[Photography] All Of Our Yesterdays.

Polaroid SX70 [Red] | Polaroid Time Zero Artistic [Edge Cut]

[Photography] I See A Darkness.

Polaroid SX70 [Red] | Polaroid Time Zero [Expired 1999]

[Photography] You Only Disappear.

Polaroid SX70 [Tan] | ImpossibleProject PX680 Beta

[Photography] Lazy Butterly.

Polaroid SX70 [Red] | Polaroid Time Zero [Expired 1999]

[Photography] Grass | Lensbaby.

Grass.

Bude Cornwall | June 2011 | Canon 400D | Lensbaby Muse Plastic Optic

[Photography] My 50/50 Project.... Lives Again!

"Life" [50/50-027]

The 50/50 project is back up and running now that I have replaced my Canon 50mm f1.8 lens that got broken in Southend back in April. So nice to have the shallow DoF and limited field of view again. Love it.

The full 50/50 set so far is here. It's a pretty random affair, no links between the images apart from the lens used. 27 images so far, 23 to go.

[Photography] 'Roid Week Summer 2011 Out-takes.

Four Polaroid that were out-takes from my 'Roid Week shoot. 2 on Polaroid ATZ; 2 on ImpossibleProject PX600SilverShade FirstFlush. I liked 'em enough to share, just not enough to use for 'Roid Week.

[Photography] Overreach.

Overreach.

Apple iPhone 4 | Edited in the Instagram app.  Grabbed this on the iPhone whilst out taking Polaroid for 'RoidWeek.  The scene was too dark for a Polaroid to work, but came out nicely on the iPhone, even better when run through a "vintage" filter in Instagram.

[Photography] 'Roid Week Summer 2011 Day Five.

I Can't Remember.

Dam That River.

My final two Polaroids for Roid Week Summer 2011. These were the last of decent shots I had left over from my trip out on Monday, and even still Im not 100% sure about one of them.  First is on SX70 with Polaroid ATZ film; second on the modified SX70 using TIP PX600SSFF.  Alice In Chains songs to round the week off.

Go and have a look at the Group on Flickr [link above] and give yourself an hour or so of looking through the photo pool. some truly amazing stuff in there.

[Photography] 'Roid Week Summer 2011 Day Four.

In From The Storm.

You Got Me Floatin'

Day Three of Roid Week Summer 2001 is here. I shot these two at the same time as the others Ive used for Roid Week so far, but I left them a few days before I scanned them to allow the TheImpossibleProject PX70 ColorShade FirstFlush to "cook" properly and for more of the image to come out. It worked!  Both of these are flawed images.  The right hand side [In From the Storm] is too dark and has a poor chemical pod in the middle, but the details was retained in the sky; and the other one [You Got Me Floatin'] has some weird thing going on.  No idea what it is, but it pops up on a few on my 'roids over the last year.  I like it.  Both named after Hendrix songs.

[Photography] 'Roid Week Summer 2011 Day Three.

Last Caress.

Come Back.

Offerings for Day Three of Roid Week Summer 2011. Again I went for the Time Zero Artisting [Edge Cut] for the first shot, falling back on some PX600FF from TheImpossibleProject for the second. Both named, this time, after Misfits songs.

[Photography] 'Roid Week Summer 2011 Day Two.

Burn It Up.

Gone Away.

My two Polaroids for Roid Week Summer 2011 Day Two. The first was on an SX70 using Polaroid Time Zero Artistic film.  The second was on my modified SX70 and ImpossibleProject PX600 SilverShade FirstFlush.  Both named after songs by The Offspring.

[Photography] 'Roid Week Summer 2011 Day One.

Soul To Squeeze.

This Is The Place.

My two Polaroids for Roid Week Summer 2011. Both were taken today, both on my modified SX70, both on ImpossibleProject PX600 SilverShade FirstFlush [dated May 2010]. Both named after Red Hot Chili Pepper songs.

[Photography] iPhone-ography.

Been playing about the camera and the various editing apps on the iPhone.  The camera is very nice, much better than on any previous phone I've used.  The apps are great.  I've used most of them before on the iPod, but there were some such as Hipstamatic that you can only sue with a device with a camera, so those are new to me.  The photos here are on either Hipstamatic, Instagram or Lo-Mob.

Also, the iPhone 4 camera has a built in "HDR" function, that seem to take multiple exposures when you fire the trigger, and blends them to obtain a more range within the highlights and shadows - much in the same way proper HDR tools do it, but with less benefit and control.  The output from the HDR function is a bit hit and miss.  Sometimes it really gives a nice lift to the shadows or the sky, but sometimes it just makes it look like the contrast is all wrong.  Luckily it saves the "neutral" version too.

[Photography] Palma in monochrome.

Some photography from Palma, Mallorca, Spain. Top image is the Cathedral of Sanata Maria of Palma, more commonly known as "La Seu". An impressive building, the reflection was impossible not to take a photo of.

The 2nd shot is of a side street up by the main shopping/eating area of the town. The washing hanging from the window made the shot for me. The 3rd and final shot was of one of the water front palms that line the main road that runs along the coast.

All shots were taken on the Canon 400D with my Tamron 18-250 lens attached.  All shot RAW and edited in ACR before being converted to monochrome in Photoshop.  Mono worked so well for the Cathedral shot that I tried it out on some other shots and decided to stick to it.

[Photography] Countach.

Lamborghini Countach, captured at the Haynes Motor Museum in Sparkford, Somerset; a great place to visit, especially for the "Red Room".  I think they are about to undergo a massive renovation of the place.  Canon 400D + Tamron 18-250 lens.  Some editing in ACR and Photoshop to remove distractions and clean up.

[Photography] Suburban Sunrise.

A mini-project I undertook last winter. 33 shots between October 10th and December 26th of the sunrise from the back of my house. All the shots were taken on a BlackBerry Bold 9700 smartphone and all were edited on an iPod Touch using combinations of PhotoshopExpress, SwankoLab and LoMob.

My "Suburban Sunrise" set on Flickr.

I was impressed with the diversity of the sunrises I saw. There were plenty of eye-grabbing reds, oranges and yellows, but even the subtlest hint of colour in the sky led to a pleasing picture. The days when it was too wet, foggy, snowy or dull I tried to do different things with foreground of shapes to convey the mood.

I've always had a thing about hard black silhouettes against a coloured sky and this project gave me plenty of scope for that.  There was something about special about the cold, dark rooftops jutting into the warm colours.  I tried to vary the skyline as much as I could by using different views from windows, doors, the garden... in order to create some variety; but as you cant help where the sun rises, the long-view was nearly always the same.

The photos from the BlackBerry and the various editing tools worked well for this. There was a kind of relief not to have to work with a DSLR, a film camera or even Polaroid as the BlackBerry lent itself to an easy "point and shoot" style, knowing that the more lo-fi the better with this project.  Might have to do another camera-phone based project at some point, when I finally finished my Polaroid book and my [on hold] 50/50.

The original photos from the project can be viewed on my Flickr stream within this set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tobymarsh/sets/72157625286704872/

[Photography] Surface To Air.

A shot of Palma taken as we were coming in to land at the airport.  You can see the rain and storms hitting the mountains on the left hand-side, with the sun beating down on the bay and the sea.  Drove through the storm to get to the villa after getting the hire car.

Taken on my Canon 400D with the Tamron 18-250 lens attached.  Shot in RAW and edited in ACR/Photoshop.  I shot more film than digital in Mallorca [on a cheap 135 'panoramic' camera with no frills], looking forward to getting the rolls developed - mono, colour neg and xpro chrome!

[Photography] Another Four Polaroids.

A new batch of my latest four Polaroids from my series of shots from in and around Thorndon Country Park in Essex.  At least 2 of these (if not all four) will make it into my final project/book.  These were taken on a mixture of TheImpossibleProject PX680 beta film released in April this year, and PX70 ColorShade FirstFlush from last October.  Both sets of pictures were taken on a Polaroid SX70, the PX70 shots on a standard SX70 Alpha; and the PX680 shots on an SX70 Alpha that has had the ND filter over the electronic eye removed to part compensate for the difference in the standard ISO levels.

Both sets of shots were sheilded from the light upon ejection from the camera using the "darkslide between rollers" method as recomended by TIP, which I have found does produce the best results.

[Photography] The Holga [or the joys of plastic and 120 film].

My Holga 120N

I have had and used my Holga 120n for about 18 months now.  I first discovered the Holga via Flickr after I started to play round with film again.  The results I saw on Flickr instantly grabbed me and I knew I had to try one of these cameras out.

The Holga is basically the most basic camera type there is barring of course a pinhole. Formed from a simple plastic box front by a cheap plastic lens.  The early models featured 2 different aperture settings, although it is widely acknowledged that switching between these didn't actually change the aperture due to the way the camera was manufactured.  This mistake has been corrected on the more modern version including the one I have. The Holga also produces a pronounced vignette when shot at the smallest aperture setting. The focus is by the "zone focus" method, and the viewfinder is a simple view-finder type with no parallax helper lines - the viewfinder also shows a much wider view than is captured via the lens.  This combination of plastic body (which is prone to gorgeous lightleaks due to the lack of seals), zone focusing and plastic lens lends a dreamlike or vintage feel to the images produced on the film.

Another bit of interest on the Holga is the odd shutter switch, which is located on the side of the lens housing - pretty standard in the olden, golden days; but confuses the modern shooter no end.  The shutter itself isnt linked to the wind-on, meaning that double, triple or however-many exposures are available, be that planned or not.  Other non-planned effects are gained from the "bulb" setting which can easily be knocked on by mistake, changing the set 1/60 second shutter speed to "however long the shutter switch is held for", resulting in many a blurry, movement filled image.... and of course there is the problem of leaving the lens cap on - you are not a Holga shooter until you have got a roll of film back and realised the 6 black images are "lens cap on" moments.

The Holga takes 120 film, a format refereed to as "Medium Format" due to positioning between 8x10 "large format" and 35mm standard or "small format".  The 120 film is paper backed, and on the paper is marked frame number for the different aspect ratios that can be generated on the emulsion.  The Holga can be setup to produce 6x6 square images, or 6x4.5 portrait orientation images.  I choose to shoot my Holga exclusively at 6x6 as I find the square formatting give me something different to work with.  When used like this, you get 12 images on each roll of 120 film, with 6x4.5 yielding 16.

Getting 120 film developed and processed is still, despite what many believe, easy to achieve.  There are many online labs that allow postal orders of film, usually offering 2-3 turn around.  And of course there is always the option to develop at home if you are that way inclined.  I have my 120 developed by either Peak Imaging or Whole Picture Online, both of which also scan to CD at the time of processing as my aged Epson scanner doesnt take the larger negatives this film produces.

Ive shot both colour negative and black & white negative in my Holga.  I havent yet tried chrome (slide) film yet, either straight or cross-processed.  I have found that Fujifilm Colour Pro400 gives me the right blend of film speed, grain and colour rendering and is my film of choice when shooting "toy" cameras such as my Holga or Lubitel TLR.

For me at least, the Holga produces lovely evocative images and gives me a more freeform shooting methodology compared to shooting digital, instant ot even "normal" film.  The ease of use combined with the fact that you dont know exactly what will appear on the final image leads to a more creative shooting experience that it lacking in todays world of megapixels and ultra-zoom lenses.  Plus the camera is so cheap you don't mind taking more risks with it, putting it in situations you would dream of putting a DSLR.

I actually have a 2nd Holga 120N which I kind of won in  photo competition, and it set-up with a 135 adapter to take spooled 35mm film and exposure the image on the film and sprocket holes.  As yet, I havent had a chance to use it...

Some online Holga Resources:

• Holga on Camerapedia: http://camerapedia.wikia.com/wiki/Holga
• Holga on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holga
• Holgarama, UK Holga suppliers: http://www.holgarama.com/
• Squarefrog, Holga fan-site: http://www.squarefrog.co.uk/
• Holga Group on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/groups/86881528@N00/

Some of my favourite Holga shooters on Flickr:

• FitzhughFella: http://www.flickr.com/photos/duncanholley/
• abdukted1456: http://www.flickr.com/photos/abdukted1456/
• Donnie Vendetta: http://www.flickr.com/photos/donnievendetta
• Skissen: http://www.flickr.com/photos/skiss1/
• Katworks: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bzphoto/
• nefoto...: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nefotografas/