Showing posts with label Joseph McKenzie Photographer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joseph McKenzie Photographer. Show all posts

Saturday, January 14, 2023

Afternoon Delight

Q: Got a ton of old negatives that you have not a clue what to do with and you're worried about the Cost Of Living Crisis and energy coasts?

A: Get yourself a darkroom - simple as that. 


Morning folks - you know it says something when the darkroom is the warmest room in the house, but this Winter this is proving to be the case - jings, even Olive Oil solidified in our kitchen!
  
But it is very different in the darkroom - I can snuggle up tight in there, heating myself with nothing more than a constant temperature (it used to be a wine cellar); the intermittent use of a 250W bulb; one 15W safelight and the white heat of creativity 😎.

It works a treat

Grey days drift away in a flurry of activity lit red. 
Ice on the windows? 
No problem, hunker down in the darkroom and learn.
Sun not risen at all today?
Take up thy fixer and walk (or kneel in my case).


© Phil Rogers Dundee, Monochrome Printing, Darkroom, Ilford, Foma,Black And White Printing,Craft,Kodak Selenium Toner,Secol Archival Sleeves
5x4" Negative,
Fomabrom Variant 111, Kodak Selenium,
Adox Neutol NE Developer


Regular readers will know that when I was a young man, pretty much what I wanted to do with life was print. 
Regular readers will also know that what happened was not what I expected and economic circumstance led to an entirely different path. 
Well, with a change in life circumstances, that has now changed. 
I can print . . and not only that, but I can print what I want and when I want to. 
It's marvellous.


© Phil Rogers Dundee, Monochrome Printing, Darkroom, Ilford, Foma,Black And White Printing,Craft,Kodak Selenium Toner,Secol Archival Sleeves
Various 9.5 x 12" prints in Secol sleeves


To that end, and as mentioned recently, I have tried to standardise an archive, and it wasn't the easiest matter.
The problem hit me when I (after much faffing and measuring) printed an 8x8" image from my Hasselblad on 9.5x12" paper. 
I was, to coin a phrase, knocked out
It wasn't so much the sheer image size, but more the print now gave real presence to the Zeiss lens. 
I hadn't been expecting this, after all I had printed on 9.5 x 12" paper before, but this was something else.
I repeated the exercise with the Rollei T's Tessar, and the Minoltor Autocord's Rokkor, and whilst they were good (really good at times) neither had the sheer grit, micro-detail and subtle greys of the Distagons and Sonnars, and Biogon.
I then repeated the exercise with images from my Large Format lenses. 
To say this was a revelation is a bit of an understatement
A 5x4" negative printed on bigger paper with a decent border is a thing to behold.

I have to precursor that though, with the following: 
Up till now, my LF enlarging lens has been a nice 80's-ish 150mm Rodenstock Rodagon. 
It's been fine (despite the obvious scuffs on the front and the back - the latter I believe robbing me of a decent amount of quality) but always left me with an itch I really wanted to scratch. 
To my eyes, every print I have ever made from a 5x4" with the Rodagon has just not had the chutzpah you're supposed to get with Large Format photography. 
The lens was effectively free with my DeVere (God Bless Mr. MXV, wherever you are) and I always just accepted that (as has been written many times) MF and even 35mm lenses produce 'sharper' results than LF. 

Hmmm, well . . . he said stroking his chin. 
I was having a butchers at enlarging lenses on Ebay one day, and, because I believe a lowly 100mm Vivitar is the best enlarging lens I have ever owned (yes, over Leitz and Rodenstock, Durst and Nikon) I came across a 135mm one . . for £32. 
That's not even a brainstorming, sick-on-the-pavement night in the pub these days, so I thought why not. 
And indeed the thing was a complete revelation. 
All the micro-detail, subtle grey nuances and "overall bollocks" (that's a technical term - look it up - it's in "The Negative" . . page 134) that I'd always thought were there on the negatives, were indeed there, but now writ large on big paper. 
Oh boy was I a happy bunny.

And what, you might well be asking yourself, is the big paper?
Well for 'economical' purposes I decided to get 50 sheets of Ilford MGFB and a 10 sheet sample box of Foma 111. 
Why Ilford? 
Well, the colour head mixing settings for different grades are the same as Kentmere RC (and I had a box of that) so I am not having to slice up expensive fibre paper to make test strips and overall, I would say things match up very well
As for Foma, I have never used it before and I have to say I shall be using it again, which is weird because I am not really a fan of their films. 
The paper though has a different look to Ilford. 
Its surface reminds me more of the sheen on Forte's Polywarmtone which I always loved. AND it looks like Fomabrom and Fomaspeed (the RC version) use the same emulsion, so I can use RC for test strips.

OK Sheepy, wtf about dry-down etc, how can you possibly judge things?
 
Well, it is a complex matter, that, dare I say might well have been over-egged over the years. 
If you read around, dry down is a relatively strange thing, running from shifts in the darkest tones (Ansel's "thud") of a print due to: wet prints vs dry prints; heat drying; malevolent forces; changes in emulsion; alien interference etc etc - told you it was complex. 
I always air-dry my prints and have to say I have never noticed any really significant darkening of images and that is over decades of printing. Sure there is a small (as in tiny) amount, but to say this impacts on the quality of the print, is hair-splittingly hairiness of the hairy kind.
A lot of people have said it is commensurate with heat drying and I can see how that might affect things, but I don't heat dry.


Air Drying -secondhand caravan clothes line and plastic pegs!
Left and Right, Ilford Pinned Back To Back method.
Centre, Sheephouse "'Ang It From The Corner Missus" Method


It's also probably anathema to all the cloak-wearing darkroom wizards out there about using RC paper to make a printing judgement for FB paper, but it can be done. 

The greatest printer I ever knew was Joseph McKenzie, and he could make an exposure/grade judgment call just by looking at a negative. That ability came from thousands of hours spent printing; in other words experience
I'm sure the likes of Robin Bell and all the Master Printers out there, doing this for a living can work in the same way too.
For me, I don't have their eyes, so I will decide on my Grade (which as a starting point is nearly always Grade 3 these days) hack up a bit of RC, whack it on the weasel, expose in 4 second increments, whack it in the developer, develop for most of the proper time, give it a wiggle in the stop, whack it in the fix, and slap the lights on after about 15 seconds. 
I can generally make a decent judgement call from this.

You see, although printing is a relatively easy process defined by care, as in:

You have all the ingredients (assuming you have a decent negative) to make an impressive print.

You have all the ingredients (assuming you have a decent negative) to make a dog's dinner.

The darkroom is the GREAT LEVELLER.
That sounds like the name of the horned bloke from 'Legend' or, more to my taste, the name of the horned bloke from Tenacious D's "The Greatest Song In The World".
Why the Great Leveller? 
Because everyone is using pretty much exactly the same stuff, from exhibitions hanging in MOMA, to a couple of prints stuck up in a local cafe.
The difference between famine and feast is your care as a printer. 
You have to be precise and consistent
You have to take care with each stage (yeah I know what I wrote above about my test strips, but I can say that because I have been doing this for a long time).
But the thing is, printing ISN'T rocket science. 
It's a craft skill, like crochet or knitting and anyone can learn a craft skill.
It truly is an egalitarian process.
And whilst these days it is considered to be a luxury craft skill, and boy can it be frustrating when you make mistakes with a sheet of paper costing a couple of quid, on the whole, it is FUN
And educational. 
And, I believe, life-enhancing.
It improves you as a human being, because the care you take in the darkroom, can lend itself to run and rummel of every day life too. 
The precision, order and concentration rub off. 
They really do!
But that is me heading on another of my Sheephousian metaphysical borrocks convos, and we don't want to go there.

So, to round out, here's some straight scans of recent stuff, printed whilst ice formed on the inside of my house's windows, grey skies cemented themselves onto the general milieu of the British psyche and people started another year in a great state of flux and doubt.
If that phrase applies to you, I am sorry - things will get better, just trust that.


5x4" Negative, 
Fomabrom Variant 111, Kodak Selenium, 
Adox Neutol NE Developer

 
5x4" Negative, 
Fomabrom Variant 111, Kodak Selenium, 
Adox Neutol NE Developer


5x4" Negative, 
Fomabrom Variant 111, Kodak Selenium, 
Adox Neutol NE Developer


35mm Negative, 
Ilford MGRC, Heavily toned in Selenium, Then Bleached in Ferri.
Firstcall MG Developer


TTFN old fruitcakes and thank you, once again, from the bottom of my heart, for reading.
Be good and if you can't be good, be careful.
Everything is going to be alright.
H xx

Saturday, January 15, 2022

Here Come The Men

Morning folks - I hope you are all well and still breathing.

Today's wee post title was inspired by the following photo, captured on a tired, dull morning at the end of December.
Better get your suits on though, because, "Here Come The Men!"

Don't you think that in today's day and age - the Roaring 20's (sic) when "Anything Goes Dwarling" -the photo below is a total anachronism?


© Phil Rogers Dundee,Ilford Microphen 1+1,Hasselblad 500 C/M,Hasselblad 60mm Distagon,
Here Come The Men


I do.

I found it on the side of a closed shop in Dundee, beside a wee pend (Rankine's Court) leading to The Keiller Centre.
For those of you local, you know exactly where I am; for everyone else, this late 70's faux indoor market has had a chequered history. It sits on the site of the original Keiller factory,  purveyor of Jams and Chocolate; Cakes and Marmalades and so on - you've heard of both Dundee Cake and Dundee Marmalade right? Well this was their home!
The factory site was redeveloped in the 1970's. 
Apparently, for most of its life before it was knocked down, the lanes surrounding the factory smelled of cocoa and butterscotch.

When the Keiller Centre opened in 1979, it was quite a destination, butchers, bakers, fruiterers; record and video shops; clothes both new and surplus; confections and papers. People loved it.
But as with all things, its use declined. 

It was renamed the Forum back in the 1990's, but then was renamed with its original name in the 2000's because Forum sounded fecking stupid and I was inclined to agree. 
Today it is a small collection of stalls - I have no idea why someone doesn't revamp it as an Arts Centre - it would be perfect for that.

Anyway, in a weird case of happenstance and so forth, I am typing this from the scullery of a house built by a member of the Keiller family in the 1880's.
It seems appropriate somehow.

The thing I find most telling about the above photo is that someone has shot at the window with an air gun; I know, because back in the 1970's our Council house was at one time peppered with such shots. 
Oh yes, they loved us on the Racecourse Estates. The Estates actually became known as "Little Beirut" back in the 1980's. A shame, as I remember them as being a haven for working families with plenty of green space and amenities.

But back to the photo - regular readers will spot that it has, uncharacteristically for me, a curvy left wall; not only that but the whole picture is unbalanced with the openness of the frame at the right hand side meaning that everything is falling out of the frame - should have burned that side in a tad.

It was actually a really hard composition to juggle - the day was filthy and overcast and being in a small pend (or tunnel) and photographing something already dark was quite a challenge.
The exposure was 1/15th at f4! 
That was nearly the maximum aperture of the 60mm Distagon. 
The camera was entirely handheld and I was leaning back against a wall, whilst earnest businessmen with their coffees passed me in one direction and the homeless person at the start of the pend started looking at me and wondering whether I had any money.
Considering the above it came out surprisingly well.
I confess though, I DID have to crop the print, just to get things a little straighter.

It does seem madness going out photographing when you're a few days away from the shortest day and the skies are greyer than 10 week old underpants, however this was part of an experiment encouraged by Bruce from the Online Darkroom. 
Basically I used HP5+ rated at EI 800 and developed in 1+1 Microphen.
But where's the Pyrocat? I hear you ask.
Ah, my supplier has closed down.
I could mix my own, but in a bizarre mix of European Rules, Health and Safety and a lack of suppliers, I'd probably be the best part of £100 for all the raw materials. Granted it would last several lifetimes, but being now unemployed, it is not a thing I would consider.
Also, I've had a box of Microphen for ages and thought I should use it.

The results are OK all things considered - I'm not sure whether I'd continue with Microphen though as (having been used to the sheer economy of Pyrocat) that bottle of stock solution vanishes in a rapid and alarming manner. In hindsight I should have just gone the undiluted route and upped times with each use, but it is unfamiliar territory for me and I played safe.

Anyway, here's some more pics from the expedition:


© Phil Rogers Dundee,Ilford Microphen 1+1,Hasselblad 500 C/M,Hasselblad 60mm Distagon,
Manga Graffitti


Yep, camera shake is all over this, which is a shame as the image was a crisp as a packet of Seabrooks. Exposure was 1/60th at f5.6, and I was crouched and trying to make some focus sense from the dim conditions - sadly it didn't work.
But if I can't show you my mistakes there's little point in this blog - Art suffers triumph and tragedy.
Wait a minute, did I just allude to myself an 'artist'?


Tako Taal


This was a poster just outside the Cowgate Underpass - I rather was taken by the slapdash nature of the Bill Posters art.
It is an exhibition at the DCA by Tako Taal, who apparently is:

" . . . an artist and programmer. At stake in her artistic practice are the psychic structures of colonial relations, and the question of how vivid they remain in the present."

I'll counter this with:

Herman Sheephouse is a photographer and writer. At stake in his artistic practice are themes of permanence and the insubstantial nature of the digital world juxtaposed upon the need to leave some evidence of one's existence.

Don't you just love how today's artists have to be 'something' or have some sort of mission statement, rather than just making and enjoying art for the sheer joy of creativity!
I blame money.

Anyway, earlier, well a few steps earlier in fact, I had chanced upon a poster for my old lecturer/mentor Joseph McKenzie . . . or just plain Joe as everyone knew him.
I'll not go on about him too much - I've said it all already in FB.
He loved Dundee though, for its light and character and famously photographed the destruction of what could have been Scotland's answer to York.
The destruction wrought upon this City was (to my mind) as bad as Isis knocking down Nimrud.


Joseph McKenzie
A Love Letter To Dundee

The above is my tribute to the man himself - I'm sure he'd have liked this (well as sure as you can be of anyone else's opinion). 

It was taken in the underpass itself at 1/60th at f4.
I rather like the grittiness of the concrete showing through the frailty of the poster's paper. 
Joe would have questioned that and no doubt would have said something profound, witty and to the point.
The poster was OK but rather a poor reproduction, so here's the original photograph - a masterpiece.


© Joseph McKenzie Archive
"The Worker's Mansions"
From "Hawkhill - Death Of A Living Community"

The original print has life in the shadows and a better balance; it also has a glow which is probably a single-coated lens, and of course the quality of the paper shines through.

He pretty much used Galerie exclusively from the early '80's, though this print could well be from the time it was taken - 1971, so I've no idea what he was using then.
He was a great man and teacher though and I still can't believe he hasn't been better acknowledged by his contemporaries or the greater photographic world.
I count myself lucky to have known him and, well, you wouldn't be reading this had it not been for him.
He still is a legend.

It has been good having time to write this in a leisurely manner rather than my usual slap-dash, early morning panics to get another FB published. 
It is absolutely wonderful to be able to take my camera out when I please.
Time is the most precious thing we don't own.

And that, as they say, is that.
I told you this one would be brief didn't I.

Till the next time, be good.
H xx







Monday, April 19, 2021

Ãœbermensch

Morning folks - y'see, there I was with the germ of an idea for a post, and I started, and got a title and everyfink, and then I continued expounding until all I had was a page full of words and myself, tied up in unreadable nonsense.
Goodness it was long and dull, and I got to the point whereby I thought, I really can't get myself out of this corner I've painted myself into.
So what did I do? 
Yep, chopped it all out and started again. 
(It had taken me bloody weeks too).

I like the title though, don't you?

Here's a little snippet from der Wiki:

In his 1883 book Thus Spoke Zarathustra (German: Also sprach Zarathustra), Nietzsche has his character Zarathustra posit the Ãœbermensch as a goal for humanity to set for itself. The Ãœbermensch represents a shift from otherworldly Christian values and manifests the grounded human ideal. It is a work of philosophical allegory, with a similar structure to the Gathas of Zoroaster/Zarathustra.

And with that title came this picture . . . not that it has anything to do with grounded human ideals.

It was taken around the back of Duncan Of Jordanstone College Of Art, a couple of years back.
Camera was a Hasselblad 500C/M and a 60mm Distagon, on I think Ilford HP5, developed in Pyrocat-HD.
I don't know what mentor and surrogate father-figure Joseph McKenzie would have made of it, but I wish I'd had the balls and the eyes to present something like it back in the 1980s'.

Why I think it suits the title I have no idea - maybe it's my deep subconscious at work. 
Anyway, in hindsight, I really should have taken the legs home.


Ãœbermensch 1
Hasseblad 500 C/M, 60mm Distagon, FP4+

The splashy stuff and writing are as a result of me resting the lens hood against a window and focusing on the legs - there's something about reflection photos taken this way that adds an air of dreaminess to an already unreal scene. 
Thank goodness it was just a wired safety door and not double-glazed. 
Double glazing ruins most reflection shots.
Hmmm - Ãœbermensch - Beyond Man.

Whilst not as photogenic as the legs, the title also brings this picture to mind.


Ãœbermensch 2


The above could be a file snapped on a phone, but it isn't.
It's Hard Data - exposed silver halide on a polyester base, printed in a darkroom on resin coated paper. 

Snapped from a bus, on a dark, wet Winter's night with a Nikon F, that moment is now out in the world.
A private observation becomes tangible, physical.

The negative exists in a file, in a folder, on a shelf; the print in a box.

I can hold that strip of negatives in my hand, taking them out carefully and print them. 
When I use film and make prints, by chemical process, I bring light and time into being. 

That point in my life when I took that photograph is cemented into emulsion.

When I started thinking about this it quickly became very weird indeed:

I have stopped time

Pulled a piece of the universe away from its fabric.

Maybe it's no surprise that indigenous peoples feared the camera because they thought it would steal their soul.

I photograph you at a moment in time and make that part of you, then, into a physical representation of you in a print.
The print is the child of the negative.
The negative is another version of you because you will never be that version of yourself again.
That version of you, captured, exists; but unlike say a reflection in a pool, it has become an object that transcends the momentary.

You could argue that the image fixed in emulsion is truly unreal

Even without the translation process of printing, negatives are strangely beautiful objects.

I enjoy looking at them in their own right.
I like the way that (at the right angle and with the right light behind them) you can see a ghostly brown-grey positive image. 
I like the fact that they have to be handled carefully, and cherished really, like delicate children.

Hmmm - Ãœbermensch - Beyond Man. 
Hmmm - Jenseits der Zeit - Beyond Time.

Talking of which.
The negative and the print of this exist. 
 

Stranger In Town
© W. Eugene Smith / Magnum Photos - All rights reserved


They're not data in the cloud, they're physical; beyond binary 1's and 0's, a human has taken materials and not only torn a piece from the fabric of the Universe, but also turned them into something that goes way beyond their mere physicality.
This photograph, whilst obviously old (1942 actually) transcends time. 
It speaks eloquently and across the ages, to all.
Who hasn't, at least once in their lives, felt like this?
Stranger In Town.
Ãœbermensch.


I'll leave the last word to another from my old mate Eugene Smith. 
Possibly the finest photograph ever taken in my eyes.
As full of grace, power, emotion, skill, craft and beauty as anything ever produced by anyone ever.



Nun Waiting For Survivors - Andrea Doria 1956
© W. Eugene Smith / Magnum Photos - All rights reserved


It might have been set-up as he was wont to do at times, however I am not sure of that. 
It speaks in spades, communing emotion way beyond the event and beyond time itself.
I've looked at this image hundreds of times and yet every time my eyes are drawn to the beauty and poise of the Nun, and then to the small bear in her hand, and I am moved. Moved beyond it's reality as a mere photograph.
To tears.
A translator to the life beyond, caught so very briefly in a deeply human and humane moment.
Beautiful.
Almost eternal.

And that's it - you can start stroking your whispy, lockdown, humanities teacher, proto-beard and go Hmmmmmmm.

Over and out - photography next time, and lots of it, and I might not even shut-up.

Beam Us Up Scotty!

P.S. - I latterly discovered a nice little article about the meaning of the word, or meanings of the word - hey, Quantum Philosophy!
You can find it here.

Tuesday, March 16, 2021

Occam's Razor (ish)

Morning folks - well I got there eventually - sorry for any tardiness in publishing, but sometimes, well sometimes you're busy.
Anyway Spring is a Springin'!
Mornings are getting lighter and every photographer worth his salt should be getting out from under that thiosulphate-stained quilt and heading out with some fresh film and an attitude!

Attitude?

Oh yeah.

You've got to get moving!

Over the latter Winter months this year, I photographed seriously around (on average) three times a week. Now that's a lot for me, but it was good from the point of view that it helped sharpen my compositional viewpoint and instilled in me a realisation that I am really not getting any younger, and any day lost, is one less day of light.

Oh what a yawn dahling, what a lazy use of English.

It is true though, because it is the light that defines us.

It's easy for me to write that this morning, when the sun is up, but it is still brisk outside, but trust me, the light 'round these parts has run the gamut from utter pish through to heavenly. 
Overcast ghastliness and liquid silver; chucking rain; hard, low Winter sun; calf-length snow and bitter winds - I did them all.

It's been fun though; intensive and hard, and I discovered I rather like photographing buildings. 
I've done the found objects to death, so concrete stone, glass and steel it was. 
But rather than boringly detail each and every building I thought I'd get this melange of photos together and  show you what I did with relatively simple (albeit exquisite) equipment.





Oh, and why Occam's Razor? 

Well its underlying principle is that the simplest explanation is often the most correct. 
Not only that but I like the expression!

Photographically, I think there's way too much guff spoken about photography, both in the execution and also in the production of an end product. 
For instance, regular readers will know I have a total aversion to split-grade printing as I think it may possibly be useful, but on the whole feel it is far too footery for my ends. 
In the darkroom, and paraphrasing my old mentor Joseph McKenzie, simple is best.

I also re-read some of Fred Picker's Zone System Manual recently and oh boy, no disservice to Mr. Picker, but it really makes you want to put your lens cap on. 
Well it does me, even though there's plenty of useful stuff in there, the sheer complexity and footeriness really is enough to send one running.

So, simple is the by-word and without further ado, here's the pics!


Wall


Extreme dullness in the extreme, the above has something about it I like. I think it is the off-kilter banding from a mixture of pillar shadow and low sun.
This was made with a newly acquired, super-cheap 250mm CF Sonnar. It's got a couple of cosmetic issues but is a fine lens. As sharp wide open as it is stopped down, it has made me reconsider viewpoints. 
It was taken on HP5 rated at 200, processed in Pyrocat-HD and printed on Grade 3 Ilford MGRC.


1960's Concrete Brutalist


D'amore of a D'asame, as me old mate Sting used to say. 
Sonnar 250, HP5, Pyrocat and MGRC.
There's something gruesomely beautiful about the 'new' building at Duncan Of Jordanstone.
I think there's an air of Cold War stoicism about it.
Dundee has actually modelled for Russia in TV and film a few times - weird eh!


Progress


Back in the 60's the old Hawkhill was a mix of cottages, lanes, tenements and mills. It had character in spades and was torn down in the name of progress. 
When i arrived here, the last of the Hawkhill was condemned buildings, small shops hanging on by the skin of their teeth, and major works.
A great shame.
The modern thing in the background is part of the Life Science Centre and is a world leader in all things, er, life sciency.


Tree And Wall


There's something about the juxtaposition of tree, shadow and wall that I really like.
The sun was low and hard and weirdly I was wielding Ilford's SFX with a deep red filter. EI was 6!
The lens was a CF 150mm Sonnar. Hasselblad's cheapest secondhand lens on average and a sterling performer at all apertures.
It was processed in Pyrocat and printed on Ilford MGRC again.
I use the RC to make work prints, which I'll turn into 'proper' prints on fibre paper when I get the time.
Making work prints this way on 5x7" paper is a quick and easy way of working that doesn't cost a fortune.
Again the old simple is best epithet applies.
Occam's Razor!


Winter


Yeah I know you Pickerites, there's no texture in the snow. 
Well actually you're wrong - there is, but this was just a quick print to assess things, so I shall burn the snow in slightly when I print it properly.
The snow is actually quite gungey and ugly from slush - maybe it's better pure white?
Film was HP5 in Pyrocat,  printed onto Grade 3 MGRC.
Lens was the 60mm Distagon - as fine a lens as anything you'll find. 
Zeiss recommended it for weddings, but I think it works brilliantly for landscape and 'tecture.


Future Dream


I haven't taken reflection photographs in a while, but I was so taken by this, that I had to take it. 
Sadly the double glazing has totally mucked up the quality of the reflection as it always does - bring back Victorian Plate Glass!
This was the 150mm Sonnar again and pretty much wide open.
Film is SFX and a deep red filter is in use.
Oh Yus . . .


The Hanged Man


Can you seen him? 
Me too, well I would wouldn't I because it was me. Not that I was hanging or anything . . .
This was taken about 2 weeks on from the last one - amazing the changes Winter will wrought. Snow was calf-deep in places, but I didn't let that stop me. 
The light is what I wanted to capture, but sadly it hasn't appeared here - maybe a better print would do it.
Lens was the 60mm Distagon.
It's a simple straight print on Grade 3 MGRC.


What If They Gave A Party And Nobody Came?


This was off the dreadfully under-developed roll of FP4. 
I now know my timings for next time so all is not lost and at least I hadn't walked 10 miles!
It's actually pretty underexposed too, but them's the breaks.
Camera was the SWC/M, and it was handheld at 1/15th at f8. 
It's very sharp.
The print was Grade 4 on MGRC - no need for split trousers or bleaching.


What The F?!


I really didn't realise I'd captured a Wild F, but I had. I just liked the shadows on the wall.
It was a tricky shot, me being on the ground and this being halfway up a fire escape.
I developed the film and lo and behold a Wild F!
Sadly the print is nothing like the contact print - could do better is what I'll say.
Lens was a Sonnar and Ilford SFX again.


Tunnel Of Weirdness


You know where dogs keep going back and peeing on the same wall?
Well . . . 
Though it doesn't look it, again this was the 150mm Sonnar with Ilford SFX.
I've tried to keep the composition as simple as possible, yet it's an enormously complex image.
Grade 3 print on MGRC.
Dead simple.


I.T.M.A.


Whilst technically not an architectural photo, I feel remiss for not including our old mate.
There's been many photographs of him since I discovered him, but this is one of my favourites, and I suppose that IS a building so I am excused a bit.
This was 1/15th at f8 with the 250mm Sonnar. 
I was a loooong way down the lane and it sort of shows what a long lens can do to space.
I actually like it very much.
Film was HP5 rated at EI 200 and developed in Pyrocat.
Print was a Grade 3 on MGRC just to snap things up a bit.
There was no wafting or wizard cloak involved in making the print: set grade, shove paper into easel, expose, develop. 
The whole thing was done in a few minutes.


Where Man Meets Nature


This isn't technically a 'simple' photograph as it is from the fogged and yucky roll of Bergger I detailed in the last FB, however it is a simple photograph.
Camera was the SWC/M, print was about Grade 5 on old Tetenal MGRC, which was already a very contrasty paper.
My nose was nearly touching that right hand wall!


Aliens At The V&A


The above is my absolute favourite. That marker post is so inutterably 'alien' that is sets the whole thing off.
It was taken on Ilford FP4 rated at EI 80 and developed in some really ancient HC110. 
Sadly the film is well under-developed simply because I couldn't get the right time. 
Times these days are all over the place - I think the assumption in all the literature out there is that you will be scanning the negative rather than actually projection printing them. 
Oh how the times (!) have changed.
I have to say, that I err on the side of Ralph Gibson and prefer a negative to be slightly on the cooked side - it gets you more meat and potatoes in a print. Not only that but a more developed negative is more easily correctable than an under-exposed or under-developed one. 

Oh and you might be wondering why I am talking like this - it's simply because I have nearly run out of Pyrocat, and am using anything and everything else I can find, and not only that, a change is as good as getting arrested.

Anyway, given the thinness of the above, I had to execute a swift side move. 
And what was that? 
Well, simple really, given the lack of snap in the negative I just printed it on Grade 4! 
It's a straight print apart from a wee bit of dodging to the out of focus beam at the top left.
That simple.

I really like the tonality.
It's weird really, FP4 is the most reasonable, consistent and reliable black and white film out there. I am stating that as a fact. Why waste your time testing films where the QC isn't a patch on the Mobberley Mob?
I am done with spending time composing, only to come back and develop something either flawed or inconsistent. I would use Kodak films too, because the quality control is impecable, but since they've decided to be so expensive, I'll no longer use them - shame.
Anyway, FP4 - its tonality can be wonderful. 
In my opinion, it is the pinnacle of monochrome tonality.

Photographically it couldn't have been simpler, albeit I was lucky with some really wonderful light and an eminently photogenic building.
The camera was my Hasselblad SWC/M and the photo was handheld, 1/15th of a second at f5.6.
As those bleedin' meercats used to say "Simples"!

And that's it really. 
Occam's Razor
Keep it simple.
I could probably have done the same with a Holga or the old Rollei T, or even the knackered Autocord . . . in fact that's a thought . . . . 
You really don't need bells and whistles to make images you are happy with.

There's an acronym: K.I.S.S.

Keep. It. Simple, Stupid.

I totally agree with that

Till next time, try it.
Unburden yourself from technicalities, sub-plots, menus, footeriness!
Go simple, and if you have a darkroom, get rid of all the stuff they tell you you have to have and have to use to get a result.
Use a single grade and your gut feelings about how the image should look, and have a go
You might well be surprised.

I guess what I am trying to say, is that at the end of the day, the final image is all that counts - if you can get there with the least possible number of complications, then that is all the better.
Why?
I don't really know actually, but probably backing it up is my old college conundrum whereby, given a problem to solve or a graphic to create, the more processes that went into the final thing, the more that thing was rendered null and void. 
Enthusiasm was sapped.
Energy drifted.
Creativity was stifled to the point of tedium, and at the end of the process, the initial thoughts and roughs seemed to be the ones that worked best.

Mies Van Der Rohe's epithet "Less Is More" rings true in so many situations, both literally and metaphorically.

Over and oot - beam me up Scotsman!







Thursday, February 04, 2021

Kung Fu Rescue Job

Morning fiends, er friends. 
This morning I am going all glasshopper again, because I was severely let down by an errant roll of film over Christmas and would like to recount the whole sorry tale.
Why Kung Fu?
Ah, the good old 1970's!
Well, if you remember the program, David Carradine always seemed to pull off the impossible no matter the odds.
I felt myself to be in a similar situation when some interesting pictures (conjecture of course - that's my opinion!) were nearly rendered null and void by weirdness.


Hasselblad SWC/M,Bergger Panchro 400,Pyrocat-HD,Tetenal TT Vario RC Paper


Despite its epithet as 'Scotland's Sunniest City', weather in Dundee can be overwhelmingly ghastly at times. 
We're shielded by the Grampians from the North and West; we don't poke out into the North Sea to suffer the same banks of fog and extremes that the likes of Fife does; we're too far South and not far enough North (and coastal!) to render most snowfall null and void. 
All in all we can be incredibly grey, and when we get The Grey, we get it in spades.
Into this mix add haar (a lovely Nordic term for cold river and sea water meeting warm air and thus creating banks of weird fog) and you've got a brew made in mad weather heaven. 
You can see haar building in the middle of the Tay; it can start as a whispy white mohican on the river and the next thing you know the whole town is blanketed in chilly mist. 
In the Summer it can be (dare I say it) pleasant, however in the Winter when it has been grey for days, that chill dampness gets into every single fibre of your body
I call it East Coast Raw and it really is.

On the other hand, the light on the Tay can be extraordinarily beautiful
It was enough to anchor Joseph McKenzie here for decades, and I can quite see why - he once described the light so beautifully to me that it is worth recounting it, albeit through the filter of decades passed. 

There's a liquid silvern quality to it that is at once ethereal and distancing; with the haze and moisture of the river, distance is extended; on clear, haze-free days, distance is compressed; daylight on the river can at times act like a reflector, and if that reflection is caught by cloud it is reflected back onto the city; it is like a solar North light that evens illumination.

That's the gist of it.
The light can manifest itself at most times of day too, but especially so on a cooler morning as the sun is just rising - lovely stuff and especially so if you're using a film that lends itself to subtle greys.

Despite all this potential, this past Winter has been something else - I do believe it has rained most weekends since the start of November. 
The Grey has cemented itself in
It has been pitch (nearly) going to work and the same coming home. 
A ghastly, enthusiasm-sapping wind has blown constantly from every direction and all at once and in most of a lifetime of living here I reckon it was probably the most overcast Winter I have ever experienced. 
On the plus side, it was less cold than usual.

So imagine my joy when the sun came out for a brief time a month or so back - oh boy, I was skipping like a lamb. 
Me and t'missus had a lovely walk, came home, had lunch, and then I stepped out to take some photos.

You know, I love taking pictures with the Hasselblad SWC/M for a couple of really simple reasons. 
Remember when you were young and your Dad let you use the Kodak Instamatic - all you had to do was set the zone focus and press that weird oblong shutter release - Click
And that was it until you collected the pictures from the chemists.
Wonderful.
Uncomplicated. 
The image was all there was - no technical footery.
Well, others might disagree, but the Hasselblad Super Wide is just a simple point and shoot, albeit with one of the best lenses ever made stuck on the front.
You load your film holder, attach to camera, remove darkslide, set aperture and speed, adjust focus, squint through weirdly comforting viewfinder and Click!
You know you'll have something (often something epic) and you don't need to worry about any deficiencies in the camera.  
Everything else is operator error.

So, there I was, ready to go and chancing some new and different film - Bergger Panchro 400!
I thought I'd give it a go, just in case. 
I halved box speed because that'll usually do it with most 400 films and set off with a supremely lightweight but high quality picture making maschine.
I was ready for everything.

Ah it was brilliant - Dundee Uni was empty - no students courtesy of CV, just myself and a few old ladies walking their dogs. 
Everywhere was hard, low sun and steep, deep shadow and whilst not intending to photograph buildings, their lines were so enhanced by the light that I couldn't not do it.
An hour and a half slipped by like it was nothing
I was really cold, but so fired by what I was seeing that the extreme chill was meaningless.

Have you ever got yourself into one of those Photographic Zen Zones?
It is very akin to when you are improvising music with other people, or when you are writing and the characters take a hold of you and won't let you stop till they're done. 
If you've never experienced either of these, trust me, the similarities are, er, very similar.
In a PZZ, you are led by your eyes. 
Everything looks like a potential scene.
I'll add an epithet to that though, everything can also look like a potential crime-scene if you aren't careful.
You have to exercise a modicum of restraint - it's easy to blaze away, so I have one simple phrase I say to myself:

Would I print that?

If the answer is NO! move on buddy. 
It works for me.

Anyway, back to our trip into madness . . .
I used a tripod pretty much the whole way, just 'cos I wanted the best sharpness I could get; also when you're eyeballing the bubble level on a SW, having it steady before you start footering is an added advantage. I had a brilliant time.

I was so thrilled by what I'd seen that I hoofed it home in double quick time, and because the film was an unknown, decided to use Pyrocat (simply because it has been the most consistent and reliable developer for every film I have ever developed with it.)
18 mins in the developer (yes I know); a couple in a water stop; 5 mins in semi-fresh fix and a couple of washes before I got my mitts onto it.
I was so excited!
And then . . .

GAAAAARRRRRGGGHHHHHH!

A cursory examination and the whole film appeared nearly black.
I initially thought the whole film was fogged, and I had no idea how that had happened.
Obviously I was expecting some stain with Pyrocat but this was well beyond my experience of it.

That's them all sleeved below with the LED equivalent of a 60 watt bulb shining behind them.
Not only is there edge fog, there's a general massive amount of base fog over the whole film. 
Allied to this, there's also what appears (at first) to be a scratch on the emulsion (yes, I spent about half an hour minutely going over my film back . . . there was nothing sharp): on even closer examination, the scratch was actually an exposed line within the emulsion itself.
I was absolutely FIZZING.
What a total waste of time and money . . . and I had another 4 rolls of the stuff!


Hasselblad SWC/M,Bergger Panchro 400,Pyrocat-HD,Tetenal TT Vario RC Paper
Denser Than A Busload Of Denseness


After I'd calmed down a bit I decided to do a contact print (because I always do a contact print for reference) and it was even more ghastly than I'd thought.
My normal exposure time for PHD negs is 32 seconds at f22 on Grade 2.
This beauty took 56 seconds at f8 on GRADE 5
And yes I was using speed matching with the filters.
I think that shows you that it was a tad foggy.


Hasselblad SWC/M,Bergger Panchro 400,Pyrocat-HD,Tetenal TT Vario RC Paper
More Fog Than A 1940's Peasouper



I know what you're going to say - you unloaded/loaded that in full sunlight. Not so. All done in subdued light, so put that in yer pipe and smoke it.
I would normally detail all the exposures here, but I'll not waste your time - there's no point.
I was about to exit the darkroom in a total mare, but something clicked in my head and I thought feck it - why not have a go at trying to get some prints?
It was pretty 'orrible and grey outside anyway, so why not?

I've had a few grim sessions in the darkroom in my life - most of them involving underexposed negatives and stupid mistakes.
Most of the underexposure on these is actually a result of the fog interfering with things, a bit like it does in John Carpenter's masterpiece! 
There's details in them thar dark bits, but youse can't see 'em boyo.

I also had to do something that is anathema to me - CROP A NEGATIVE!
I always print full frame - why? Because I prefer to have the scene set on the VF when I take the photo and not use a judicial after-the-event-eye on things. 
No doubt it is faulty thinking from me, but that's just me.

Anyway, it was a heck of a job.
I'll usually do prints on Grade 3 and around 15 secs at f22 - Pyrocat can make timing very consistent, and the DeVere's nuclear bulb makes short work of everything.
With these puppies I was anywhere between 15 and 30 seconds at f16 on Grade 5.
It took me a while to get to that point using test strips, but once I'd dialled it in, I whipped through them quite quickly.
I had to use Grade 5 to punch through the fog - it was the only solution as far as I could see, that would give me something look-at-able.
The paper was some of the last of my Tetenal RC - already a very contrasty paper on Grade 2, so believe me, it was contrasty! I am also now using First Call's soft pack paper developer too, which I think is a variation on the much missed Agfa Neutol. 
It is very good stuff indeed, and won't go off to the same extent, it being in a pouch (I wish I could say that about myself.)


Anyway, here they are in all their tawdry glory. 
I don't mind them at all actually, strangely; I thought I'd hate them. 
It's actually made me want to try printing things softer for a while and see what happens - obviously not with these though.
Most of my negatives are on the denser side of normal, so it might be an interesting experiment.
Oh and print size was 5x7" and the image size is 120mm.
I forgot to say that over Christmas a neighbour very kindly asked "Is this any use to you?" and promptly handed me a Leitz easel over the garden wall!
I reckon its 1950's and it is an ideal size for smaller pieces of paper. 
Anyway, I am using that and it gives me wonderfully thin borders - thinner than a Spiv's 'tache - and on these prints it is just a hair over 3mm.
I print the image on the shorter end of the paper, so there's a nice big holdable bit of white at the bottom.
Not only does it make for a tactile print that is both easy to store and refer to, it also slashes your paper costs!

Onwards glasshopper.
 

Gargh 1


Why not I thought, so I made like a duck with my fingers, but didn't actually realise I'd captured myself in all my grimacing glory. Sorry if I've broke your monitor.
There's a window around the corner from this that is so severely covered with guano, I reckon it is holding the whole building up.


Gargh 2


Dundee Uni's 'Security Centre' - at all times of day it is a faceless maw waiting to capture the unwary. 
In a way it reminds me of a Stasi headquarters - innocuous enough, but they're watching you.
The guano is exquisitely set - I reckon you'd need to take a chisel to it.


Gargh 3


At some point in time, someone thought it would be a good idea to plant these palms right next to a building. 
As you can see they've gone a bit mental and are now obscuring everything. 
This being said I like it - there's an air of mystery to it.
We've a surfeit of palms around the Uni for some reason - must be because we're 'Scotland's Sunniest City'!


Gargh 4


Yes I should have cropped more judiciously and aligned my verticals better. 
It is only slightly out, but it lends a feeling of disquiet to me and I find it visually disturbing. 
Gary Winogrand always said no matter how wide the lens, try and get the left vertical correct and everything else will follow, because we scan a print from left to right (whether consciously or not).
He's bang on.
Those trees are I believe lilacs and they're rather beautiful.


Gargh 5


I had great hopes for this one - it's a bunch of Yuccas squashing themselves against a window in a mad bid to escape. 
It's in the Engineering department at the Uni if you want a butchers . . . but who wants to come to Dundee? 
Ah, you do . . well bring your mask and don't get caught.
Sadly the fog has rendered it like a Grade 0 print on nicely fogged 30 year old Multigrade  . . . with extra fog.


Gargh 6


Which brings me to my last choice. I know where this is, and I'll keep it that way. There's something about the juxtaposition of trees and concrete that I have to keep photographing it - in fact now at the start of February I've taken another 5 photos of it at differing times of day. 
It's weirdly beautiful and I wish it wasn't chuffing phogged!
This being said the phogging has leant the print something of a warmth and also an older look. 
T'missus instantly said "that looks 30's Bauhaus"', and I tend to agree with her.
The incredible sharpness and lack of distortion from the Biogon is, to me, remarkable.


And that's the end of this sorry tale.
At least I managed to rescue something - I was chanelling Caine - he helped greatly. 
When I said thank you, he just adjusted his hat and bag, gently opened the darkroom door and moved off quietly into the gathering dusk. 
I could hear his flute for a long time after.

As for Bergger. Well don't let it put you off - their Fibre paper is lovely stuff, and to be fair to them, after I contacted them and said:

Wot's this 'ere then? I've got another 4 rolls of this tosh!

they went:

Sacré bleu!

And replaced the whole lot. 

Excellent customer service.
This being said, I doubt I'll be using it again. As I explained to them, when you go to the time and effort of all this and then the medium lets you down badly then you're unlikely to try it again. It was a good job I hadn't driven 40-odd miles and walked another 12.

I had the same thing with Foma 100 Sheet film 10 years back - and I did actually drive and walk those distances, with a bleedin' Sinar F too. The results were utterly awful (for my needs) and I've never used it again.


Anyway, over and out. I'm off to rescue a Chinese Railroad Worker and his family.

"Once mighty waters hurled themselves against rock, and from those two great forces came this gentle sand."