Drifting further into the abstract

May 22, 2020 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

As it’s a public holiday here in the UK on Monday (Spring Bank Holiday or, as it used to be known when I was a kid, Whitsuntide) I decided to extend the weekend futher and book today off work as well. As my wife is currently nursing an injury, my morning consisted of doing the weekly grocery shop and then, when I got home, helping with the housework. Not quite what I’d hoped for when I booked the day’s leave. Still, being positive, at least those chores are now done and I can spend the next three days doing mostly what I please.

The trip to the supermarket was a little stressful – while I’ve been in the local Sainsbury’s store on several occasions since the lockdown and social-distancing measures were enforced, this was my first trip to Morrison’s. Perhaps because the aisles are less spacious in Morrison’s, and perhaps because they were allowing more shoppers in at a time, the place felt crowded – certainly in comparison with my experiences at Sainsbury’s. There was little hope of maintaining a constant two-metre distance anywhere other than the queue for the checkouts (or the queue to get in). A good number of people didn’t seem to care anyway and I caught myself holding my breath on more than one occasion in some sort of futile attempt to ward off viruses! In the end, a task that takes my wife an hour (even under current conditions) took me almost two, and I was duly chided for it when I got home.

After unpacking the shopping, it was onto the housework – although there wasn’t too much to be done, thankfully. Once complete, I had some lunch and then undertook a couple of photography chores. I have a roll of HP5+ that needs to be developed, so I loaded that into the tank ready to dev it tomorrow. All went well getting it onto the spiral, but the bit of tape that holds the film to the backing paper evaded my fingers and stuck itself to the film. Whether this was on a section of exposed emulsion, I’m not sure, but I’m bracing myself for at least one knackered negative. After this, I scanned a roll of Fomapan 100 that I developed last weekend. This is the first roll of Foma that I’ve home devved in the Ilfotol DD-X so I was curious as to the results, and I’m pleased to see that they look good. I like Fomapan 100 and I’m glad the DD-X does it justice. It’ll be a while before any of those see the light of the blog though as I’ve got a bunch of other stuff I’ve already scanned but not yet published.

Today’s photo is another shot from the expired roll of Lloyds Pharmacy 200 shot over Easter. It’s another abstract, this time of a ridged golden vase that holds a bunch of artificial flowers.

Nikon F80, Sigma 105mm f/2.8 OS HSM & Lloyds Pharmacy 200 (expired 2008).

Taken on 11 April 2020

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Faking it

May 21, 2020 fishyfisharcade4 Comments

I made photos of a bunch of things in the house during lockdown. Some that looked appealing in the viewfinder resulted in disappointing photographs. Some, however, turned out pretty well.

The three photos today are of a small vase containing some artificial flowers (I don’t know if they’re supposed to represent an actual species of plant or if they’re just some kind of made up blooms – I know little about plants). Framing them against the out-of-focus yellow wallpaper has created a nice colour contrast.

Considering the fact that flowers are not something I readily turn to as a subject for photographs, I’m very happy with these – artificial or not.

Nikon F80, Sigma 105mm f/2.8 OS HSM & Lloyds Pharmacy 200 (expired 2008).

Taken on 11 April 2020

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Freedom part deux

May 20, 2020May 21, 2020 fishyfisharcade2 Comments

The insect screen that hangs over the back door catches the wind pretty easily, and so it did while I sat on the back garden one day back in April. I liked the way the fluttering tassles looked against the blue sky so decided to take a photo. Obviously, as soon as I got my camera in hand this meant the wind dropped and I had to stand in place for five minutes before they blew into the air again.

This shot isn’t perfect – it has a significant vignette for some reason, and very few sections of the tassles are in focus, but I like the summery feel it has.

Nikon F80, Sigma 105mm f/2.8 OS HSM & Lloyds Pharmacy 200 (expired 2008).

Taken on 11 April 2020

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Chesterfield market

October 6, 2019 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

As an adjunct to yesterday’s post about the old Chesterfield Magistrate’s Court building, today I’m posting some photos of Chesterfield market, which is a mere stone’s throw away from the court (with a good arm, at least).

Chesterfield’s markets cover two outdoor areas with covered stalls, and a market hall with indoor stalls that sits between the two (the hall, with its clocktower, can be seen in the first picture in today’s set). Thursday morning features a flea market, from which I’ve had a camera bargain or two in the past. I’m not sure which days the markets are busiest, but there were a noticable number of unoccupied stalls on the day I took these pictures.

Again, these are shot on the Lloyds Paharmacy 200 expired film, so the colours are a little off and the contrast is pretty high, but it hasn’t turned out too badly all things considered.

The first and final images are my favourites.

Nikon F70, Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 D & Lloyds Pharmacy 200 (expired).

Taken on 30 September 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

The old Chesterfield Magistrate’s Court

October 5, 2019 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

A few months ago I was given a couple of rolls of film by one of the ladies at the local photographic society. Both were Lloyds Pharmacy 200, with an expiry date of 2008. You can’t get much more “drugstore film” than this, I guess. Some research suggests that it is actually Solaris Color FG Plus 200 that has been rebranded.

Both rolls have been sat in my freezer since then, so I decided last week to shoot one of them. Given the age of the film and the fact that I didn’t really know it’s provenance, I decided to rate it at 80ASA and loaded it into my Nikon F70. It turned out to be in a pretty good state, and rating it at 80ASA was probably too much – most of the images are a little overexposed, although I’ve recovered them pretty well in Lightroom. Otherwise, while there are some minor colour shifts, and the shadows are not the best, it’s not too bad. I’ll have much more confidence when I shoot the remaining roll.

I’m always a little wary of putting too much effort into making photographs with expired film, at least unless I’ve already had satisfactory results from a roll from the same batch, and this was very much the case with this roll. Most of the frames were shot on a walk around Chesterfield town centre, and the ones shown in this post are of the old Magistrate’s Court building.

The building was constructed in the early 1960s and was in use until the 2000s when a new building was constructed about half a mile from the old site. Since then the building has fallen into disrepair. As it is Grade II listed, it cannot be demolished, but there are apparently plans afoot to convert it into residential use.

It’s an interesting structure and one I’ve photographed on more than one occasion, so here are a few of the most recent pictures. I think the fourth photo, with the roosting pigeons, is my favourite.