135mm lens.  The exposure was for 1/8 second at F32.0

I'll chalk this one up as a learning experience and move on to better things.

First Shot of 2022

The batch of twenty 4" x 5" sheets of film that I developed on March 12th, included my first photograph of the year, taken four years ago in 2022.  This was a sheet of Rollei RPX-25, developed in Rodinal 1:50, for 11:00 minutes at 24C.

It was almost exactly four years ago, as I took this photograph on March 21st of 2022, at about 2:00 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a long, Fujinon 250mm lens.  No filter was used.  This is Shunda Creek, near my part time residence in Nordegg.  This overview was taken from the bridge near Beaverdam Lake.  

Technically this was my second photograph of that year.  The first one was a sheet of Kodak T-Max 100, at exactly this same setup.  That shot was followed by this exact duplicate on Rollei RPX.  I almost always take a duplicate shot at every set up.  I have learned the hard way, even with my years of experience, that I sometimes mess things up.  I have lost numerous images due to handling and developing errors, and by shooting a duplicate I have mostly eliminated this.  The exposure was for 1 second at F51.0.  The way the film rendered the highlights on the water during this long exposure, is very similar to the image I posted yesterday.

Old Negatives - RPX25 in Rodinal

On March 12th and 14th I headed into my darkroom and ran a couple of mixed batches of film.  Mostly this was to finally get some really old negatives processed.  I didn't really have enough of any one particular type of film, so I had to do mixed batches of different films.  They all required the same developer and temperature, but the development times were different.  So at points during the process some of the film had to be pulled from development, and other sheets left processing longer.  Its all pretty easy to do with my method of using stainless steel hangers for each individual sheet, in open tanks.  Of course this type of processing needs to be done in total darkness, and you really need to pay attention.  I also had to add some recently shot images to round out the batches.

These two batches included some Efke PL25M, Rollei RPX-25, Ilford FP4+, J&C Classic 200, and some Arista EDU Ultra 200.  The Efke and J&C films have been discontinued, and I don't shoot the RPX or EDU very often.  I think I will probably phase these out of my regular routine, once I deplete my current stock.

This negative was developed on March 12th 2026.  It is a 4" x 5" sheet of Rollei RPX-25 that I gave normal development, in Rodinal developer, 1:50, for 11:00 minutes.  I shot this one way back on May 15th of 2022.  I was out for a spring walk with my camera, in Blackmud Creek Ravine, not far from my home in the city.  It was about 2:30 in the afternoon and the light was pretty intense and contrasty.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a wide, Rodenstock 90mm lens.  A #25 Red filter made the background shadows fall off, and darkened the tone of the water, making the bubbles trails really stand out.  The exposure was for 8 seconds at F32.0.

I only have one sheet left from 2022 that remains to be processed, and will get to that shortly.  I checked and I have about 18 sheets left to go from 2023.  I haven't counted yet for 2024 and 2025, and of course now I am starting to shoot in 2026.  It seems there is always film waiting to be developed.

The Last Apparition

This is the last of my five submission images for the Apparitions project.  My colleague Arturo also has five of his images included.  We are in a holding pattern for now, waiting to hear back from some of the galleries that were sent our exhibition proposal.  We have more galleries to submit to in the coming months, as their calls come up.

This image is a little different flavor than the others, and I have posted this one on my blog in the past.  This is a native site that honors the regrowth after a forest fire.  This is out on the Kootenay Plains, not far from our property in Nordegg.  This area was heavily burned when the Spreading Creek Fire went through the area a number of years ago.

Another Apparition

This is another of my images from the Apparitions project submission package.  This one is kind of a weird image, which is exactly why I chose it.  This old doll, the hatchet and the saddle shoes were all artifacts in an old museum.  But the museum was abandoned, for about 40 years, and towards the end, when the site was no longer monitored and maintained, many of the buildings and artivacts were looted.  The building that housed these items has since been moved to another location.

Arturo and I have now sent out our submission package to eight galleries... since early February.  We have about four or five more, that have upcoming deadlines through the next several months.  We are considering applying for another Arts Grant to fund travelling of the show to galleries that are further away.  With each acceptance comes the expectation that the prints will be delivered to the gallery, the artists will attend the opening, and the prints will be picked up after the show.  Many galleries pay an exhibition fee which partially covers these costs.  But if the venue is further away, then the costs exceed the fee.