MorseBlog

Last September I made a couple of posts about using my Fuji G617 panoramic camera for intimate landscapes. Part of this was to try and defeat the summer photography blues. I got some rather good results.  Now I am facing another photography drought and Spring has arrived, and I have never really known what to do with Spring photography. Indeed, Spring and Summer are the worst seasons for me. Fall has color, Winter has forms, and both have frost and fog. Right now, we are at peak bluebell season. I find photographing flowers generally unsatisfying, and bluebells are a bit of a cliche even though they are amazing to walk amongst this time of year. Don't get me wrong they really are spectacular, but I really haven't gotten an image of them that makes me say 'wow'.  And so, I find myself out on a brilliant and cool spring morning that quickly warmed as the sun rose. The bluebells are spectacular right now in Monk's wood and are accompanied by Wood Anemones, Celandines, ...

This is a long rambling post. You have been warned... A New 75mm f4.5 Lens The Lens Nikon 75mm f4.5 SW I bought a 75mm lens for my Intrepid 4x5 fof eBay from Japan. My motivation was to replace my much heavier 90mm Fujinon SWD lens. It is a technically great lens but has much more movement than I need and weighs more than my other lenses.   Now I have purchased 3 similar lenses (90mm, 150m, and 210mm) along with my Fuji GW690III all from Japan through eBay with no trouble. Each was in excellent working order and excellent condition.  This time, however, my experience was different. I waited a week or so for shipping and to clear customs. (In the UK you pay about 20% VAT which FedEx invoiced me for.) The lens arrived well packed, and I opened it up and found it looked to be in immaculate condition. No scratches in the paint or signs of wear were evident on the lens body. The glass was in excellent condition. I fired the shutter at each speed, and they sounded correct. The ...

Out again this morning with more fog in the forecast. It was clear as we drove down it was light to non-existent. Mollie and I carried on as we love walking there especially on crisp frosty morning. We parked in our usual place but instead of heading into the forest I opted to head south and scout the southern edge of the western coverts. Often overlooked and parts of which I have never walked. I was determined not to shoot as many bad images as in the first (and perhaps the second as I don't have that film back yet) frost session. I am feeling my way into this different situation.  The sun came up as we walked down this southern edges across the open fields casting warm light across the fields and into the forest grazing the tops of the canal-side reeds. Lots of lovely views but nothing I could build an image around.  I ran into my second photographer and we acknowledged each other as I turned southward again. I rounded the first turn back into th...

I took this photo on the same day as the earlier print Rising Mist . It was a bright cold morning with mist rising from the frosty forest floor. This one was a bit more challenging to print. Again bright sunlight emanates from the top left so offers a range of light. I started with tst strips. This time I decided to divide the print in half and print soft filter intervals along the top and hard filter along ghe bottom.  f32 Test Soft filter Top Hard filter bottom Intervals on top 8-64" 1/2 stop intervals right to left I looked at the soft filter and saw it didn't look soft enough so I miss-guessed the aperture and should have opted for f45. I made a guess at f45 for the soft filter at 11 seconds which is 1/2 stop less than the lightest strip from above. I then applied a hard filter test strip acorss this guess. f45 Test strip #00 1 second base exposure Hard filter intervals 8-64" 1/2 stop intervals right to left.  Rightmost band has no hard filter applied.  .This provide...

I recently took this photo on HP5+ 4x5 film with my Intrepid large format camera. I thought this would be a difficult negative to print given the range of light and texture. However, it was fairly straightforward. Blog Post Cover Image  Started out with a matrix test print. I seem to try different test print/strip strategies. Sometimes I run small strips for each filter (hard and soft). Sometimes the Les McClean method of soft then overlay hard test strip on a print with the best soft filter choice base. They each have their strengths and weaknesses. Matrix Test f32 (Scan7) Soft (#00) right to left 8-64" 1/2 stop intervals Hard (#5) bottom to top 8-64" 1/2 stop intervals   In this case the variation light makes this matrix print difficult to judge. For the soft filter I am looking for the right level of white tones. I can usually count on the hard filter to not impact highlights until the longest exposures.  So I know the bottom horizontal strips are mostly soft filt...

I finished a conventional version of this print and now it is time to have some more fun and explore what lith can do for the image. I like printing foggy images in lith as you can get a nice contrast increase and the rich tonality can give unexpected results. This time I have further motivation as I picked up 10 sheets each of Forte Polywarmtone and Oriental Seagull Exhibition paper in 16x20 size.  Oriental Seagull is a well-known lithable paper and I have enjoyed using it. I thought I could get more in this exhibition variety (spoiler alert: It liths very nicely). Forte Polywarmtone (PWT) is another old paper known to lith well, so I was keen to try these papers out as well. I plan to cut these all down to 8x10 sheets so I can get more mileage out of these no longer available papers.  I am back on Moersch Easy Lith as my lith developer. I used the recommended 1+25 dilution that has me add 20ml part A and 20ml part B to 1L of water.  First, I started out with my origina...

Last night the forecast was for the possibility of fog and with that in mind I got my film holders out of the freezer and pulled my large format kit together. I did not have expectations for much fog however but there would be some frost as well.  Last time I was at Holme Fen I arrived before sunrise. This turned out to be a mistake. As I went about shooting those frosty scenes I became worried that there was not enough frost on its own to make a good image. When the sun did come up the forest got a lot more interesting. The warm morning light combined with the vapor the sun's rays were driving off the forest floor added misty sunbeams. By this time I was out of film and decided to go home however. I did linger and watch in wonder the beauty around me. Something one can regret while photographing is not taking time to be in the surroundings and absorb and appreciate the mood. I often stop and have some coffee and a snack just for this purpose (Moll...