MorseBlog

I am catching up on some work these past couple of days now that my initial digital intensity has subsided. A result of my earlier project around Houghton meadows was that there were some printable images that I wanted to lith print. One did not turn out well, but a couple of others did.  One obvious candidate was the Heron viewed through the reeds in the water. I printed this conventionally to include in my photo books. The negative does not have much contrast despite being pushed because of the mist and early morning light. The conventional print was done entirely on the #5 filter, and I was not able to get completely black shadows without losing the highlights in the water. I compromised somewhere in the middle. It makes for a good print despite this as the print reflects the conditions on a foggy morning. I made some lith prints on Oriental Seagull paper as well as Fohar Raster which I have to think of as having more soul especially when toned. Since the Rater paper is 5x7" (...

As I started to write my post on Chromogenic film I realized I was digging deeper into the whole subject of printing C41 negatives and the reason why Chromogenic black and white film exists. It just so happens I had finished a couple of rolls of film in my Mamiya 645 Pro.  These rolls violated one of my rules of mixing color and black and white shooting in the same session. The great thing was I had some photos of the same subject taken back-to-back on both black and white film (Ilford HP5+) and color negative (Kodak Portra 400).  Here is the color version.  When I first got into film photography (over 10 years ago!) I preferred reversal (slide film) over color negative film. I had struggled to get good colors with scanned negative film. Eventually I learned enough to know how to get good color correction on color negative scans. After I came back to color negative f...

We are entering summer now and what I call the 'tyranny of green'. It is never a very productive time for capturing new images for me. I tend to stick with black and white as a result and spend more time in the darkroom as well. Ironic in that when the weather is nicer I find myself in s small darkened room! I have been taking a few photos with my Mamiya 645 after I had some meter problems which I adjusted. I broke my rule about not shooting black and white and color at the same time. I find each requires a different mind set and alternating film backs can be confusing and not very satisfying.  So I accumulated a roll of images on Kodak Portra 400 over the past month plus. I have a parallel roll of black and white I am not quite through the roll however. Despite mostly being snaps without any real intent artistically a few images came out well. I took most of these with my 150mm f3.5 lens sometimes with the 2x teleconverter. One image was with my 80mm f1.9 which is the widest l...

Since my series of posts on the Mathematical Trees prints   I had given some thought to the idea that there might be other compositions or viewpoints that might give up different interpretations of the image. I was stymied by the idea that what worked was the snow on the ground in terms of the making of a minimal image. Failing snow in the weather forecast I filed the idea away in my head.  This morning I was up very early relieving myself and peeked out the window as there was fairly bright light with the full moon. There was a thick fog apparent so I set my alarm for a couple of hours hence. As I fell asleep I laid my plans to make a quick return visit. The alarm sounded and I quickly got dressed and hurriedly gathered my gear.  A little too hurriedly it turns out as I left my tripod plate on my Fuji 690. The fog was thick when I arrived and perhaps a little too much. It was cold about -3 degrees C. I brought one roll of Ilford FP4+ as I wanted to be back home for break...