In fact I should be happy

Been a bit to do at work lately, and that's the reason why I actually should be a happy man. There's quite a few norwegian sailors having nothing to do these days, meaning I should rather have been jumping in joy. And stuff like that.
Well... I'm not the sort of dude jumping too much around anyway these days, but I would if I could. On the other hand I'm a bit tired, because there's been quite a lot to do frankly spoken. 
Seems it's getting "better" though, so I might catch my breath at some point and even get my heart rate down to somewhere closer to idle. Who knows?!

I'm not sure if this one's been posted before, to tell the truth. It might have been, and it might have been not. It's the lighthouse at Ona there towards the horizon, and another one of them telegraph poles standing tall a bit closer. Oh, and it's the cottage belonging to the late Henning Mankell, the writer himself, squeezed in between the pole and that angled wire there to the left. Rolleiflex camera, obviously, as it's the only square snapper I got if you're able to look away from the Diana F+ for a brief moment... 

Photographic stuff so far, you say? Simple answer! 
I do, as per usual, have a bag full of cameras and film brought with me this time as well. They have not come into much use though, other than the usual daily snap done with the F3 on Ilford PAN400 film pushed to 1600 as I seem to do these days. 
When things calmed a bit down today I also went into mentioned bag and fetched the old Diana Mini camera. Half-frame plastic piece of junk actually, but fun thing to point around none the less. I went outside and played with it for a while, but as usual it's very hard to know how much film there still is inside the thing. The counter does not work properly, and as it's half frame size it takes forever to spin through a roll. I might get there some day though! I'll let you know when it happens and the film is ready for a proper wash in a bath of Rodinal or something similar. 

Another Rolleiflex snap from just before Christmas. I know, because this was snapped during the yard stay, which took place early to mid December last year. See...? I still can remember things that happened not too long ago. That's quite something, me thinks. 

And, (rises both hands into the air looking baffled) I just sold a lens!! Hah! Never thought that was going to happen, did you?
There's this chap, you see, in one of the groups I've been following and posting into on the big social media place. He's been on top of me for the last year or so with a clean goal of letting me go of the huge (and yes, it's huge...) 500 mm APO lens for the Mamiya RZ67 system I got hidden inside a big box somewhere inside the house. 
I never use the heavy lump anyway, so instead of me wasting film on testing it once or twice a year, he might just as well take it away to put it into some good old use. 
As I'm going to old England this summer, and his relatives lives in Holland, I will get it hand carried all the way down there and leave it into the hands of someone close to the new owner in about a month or so. 
It's not the cheapest of lenses, but compared to almost anything else you get a LOT of lens for a rather small bunch of money. This beast weighs around 2.3 kgs, and sold for around half the price of a good Leica Summicron 35mm weighing around 0.25 kgs... you go figure! That's a lot of glass and metal more or less given away folks! 
I hope he will use it a lot, and I hope I will not regret selling it at some point. I don't think so, actually, because I'm more a normal to wide angle photographer than a tele dude, so I think I'll be fine after all. 

Yes... I can see it's posted here. I got no clue what so ever about why, I'm sorry to say. I can't remember which camera I used or anything else about it. I can see there are lines, and I have seen these lines before on board the ship, but apart from that it's not exactly anything to shout out loud about. It's what we call a "filler" I guess...

The good thing about selling the thing is that I will get pound, shilling and pence to drop by one of the film shops in Good Old England. I hope to find something useful over there, and looking at the interweb there should be a chance that it will happen some day soon. Film and paper, and a bottle or three of some sort of developer and things like that would be nice to find. 
I'll let you know what I found, and I'll let you all know how it feels to buy stuff like that over the counter again. 
If The Landy will take me all the way, that is... You never know, of course. After all it's a fair bit of land to plough until I'm home again. 

A few more 365 snaps then

As you know I'm doing a 365 on film this year. I'm using an old and quite well beaten Nikon F3 and decided to go for Ilford PAN400 film. So one camera and one film, one snap each day for the full year. I have not yet snapped the one for today, but when I do it will be #146. I have them all noted and taken care of inside one of my notebooks, you see. 

I have already started to think about doing something similar for next year, but don't mind to tweak the fundamentals a wee bit. Any suggestions of cool things to do, anyone? It must be on film though, and prefereably B&W since that's what I do... at least 99,8% of the time or something like that.

Oh well, I'm just talking... as usual.
Here they are, so please enjoy if possible.

#044: 

The Rather Troublesome Chain Block. The one which has caused me quite a lot of grief up through the last five years or so... I say nothing more about it!

#045: 

Muster Station #1. A familiar sight for the chaps belonging to this muster station on board the ship. My place is on the other side, but I pass this place every day anyway as it's pretty close to where my cabin is. I try to do a daily short walk you know, before I go to work. It's nice and fresh out here, usually.

#046:

It's the lighthouse in Scrabster, up very far north in Scotland you know. We had a crew change here this day, and then went straight back out to sea for a job of towing stuff from the bay just north of Wick. A "bundle", they told me. Luckily we didn't have to tow anything, only check that the thing went the right way and at the right depth and stuff like that. 

#047:

And here it is. A snap from Wick bay looking towards the hill above the small town from the north side. You can see the lighthouse and even parts of the airport if your eyes are somewhat like they used to be back in the days. I've been landing up there more than a few times, but it's been a while now. We were waiting here for a day or two until the towing of the bundle was started. Had to get the 3km long thing launched into the sea and everything, which took a while as you might understand. They don't just dump these things into the water and leave us all to it, as the price is a bit on the heavy side when it comes to stuff like this.

Just signed in at my cabin again

After a few busy days back home it certainly was about time to get to work again as one's in too much need of keeping the constant stream of cash flowing through the system these days. To keep the wheels of the world turning, I'm told.
Well, at least all this means I'm back on board the ship since mid-day yesterday, and already well into subsea work somewhere out there. North Sea for a few days now, before the plan is to go in for some throwing stuff off and on before we go out for a new job. 
So that's the overall plan, and we will later see if we were able to keep to it or not, and where we end up working.

Look at this tiny thing standing out in the North Sea somewhere, pointing towards the blue sky and just looking very pleased with everything in some weird way. Dutch sector of the sea, if my memory serves me right for a change. Done on one of them german rangefinders, I believe. With the 21 mm lens attached, by the look of the perspective and all.

You should have seen the weather out here today as it was absolutely fantastic. Up to the point when the fog came in, of course. Right now I can't for all the pesetas in the world even see the back deck of the ship from here. That's rather foggy, just saying.

Same place, kind of, but snapped from a different place on board the ship. Same nice weather as this morning, by the way. Not so now, because the fog is pretty dense at the moment. It will get better though, some day. Rangefinder, again.

Before I left home I had a few bits and pieces checked and re-checked. We're going for a drive as soon as I come home in about four weeks time, as you might remember. Over to old England, you know. And maybe Wales, and maybe a short trip into Scotland for all I know. We will see how far we gets before the landy breaks down, I guess.
So, I had to have a good look at the different moving parts of the car, and also see to that my old kerosene fired camp stoves were working as they should. I need something to boil some good old coffee on while I'm away, you know. And something to cook breakfast on should it be needed would be absolutely needed, so I had them things brought out and tested to find out if any maintenance was needed. Well, nothing major had happened to them I'm happy to inform you all about. 
Still I bought a few parts I know might come in handy should the thing fail at some point. I like these old burners from the mid 1900's for some reason. Maybe because this type of stove kept me warm through my year of military service back in the days or something. And they just keep on working, which is a good enough reason to still keep them and maintain them, I guess.
As you might know, I like stuff running on fuel and working... it's just a minor deficiancy of profession, mind you.

My 365 project still moving forward

The 365@50 project is still moving forward, day by day. I just loaded my Nikon F3 with film no.5 this morning after frame no.141 was done.

I'm far behind on posting, I know, but I guess there will be time enough to get them all online before 2017 is done and dusted. Or, I will of course have to post the last few snaps a bit into the new year as this is film and not the usual pixelated stuff. Or, they are of course pixelated in the end due to the scanning process and all, but you know all about that anyway. 

Anyway, here you get four more from the series. All for free as per usual.

Enjoy...

#040 One of our ships, the Viking Dynamic steaming out of Cromarty Firth one day in February while we were staying alongside at Nigg. The pilot boat is barely visible just in front of her, as you can clearly see.

#041: One of the huge doors in some kind of production hall they got over there in Scotland. It was rather nice at night time, as it happens. This snap was a bit boring, though. 

#042: Another night time snap from around the port. This jack-up was tied up as well, just as we were. You might remember having seen the scaffolding in front of the thing from a different point of view some time somewhere else in my blog? Just have a good look around and you'll find it, probably.

#043: Oh well... I guess I poked the camera in this direction some day at work. Looks like it's the motorman coming back from one of his many checking rounds around the engine areas. There's a fair bit of stuff to take care of, you see, but somebody's got to do it.

About the weather, and a few of the things I see

Another nice day up here in Norway today. At least around my parts of the country. Around 18 degrees Celsius and sunny most of the day, but a bit more chilly in the evening. Now it's close to midnight, and the clouds have come in bringing something that could turn into rain at some point during the night. Even though the clouds are a bit on the heavy side it's still rather light outside. We have finally reached the time of year when daylight never goes away, and it's probably what makes it worth fighting the dark days of the rest of the year. 
Well, luckily I think the darkness and the crappy weather we usually get up here is a bit refreshing which probably makes the life a bit easier to me compared to a lot of people usually having a hard time through the darkness of the wintertime. 

This thing called out for some attention one of the days alongside in Lerwick a few weeks ago. The smoking area for the dock workers, I guess. Linesmen and the likes, fork lift drivers and what have you working inside the area. I sort of like the composition, with the lines and everything. The snap would probably have worked a bit better if some random smoker were actually using the facility at the time, but then again I guess we should be more than happy with the thing getting as little use as possible. It's not the best of habits, as we have learned to know through the last few decades. I think this was the Leica M6, 35mm Summicron lens, snapped on HP5+ film. 

We just had a few visitors coming by. Young people, you know. Daughters with friends and dogs and everything, and even a boyfriend I was not aware of. We served hamburgers from the barbeque (and veggie-burgers for the ones in need of that) and by the looks of things I initially thought they were only coming for the free food. Turned out that they had a bit of time to spare for the old folks, so we had a few hours of great chatting and a generally nice time outdoors. We like that sort of thing, you know. 

One of the holes in the wall of the outer breakwater of Peterhead harbor. At least it looks like they will be able to make a hole out of it if needed some day. It's not the best of berths to have for a big ship this place, as the current and swell from the North Sea is making life a bit busy on board a ship even on a nice day up there. Leica M3, Elmarit 21mm lens on Ilford PAN400 shot at box speed.  

Tomorrow is Sunday. Nothing much planned, but I got a few things on my list of things that have to get done before I go to work again. Leaving Wednesday very early morning for Scotland again, so I probably need to use parts of the Sunday as well to have even the tiniest chance to get the things done in time. What I definitely know is that any dark room printing will not be done during this trip at home. Good thing is that I now know what's hiding inside the darkroom at my local photo club. A couple of enlargers and a rather good collections of trays and stuff. The deal is that I can use it whenever I like, which suits me quite well as you probably understand. I just have to pick up the key and lock myself in and out as I please for a day or three. Sounds great... huh?
I will give it a try as soon as I get the chance. I promise.
Other things...? Nah, not really. I stumbled around with the Rolleiflex in hand for a few hours today, but nothing came out of it, I think. 
But I did snap the daily one, though. As I'm doing every day, of course. Nothing grand, mind you. 

Another one from the same film as above. I noticed this scene during a lunch walk outside of my cabin last time at work. Nothing much to say about it, as you quite clearly can see. The orange filter was attached, making the whole thing looking a bit graphic and contrasty. I'm not too sure if I really like it, but might be worth posting anyway. Leica M3, Elmarit 21mm and Ilford PAN400 film. 

I've been away, I know!

Not that I've been far away, as such, but away from the blog as you probably have managed to figure out well enough. Been enjoying life and stuff like that lately, as you should when you live where I do and having a few weeks of sunshine and mild(ish) weather. At least the temperatures has been great the last couple of days, but the weather as such has been absolutely fantastic for three weeks now. That does not happen every year, just saying!

A few of the "lines" I found during the short photography session at the photoclub last week. All of them straight, as you can see. There was some curvy ones as well as it happens, but that's for another day to see. I liked these windows, of course. Rolleiflex, HP5+ dunked in Rodinal. 

No big news when it comes to photography though. 
I've been around the hood for a few trips, snapped a couple of films of course. Nothing that will wipe any of you off your chairs one way or the other, mind you. 
Just done scanning a few recently developed rolls, but it's more or less the same old story there as well. Nothing ground breaking at all, it seems. They are all from that same roll of 120 film, the four posted here and now. It's probably all you will ever see from it as well.

This is Flø, not too far away from the cottage by the sea. You only have to drive for two minutes to get on the 20 min. ferry to take you over to the other side of the fjord, and then drive for another 15 min. or so. Then you're there looking at this, having the lovely light coming in and all. It's beautiful, at least when you manage to decide whether you want to expose for the sky or the stones in the foreground. Same camera and the same film as the one above. 

Oh, and I was at a meeting in the local photography club last week. It was a good couple of hours spent, and I even managed to take a few snaps with the old Rolleiflex believe it or not. The subject for the evening were "lines", and I found a few of them around the old building where the meetings are held. 
They got a darkroom there as well, but I've not seen it yet. It's not been used for quite a while, but I hope to be able to get that part sorted rather soon. 
One of the board members of the club has agreed to meet me tomorrow bringing a few keys so we can get in there and check out the condition and to what degree it's equipped. 
We'll find out some time later today, I hope. 

See? There's a nice beach here and everything. Nothing like the western isles over in the UK or anything, but compared to everywhere else over here it's nice. Period.

There suddenly was a real rush on my blog the last few days. I realized this just a couple of hours ago when starting to write this post. I started to wonder what all the fuzz was about, and think I found the reason of all the razzamatazz coming from this place as my blog friend over in the US, Mr. Jim Grey has been featured with his list of film blogs at PetaPixel. At least that's what I think it is, but I'm sure the good man over there will put things right if that's not right in any way. I just wanted to say it's a great list of blogs, and a very handy thing to find and look through from time to time, or even find a few new to follow. I hope I can at least get a couple of new followers out of it. It's really needed, I can tell you that much. 
Not that I'm going to stop blogging just because the interest is limited though, but you know. It's always nice to know someone is having a quick look at what you do, and to read the words you wright. 
 

The never ending waves hitting the beach at Flø right over there, pointing to the other side of the fjord and over that hill over there. It's a really nice place, as you obviously can see with your own eyes. Rolleiflex, HP5+ and Rodinal 1:25