Steel City Snapper photography
35mm, medium format and large format film photography (with the odd bit of digital every now and then…)
A couple of photos taken earlier this year when I had to attend a course in Manchester. As I had a little time each morning after getting off the train, I would wander the streets and take a few pictures with the camera I had with me (an Olympus Superzoom 105 G compact in this case). These are both of the same street, but from the opposite ends.
Olympus Superzoom 105 G, Fomapan 100
Olympus Superzoom 105 G, Fomapan 100
Two shots today, both of the same subject, taken on the same day, but with different cameras and film. I’d gone for a day out to visit Gainsborough Old Hall, but stopped off at Retford for a ‘comfort break’ at a Morrison’s supermarket. The store sits beside the River Idle and the riverside foot path is accessible from the car-park (which is also adjacent to the road that is carried by the bridge in the photographs).
Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8, Rollei Superpan 200
Olympus Trip 35, Kodak Portra 160
(I’ve taken to adding ‘arty-farty’ white borders around my colour shots lately).
Both shots taken on Monday 31 July 2017.
Well, this morning’s issue with linked Flickr images seems to have magically resolved itself, so here’s a bonus post to make up for the disruption!
The front end of some vintage car or other (I neglected to take note of what it was and don’t have enough here to ID it). Taken at the Classics on The Moor car rally in Sheffield.
This outing was my first time shooting Ilford Delta 100 and I’m very happy with the results. Very clean and contrasty.
Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8, Ilford Delta 100
Date taken: 6 August 2017
Between Solly Street and Scotland Street, Sheffield.
This small UFO was sighted on a lamppost in an alley joining the two roads. I’m a bit of a sucker for shallow depth of field shots.
Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8, Ilford HP5+
Taken: 23 July 2017
So, as some of you who read this blog might have noticed, the gaps between posts has gradually gotten larger following the early flurry of activity when I first started. In an attempt to combat this and increase the rate at which I post, I’ve decided to change the way that I update the blog. Instead of posts containing multiple shots, I’m going to cut it back to posts containing a single image (although there may occasionally be multiple shots, and even some of the longer posts every now and again) with a concise description. This will hopefully allow me to post frequently and keep the stream of content moving. It also has the benefit of me being able to mix things up a bit and publish photos from different sessions and rolls as I feel like it, rather than posting a whole bunch of pictures from a single event, trip or location (unless I feel like it, of course!). I’ve got a large-ish backlog of pictures taken since I started the blog, plus a pool of other shots taken beforehand to choose from, so there should be no shortage of content at least. I’ve also started re-scanning some of my earlier photos to get better results (I’m now much more adept at using the scanner and software than I was back then), so some older shots have now become a bit more presentable than they were.
To kick things off, here’s a shot from the first roll I shot when getting back into film photography. It was shot on 23 July last year using my Olympus Trip 35 on Agfa Vista Plus 200 film and re-scanned recently on my Epson V550 flatbed. I’d bought the Trip to replace one I already had (given to me by my dad), but which doesn’t work properly anymore (the red flag doesn’t pop up to indicate bad exposure) and chose the Agfa Vista because it was available for £1 a roll at Poundland and, as this was my first foray back into film shooting in about twenty years, I didn’t want to risk a more expensive brand. The film was developed at a branch of Max Spielman and I was happy enough with the results, but I get the impression that film development is becoming a bit of a lost art at some of these high street outlets these days, and after a couple of subsequent rolls yielded very unsatisfying results, I switched to a pro-lab (Peak Imaging) for all subsequent processing and have been very happy with the results since.
This is the dam in Crookes Valley park, Sheffield, UK where I went with my wife and younger sons. The re-scan is far better than my original version (which was a scan of the actual print instead of the negative). The colours are better and more vivid, plus the image is sharper and has less cropping (the person’s legs at bottom left, and the child at mid-left were not visible in the original version at all).
As my slovenly updating of the blog continues, I thought I’d just drop in a bunch of photos to keep it alive!
These were taken back in June at the Sheffield Steam Rally ay North Anston. I’ve already posted the shots of the traction engines, but there were also some classic cars that I photographed, plus a few random shots. These were shot with my OM-1 with the F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8 on Fomapan 100. I like the Fomapan, it’s a little grimy in my experience, sometimes having little back soot-like flecks on the negatives, but the results are pretty nice.
Once again, apologies for my somewhat slower paced updating of the blog. In order to at least post something to keep the blood flow going, here’s another in my occasional Oddshots posts – just a single image that doesn’t really fit in a bigger post, or perhaps something from the archive.
This one was taken a week ago following a trip to the local cathedral (which had opened it’s doors to a local photography group for the evening). After the visit came to a close I walked back to the car to find that the street where I’d parked was bathed in gorgeous evening sunshine. Hawley Street consists of a row of terraced houses that were spared damage in the blitz, and the light on them was lovely. It’s only the contemporary cars (and maybe the odd street sign and road marking) that really date this image – it might otherwise have been taken 75 years ago. I’m not disappointed by the cars in the shot – they themselves will add a nice historical air as the photo ages.
On Sunday 25 June I attended Sheffield Steam Rally, which is held just outside Sheffield at North Anston. I visited last year too, but have only attended one other time before that, probably sometime in the late 1990s. Like trains, classic cars, or aircraft, steam engines are not something that I have any deep interest in, in and of themselves, but as a photographer, they make for excellent interesting subjects, both of themselves, and also in the vast array of detail that they hold. There’s also a wonderful nostalgia that surrounds them and, while I don’t think I’d like to have lived in an environment thick with it, the pungent whiff of coal smoke is lovely in these situations.
I managed to take over fifty photographs on the day, but this post contains just a selection of them. These shots were all taken with my Olympus OM-1. Some shots are on Ilford HP5+, and others are on Fomapan 100. I’ll mark each shot accordingly, but the HP5+ shots will be first.
#1 (HP5+) – This was a favourite of the day. I really like the out-of-focus engine to the rear of the shot, and it feels like it could have been taken a long time ago.
#2 (HP5+) – Another favourite. I like the composition and the trio of figures.
#3 (HP5+) – A lot of the traction engines appeared to be family endeavours, with fathers, sons, wives, daughters all mucking in. I like this shot because of the foreground interest granted by the man and his dog (although I nearly cut off its feet!).
#4 (HP5+)
#5 (HP5+) – I think the human element adds to a lot of the shots. Some of the interest would be lost if were just the machines.
#6 (HP5+)
#7 (HP5+)
#8 (HP5+)- This must be a show regular, as I photographed it last year too. To be fair, many, if not all of the engines might’ve been there last year too, it’s just that I recognised this one.
#9 (Fomapan) – Another favourite. If the van weren’t in shot, this would perhaps have the look of a much older photograph.
#10-19 (Fomapan) – The steam engines take part in a drive-past event in the central “show-ring” area and I took a number of photos of this. The next two are my favourites – the size of the machines, but also the poses of the drivers, gives them something od an epic feel I think.
#20 (Fomapan) – The smoke adds so much atmosphere (both literally as well as figuratively!).
#21 (Fomapan)
#21 (Fomapan)
#22 (Fomapan)
#23 (Fomapan) – There were other things present, apart from steam rollers and traction engines, including this organ. There were also some nice food stalls and I had a delicious pork and pulled-pork burger from one of them.
There were also a large number of classic cars, bikes and trucks present, but I’ll save those photos for another day.
Oh well, the sky hasn’t fallen down as yet, so I guess my self-imposed “at least one post a week” wasn’t the be all and end all (after all!).
Anyway, I’ve still got quite a mountain of pictures to post – even though, until the weekend, I’d had a break of a couple of weeks without taking a single photograph – so here’re a few more. These were all taken during the day-trip to York that I’ve already posted about, but were on a second roll of film that I didn’t finish on the day. There’s no particular theme, just a selection of things I though might make a decent picture.
These were all shot with my Olympus OM-1 on Ilford HP5+. I used the F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8 for some, and a Hoya 25-42mm wide-angle zoom for the others. I got both lenses with the camera but, despite its wide-angle versatility, I’m not keen on the Hoya – it’s very bulky and heavy and the image quality isn’t a patch on the F.Zuiko. I’ve flagged the Hoya shots with a (H).
#1 – This was taken on my way back to the town centre after the morning’s visit to the National Railway Museum. I hung around at the edge of the street to get someone reflected in the puddle. I took two shots, but this is the best.
#2 – Despite their poorer image quality, I still like a few of the Hoya shots, including this one (H).
#3 – York Minster at a jaunty angle (H).
#4 – Another one of the Hoya shots I really like (H).
#5 -The Minster again (H).
#6 – And again. I like the juxtaposition of the old Roman column against the more modern cathedral here. I couldn’t have taken this without the wide-angle (H).
#7 – A couple of bicycles (H).
#8 -Another street scene (H).
#9 -And another (H).
#10 – York’s famous medieval shopping street. the Shambles, some of the buildings here date back to the 14th century. It gets its name because it used to be the home of a large number of butchers’ shops (shambles being an old term for open-air butchers and slaughterhouses.
#11 -And York’s famous tea-room, Betty’s (there’s another branch in Harrogate, which I think is the original). There was a sizeable queue outside each time I passed by.
#12 -Finger-puppets for sale on The Shambles.
#13 -And more modern digital “bobble head” clocks.
#14 -And gin (though this wasn’t on The Shambles).
#15 -There was a sizeable international food fair taking place on the day, with loads of stalls, but the only one I photographed was this sausage stand (which might be there all the time anyway for all I know).
#16 -The old BT piper logo was still in evidence on these payphones.
#17 – This is my favourite shot of the bunch. I spotted this trout’s expression on a fish monger’s stall.
#18 – Another bicycle. The city being relatively flat, bicycles appear to be a popular form of transport in York.
#19 – Not sure if these stones mark actual graves any more.
#20 – And the final shot of this batch, a small alleyway just off Stonegate. And another of the shots I quite like.
It’s a shame the weather wasn’t better on the day – there are untold numbers of things to photograph in York, and the place is well worth the visit.
Following on from yesterday’s post, here are the remaining black and white shots from Brodsworth Hall. Sorry it’s a bit of a hectic post!
I’ll start off with the classic car related photos and then move on to the others taken in the grounds.
#1 – A cheeky selfie.
#2 – Someone relaxing behind their car.
#3 – Model-T Ford hood.
#4 – A bit of bonnet bokeh.
#5 – A Browning M1919 atop the hood of a Willys Jeep.
#6 – I think this was inside the Model-T.
#7 – Under a Chevvy’s hood.
#8 – Morris 8 bonnet.
#9 – Bentley bonnet (not sure of the model).
#10 – Rolls Royce grille – again, not sure of the model.
#11 – A sunlit statue.
#12 – A large monkey puzzle tree in the gardens.
#13 – Another sunlit statue.
#14 – Pine cones.
#15 – A tree stump and footpath.
#16 & #17 – Brodsworth church.
#18 – And finally, a metal handrail on a bridge that went over a sunken garden area. I really like this shot.
