Four Years - Adox CHS-50 Art

A decade or so back I bought a few boxes of 4" x 5" sheet film.  This was Adox CHS-50 Art.  It is supposed to be a remake of 1950's era film.  Later I acquired a couple of boxes of a slower version of the same film, CHS-25.  Some time later the film was discontinued and has never come back on the market.  I still have some in my freezer and shoot it from time to time.  Perhaps because it is no longer made, and I don't want to risk becoming attached to it, I don't shoot it all that often.  That became evident when I recently accumulated 20 sheets and was able to develop a batch.  That batch included sheets exposed in four different years.  It also included my last remaining sheet for the calendar year 2021 that still needed to be processed.

I process the film in Rodinal Developer, diluted 1:50, for 5:30 minutes.  This is a little less development than I typically give for other films, but it seems to yield a full tonal range in this particular emulsion.

This first image is that last remaining shot from the 2021 calendar year.  It is some grasses and hummocks in Blackmud Creek in Edmonton.  I shot this on September 29th 2021 at about 1:45 in the afternoon, with my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a long Fujinon-T 400mm lens.  A #11 Yellow Green Filter was used to raise the value of the grasses.  Although the box speed of the film is 50iso, I rate it slower, at 25iso.  This required a moderate aperture of F18, and a long shutter speed of 1 second.  Obviously there was a little motion in the grass as a result of this long exposure.

This next one is from the 2022 calendar year.  These rills and small hoodoos are located in the Red Deer River Valley, not far from our shop in East Coulee.  I shot this on April 24th 2022 at about 5:10 in the evening.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and once again the Fujinon-T 400mm lens.  A #25 Red Filter increased contrast by lowering the value of the shadows, and created separation in the sky. The exposure was at F22 and a shutter speed of 1 second.

This next one was taken in the 2023 calendar year.  Arturo and I were out exploring, looking for subject matter to photograph for our Apparitions project.  Photographs for this project impart a human presence without including any people in the images.  We found these old chairs and table, along with some old playing cards, in an abandoned community hall.  I have come across old playing cards on a number of occasions before and since this outing, and almost always end up photographing them.  I exposed this sheet of film on June 26th 2023 at about 2:30 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony SV45TU view camera and a Nikkor-W 150mm lens.  No filter was needed.  The exposure was F11 for 4 seconds.

And finally, something more up to date.  This shot was recently taken on one of the outings for the Beer Parlour Project.  This was BP 16.0, our visit to the Grand Hotel in Rimbey, Alberta.  I shot this one on August 16th 2024 at about 7:20 in the evening.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera and a Fujinon-W 125mm lens.  No filter was used.  The exposure was F16 for 1/2 second.