Holme Fen: Retakes
Another early morning. A very dull overcast day, at least it was dry and about 8 degrees C so comfortable. It seemed calm but when I got out of the car I felt a cold breeze. Not good as it was quite dark despite the sun being over the horizon and I would have some long exposures. The breeze died so I carried on having come all this way. I had loaded up some FP4+, HP5+ black and white and some Ektar color film.
I was down here today to retake the fallen oak I had found before Christmas.
I quickly found the old tree again just off the trail. I kicked myself at this point as I had wanted to review my old blog post on the original photo to remember the new crop I felt would more effective in retrospect. In any case I should be able to visualize it now. I used my viewfinder app set for my 210 mm lens from near the same position I was in last time with my 90mm. I could see problems on the right where some pine branches interrupted the flow of the dead oak branches. I adjusted my position and setup my camera wit the 210mm lens.
Composing on the ground glass revealed I was still too close so I moved back 6 feet or so to get the best lines of the oak and catch the twisty tree in the back that complements the straight paler lines of the oak.
I then proceeded to meter at ASA 80 which is what I shoot FP4+ at. It was really overcast as I was getting a max Ev on the log at about 5! The meter said f22 at 1 minute. Reciprocity app translated this to 6 minutes 49 seconds. So I went for it. Set the shutter to T, aperture to f22, closed the shutter then hit the shutter release.
Since the exposure was almost 7 minutes I set another timer on my phone to sound an alarm at 5 minutes in case I got distracted. I thought I might wander about to pass the time but then I remembered the peat soil here transmits motion really easily. I worried it might move the tripod so I stayed in place and meditated a bit and soaked in the sounds and smells of the forest.
It was somewhere near the end of this long exposure that I remembered I really don't trust the reciprocity app for Ilford films. For instance the Ilford datasheet for FP4+ gives a formula time exp 1.26. For this exposure metered at 1 minute this would be 60 exp 1.26 or 174 second or 2 minutes 54 seconds. Much less than the app gives. Alas it was too late so I let the exposure timeout. Turns out this would have been useful to know in this instance as the wind picked up and the big fern began to move right in the last couple of minutes of the exposure. Here is the result.
I decided to shoot another sheet of FP4+ but with my revised reciprocity calculation and wait for a breeze-free interval. This time however I found I did something wrong with my film loading and the dark slide met some resistance. When I removed the film holder the sheet of film was outside the darkslide! In retrospect I should have pulled the camera off the tripod and put it in the changing bag and fixed the problem. Impatience can be a problem for me.
Now I was out of FP4+ but that's OK as the HP5+ at 400 ASA is faster which should help with the breeze even more. I decided to shoot one sheet at box speed and develop normally and then push the second sheet to ASA 800 having never tried this.
The first sheet metered f22 at 8 seconds, I shot it at 9 seconds (should have been 15 seconds). This turned out well. I used my phone to photograph that side of the film holder so I would know which sheet was which when it came to developing.
Finally the pushed HP5+. The sun was getting up somewhere behind the clouds so it was good to keep checking the exposure. F22 was 4 seconds now with reciprocity of 4 exp 1.31 is about 6 seconds. This really steers clear of the breeze problem. I developed this in HC110. There were two times in Massive Dev chart dilution B pushed to ASA 800. I opted for the longest time of 10 minutes as the shorter time did note seem enough different. This too turned out nice. One great advantage of sheet film is the ability to vary development from image to image. Roll film you have to shoot and develop all at one speed.
It is difficult to see significant differences between the scanned and adjusted images above. In large format even the grain is difficult to use to differentiate between the photos. And unfortunately my failed second FP4+ image did not give the chance to see the difference in reciprocity calculations between Ilford guidance and the app. My experience in the past with the app is it does over-expose in my opinion and it gives much longer times than Ilford recommends. However if I look at the raw scans (negative images) the differences are apparent. Below I have a screenshot of Adobe Elements with all 3 raw images.
Upper left is the first image in FP4+ using the reciprocity app exposure. Below it is the second photo with a miscalculated too short exposure. The larger one on the right is the negative pushed to ASA 800 and with the proper reciprocity. (The thumbnails at the bottom follow the same order left to right.)
There are too many variables to draw perfect conclusions but it seems clear the app gives an overexposed image. I can also see the pushed image is probably the best exposure. All three seem printable however when I look at then. Detail holds up in the shadows in all cases. There is not much dynamic range if you exclude the small patches of sky between the branches owing to the overcast.
Finally with respect to my objective of re-shooting the subject with a better composition I think the trip was a success. I did explore a bit more but with only color to shoot and it being very gray out I decided to pack up and call it a day.
I was down here today to retake the fallen oak I had found before Christmas.
I quickly found the old tree again just off the trail. I kicked myself at this point as I had wanted to review my old blog post on the original photo to remember the new crop I felt would more effective in retrospect. In any case I should be able to visualize it now. I used my viewfinder app set for my 210 mm lens from near the same position I was in last time with my 90mm. I could see problems on the right where some pine branches interrupted the flow of the dead oak branches. I adjusted my position and setup my camera wit the 210mm lens.
Composing on the ground glass revealed I was still too close so I moved back 6 feet or so to get the best lines of the oak and catch the twisty tree in the back that complements the straight paler lines of the oak.
I then proceeded to meter at ASA 80 which is what I shoot FP4+ at. It was really overcast as I was getting a max Ev on the log at about 5! The meter said f22 at 1 minute. Reciprocity app translated this to 6 minutes 49 seconds. So I went for it. Set the shutter to T, aperture to f22, closed the shutter then hit the shutter release.
Since the exposure was almost 7 minutes I set another timer on my phone to sound an alarm at 5 minutes in case I got distracted. I thought I might wander about to pass the time but then I remembered the peat soil here transmits motion really easily. I worried it might move the tripod so I stayed in place and meditated a bit and soaked in the sounds and smells of the forest.
It was somewhere near the end of this long exposure that I remembered I really don't trust the reciprocity app for Ilford films. For instance the Ilford datasheet for FP4+ gives a formula time exp 1.26. For this exposure metered at 1 minute this would be 60 exp 1.26 or 174 second or 2 minutes 54 seconds. Much less than the app gives. Alas it was too late so I let the exposure timeout. Turns out this would have been useful to know in this instance as the wind picked up and the big fern began to move right in the last couple of minutes of the exposure. Here is the result.
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| Ilford FP4+ f22 6'49" exposure ASA 80 |
Now I was out of FP4+ but that's OK as the HP5+ at 400 ASA is faster which should help with the breeze even more. I decided to shoot one sheet at box speed and develop normally and then push the second sheet to ASA 800 having never tried this.
The first sheet metered f22 at 8 seconds, I shot it at 9 seconds (should have been 15 seconds). This turned out well. I used my phone to photograph that side of the film holder so I would know which sheet was which when it came to developing.
 |
| Ilford HP5+ f22 9" exposure ASA 400 |
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| Ilford HP5+ f22 6" exposure ASA 800 |
Upper left is the first image in FP4+ using the reciprocity app exposure. Below it is the second photo with a miscalculated too short exposure. The larger one on the right is the negative pushed to ASA 800 and with the proper reciprocity. (The thumbnails at the bottom follow the same order left to right.)
There are too many variables to draw perfect conclusions but it seems clear the app gives an overexposed image. I can also see the pushed image is probably the best exposure. All three seem printable however when I look at then. Detail holds up in the shadows in all cases. There is not much dynamic range if you exclude the small patches of sky between the branches owing to the overcast.
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| Best crop from previous visit. (for comparison) |
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