This is the corner of The Fat Cat, a pub in Sheffield’s Kelham Island area – somewhere I seem to make a lot of photographs, despite living nowhere near the the place.
The Fat Cat dates back to the Victorian era, being built in 1850. As a result of it’s age, and it’s position close to the course of the River Don, it was affected by the flood in 1864 when Dale Dyke resevoir collapsed catastrophically, killing over 240 people as the water descended it’s course to the centre of the city.
One-hundred-and-forty-three years later the pub was once again engulfed by flood water, this time caused by torrential rain. Three people lost their lives in this event.
The pub has two markers painted on it’s wall denoting the water level of both floods.
Today I present a photo of the University of Sheffield Student’s Union building…
…and a literal stone’s throw away (as can be seen by the looming Hick’s Building looming in the background), and also conveniently for the students, a bar…
A few weeks ago I posted a couple of photos of pillar boxes (or post boxes if you prefer) that I shot on some Fuji Velvia 100 and which exhibited vividly saturated reds. Today I have a photo of a different pillar box, this one dating from the reign of Queen Victoria – hence the VR insignia on the front. A quick bit of Google research points to this being a VR Penfold model.
Once again, the slide film has delivered vivid reds. While I’ve tweaked the contrast a little which might account for some of the rich colour, I’ve not touched the saturation of vibrancy controls at all. It looks pretty much like this on the original transparency too.
Olympus OM-2n, Zuiko Auto-S 50mm f/1.8 & Kodak Ektachrome 100 EPP (expired at some unknown date).
One of two theatres adjacent to one another in Sheffield city centre, the Crucible is the younger of the pair, dating from 1971 (the other, The Lyceum, dates back to the late 19th century). It’s probably most famous for being the host venue for the World Snooker Championship since 1977.
As I write this today, Sheffield (and the rest of South Yorkshire) has been put on notice that we will be moving to the Tier 3 “Very High” level for Covid-19 restrictions at the weekend. While, for the most part, these won’t make much of a difference to what I do (it’s nothing like as restrictive as the full lockdown we had earlier in the year), it does place a restriction on mixing with people outside your immediate family or support-bubble, so it’ll mean I can’t see my dad for the next few weeks (assuming it’s lifted by then).
It also means that I’m not supposed to travel from the Tier 3 area to areas at a lower level of alert. This is disappointing as I have a week’s leave coming up and had planned to make a visit or two to the Peak District National Park. While I can still access part of the park (some of it falls within Sheffield, and South Yorkshire’s borders), it’s a relatively limited area and doesn’t include the places I’d hoped to go to. As I would be travelling in a private vehicle and not interacting with anyone, I’m not sure that there’s a problem or that I would be risking any sort of trouble, but I guess I’ll see what happens before making a decision one way or the other. If not, there are plenty of other places within South Yorkshire that I can visit, and not just the bits within the Peak District. I have a project that I came up with the idea for over a year ago, so maybe I can make a start on making the pictures for that.
Olympus OM-2n, Zuiko Auto-S 50mm f/1.8 & Kodak Ektachrome 100 EPP (expired at some unknown date).
This wonderful sculpture was sat outside Midland Station in Sheffield when I walked past a few weeks ago. The day was bright with autumn sunshine and the metal body of the fish caught the light nicely on its scales. The OM-2n metered the scene with aplomb, the Zuiko glass resolved sharp images, and the expired Ektachrome gave a gorgeous look (although I have removed a purple cast that was lurking in the shadows).
Olympus OM-2n, Zuiko Auto-S 50mm f/1.8 & Kodak Ektachrome 100 EPP (expired at some unknown date).
This morning I decided to get up early and go make some photographs. A lot of trees are starting to turn and there are some gorgeous colours to be seen in their foliage – colours that would look extra nice in the light of an early morning sun. The weather forecasts over the past few days – right up to when I went to bed last night in fact – had stated that it would be cloudless first thing today, with duller weather coming later, and the dew point indicated a chance of mist. When I woke up, I took a look out the window to see how it looked and, sure enough, the skies were free of cloud to a degree, although there was still quite a lot about. So I got dressed, grabbed my camera and tripod, and had a quick breakfast. When I stepped out of the front door twenty minutes later the sky was covered with cloud from horizon to horizon.
I briefly considered just going back inside, getting undressed again, and getting back into the warm bed. But I didn’t. In for a penny, in for a pound as the saying goes and, even without the clear skies, I still thought there might be a chance of mist in the river valley where I planned to go.
There was no mist.
I have several weather apps on my phone. None of them seems to be any better at correctly forecasting the weather than a pine-cone or bit of dry seaweed hung outside the door. One of them once told me that the location where I was experiencing pouring rain at that very moment was actually in full sunshine. If they can’t tell you what the weather is doing in the present, what hope do they have at predicting the future? Anyway, rant over.
Deciding against making any photos in the dull, unflattering light – no point wasting film – I decided instead to drive to a nearby car-boot sale. It would be the first time I’ve visited a boot sale this year. Partly due to lockdown, but also because I’ve just had other things to do at weekends. I always have a slight frisson of expectation when I visit these places. The dream of picking up a Leica or a Hassleblad for next to nothing, that sort of thing. The dream didn’t come true today, sadly, but I did find another film camera, the only one I saw on all the stalls. It looked in nice condition – boxed with the manual – and the seller only wanted £1 for it, so I decided to rescue it.
It’s not a camera I wanted or needed at all – it’s a fairly nondescript 35mm compact – a Fujifilm DL-270 Zoom Super (catchy name, eh?), with a 35-70mm zoom that starts at a slow-ish f/5.6 and goes downhill from there as you zoom in, granting f/11.2 at the long end. It look s like the sort of camera that someone who wanted to take pictures but lacked any interest in photography would have bought in the 90s. But, for the low price, I’ll give it a go and see how it performs (maybe on a bright day though!). The last camera of this ilk that I used, a Samsung Fino, made surprisingly sharp pictures. Hopefully Fujifilm stuck a decent (if slow) lens inside.
As a bonus, there was a boxed roll of Fuji C200 in a box on the same stall, and the seller kindly threw it in with the camera. I expected it to be expired by fifteen years or something, but it only expired in July this year. Even if the camera is a bust, I still got a bargain roll of pretty fresh film! On top of that, there’s also a roll already in the camera. When I stuck a battery in when I got home (the included battery being dead), it powered up and showed frame 1 on the LCD. This probably means one of three things:
The roll of film is completely unused. Bonus!
The roll is partly used, but the counter has reset due to an elapsed battery. I’m not sure if this would happen though.
At some point someone has opened the back of the camera while it had the film inside, resetting the counter and probably ruining the film. This is the option I think is most likely (although the other, fresh, roll of film I got with it might indicate otherwise). I believe the camera is one of thosa that unloads the entire film when inserted and then rewinds each exposed shot back into the cannister though, so any shots already on the roll might be safe (whatever they might be), but the unexposed remainder might be toast.
Whatever the case, I’ll shoot the roll that’s inside and then, depending how I feel, maybe another. After that, unless it stuns me with the results, I’ll likely pass it on to someone else. But at least it will live on.
And finally, nothing to do with the rest of the post, here’s a nice colourful photo I made with the Yashica Mat the other week…
A couple of photographs taken within 50-feet or so of one another, looking in different directions (roughly north-east and north-west), but quite similar in look and feel thanks to the tall buildings in this part of town and the way they have reflected the clear blue of the sky. They both share the theme of reflections too.
A photograph of The Hubs, which I’ve posted images of before, such as in this post here.
The building has occasionally been referred to as the saucepans by locals, each part of the four hub structure looking like a silver pan with a stubby handle, not that it’s apparent from this angle.
Yashica Mat 124G & Kodak Ektachrome 100 EPN (expired 2008).
I recently shot a roll of expired Ektachrome 100 EPN that I’ve had sat in the freezer for quite a while now – since last Christmas in fact when they were kindly gifted me by my Emulsive Secret Santa. I like the thrill of shooting expired film, there’s a certain frisson of tension around how the shots might turn out. On the other hand though, I never use it for outings where I want my shots to count – holidays, day trips, special events and so forth that I might not get the chance to visit or photograph again. I still aim to get shots I like though – the last thing I’d want is for it to be wasted – and so I shot this roll on a very nice sunny day last month.
The subject matter is just a bunch of things that I thought might look nice (to me at least). I’m not sure what genre this sort of thing falls under – I’m tempted to say it’s inspired by the New Topographics movement, but I’m not sure it that’s the case or not. A sort of halfway house between street and architecture I guess. Who needs labels anyway?
The film was shot at box speed and turned out pretty nicely I think. There’s a bit of colour shift towards magenta but nothing major, and it has a subtle, overexposed Portra look about it that’s nice.
Yashica Mat 124G & Kodak Ektachrome 100 EPN (expired 2008).
Steel City Snapper photography 