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New site name!

fishyfisharcade4 Comments

I’ve decided to change the name of my site. Steel City Snapper has been retired (for me, at least).

I originally chose the name because the city I’m from – Sheffield, in the UK – is known for its steel industry (although it’s diminished from its heyday) and was sometime known as Steel City as a result. “Snapper” was added for its photography connotations. It always felt a little cheesy if I’m honest, but it stuck and I stayed with it.

However, over time I became aware that I wasn’t the only one to use the title and there was not one, but two other Steel City Snappers on the go. One going by The Steel City Snapper, the other (actually a small collective, I think) by Steel City Snappers. I think both of these other namesakes do different stuff to me – I don’t think they use film, for instance, which is still my main gig on here – and the former of them is much more active on social media. I’m not entirely sure who picked the name first but I’d felt that it might lead to confusion at some point and had started to think about a new name for my blog a while back. I don’t tend to do social media all that much (I’m on Instagram but only post there irregularly, and that’s under a different name anyway), so I think this place was a little off the beaten track in terms of recognition and it’s no great loss to switch.

However the main thing that’s pushed me to make the change is that The Steel City Snapper, who is mostly active on Instagram, has been accused of some alleged unpleasantness. I’m not going to get into the details, or whether it’s accurate or not, but suffice to say I don’t want to be dragged into someone else’s mud via a case of mistaken identity, so today seemed as good a time as any for a change. It’s a shame that the change has been forced by the alleged behaviour of someone else, but what can you do? I didn’t have copyright on the name or anything.

So I’m now going under FishyFishArcade – which is what my posts were always authored as anyway. Apart from that everything stays the same, with the usual daily postings of the same sort of pictures and witterings that I’ve always posted.

Normal service continues tomorrow. 🙂

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Nearly forgot…

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I forgot to add the following picture to yesterdays post of shots from Newark-on-Trent, and it’s one of my favourites from the roll.

Again, it shows some signs of the expired film’s deterioration in the sky, but otherwise is pretty nice.

Newark-on-Trent river scene

Olympus OM-10 & G-Zuiko Auto-W 35mm f/2.8 on Ilford Delta 400 (expired October 2003) @ 100asa. Ilfotec DD-X 1+4 8mins @ 20°

Taken 11 July 2026.

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Expired film in Newark-on-Trent

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Back in July I took a trip down to Newark-on-Trent to visit a photobook exhibition in a small gallery there. I was drawn mostly because there would be prints on display by British Photographer, Paul Hart, who’s work I’ve admired for a number of years. As it turned out there was only a single one of his prints on display (although the gallery owner was kind enough to show me another print he had in storage) and I might not have made the trip had I known that would be the case, but the exhibition was nonetheless still worthwhile, I had an interesting talk with the gallery owner, and Newark is only an hour away, so it’s not a huge undertaking to get there.

I also wandered around taking pictures, shooting with three different cameras: my Yashica Mat 124G, my Olympus XA3, and my Olympus OM-10. I’ll share pictures from the other two in due course, but the photos shown here today are all from the OM-10 which had a roll of expired Ilford Delta 400 loaded. I think I bought the film from a stand at Photo North earlier in the year. It didn’t cost much and I’ve had mostly favourable results with expired black and white film, sometimes with images that look like they were shot on fresh film.

As I didn’t know the provenance of this roll, I over-exposed it perhaps a little more than I needed (I usually go with half-a-stop per decade of expiry, but in this case went a full two stops). I think a stop, or maybe a stop-and-a-half would have sufficed as the negs were a bit dense when I took them from the developing tank. Nothing that couldn’t be mostly rescued in post-processing though. There are some mild signs of the films age – some frames on the roll (though not so much these) have blotches and spots – but that’s the risk you take when shooting old film, I guess.

So here are the results.

Mr Bike
Newark castle
Winch
Trent lock
Trent bridge
A path through the park
Riverside Parlour
Newark signal box
St. Mary Magdalene Church, Newark-on-Trent

Olympus OM-10 & G-Zuiko Auto-W 35mm f/2.8 on Ilford Delta 400 (expired October 2003) @ 100asa. Ilfotec DD-X 1+4 8mins @ 20°

Taken 11 July 2026.

35mm · Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

National Telephone Kiosk Collection

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Within the grounds of Avoncroft Museum of Historic Buildings is the National Telephone Kiosk Collection which, amongst other things, includes every type of telephone kiosk used from 1912 to the present day.

I took some photos at the start of the day on 35mm film, and then just before I left on medium format.

Telephone
Police telephone
Phone boxes
Vintage Post Office van
Talking to the past
Is there a doctor about?

Nikon F80 & Nikkor 24-120mm f/4 ED VR on Fomapan 400 (shot at 200asa) AND Yashica Mat 124G on Ilford HP5+. Ilfotec DD-X 1+4 9mins @ 20°

Taken 1 August 2026.