One Week Absence

I was back in Edmonton for about a week, and just headed back out to Nordegg on the morning of Thursday June 10th.  I went out by myself, but the girls will be joining me on for the weekend.

While I was back in the city I managed to catch up on a whole bunch of chores.  I started with a day trip out to do a little photography, with my friend Arturo.  After that I dug into a whole bunch of chores.  This included making some prints for the Beehive Artisan Market, paying bills and attending several meetings.  We toured a school that we will potentially enroll Annelise in this fall, and I took my Mom to an appointment.

A lot happened out at Nordegg while I was away.  First of all there was the weather.  We got yet another spring snow storm, this one dumping about 3 inches of wet snow.  That was followed by about 1-1/2 inches of rain, over several days.  This certainly should be good for all the seedlings that we just planted a week ago.  I didn't leave my sump pump turned on this time, because I had issues with it last time.  Our "sump" actually consists of a vertical length of culvert run down to the level of our weeping tile.  The weeping tile can't naturally drain away from the foundation of the cottage because of the slope of the bedrock.  Last time the vibrations of the pump pulled the drain hose down into the sump.  The pump was running and running and just recirculating the same water.  So this time I didn't leave it turned on.  The sump was pretty full, and there was a puddle of water about 1/2 an inch deep in the low spot of our basement, when I arrived. Fortunately it is not a true basement, and we only have a gravel floor, so there was no damage.  I have figured out where the low spot is and make sure to not leave any "stuff" on the floor in this location.

Just as I arrived the septic tank was being delivered and placed in the excavation on our property next door.  I took a bunch of pictures of it for the permit inspector.

My contractor Scott brought in a processor last week.  It is a large machine that cuts logs up to firewood length.  They ran my whole log pile through, plus a bunch neighboring properties as well.  There are some short ends that the machine can't handle, so I still have a little bit to cut with the saw.  Before the rain hit Scott managed to get his crew out to build the forms for the footings.  That is now complete so as soon as things dry off a little, we will be able to get some concrete poured.  Then the real construction will begin...!!!

Artisan Market

Some local residents in Nordegg just opened a new business.  Over the winter a new building was constructed beside the Shell Station.  The Miner's Cafe moved from the old school house museum, to one half of this new building.  The Beehive Artisan Market set up in the other side.  It is a really cool little shop that sells all sorts of artisan products.  There are t-shirts and clothing items, paintings, metal sculptures and photographs.  They also have a selection of organic produce in coolers, and some other food items.  There is a lot of tourist traffic here over the warmer months so I think they should do quite well.

I approached the owners and asked if they would be interested in showing my black and white photography.  They were, and it turns out that the owner already knows of me.  He is friends with two members of the Monochrome Guild and has been out to some of our group shows back in Edmonton, in years past.   The acceptance was just a formality and they told me that they expected it was only a matter of time before I approached them.

So, I will be putting a bunch of my prints on consignment.  These will be 11" x 14" prints to start, which I will follow up with some smaller 8" x 10" ones.  Depending on how much interest there is, I may also do some larger ones.  The prints will be dry mounted and matted and presented unframed in crystal bags.  Unframed prints are faster and more economical for me to produce, and help to keep the selling price down.  I will mount them to standard sizes so that the buyer can purchase their own inexpensive frame... assuming anything sells.  Kind of have to try and find a sweet spot as far as price goes so that I can still make a decent return after paying the commission to the market.  Plus, they don't have a lot of available wall space at the market to hang up all the artwork that is available.  A tabletop display is necessary.  I've never been involved in photography for the money, but believe that my work is good enough that is should command a reasonable price.  There are quite a few hours of work that go into making prints and mounting them, not to mention the artistic ability to create the image in the first place.  Film, chemistry, paper and matboard are all becoming very expensive.

When I was back home in the city from June 2nd to 10th I spent two days down in my darkroom and made 34 prints, 11" x 14", from eight different negatives.  The snapshots below are of the prints as I worked on them.  On June 9 and 10 I spent two days clearing, toning, washing and drying all the prints.  I hung them up to dry and laid them out on screens just before I headed back out to Nordegg.  Unfortunately they were not ready to bring along, but the Beehive is OK with me bringing them out in a week or so.  Their official grand opening is on June 26 and there will be a big event with Edmonton musician Bill Bourne playing over at the Community Hall.

Three More

Here are three more scans of the recently processed 8x10 negatives.  This is part of the same batch of Ilford HP5 film that I processed in D76 developer.  I also have a second batch of T-Max 100 that I have just finished processing.  These negatives are currently in my film washer and will be scanned and shared in the coming days.

Fresh Batch of 8x10 Negatives

I just finished processing a batch of 8x10 film.  This was eleven sheets of Ilford HP5+ film that I processed in Kodak D-76 Developer.  I'm not crazy about this particular combination and will look to try something different next time.  The negatives are OK, but they are a little heavy and flat.

I've included scans of three of the negatives from this batch.  My scanner does not do a great job with large 8x10 negatives.  There is no frame, or nothing to put pressure on the film and keep it flat.  The edges tend to curl a little, and some light creeps around the edge.  When the negative is inverted to a positive this light becomes a bit of a shadow.  Its not evident in all of the scans, but it shows up in some of them.  I may try to rescan these at a later date.

All of these images were taken in 2021 on various day trips that I went out on.  My friends from the Monochrome Guild were along with me on most of these outings.  I still have not gotten around to setting up the 8x10 enlarger that I bought years ago.  In the short term I look forward to contact printing some of these negatives.  Likely by some sort of alternative process.

These processes involve coating a sheet of art paper with a light senstive emulsion, made from raw chemicals.  The paper is coated, and then the negative is place directly onto the paper.  The materials are then exposed to a UV light source... either a UV light box, or just the sun.  An image then prints out onto the emulsion with the exposure to light.  Once the desired density is reached, the print is finished by a washing and sometimes a clearing.  The methods vary a little depending on the process being undertaken.  I have the chemistry necessary to attempt Van Dyke Brown, Ziatype, Cyanotype and Callitype prints.  There are numerous other ones that I may also attempt at some point.  Stay tuned for more...

Thresher and Old House

In 2020 the Monochrome Guild members were not able to get away for our annual Fall Photo Weekend. Like so many other things, this event was a victim of the Covid pandemic.   To keep the tradition alive, we attempted a couple of day trips.  The first one was under less than ideal condition on October 20th of 2020.  It was cold and windy and the light was pretty flat.  I took this photograph at one of our first stops of the day.  It turned out alright, but I had to crop it to a panorama to get rid of the blank boring sky.  We went out for a second day trip a couple of days later and were faced with slightly better conditions.  Hopefully in 2021 we are able to consider our weekend outing and hopefully most of the Guild members can attend.  This tradition has been ongoing for around 20 years now and it always a lot of fun to get out as a group.

A Drive to the Southeast

My friend Arturo and I decided to head out for a day trip on Thursday June 3rd.  We elected to head back down to the southeast of the city.  We had explored this area a few weeks prior with our friends Court and Fred.  On that trip we ran out of time, and didn't have the opportunity to check out a few things that we saw, mostly on the way back home.  

We were headed in the general direction of the badlands and coal mines in Paintearth County, but never made it quite that far.  Our first stop was an old abandoned baseball diamond.  I hopped the fence and began to walk down towards the backstop.  But, there were a number of goats and sheep in that pasture and they quickly headed over to check me out.  I thought it best to make a hasty exit and never got to check out the sports field.

Later we made a stop at an old abandoned hilltop homestead.  The majestic old house was significantly overgrown with carraganas and lilacs.  We took a couple of photos here before moving on.  Later we found another old homestead.  It was located right beside the road, but also adjacent to a small creek down in a broad coulee.  We spent a great deal of time photographing here as both the interior and exterior of the old home were visually interesting.

Once we wrapped things up here we turned back in the general direction of home.  We checked out a number of small towns along the way including Meeting Creek, Edberg and New Norway.  Just when it seemed we had run out of subject matter we stumbled across an old abandoned community hall.  This one was very unique.  It consisted of a gable style roof built immediately upon a concrete foundation.  The foundation extended only a couple of feet above grade and there were no framed walls.  It was much like a bunker or a bomb shelter.  On this day when the temperature got up to 30C, it was very cool and pleasant down in that foundation.  The walls were decorated with a lot of really colorful graffiti and we took a couple of photos down there before eventually making our way back home.  We had a short outside visit on my patio back home, and shared a couple of beverages before Arturo made his way back to his place.  A very enjoyable day once again, and I hope I created a couple of worthwhile photographs.  Time will tell, when I get around to processing my film.  Although I brought both 4x5 and 8x10 cameras with me, I only ended up shooting with the smaller 4x5.  I exposed around 15 sheets of film and I'm hoping for one or two keepers.

Winch Motor

Another sheet of Kodak T-Max 100 from the recent batch of 4x5 sheet film processed in 510 Pyro.  This developer is one that I make from scratch using raw chemicals.  The formula was invented by Seattle based photographer Jay DeFehr.  

This shot is of a vandalized winch motor.  Thieves ripped this apart to steal all the copper wire.  This motor was once used to winch mine cars up and down a tramway at the Greenhill Coal Mine.  The winch building included these motors, and some huge cable spools with a large brake system.  The Greenhill Mine is located near the town of Blairmore, in Crowsnest Pass.

I was visiting there with several friends in the late spring of 2019.  Some of the images that were taken on that trip will be used in our upcoming "Coal in Alberta" exhibition.

May Game Camera Photos

When Anna and I left the cottage on June 2nd, I pulled the memory card from the game camera.  The deer have not been coming around nearly as much... but are still common.  I think the construction activity in the area is keeping them away a little.  And, there is no shortage of food now that spring has fully arrived.  And, the females are about to have their fawns, so they are probably staying in hiding for a bit, until the little ones are mobile.  Sure look forward to seeing some of them in the coming weeks.

The Red Fox seems to be a regular visitor.  Anna and I saw it one day as it wandered about the yard.  The game camera must have captured well over 30 photos of it through the month of May.  The bucks are starting to see their antlers increase in size and they now have those rather goofy looking velvet knobs sticking out of their heads.

Sideboard

I shot this image back in early May, when I was out on a day trip with my friends Court, Fred and Arturo.  This is the interior of an old abandoned house in Camrose County.  We stopped here on our way down to the Diplomat Mine site and the Paintearth badlands.  I shot this on Kodak T-Max 100 with my Ebony 4x5 view camera.  I used a wide 90mm lens to include as much of the room as possible.  I'm quite happy with the way this one turned out.

Envoy

The Envoy brand name was created by General Motors Canada.  It was assigned to Vauxhall and Bedford vehicles imported from England for the Canadian Market, from 1959 to 1970.  I believe this particular vehicle is an Envoy Epic from the mid 1960's.  I took this shot back in mid-April when Arturo and I were out exploring in Lamont County.  I previously posted some snapshots from that day trip but this is the first of the film images that I have processed.