Image 11 - First Utah Trip - Juniper Fence

This is another image I am working on for inclusion in the Photo Album I intend to have printed.  These will be images from my three trips to Utah.  This is Image Number 11, on a long list of close to 200 images that will be considered.  

My friends Rob and Brad traveled with me to Utah in 2013 and again in 2015.  We stayed in a rental house in Kanab, and each time spent a week exploring the area.  We used the same rental as a base for both trips.  In between, in the spring of 2014, I took Margarit and the girls to the area, and at that time we also used the same home as a base.

This photograph was taken on the second day trip of our first stay in Utah.  Rob and Brad and I set out to the east of Kanab and eventually turned off onto the House Rock Valley Road.  This road travels south and eventually crosses the border into Arizona.  The Coyote Buttes, the Wave and the White Pocket are all accessed off of this road.  This area is known as the Paria Plateau.  I believe that this particular location is within the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument.

This corral was made with juniper trunks, as that is pretty much the only wood to be found in the area.  I'm not sure if it was used for cattle or horses.  I seem to recall that the Parks staff may have used this for their horses, but it was so long ago that I visited, that I can no longer be sure.

I shot this image on Kodak Tri-X Pan 320, rated at 320 iso.  Development was Normal, in PMK for 9:35 minutes.  I shot this with my Ebony SV45TE 4" x 5" view camera and a Fujinon 125mm lens.  A #25 Red filter creates some separation in the sky, and increased contrast.  The exposure was for 1/8 of a second at F22.0.  The photograph was taken on October 15th 2013, at about 10:30 in the morning. 

 

Lawnmower

This is a scan of an older negative.  When I shot this image I thought it might be something to consider for my Apparitions project.  Obviously it is an old push lawn mower.  In this instance it is probably more like a snow mower.  I was returning from a weekend in Jasper with some colleagues from the Monochrome Guild.  This was our annual Fall Photo Weekend in 2022.  We stopped at a private family cemetery beside the Yellowhead Highway, and I found this.

This image was exposed on a 4" x 5" sheet of Kodak Tri-X Pan 320, rated at 400iso and given N+1 Development in PMK.  Development was on my Jobo Processor for 16:40 minutes at 20C.  I shot this on October 24th 2022 at about 1:00 in the afternoon.  It was taken with my Ebony view camera and a Fujinon 125mm lens, with no filter.  The exposure was for 1/8 second at F25.0.

Lundbreck Falls

This scan dates back to late 2023.  I shot this on September 18th 2023 at about 9:00 in the morning.  We had just finished up a successful visit to the Crowsnest Pass area for the Beer Parlour Project.  This was BP 2.1 at the Greenhill Hotel in Blairmore, and BP 7.0 at the Grand Union Hotel in Coleman.  On the long drive back home to Edmonton, Margarit and I made a quick stop at Lundbreck Falls.  I had stopped here before, and photographed the falls from the viewing areas up above.  But this was the first time I packed my camera down the trail to the base of the falls.

This recently processed sheet of Kodak T-Max 100 was rated at 80iso and developed normally in 510 Pyro.  I shot this with my Ebony view camera and a Schneider 135mm lens.  The exposure was for 1/2 second at F32.0.  The small aperture was necessary to hold depth of field from the foreground rocks back to the waterfall.  The long shutter speed showed some nice motion blur in the waterfall.

Spirit Tree

Last October, myself and three other members of the Monochrome Guild headed out on our annual fall trip.  Normally we have referred to it as the Fall Photo Weekend, but now that most of the Guild, and in particular the ones taking part this year, are retired, the weekend part didn't matter.

Normally we have visited Jasper National Park but this past fall, with the wildfires still in the recent past, many of the hotels and businesses had not yet reopened to the public.  So we elected to head down to the badlands of southern Alberta instead.

This is a photograph of a once majestic Plains Cottonwood tree.  It is said to be over 300 years old and would have been a sapling when the first white explorers visited the area.  Some of the branches were still alive at this late point in the fall when I visited, but the tree is obviously not doing well.  I shot this on a sheet of Ilford HP5 film, rated at 320 iso.  I used my Ebony view camera and a wide Nikkor 75mm lens.  A #25 Red filter added some contrast and created a little separation between sky and clouds. Development was in 510 Pyro, for 7:25 minutes, at 24C.  The exposure was 1/8 second at F22.0.  I shot this on October 17th 2024, at about 4:00 in the afternoon.  

The image kind of reminds me of the famous painting, "The Scream" by Edvard Munch.  He created that work in 1893, and the tree would have been well advanced at that time.

This is another shot of the same tree, taken over 25 years earlier.  This image was included in the traveling gallery exhibition called "Procession West" that my friend Rob Michiel and I put together around 2013.  That show, with this print included, toured around various galleries throughout Western Canada.  I was much younger and somewhat fitter back in those days, and carried around a much heavier camera than I use now, in my old age.  Originally I worked with a heavy Sinar F1 monorail camera which I packed around in a protective plastic case mounted onto a metal back pack frame.  That outfit, together with tripod, weighed well over 60 Lbs.  These days, my camera outfit, using the lighter and more compact Ebony view cameras, weighs in at about half that weight.  I did use the same Nikkor SW 75mm lens for both shots.

This older image was taken on a sheet of the long discontinued Agfapan APX-100 sheet film rated at 50 iso.  I developed it in Rodinal 1:50, for 14:00 minutes at 20C.  This 4" x 5" sheet was exposed on August 27th 1997, at about 7:30 in the morning.  A #12 Yellow filter bumped contrast a little but to a lesser extent than the red filter I selected a quarter century later.  The exposure for this one was 1/2 second at F22.0.

Image 10 - First Utah Trip - Grosvenor Arch

This is another scan from the Utah photo album that I am slowly working on.  This shot was taken near the end of our first day of exploring, on the first trip down to southern Utah.  This is Grosvenor Arch, at the northern end of the Cottonwood Canyon Road, in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.  After we finished up shooting here we still had a long drive... a couple hours as I recall... to circle back to our base.  We were staying in the small town of Kanab.

This shot was taken on a sheet of Fuji Neopan Acros 100, rated at 64iso.  Development was in Rodinal 1:50 for 8:00 minutes.  I shot this with my Ebony view camera and a long 400mm telephoto lens.  A Red filter increased contrast and deepened the value of the sky.  The exposure was for 1/2 second at F18.0.  The photograph was taken on October 14th 2013, at about 6:00 in the evening.

Dirty Dektol

In terms of developing film, I have used many different developers.  The list is long and includes products such as Rodinal, Perceptol, Microphen, T-Max, 510-Pyro, PMK, X-Tol, D-76, and more.  But, when it comes to paper developers, I have mostly just used one... good old Kodak Dektol.  I dabbled a little with a few others, but always came back to Dektol.  I'm not sure why this is the case...?  The choice of developer makes a fairly obvious difference to the look of the negative, but with paper, not so much so.  There are some differences, but they are not as pronounced.

Some months ago it was announced that Kodak was going out of the chemistry business and would no longer make any of the darkroom supplies.  But then a short time later it was announced that their chemical division had been sold and taken over by another company.  Rumour has it that the new owner is a Chinese company, but I'm not certain about that.

Dektol is supplied as a dry powder that is mixed with water to make a stock solution.  That stock solution is further diluted for use.  I recently bought some of the new material and mixed up a batch in advance of my printing session.

Much to my dismay a saw that the dry powder was tan colored, when in the past it had always been white.  And, when I mixed up the stock solution, it was a dark reddish brown.  In all the years that I have used this material it was always been a clear solution with a bit of a sort of pinkish tinge to it.

I checked with my colleague Arturo and asked if he had experienced the same thing.  He confirmed that he had, but that the material seemed to still work OK.  He recommended that I test mine before doing any serious work.  So, I ran a few small 8x10 test prints on some cheap RC paper that I had in stock.  It did in fact seem to work just fine.  So I set about using the stuff on my current printing work for the Apparitions project.

I'm still not sure that I totally trust this stuff and will make a point of using it quickly.  I will also limit the number of prints that I run through a tray full in one printing session.  I'm fairly concerned about this and will see if the next batch that I mix up is the same.  It may be time to consider switching to a different paper developer.

Printing for Apparitions

For the first time in many weeks I was able to go down into my darkroom and work on making some prints.  In recent weeks, as my broken leg continued to recover, I was able to organize my darkroom and make some unsharp masks.  Since I've returned home from my recent trip to Nordegg I've now made time to get back downstairs and start on some printing.

Arturo and I are supposed to have our exhibition prints ready for the Apparitions project by May. Originally the deadline was in January, but we requested and were granted an extension due to a delay in the availability of our silver gelatin paper from Ilford, the manufacturer.  In hindsight, its good thing we are able to do that, as my broken leg resulted in further delays.  The reason that we even have a deadline is because we were awarded an Edmonton Arts Council grant to help finance putting our exhibition together.  We have the shipping crates essentially built, and just have to attach a little hardware and then they are ready to go.  We also have all of our framing materials... frames, glass, mounts, matts, hardware, etc. all cut and ready to go.  It is just the printing that remains, and then install the prints into the frames.

The exhibition will consist of 32 large prints, 16 by each of us.  I have actually printed about six or eight of mine, but I'm not 100% happy with all of them.  This is always a problem for me when it comes down to preparing prints for exhibition.  I can never decide what to include and I always begin to second guess myself.  Some of my more recent work often gets more seriously considered than images that are a couple years older, and that I have already grown tired of.

On February 20th I had a little time, so I tested a questionable batch of Dektol developer.  When it proved to be alright, I continued working and printed one negative.  Then the next day, I returned to the darkroom and spent about five hours down there.  By the end of it I my leg was pretty tired.  I think my good leg actually feels worse than the broken one, because I favor it so much.  In any event, there was no significant pain and it seemed to go alright.  I attempted to print four negatives.  One I was totally unhappy with an gave up after one work print.  But the other three turned out pretty well.  

I think that out of all the prints I have made so far I have about six that will make it into the exhibition.  That leaves me with ten more to print before the deadline.  One of the issues that I have is that I know I have some strong newer images, but I have not even developed the film yet.  But, I will focus my attention on getting this project wrapped up over the next several weeks.

We have already begun sending out gallery submissions to find venues that are willing to exhibit our show.  We have four submissions already sent out, and two more in the works.  These are typically sent out well in advance and should we be accepted, it would likely be for 2026 or 2027.  Over the course of the next year or so we plan on sending out at least two dozen more submissions.

Rails

This is another scan of a recently processed large format negative.  This sheet of 4" x 5" film is Kodak T-Max 100, processed in 510 Pyro, 1:100, for 7:45 minutes, at 24C.

This is a detail shot taken up at the Nordegg Historic Site during one of my tours last fall.  These are small gauge rail lines that are used to move coal cars around.  This intersection is by the rotary dumper and the scale.  I shot this with my Ebony view camera and a 125mm lens.  It was taken on September 9th at about 12:30 in the afternoon.  The exposure was for 1/2 second at F25.0.

Oh Canada !

This is the time of year that all hockey fans dread... the All Star Break...!  The regular season is interrupted for several days while select star players travel to some select city, to play a meaningless game.  The game has no intensity, as no one wants to get hurt.  Most fans hate it, with the exception of young kids that like to see all the stars together.

This year the National Hockey League finally smartened up and organized something different, the 4 Nations Cup.  NHL players from all the teams were selected to play for their country in a four team tournament.  This included Canada, USA, Sweden and Finland.  Sadly some of the countries were not represented, as they did not have enough players in the NHL to put together a competitive team.  And, of course the Russians were excluded, and rightfully so.

Over the course of about ten days each team played the other three teams once.  Then the two teams that finished at the top, played off in the championship game.  Canada beat Sweden in overtime in their first game.  Then they lost to the Americans in the second one.  The score was close at 2-1 late in the game when the Americans iced it with an empty net goal.  Then Canada beat Finland 5-3 in a game that got a closer than it started.  So the show down for the championship would be between Canada and the cocky Americans.  All tournament long the Americans were shooting off their big mouths and totally annoying everyone north of the 49th.

It was about as far away from an All-Star game as one could imagine.  All the players were honored to put on the jersey's of their country.  The games were fast, hard hitting and intense.  There were numerous injuries over the course of the event... fortunately none extremely serious.  It was very entertaining and kept Canadians glued to the TV for the duration of the event.

The championship game was played in Boston on February 20th.  Canada scored first.  The Americans later tied the game and then went ahead.  Canada evened it up and the game ended up tied and going into overtime.  Connor McDavid of the Edmonton Oilers scored the game winner for Canada...!

Margarit and I went to the neighborhood pub, Mimi's and watched the game there with a bunch of friends and neighbors.  The place was packed and the crowd erupted every time Canada scored, and particularly with the overtime winner.  It was only fitting given the current political situation in the world that Canada managed to beat the Americans.  The Orange-Moron-In-Charge down south was spouting his usual verbal diarrhoea going into the game.  Hopefully the loss shut him up for a little while.  My friend Brian texted me right after we won...   "Canada!!!!!  F*ck the f*cking Americans All to Hell.  Beat them in their own house"  Later this image was circulating extensively on social media.  Not sure of the source so I can't give an image credit, but I will include it here.

Afternoon Delight

Much of western Canada has been in the grips of an extreme cold spell for the past week or so.  Record temperatures were set in parts of southern Alberta in recent days.  It has been very cold everywhere, and the wind has made it worse.  The central prairies of Saskatchewan and Manitoba were even colder than Alberta.  The front ranges out around Nordegg have experienced milder temperatures and less snow than the rest of the province, and the rest of the prairies for that matter.

When I arrived at the cottage on Valentine's day the daytime high temperatures were getting up around -20, with night time lows dropping to near -30.  I understand that it was somewhat colder than that back in Edmonton.  Since then it has been gradually warming up, and the days have been mostly sunny.

Most of the people in the subdivision, with the exception of the permanent residents, went home after the Family Day Long weekend, just as the weather improved.  By Monday and Tuesday the afternoon high temperatures were peaking at about -7C.

On Tuesday February 18th I took a drive west out to Abraham Lake.  I'm still not overly mobile with my busted leg in an air boot, so it was essentially just a drive.  I stepped out of the truck to take a couple of snapshots, but did not venture off the road.  As usual, the level of the reservoir has dropped steadily over the winter.  The east end of the lake, near the dam, is quite snow covered.  At the elbow of the lake, near Mount Michener, there is only patchy snow.  Windy Point lived up to it's name and the wind was sweeping the snow across the frozen lake surface.  There is not a lot of snow there, and any south facing slopes are pretty much bare.  There is more snow at Nordegg, but still less than we have experienced in Edmonton.  For whatever reason there was not really any wildlife out and about and the only deer that I saw were in the subdivision, mostly around my yard.

The Bucket

This is a scan of a recently processed negative.  This is a 4" x 5" sheet of Ilford HP5+, rated at 320 iso and given Normal Development in 510 Pyro.  Processing was for 7:25 minutes at 24C.

I shot this during one of several tours I took of the Nordegg Historic site, last year.  I worked with the management team at the site and had full permission to be there photographing with my large view camera.  Access to this site is limited to guided tours and there is no public access.

I shot this on September 9th of last year at about 12:00 noon.  I used my Ebony view camera and a long 210mm lens.  This detail shot of an old bucket was taken in the hoist house.  Back in the days when the mine operated, 75 years ago, this winch was used to draw mine cars loaded with coal, up from the underground workings.  It was also used, with its braking mechanism, to lower the empty cars back down into the mine.  The entrance was not vertical, rather is was an inclined slope.  Today the entrance is blocked and access underground is no longer possible.

Due to the low light conditions in this building the exposure was a lengthy 30 seconds at F20.0.  This despite the use of a relatively fast film.

Image 9 - First Utah Trip - Candyland

This is another shot, for the upcoming album, and from the first trip down to Utah.  This is still from the first day trip of exploring with my friends Brad and Rob, on the Cottonwood Canyon Road.  By this point it is getting later in the day, and we are near the northern end of the road, in an area called Candyland.  This is still part of the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.

This photograph was taken on a sheet of Fuji Neopan Acros 100 rated at 64 iso and given normal development in Rodinal 1:50.  Development was for 8:00 minutes at 24C.  I shot this on October 14th 2013 at about 5:20 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony view camera and a wide 80mm lens.  The late day low light was already quite contrasty and there was a significant difference in subject brightness between the upper highlights and the foreground shadows.  As a result a filter was not necessary.  The exposure was for 1/4 second at F25.0.

Return to Nordegg - Finally...

On Valentine's Day I traveled back to Nordegg, for the first time in over two months.  Margarit decided to stay in the city with the girls... so it was not very romantic.

I must say that our power bills this winter have been rather high.  Both the main cottage and the guest cottage are heated with forced air electric furnaces.  It is a very reliable heat source as we do not have to worry about propane freezing up or vents choking off due to condensation build up.  The solar panels on the guest cottage don't supplement anything in the winter as they are often covered with snow, and the days are very short.  When we are out at the cottage, we heat with wood and the electric furnaces don't really run.  But when we are not around, even with the themostats turned way down, the power consumption is not insignificant.

I attended a meeting of local residents in town on Saturday the 15th.  We are concerned about the ongoing Land Use Bylaw rewrite that is being undertaken by the County.  There are a lot of concerns about what is going to change and residents wanted to voice these to the County.   It was well attended, with nearly 50 people present.

Since that meeting I've just hung around at the cottage and enjoyed the peace and quiet.  Although it is the Family Day long weekend, there are not a lot of people around.  It's been pretty cold, with night time lows approaching -30C, plus a wind chill.

But I'll hang around for a bit... keep the chill out of the place, and enjoy the fresh mountain air.  Not really much on the agenda, as my mobility is still somewhat limited.  I'll play a little guitar, work on a watercolor painting, and catch up on some correspondence.  In a few days I'll return to the city and carry on with some darkroom work, but I plan to return to the mountains as soon as I can, and on a much more regular basis.

Beer Parlour Project - BP 16.0 - Billiards

Recently, as my broken leg began to recover, I was able to return to the darkroom and begin to get back to work.  I developed two batches of film.... some Kodak T-Max 100 and some Ilford HP5+... both in 510 Pyro.  I also made a bunch of unsharp masks, in advance of some printing that I intend to get started on.  

This one is from the batch of HP5 that I developed.  Most of that batch were sheets that were rated at 320 iso and given Normal development.  But there were a handful of sheets, including this one, that were rated at 1600 iso and given extended development for 30:00 minutes.  These were all from various Beer Parlour Project outings.

This one was taken during the BP 16.0 outing at the Grand Hotel in Rimbey.  This was on August 16th 2024.  The shot was taken at about 6:30 in the evening.  I used my Ebony view camera and a 125mm lens.  The exposure was for 1/2 second at F8.0.

On more recent outings I have begun to use a couple of floodlights.  This allows for shorter exposures and/or a smaller aperture, for greater depth of field.  A lot of past shots have been ruined by bar patrons that were unable to hold still long enough for the long shutter speeds, although this one worked out alright.

Surgeon's Report

On Monday February 10th I went in to a follow up appointment with my surgeon.  X-rays were taken and she reviewed the progress of my recovery.  She said that the break in my fibula was beginning to heal, but was not fully healed yet.  I was given permission to start putting weight on my right leg, and to begin carefully walking with my air boot.  I was told to continue to rely on my crutches, if conditions were slippery, or uneven.  Since then I have followed that advice, and everything has gone well. 

I will be returning for another follow up appointment in four weeks.  After that I will start rehab for the eventual return to regular, more strenuous, activity.... like skating...!!

This is the information that was included in my medical record...

The doctor couldn't remember exactly how many screws she put into my leg.  She said that usually it was six or seven for a fracture such as mine.  I was awake and alert during the procedure, and I counted six.... based on the sound.  I didn't realize that a plate was also put in, but this report confirms that.  I have the option of having the screws removed... about a year from now... if it turns out that they bother me.  I'm thinking, unless there is a significant issue, I don't want to go through surgery again....!

PROCEDURE(S): GR ANKLE RIGHT

HISTORY: Post op. Rt. ankle. sx date 2025-Jan-09. Assess healing.

COMPARISON: 20 January, 2025 right ankle radiograph.

INTERPRETATION:

Interval removal of an overlying cast.

Unchanged lateral plate and screw construct and an interfragmentary screw fixating the oblique distal fibular fracture.

Margins of the distal fibular fracture are indistinct, suggestive of early healing. No change in fracture fragment position.

Symmetric and congruent talocrural joint. Tiny joint effusion.

Mild soft tissue swelling overlying the distal fibula, as seen previously.

IMPRESSION

No adverse interval change. Early healing associated with the distal fibular fracture.

La Fille

Here are a couple of new old negatives.  These are from a recently processed batch of Kodak T-Max 100 that I developed in 510 Pyro.  Development was for 7:45 minutes at 24C.  

Both of these negatives were taken on October 22nd of 2023.  I was out on the west coast with my friends Arturo and Chris.  We were enjoying a week of exploring, and looking for subject matter that might work for the Apparitions project.  This boat was moored at the Ford Cove Marina on Hornby Island.  I took the two shots about ten minutes apart with my Ebony view camera.  The first one, of the bow of the boat, was taken with a wide 90mm lens.  The exposure was for 1/15 of a second at F20.0.

The second shot, of the mooring lines was taken with a 125mm lens.  The exposure for that one was 1/8 of a second at F20.0.

Images 7 and 8 - First Utah Trip - The Clansmen

Here are a couple more images from the first Utah trip.  I'm in the process of editing these, and putting together a photo album of the best images from the trips that I made over three years.

On the first day trip, of the first Utah visit, that I made with my friends Rob and Brad, we drove the Cottonwood Canyon Road in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.  It was an all day affair.  The southern end of the road was an hour's drive east of the town we were staying in.  And then it took all day to drive the road.  By the time we got back to our base in the evening, it was long after dark.

Along the road we came upon these formations.  I'm not sure if they have any official name, but my friend Rob thought they looked like Clansmen, so that's what we called them.

The first shot was taken on Kodak Tri-X Pan 320.  I rated the film at 400 iso and gave it increased development to boost contrast.  I took this shot on October 14th of 2013 at about 4:30 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony view camera and a wide 80mm lens.  A #25 Red Filter further increased contrast.  Development was in PMK for 16:40 minutes at 20C.  My Jobo processor was used to provide constant agitation during development.

The second shot is a tighter detail shot of the same scene.  It was taken on Fuji Neopan Acros 100 rated at 64 iso.  It's surprising how much different the tones appear, even though the two images were taken in the same place, about 15 minutes apart.  This one was with my Ebony view camera and a longer 210mm lens.  The same #25 Red filter was used to increase contrast, though development was Normal, in Rodinal 1:50 for 8:00 minutes.

In Focus Photo 2025

On February 7th Margarit and I went out for lunch with our friends Laura and Louis.  After lunch we headed out to the Wild Skies Gallery at the Edmonton International Airport to attend the InFocus Photo show.  The opening party was on this evening, and many of the photographers were in attendance.

Of course I had scrambled to get my print ready, due to the challenges of working with a broken leg, and managed to get it delivered, beyond the deadline, but just in advance of the opening.  Louis also had some of his images in the exhibition.  He shoots color digital, mostly landscape, and has some very strong images.  Last year he won Landscape Photographer of the year.  

The Monochrome Guild was very well represented at the exhibition and Arturo, Steve, Meghan, Gord and I were all there.  This time around Meghan won for Landscape Photographer of the year.

Here is a link to the website for anyone that it interested in checking it out.  The show is actually in three different gallery spaces... the one at the airport, as well as two out in Stony Plain.  I hope to get to the ones in Stony Plain before this years version of the show comes to an end in April.

https://www.infocusphoto.ca/

Image 6 - First Utah Trip - Cottonwood Creek

I continue with editing of the images from my numerous trips to Utah.  I'm a little undecided as to exactly how I will put together the photo album/book project that I am considering.  Pehaps it will come to me as I continue to work with the images.  The main question at the moment is.... do I include all of the images, or just feature the very best ones.....?

This is another image from our first day trip, after Rob and Brad and I arrived in southern Utah in 2013.  We had rented a house for the week in Kanab, which is central to a whole bunch of fantastic places.  Each day we would set out from there, exploring.

This is the dry wash of Cottonwood Creek, near Cottonwood Canyon Road, in the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.  I shot this one on October 14th 2013, at about 2:30 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony view camera and a wide, Schneider 80mm Lens.  A #25 Red Filter was added to increase contrast.  The film was Kodak Tri-X Pan 320, rated at box speed and given normal development in PMK developer.  The film was developed on my Jobo Processor for 9:35 minutes at 20C.

Back to the Darkroom... finally....

Over the first few days of February I spent a little time in my darkroom.  I had about 50 to 60 film holders that still had exposed film in them, from late 2024.  I unloaded them all, and put the film away in boxes to await development.  Then I reloaded all the film holders with fresh film.  With this out of my way, on February 7th, I was able to set up and process a batch of film, for the first time this year.

It was a batch of Kodak T-Max 1000, developed in 510 Pyro.  Most of the shots were from 2023, including about ten that were from the trip to Vancouver Island in that fall.  There were a couple from 2024.  Once the film is washed and dried I will be scanning and posting some images.

Then on February 9th I processed a second batch of film.  This was Ilford HP5+, also developed in 510 Pyro.  This was a mix of stuff, some from outings last fall, some from the first trip to Saskatchewan in June, and a few from Beer Parlour Project outings.  For the pictorial images I rated the film at 320 iso and developed for 7:25 minutes.  For the Beer Parlour stuff, I rated the film at 1250 iso... so significantly underexposed... and developed for 30:00 minutes.

Below are a couple of snapshots taken with my phone.  The first is a shot of my stainless steel film hangers in the individual processing tanks [in the background], with the batch of 20 sheets of Ilford HP5+ in the film washer [in the foreground].  The second snapshot is of all of my 4" x 5" sheet film holders piled up on my mat cutter, waiting to be put away.  Each holder is individually bagged in an anti-static bag, and there is a note sheet written up for each one, indicating what film is loaded.

Image 5 - First Utah Trip - Cottonwoods

I continue with editing images for my Utah photo album.  This is image number five, from the first trip down to Utah.  This one, like the previous four, was from our first day trip when Rob and Brad and I explored Cottonwood Canyon Road, in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.  The road takes its name from Cottonwood Creek, which it follows for much of the way.  This is a shot of a grove of those magnificent trees, down along the creek.  At the time of our visit in the fall, the creek was dry.

I shot this image on Fuji Neopan Acros 100 rated at 64 iso.  I used my Ebony view camera and a wide 80mm lens.  A #25 Red Filter deepened the sky and made the leaves stand out a little more.  Development was in Rodinal 1:50 for 8:00 minutes.  This image was taken on October 14th 2013, at about 2:00 in the afternoon.  The exposure was for 1/2 second at F18.0.

Image 4 - First Utah Trip - The Cockscomb

In between other things that I am finally able to begin doing, as the recovery from my broken fibula progresses, I am continuing to edit the photos for my Utah photo album project.

This photo, like the previous three, was from our first day of exploring, after our arrival in southern Utah.  Rob and Brad and I took a drive down the Cottonwood Canyon Road in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.  This shot is a formation in an area called The Cockscomb.  It was taken on October 14 2013, at about 1:00 in the afternoon.  I used my Ebony view camera and a Fujinon 125mm lens.  The film was a 4x5 sheet of Kodak Tri-X Pan 320, processed normally in PMK developer.  A #25 Red Filter increased contrast, and darkened the blue sky.

The Winners - Humphrey Dumptrucks

On February 5th Margarit and I paid our usual Wednesday evening visit to our local neighborhood pub, Mimi's.  Every Wednesday they host trivia night, and when we are available, we attend.  We usually do pretty well with general knowledge questions and classic music.  We are terrible with modern music and don't do well with questions about video games, technology or celebrities.  The event has been taking place for a couple of years now, and is getting very popular.  If you don't get there early, or reserve a table, sometimes you don't get in.

There are a couple of teams that seem to win most of the time.  They generally are larger groups, with a mix of young and old players.  We just go for fun, and are satisfied if we don't come in last place.  Sometimes friends and family come out and play on our team.

Every team has to have a name, and we have been calling ourselves Humphrey Dumptrucks, after an old 70's rock band from Saskatoon called Humphrey and the Dumptrucks.  This time around we brought a bunch of people to play on our team.  Margarit's friend Cathy and her husband Ken [in the Oilers jerseys], our friends Arturo and Sharon, and their son Camilo.  Between the seven of us we seemed to have a pretty good handle on most of the questions.

There were about 12 teams playing and by the end of the six rounds we were tied for first place with a team called Skunk Den... both of us with 45 points.  These guys are regular players and one of the teams that often wins.  It came down to a tie breaker question, which was, how many pounds of poop does the average adult expel in a year.  The team with the closest guess, without going over, would win.  We guessed 350 Lbs., and won.  I't not sure what Skunk Den guessed by the correct answer was 380.  We all thought it was kind of fitting that a team named Dumptrucks would win on a question based on taking a dump.  We got to write our name on the Sticky Note stuck to the trophy... until next week, and also got a Coors jersey and a $25 gift card.  We will return next week to defend our title.

In our years of playing I won the event once before, that was in the early days, when the turnout was not very big.  My neighbor Brian and I won a couple of beer glasses.  But since then, and until now, we have not been able to repeat that victory.

Busted

This is the x-ray image taken back on December 30th that confirmed that I had fractured my fibula.  This was after I had been walking on it for almost two weeks.  The foot and ankle bones were beginning to push up into the distal end of the tibia and the fibula and spreading the joint.  I was put under a general anesthetic at the emergency ward of the Grey Nuns Hospital later that day and they reset this break, and put a splint onto my leg.  Ever since then I have been living the adventure of surgery and healing and recovering from this.  Can't wait to ditch the crutches and start walking again.  And to get back on skates.

Got My Lawn Mowed

With my broken leg continuing to heal, I am able to do more and more.  I'm still on crutches, and not supposed to put much weight on my leg yet.  But I have been putting a little pressure on it, mostly just for balance and for maneuvering around on the crutches.  I have taken a few light steps on it, but not really any walking.

On February 5th I just needed to get out of the house.  It had warmed up a bit from the cold temperatures we had experienced in previous days, but it was still -20C.  I really wanted to start my truck and take it for a drive.  It had been parked since December 19th, the day after I broke my leg.  I've started it a few times off an on, just to keep the battery charged and the oil circulated, but it has not been driven.

I got Hailey to give me a hand to plug the block heater in, and then I let it sit for a couple of hours before attempting to start it.  It fired up right away.  It still had a little over a quarter tank of fuel left, from my last trip out to Nordegg in early December.

I hobbled out to the truck on crutches, managed to stow them in the back seat, and the drove with my air boot on my foot.  It was a little clumsy, but its a big truck, with large pedals, and lots of foot room, so it wasn't really a problem.

I drove over to the X-ray clinic where my original images were taken back on December 30th.  I picked up a memory stick with image files on it.  I wanted to have a copy to remind myself of the perils of not checking injuries out properly.  Margarit came along for the ride.

After that I went over to the barber shop and got a haircut.  It was either that, or a dog license...!  It was getting to the point that I needed a haircut back in December when I first hurt myself.  Now, two months later it was getting pretty shaggy.  For a while there I was not able to take a shower every day, and laying around on the sofa all the time saw my hair turn into a tangled mess.  It felt really good to be able to get my lawn mowed.  And, now that my leg is healing, I'm also able to take a shower every day.... a huge relief...!

Image 3 - First Utah Trip - Dead Yucca

Here's another image from the album of photographs that I am putting together from my Utah trips in 2013, 2014 and 2015.  This one was on the same day trip as the previous two images, as my friends Rob and Brad and I explored the Cottonwood Canyon Road in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.  It was fall, and the temperature at night, at these high elevations, dropped below freezing.  This yucca plant had died back for the season.

I took this photograph on a sheet of Fuji Neopan Acros 100, which I developed in Rodinal Developer, 1:50.  I shot with my Ebony view camera and a long Fujinon 240mm lens.  No filter was used, and the exposure was for 1/2 second at F64.0.

February Image - David Thompson Country Calendar

This is the image that I selected for the February page of my 2025 David Thompson Country calendar.  I was drawn to the shape of this aspen tree, and the way it stood out in the winter sun, against the background of darker evergreen trees.  It was right beside the David Thompson Highway, near the Bighorn First Nation.

Image 2 - First Utah Trip - Fallen Slab

I will slowly continue to share all of the images from my trips to Utah and northern Arizona.  It will be a long, drawn out process, as there are over 150 images.  I will mix these in with other current projects and outing that I hope to be working on, as soon as I fully recover from my broken leg.

This fallen slab of rock was not far from the Rockfall image that I previously posted yesterday.  Sadly there are some tire tracks in the foreground, and some power lines in the left background, that spoil the shot to a certain degree.  I would probably never print this one, but may include it in my album.

I shot this on Kodak Tri-X Pan 320, rated at 320 iso and given Normal Development in PMK.  Development time was for 9:35 minutes, on my Jobo Processor, at 20C.  I shot this on October 14th 2013, at about 11:00 in the morning, with my Ebony view camera, a Fujinon 125mm lens, and a #58 Green Filter.  I hoped that the green filter might increase separation in the tones of the red rocks.

USA Roadtrips

With all the chaos taking place since the term of Donald Trump as American President began, it will be quite some time before I am willing to consider visiting the United States.  The mindless tariff war that he has commenced will hurt citizens on both sides of the border, not to mention all the other countries that he has targeted.  I suspect that he doesn't really give a rats ass about the common man, and this is all about stroking his ego, and making all his friends rich.

I made three road trips down to the United States over a decade ago.  All three times I stayed at the same rental home in Kanab, Utah and explored southern Utah and northern Arizona with my camera.  In October of 2013 I travelled with my friends Rob and Brad.  Then in the spring of 2014 I took Margarit and the girls down with me.  And in October of 2015 I made a return visit with Rob and Brad.

I decided to put together a photo book of all of the best images that I shot while on those three trips.  These are all Black and White film images taken with my 4"x5" view camera.  This is not really so much a book as it is a photo album.  I guess you could say it is a self published book, but I only plan on printing one copy.  If someone that was with me on those trips sees the book and likes it and wants a copy, then I may have an additional one(s) printed.  But that seems highly unlikely.

Over the coming days and weeks I will share some of those images here on my blog, beginning with this one.  This is the first image I shot on that first trip in 2013.

This Rock Fall is along the Cottonwood Canyon Road in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, Utah.  The road generally parellels the Paria River, at least at the southern end.  I shot this on Fuji Neopan Acros 100 film, rated at 64iso and given normal development in Rodinal 1:50.  I used my Ebony view camera and a Fujinon 125mm lens, fitted with a #25 Red Filter.  It was taken on October 14th 2013, at about 10:30 in the morning.

Groundhog Day

From Wikipedia... "Groundhog day is a tradition observed regionally in the United States and Canada on February 2nd of every year. It derives from the Pennsylvania Dutch superstition that if a groundhog emerges from its burrow on this day and sees its shadow, it will retreat to its den and winter will go on for six more weeks. If it does not see its shadow, spring will arrive early:"

In Germany the Badger is the forecasting animal, while in Hungary, the bear serves the same purpose.

Also from Wikipedia... "The groundhog (Marmota monax), also known as the woodchuck, is a rodent of the family Sciuridae, belonging to the group of large ground squirrels known as marmots. A lowland creature of North America it is found through much of the Eastern United States, across Canada, and into Alaska. The groundhog is an extremely intelligent animal forming complex social networks and kinship with its young. It is capable of understanding social behavior, communicating threats through whistling and working cooperatively to accomplish tasks such as burrowing."

"Common names for the groundhog include chuck, wood-shock, groundpig, whistle-pig, whistler, thickwood badger, Canada marmot, monax, moonack, weenusk, red monk and land beaver. French Canadians referred to the animal as siffleux. Young groundhogs may be called chucklings. The name Woodchuck is unrelated to wood or any sense of chucking. It stems from an algonquian name for the animal, wuchak. The similarity between the words has led to the popular tongue twister..."

How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood.

A woodchuck would chuck all the wood he could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood.

Here in Edmonton today it is -25C, with a cold breeze and about six inches of fresh snow. It is hazy and overcast at the moment, but looks as though we may see a little sun later. There would be a chance of a groundhog seeing its shadow, but as they are intelligent animals, its doubtful that any in these parts will venture out of their burrows.

We had a pair of groundhogs living in our woodpile out in Nordegg. These were a very dark color phase of the animal that is more commonly a lighter brown. Our neighbors named her Shadow. She had a couple of chucklings in the wood pile one year, and then afterwards we didn't see any of them for quite some time. More recently, I've seen one this past year in another of our woodpiles. It is dark in color as well, so perhaps it is Shadow, or one of her offspring. The snapshot below was taken behind our cottage in April of 2021.