Tag: black and white

The Opening of the Film Archives – Stonehenge August 2016

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Stonehenge is something different for most people.  For some it is a historical site in Wiltshire, and despite not being part of the 7 wonders of the ancient world, still remains pretty special.  For some more “alternative” folks, it’s an ancient spiritual centre, and just happens to be on converging energy lines.  For some it’s a day out with the children.

We had come back from a cruise that had taken us around the Canary islands, Lisbon, and Galicia in Spain.  Thank you Mummy, and thank you Daddy!  I think they felt guilty about us always coming up to see them in Northumberland, and wanted us to get a different holiday experience.  Well, different it was!  But that is a totally different story, and the photos can be found in the Olympus Trip 35 article.

So our ship docked at Southampton and we still were in the holiday mood.  I remember as a small boy visiting Stonehenge, and thought it was “the” opportunity to introduce my family to the site.  

It seemed slightly smaller than I remember it.  As do most things if I’m going to be honest with you, but the majesty of the stones remained.  As did the wonder at the fact that these stones had been dragged overland from Wales, and put into place, with the joints still being “rock solid” and down to the nearest millimetre.  I work in a factory that does industrial woodworking and I know what we can do with modern tools and technology and yet here, this massive construction was put together using basic tools.

The children were just taking in the whole experience, and rather bemused at the sight of Japanese tourists being shoved around the site and taking the obligatory selfie.  They also seem quite bemused by the amount of school groups being led around.  

I preferred, as often as I do, to just take my time and take it all in and get some photos of the place.  With the 40 mm zuiko lens I was getting some lovely environmental shots that you can see below.  

My wife, however, was in tears.  Crying her heart out.  She later confided in me telling me how she just felt overcome with emotion.  Maybe those lines of energy for those alternative folks might have something in them…

The Opening of the Film Archives—the Hangar à Bananes August 2016

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In my last venture into the film archives, I talked about how there was a time that my daughter hadn’t yet seen me the way I see myself and how she actually still liked me, before turning into a teenager.  This is the second part of that special day.

We had explored the Jardin des Plantes and discovered what they had to offer.  This of course builds up an appetite in a young lady, and convinces her that she really needs to drink something Daddy.  And why couldn’t we go to the Altercafé (now the D3) at the Hangar à Bananes.

So what else was I to do but drive us to the Hangar à Bananes.  You will have seen the Hangar in this article, and you will now be completely up to date and know nearly everything there is to know.

Don’t forget that this is a girl who gets an idea into her head and then just goes through with it.  That idea is so rooted that it is nigh on impossible to change that idea.  I knew what was coming.  I would order a chocolate brownie, and Kate would have an Orangina.  I could have a beer.  How gracious of her.

She had been my model for most of the day and even a top model needs a rest, and just has nothing left to give a photographer.  You just know when enough is enough…

The Opening of the Film Archives—Jardin des Plantes August 2016

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There was a time when my daughter wasn’t a teenager.  There was a time when she quite liked her Dad, and she would accompany me everywhere.  It was good being that child’s hero.  It was a more innocent time.  It was a time when she actively tried to spend time with me.  It was a time when she didn’t see me the way I see myself…

One of her favourite places in Nantes was the Jardin des Plantes, a huge botanical garden in the middle of Nantes just across the road from the station.  I could talk about the fact of it being a haven of peace in the bustling city.  I could talk about it being an oasis of green in a sea of concrete.  I could talk using clichés ‘til the cows come home…

These photographs are not clichés, but real attempts of capturing a specific moment in time allowing me to travel back through time.  And looking at these images, I’m definitely back in time.

Let me introduce you to my daughter from 2016.  She was a 7 year old that already knew what she wanted but was slightly more subtle about it.  She would suggest that we go into town.  That I could take my camera.  That we could go to such and such a place.  That we could do such and such a thing.  And all this as if it were completely natural.  And I was a very willing victim.   

This time she suggested going to the Jardin des Plantes.  She would take her camera (my old Sony bridge) and I would take my Olympus Trip 35.  I used the Olympus Trip quite a lot at that time and its ease of use, the zone focussing, and general lack of buttons to press, made it quite the fool proof piece of kit.    

As usual, I let her lead the way.  This was here outing after all, and kept a respectful distance, so I could photograph her and record her for posterity.  The Jardin des Plantes has not only plants, the clue is in the title, but also is the backdrop to the Voyage à Nantes, and certainly was that year.  

I think the images speak for themselves and I’ll let you peruse them at your leisure.  They were taken on Ilford HP5 Plus film shot at box speed.

The Opening of the Film Archives – On the way to work

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Sometimes we can have a tendency to ignore our habitual surroundings as photographers.  In this series of photos from the film archive, I’m going to show you part of the route I use to go to work.  What is ordinary to one person might be an pastoral idyl to somebody else.  It only goes to show that there is beauty everywhere in this world and one of our roles as photographers is to document it for future generations.

My wife, bless her, has always said that my black and white photos have a timeless feel to them, be they in the city or out here in the country.  I think that using film, especially this grainy HP5 Plus, even shot at box speed, adds to that sentiment.  The fact that I used Rodinal as my developer might have accentuated the grain too.  Also don’t forget that this is the beginning of my return to film development so I might have been a little vigorous in my “agitations” whilst developing the film.  I now use mostly Ilfosil 3 and lower grain film, and have brought a little more “calm” to my “agitations.”

The camera that day was the FED 5 rangefinder camera from Ukraine.  I’ve talked about it before, and although I mainly use SLRs, I still feel guilty about not using it more.  It’s a beautiful camera and I don’t want it to feel neglected.  I might just have to correct that soon.

I lived just outside Paris for 7 years before moving out to the country in 2001.  The change in ambiance was startling.  I went from blocks of flats to village life in the French countryside.  I went from riding the metro, and suburban Parisian trains, to learning to drive though this beautiful landscape.  Driving through this scenery still gets me every time I get into the car.  I wonder what I’ll see.  I see the changes in the fields and countryside through the seasons.

I want you to promise me, Dear Reader, that you will take a closer look at your route to work, and maybe I can convince you to record it too for prosperity.  Don’t worry about film or camera, even just using your phone will do the trick.

The Opening of the Film Archives – Kate July 2016

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I am a father.  I am the father of a son, and have been for the last 25 years.  I am a father.  I am the father of a daughter, and have been for the last 14 years.  I am a father.  More traditional than modern, but definitely a doting and loving father of both children.  I am a photographer.  Both children have had multiple photos taken of them over the years.  However, the subject of bedtimes has always been contentious.  They say you have to be rigid and follow an established routine.  They say that for the good of the children you have to respect this routine to the letter.   They are obviously not parents.  They are obviously completely disconnected from reality.  They obviously have their heads buried so far up where the sun don’t shine.

As a father, I’ve learned the importance of picking your battles, especially when it comes to bedtime routines. This particular night, with my 7-year-old daughter wide awake, a fight wasn’t the answer. So, I grabbed my Praktica MTL3, loaded some HP5 pushed to 1600, and turned a potential meltdown into an improvised photoshoot. We ended up in the bathroom – because teeth brushing was still non-negotiable – but the resulting photos captured a moment of pure magic.

Let’s talk about technical details: the Praktica MTL3 is the model that I learnt my craft on.  It’s solid.  It’s fully manual, and gets the job done admirably.  The lens is an F1.8 Pentacon 50mm, with a lovely depth of field.  I pushed the HP5 to 1600 to be able to take advantage of all the available light.  

Kate posed for me and thoroughly enjoyed herself.  Teeth brushing.  Calling somebody very important on the Fisher Price telephone.  And pulling a face to tell me off.  Some things just don’t change…

Photography is not the technique or the camera, or worse still, the settings used.  It’s about capturing that “Kodak moment” albeit with Ilford HP5.  It’s about the shared memories.  It’s about the nostalgia of looking back on family life that can never be recaptured.  It might seem mundane to you, but to me it’s priceless.  And looking back at these family photos, it just reminds me how much I love both my children, and am fortunate enough to have captured these fleeting instants.

The Opening of the Film Archives – Saint Cado, Belz, Morbihan

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Welcome back to the film archives, and welcome back to Brittany, that gorgeous corner of France where my in-laws live. I think I might have let it be known that my French family love camping. Yes, they’re so in tents… I’ll just let that joke sink in for a couple of seconds. In 2016 I had begun “collecting” cameras. The photos from this Breton outing in Saint Cado were taken with the Kodak Retinette 1B, a little gem of a camera from the 1960s, and HP5 Plus film.

We’ll start with Saint Cado. It’s one of those picture-perfect postcard places. It’s not easy to take a bad photo of the place. It’s photogenic. It’s quaint. It has all the clichés of a small Brittany island in the Ria d’Etel, which is an inland sea connected to the Atlantic at the Barre d’Etel… I’m thinking lobster pots, oyster beds, black and white houses with slate roofs, a local Saint, a chapel to this local saint, who was actually from Wales of all places, and a miraculous fountain that fills up with every incoming tide. Yes, it’s one of those places… Did I mention that the bridge that links the island to the mainland is a Devil’s bridge? It is said that the devil demanded the soul of the first creature to cross it. The story relates that Saint-Cado, who was a shrewd fellow, put a cat on it! It is just gorgeous!

Let’s talk about the Kodak Retinette 1B. As I said in the introduction, it is a camera from the 1960s that uses zone focusing, and the 1B as opposed to the 1A has a selenium light meter that works a treat. Zone focusing is where you focus by zones. Mind-blowing, right? If I look at my lens, I will see a distance measurement that I will use as a guesstimate. I will move my aperture dial and let’s say I’m at F8, well everything from one F8 to the other F8 will be in focus. A lot of cameras from this period used this system, and it works. If you want to open right up to F2.8, then there are little rangefinders that you can put on the hot shoe mount and there you will be able to get an exact reading for the distance from your subject. Up to you…

Why use a camera that is over 60 years old?  First of all, why not?  It works.  It’s simple to use.  It doesn’t need a battery.  You load your film and Bob’s your Uncle!  Off you go to shoot your 36 exposures.  It also looks pretty damned sexy hanging around your neck too…  It actually looks so sexy that my son nicked mine, and I had to go and get another one.  At the time of purchase I must have paid no more than £15, and even now it will cost you less than £50.  

So there you have it – a charming little island, a vintage camera, and a roll of trusty HP5 Plus. This trip to Saint Cado was a reminder that sometimes, the best photos come from the simplest tools and the most unexpected places. And who knows, maybe those old film cameras aren’t just gathering dust in the attic – they might just be waiting to capture your next adventure. (But if you happen to see my son with a Kodak Retinette slung around his neck, please tell him to bring it back!)