Tag: Nikon F80

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Pool balls

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At the steam rally last weekend, apart from the various steam engines and classic vehicles on display, there were a number of flea-market type stalls dotted around the arena (as well as some stalls selling new goods). These are always interesting to browse, both as a potential source of a bargain*, or to provide interesting material for a photograph or two. The stalls at the rally were no exception, and today’s photo is one of several that I took of the wares on display. It could perhaps be argued that these pool balls (and chalk cubes) would have been better shot using a colour film but I’d already finished the roll of Ektachrome by the time I spotted these and, anyway, I really like the contrasty look the HP5+ has rendered.

*One stall had a box of camera gear. This was mostly flashes and the like, but for the price of a few pounds I managed to pick up some close-up lenses for my Yashica Mat, a Pentax Espio 140M compact 35mm camera, and an 80-200mm Tamron zoom lens with a Canon FD Adaptall adapter. I don’t have any Canon SLRs, but the lens is in very clean condition so I’ll either hang on to it in case I do find a suitable body at some stage, or pass it on to someone else. The close-up lenses were a particular bargain for just £1!

FILM - Balls

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 D & Ilford HP5+.

Taken on 30 June 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Continental

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As well as all the steam engines, the steam rally I attended last weekend also had a good selection of vintage cars, trucks and bikes, including the odd import. Here’s the hood of a Lincoln Continental. I’m afraid my car knowledge is lacking – I like to photograph them, but my knowledge extends little beyond that aspec – so I don’t know which year this model is from.

FILM - Continental

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 D & Ilford HP5+.

Taken on 30 June 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Maintenance

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This chap was performing some maintenance or repairs on the tyre of this engine. I’m not sure what the tyre is actually made of – I know that they can have solid rubber tyres, but this one looked to be laminated in some way and some of it peeled off in a layer as I observed. Perhaps that’s just the way rubber tyres of this sort are constructed, or perhaps it was made of some other material?

FILM - Repairs

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 D & Kodak Ektachrome.

Taken on 30 June 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Steam rally 2019

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After a hiatus (on my part) last year, I visited the Sheffield Steam Rally again this weekend. The weather was warm and sunny – in fact very warm on the Saturday, hence my choice of visiting on Sunday instead. I like nice weather, but not too much ot it all at once. 🙂

I decided to shoot the roll of Ektachrome that I bought myself just after Christmas and which I’ve been saving for a suitable occasion. The steam rally, I decided, would be suitable enough, otherwise I’d risk the film never being matched with a good enough subject and sitting in the fridge forever.

I was quite excited to shoot with it, and it was only the third roll of positive film that I’ve bought, so I loaded it into my Nikon F80 (figuring that that would have the most reliable metering of my film cameras) and set off – with a roll of HP5+ as trusty back-up.

As soon as I entered the showgrounds, I started taking pictures, but it was only when I got to about frame ten that a sudden horrible thought dawned on me… I wasn’t focusing the camera!

You see, most of my photography over the past couple of months or so has been with compact cameras (where a half-press of the shutter triggers the auto-focus), or manual focus SLRs, where it’s very obvious when something is out of focus. However, I’d made a rookie mistake of forgetting that I’d set my F80 for back-button focusing, and was instead just half-pressing the shutter to focus and then taking the shot. The reason I didn’t notice my error more quickly is that I was shooting at f/8 and the viewfinder looked to be pretty much in focus anyway – I just wasn’t checking for it snapping to sharpness when pressing the button.

As soon as I realised my mistake, I resorted to doing things properly, but I had sour thoughts about the almost-third-of-a-roll of expensive Ektachrome that I’d probably wasted. I did think about re-taking some of my initial shots, but then decided I’d take the risk that they might be ok and photograph other things instead.

I got my slides back today and, thankfully, all bar a couple of those first shots have come out focused sharply enough to be used, so I was relieved about that. I haven’t scanned the full roll (or even started on my HP5+ shots) yet, but here is one of the pictures that I have. The Ektachrome has produced beautifully saturated colours in the sunshine ( the colours on some of the more shady frames need tweaking though – especially the reds) and, in fact, I’ve actually reduced the saturation a little on this photo.

FILM - Traction

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 D & Kodak Ektachrome.

Taken on 30 June 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Wot? No pictures?

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As I type this Flickr is still undergoing its site maintenance involving the moving of everyone’s accounts, pictures etc. (billions of photos and videos, and over 100 million accounts!) across to a new hosting platform. I think it was scheduled to take 12 hours, but like many IT projects, is taking a little while longer than originally planned. As such I can’t get at my photos to add them in the normal way so, instead, here’s one I’ve uploaded directly.

Note: This isn’t meant to be a metaphor for Flickr’s account migration project. 🙂FIM - Planet Circus

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f.3.5-5.6 AF & Fomapan 400.

Taken on 20 February 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

A lovely day at the seaside

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“Bracing”, that’s the word we use to describe those seaside walks in bitterly cold wind.

This day however was far from bracing – it was taken back in February during an unseasonably warm period.  Good old climate change, eh? At least we’ll get some nice warm days at the seaside in the middle of the winter before the sea swamps the place altogether so we can never visit it again.

FIM - A lovely day at the seaside

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f.3.5-5.6 AF & Fomapan 400.

Taken on 20 February 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Freemason’s lodge

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I noticed this building when in Wakefield recently. The symbol in the decorative pediment identifies it as a freemason’s lodge and it has attractive features as a building. A tilt-shift lens would be very useful for shots such as these but, alas, I don’t have one (nor can I justify the expense either), so the picture is stuck with the converging verticals.

I’m presuming that a staircase runs from the left to the right of the upper floor to account for the different sized windows,

FILM - Freemason's lodge

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 & Arista Edu 200.

Taken on 30 March 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Farm

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Today’s photo was taken on the same walk last week where I photographed the cows in yesterday’s blog post. This shot of the farm was taken before I got to the cows though.

I’ve passed this farm a number of times, but never stopped to see if it offered any photo opportunities. Turns out it does – I took about five photographs during this session, and there are doubtless a few more to be had – even just standing on the road that passes it.

I’m not sure if the farm is still occupied. It’s surrounded by fields that are clearly still being worked, but the farm building themselves had a decidedly quiet air about them. Maybe I just passed at a quiet time though.

FILM - Farm

Nikon F80, Nikkor 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 & Arista Edu 200.

Taken on 31 March 2019