Another Trip to Saskatoon

I just returned from my third and final [for now] trip to Saskatoon.  I drove there in early January to deliver the prints for the Procession West show to the Saskatchewan Craft Council Gallery.  Then I made a second trip in late January to attend the reception.  Our show was taken down last weekend and this time I had to pick up the four crates full of prints and bring them back home.  My brother in law Shawn was in Saskatoon visiting his girlfriend and he gave me a hand this morning to load the crates into my truck.  We also got together for a visit and a few drinks on Sunday night.  Today I made the long drive back home.  I had hoped to be able to stop along the way and take a few photographs, but it was not to be.  It was moderately cold, for this time of year and there was a really brisk wind blowing that made conditions rather uncomfortable.

I did have lunch today with Zach Hauser.  Zach was on the jury at Saskatchewan Craft Council that accepted our show and I met him at the reception.  He is a former professional photographer that has now put photography aside to pursue a retirement career in artisan furniture building.  I bought some film holders and some paper from him and it was a very pleasant visit this afternoon.

It seems March has come in like a lion so hopefully the old saying holds true and it goes out like a lamb.  It was -17C this morning when I went out to start my truck in Saskatoon.  Here in Edmonton we are supposed to have similar conditions for the next few days.  Night time lows approaching -20C and daytime highs only around -10C.  This is far below the long term average for this time of year.  Hopefully once we limp through this current cold snap things will turn around and we will see a gradual transition into spring weather.

Horseshoe Channel

Here's another recently processed negative.  This one is from the Fall Photo Weekend in Jasper, last year, with the gang from the Monochrome Guild.  This is the southwest arm of Horseshoe Lake, in Jasper National Park.  This dates back to late October of 2016.  I took this one with my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a Fujinon-W 125mm lens.  The film was Kodak 100 T-Max, exposed at 80 iso and processed in 510 Pyro developer.

Fujinon SF F5.6 250mm Copal 3

Here is an example of a portrait taken with my soft focus lens.  This is from the recent portrait session, a couple weeks ago.  This shot, of middle daughter Annelise, was taken on Kodak 100 T-Max and processed in 510 Pyro developer.  I had the lens nearly wide open at F6.5.  The main light was a softbox, with the fill light bounced off of an umbrella.  I used my trusty old Sinar F1 view camera and my Photogenic strobe lights for this portrait session.  I quite like this lens and the way that the center of the image stays nice and sharp, but the fringes get all swirly and soft.  It may not be overly noticeable in this scan, but under Anna's right arm there is a structure that looks like a squashed bug.  This is static discharge, that exposed the film in this area... fortunately it is not overly detracting from an otherwise great portrait.

Family Portrait

Here's another image taken on the new Foma Retropan Soft 320 emulsion.  Two weeks ago I set up my backdrop and studio lights in our living room and took some portraits of the girls.  It has been quite a while since I have taken any formal portraits.  Margarit has a couple of antique picture frames that she wants to put some up to date portraits of the girls into.  This may be one of them....

I used my Sinar F1 view camera and a heavy studio tripod.  I used two strobe lights, the main one at camera right with a soft box, and a fill light at camera left bounced off an umbrella.  I used a Fujinon SF 250mm soft focus lens, though for this particular shot the lens was stopped down enough that the soft focus effect did not occur.  I have some other images from the same studio session where the lens was opened up and the soft focus effect is quite evident.  I will include at least one of those in a future blog post.  Once again the film was processed in Ilford Microphen developer, 1:1, for 15:00 minutes at 24C.  I think the grain and the open tonal range of this film work well in a portrait.

New Film - Foma Retropan Soft 320

This is my first attempt at using a new film.  I first came across this film about a year ago and bought a couple of boxes to try it out.  I've been shooting some images with it over the past several months and finally accumulated enough sheets to set up and process a batch.  It is manufactured by Foma Bohemia in the Czech Republic.  I rated the film at the box speed of 320 iso.  I developed it in Ilford Microphen Developer, diluted 1:1, for 15:00 minutes at 24C.  

The film has very pronounced grain, much more so than any other film I have ever used, even infrared.  The tonal values are quite soft and open.  I had to crank up the contrast in this scan quite a bit and even still it is not particularly harsh.  The grain may not be overly evident in this scan, but it is very obvious with a larger file, or in looking at the negative.  Obviously this look is not suited to everything, but it is another option for situations where the grain and the softness are desirable.  Perhaps some portraits or maybe studio still-lifes, as well as certain landscapes under a complementary light.

This particular shot was taken back in early December of 2016 as the ice bloom on the North Saskatchewan River was underway.  I took this with my Ebony SV45TU view camera and a Fujinon 240mm lens.  I used a #25 red filter to increase contrast, but it's effect seems subdued.

Family Day

The skies were rather gloomy and the light very flat for the entire weekend.  I spent some time in the darkroom working on processing film.  On the holiday Monday my oldest daughter Hailey and I went out for an afternoon drive.  We didn't go all that far, and mostly just criss-crossed some backroads in Lamont County.  We checked out a couple of abandoned farm yards, and the big camera made it out a couple times for some photographs.  The flat light is actually advantageous for interior shots as the light is very soft, and the highlights from windows and openings are subdued.  Later in the afternoon we travelled a few new roads and came across some buildings that might be worth a return to in better light.  We also came across an old cemetery that we will return to when the snow is gone.

Infrared

Here's a scan of an image taken a year ago, in February 2016, and recently processed.  This is an abandoned orthodox church up in Smoky Lake County.  I shot this with my Ebony 4x5 view camera and a 200mm lens.  It was shot on Kodak High Speed Infrared Film and processed in T-Max Developer.  

We've experienced some really mild, record setting temperatures over the last few days but of course, just in time for the Family Day long weekend, it has cooled off.  The temperature is still pretty mild, at right around the freezing point, but with the change came cloudy skies.  We still only got a skiff of snow and a sprinkle of rain, but the skies are just leaden and dull and nothing looks very attractive right now.  Particularly with that old rotten snow lying around.  I didn't bother heading out to do any shooting today because it was just too uninspiring.  Instead I unloaded and reloaded a whole bunch of film holders that were cluttering up my darkroom.  I have over 200 film holders and they are now all loaded up with fresh film, waiting for spring.  Hopefully it arrives soon...!!

Stubble Field and Old House

It's been over a week since I've posted anything to my blog.  Life has been busy lately, and I just haven't had a lot of extra time.  We had some really mild weather here in Edmonton last week and for a couple of days the daytime highs were up around +15C.  There isn't very much snow left, and conditions are very spring like.  Although it has cooled off a little in recent days, there is an optimistic mood in the air as spring is just around the corner.

I went out for a drive last weekend and managed to take a few shots with the 4x5.  I also spent an afternoon at home and set up my backdrop and studio lights and took some portraits of the girls.  Work has been busy and economic conditions appear to be improving a little after having weathered the past two years of slumping oil prices and the effect on the local economy.

The Monochrome Guild met last night at my place and we are making plans for a group show upcoming in May  It was great to see everyone again.

During the week I was digging through some scans of recently processed negatives when I came across this one.  This is from a spring day trip back in April of 2016.  It was taken with my Ebony view camera and a moderately wide Schneider Super Symmar XL 80mm lens.  The film was Kodak Tri-X Pan rated at 400 iso and processed N+1 in PMK for added contrast.  This has been well received on my Flickr account.

Looking Down

This image was taken during the annual Fall Photo Weekend, an outing with some of the members of The Monochrome Guild, back in October of 2016.  We headed out to Jasper National Park for a weekend of photography, as has been our annual tradition for over 15 years.  I saw this view of the Astoria River and decided to pass on it, in favor of hiking down into the valley below.  I spent a couple hours shooting down there before scrambling back up to the top.  While I was waiting for some of the others to make their way back up, my friend Peter pointed this view out to me again.  I think the reason that I had passed on it before, is that it is seen from a rather precarious position, at least for a large format camera.  This is the Astoria River as seen from the bridge on Highway 93A.  The bridge is a steel arch bridge and is quite a distance up above the rushing water below.  In fact I had to use a lens of rather long focal length to get in this tight on the rocks and water below.  My tripod was right up against the guard rail of the bridge, with the camera hanging over the edge.  I had visions of dropping a filter, or worse yet the entire camera, over the edge and onto the rocks below.  But I survived, and so did all of my equipment, without incident.  The scale of this scene may not be fully appreciated but that large central rock is at least the size of a small car, and what looks like a stick laying on the rocks at the edge is actually the trunk of a lodgepole pine.  I'm glad that Peter convinced me to set up and shoot this as I think it is quite an exceptional image.  This one was taken on 4" x 5" Kodak T-Max 100 film, processed in 510 Pyro developer.

InFocus Exhibit - Edmonton

Last night I attended the opening reception for the 2017 version of the InFocus exhibit.  This is the third year of this show, curated by Alexis Marie Chute, and I have been involved in all three so far.  Although this year it almost didn't happen....

Several months ago I received notification that two of my prints had been accepted for exhibition.  I immediately responded to Alexis by e-mail, thanking her for the acceptance and letting her know that I was thrilled to be taking part again.  I set to work making my exhibition prints and getting them mounted and framed.  Several months went by, and the delivery date was fast approaching.  All through this period of time I had received no further correspondence about the show.  I an an e-mail, looking for some further details about the delivery dates and the opening.  Some time later I still had not received any response.  I dug into my archives and found an old e-mail address for Alexis, and a cell number.  I reached out to find out what was going one.

Apparently there is some sort of conflict between my e-mail address and theirs.  They did not receive any of my messages, and I did not receive any of the information that had been sent to me.  They thought that I had dropped out of the show, but for some reason never bothered to reach out with a phone call or any other attempt to contact other than e-mail.

So, I missed out being included on the invitation, in the catalogue, and in the on line voting for the Peoples Choice award.  I was still allowed to take part in the show and dropped off my prints at the gallery in plenty of time.

This time around the show is located at the Front Gallery, on the 124 Street Gallery Row in Edmonton.  Here is a link to the website...

http://www.infocusphoto.ca/

When I arrived at the reception I was greeted and welcomed with apologies for all the confusion.  Perhaps to make amends, my two prints were featured front and centered on the main wall at the gallery, along with the graphics for the show.  They looked pretty good if I do say so myself. 
The reception was well attended and it was a pleasant evening meeting and re-acquainting with some many other photographers.  The show will remain up for a while and I encourage anyone interested in photography to go out and see it.  I was pleasantly surprised to see that traditional film based photography is experiencing a bit of a resurgence and there were several artists included that were not digital artists.

Bentonite

This image was taken in October of last fall while my friend Rob and I were out photographing in the badlands of the Red Deer River Valley.  It had been pretty wet, and our opportunities to get out into the hills were limited.  Even by the time I took this shot, near the end of the trip, it was still pretty greasy.  This formation consists of bentonite and cretaceous shales.  It is an area that 65 million years ago, alternated between marine and tertiary.  I shot this on Kodak High Speed Infrared with my Ebony view camera and a Nikkor 300mm lens.  It was actually shot from the shoulder of the highway, not far from the Hoodoos Recreation Area.

Ice Bloom

Here are two images of the Ice Bloom on the North Saskatchewan River, taken back at the beginning of December.  Both were taken with my Ebony SV45TU camera and my Schneider Super Symmar XL 110mm lens.  I used a #25 Deep Red Filter for both.  Both images were on Kodak T-Max 100 Film, developed together in 510 Pyro developer 1:100, for 7:45 minutes at 24C.

The upper image was actually eight exposures on the same piece of film.  I set the lens at F20.0 and took eight exposures at 1/30 of a second each.  I fired the shutter, cocked it and re-fired it, and repeated this eight times.  For the second exposure I left everything the same, and just gave one long exposure of 1/4 second.  Theoretically this should be the same, and the negatives look very close to each other in density.  The look is quite different as the multiple exposure results in a lot more ice showing on the river, but there is also a jerky sort of interuption within the image.  The shadow of the bridge is much more pronounced.  I thought it was an interesting experiment.

Reception at Saskatchewan Craft Council Gallery

On Friday January 25th I travelled to Saskatoon to attend the opening of my Procession West exhibition at the Saskatchewan Craft Council Gallery in Saskatoon.  Being the ever prepared photographer that I am, I didn't bother to bring along my digital camera.  As a result I was only able to take a few snap shots of the installation with my phone.

 

Bergger Panchro 400

I really like my results so far with the new Bergger Panchro 400 sheet film.  Once I get my exposure and development a little better refined, I'm sure the results will improve.  This one is another image from the January day trip that saw Hailey and I out exploring southwest of Edmonton.  This frosty detail was taken along the north side of Strawberry Creek Ravine, a little east of the village of Telfordville.  Despite the flat lighting of the overcast day, this one has a little snap to it.