søndag 29. oktober 2017

After a few days inside the darkroom

I've been working a bit inside what I call my "darkroom" here at home in our house for the last few days. Some of you will know already that I'm actually referring to the family bathroom... but that's just how it is. I was planning to build a real darkroom last year, but plans to sell the house started to materialize, and my plans were abandoned. No need to build something great for no one to use after the house has been sold off.
So, I'm just using the bathroom.
There's this exhibition event coming up closer to Christmas, where my photo club will show pictures from the old Devold Wool Factory. I've been there a few times before, as you might remember.
We just had a session snapping ballet dancers for a few hours. That was great fun, I must say. Very tricky lightwise, but I decided to throw any wish for sharp snaps out the doors and try my best to make something stick to the film anyway. I brought a few rolls of FP4+ and HP5+ plus a couple of Mamiya RZ67 cameras... while others were playing with high ISO pixel collecting sensors. I say nothing more about that fact. 
Oh, and I brought rangefinders... and a couple of films for those as well.
We were all having a good time though, and a couple of the negs might be worth taking a bit further. I've even made a few test prints inside the previously mentioned "darkroom", and they look promising... I think. I'll give you a couple just to give you a taste. And please don't mind the dust and the light leaking into the blacks... it's a scanner issue, not bad darkroom work this time. 


A couple of test prints from the ballerina sessions @ Devold, Langevåg. Snapped using the RZ67 handheld in a sideways and strange manner to be able to shoot through some very dusty and dirty windows installed inside this building. I would have brought the prism finder if I knew this could become an issue, but I didn't. It weighs a quarter of a tonne, and I certainly prefere to work with the waist level finder, even if it means I have to look even more stupid than usual to get what I want.
Printed on Ilford ART 300 paper, snapped on Ilford FP4+ on rather longish shuttertimes. 

I also went to Ona last week. We were celebrating the 150 years anniversary of the lighthouse, and it was a grand party for sure. Lots of interesting stuff to listen to, but nothing much to snap, I'm afraid. There is of course a few pictures from that event as well, but nothing much has yet materialized into prints. Nothing much will be either, but there is three or four I plan to print. One is already partly decided to go to the family now living in the lighthouse keepers house, as a gift for arranging the whole anniversary thing. It's a detail from inside their house... and it looks smashing when printed on some ART300 paper. At least the print itself is looking good. The scan of the print is not up to standards, I know. It's me and my totally useless scanning skills again, plus the laziness of not cleaning the scanner glass before I start...

The lower part of the stairs leading up to the upper floor of the lighthouse keeper's house out on the island. I might print it bigger as a gift, but we'll see. This is a scan from a print of 5"x7" size on Ilford ART 300 again. Snapped with a RZ67, 1/2 sec. in rather bad lighting on Ilford FP4 film.

I've been developing films as well. At least twelve of 120 size, and three or four 135 films. Still got four or five 135 films to get done, but I'll get there. I developed all of them in Paranol S from Tetenal, a to me rather new thing. Bought it over in England this summer, and it's not a bad developer at all. I really like the result when developing FP4+ with this stuff, anyway.

The plan for the week to come is to take a trip up to where my parents live. The wife is joining some sort of conference not too far from there, so we'll use their house as a base for that thing. There's work to be done up there as well I heard, so I better bring a few tools and some elbow grease. Might come in handy, you know.
I'll bring cameras, of course... but I don't know to which extent I'll get the chance to use them.

Oh... and I finally got around to print a series of three prints for the living room wall. They are already hanging there, looking good. From the Yorkshire coast, they are.
This sums up the last week, at least. And nope... no time for scanning any of all the new negs I'm afraid. Which means you have to be patient for a while if you like to see a few more of the ballerina snaps or anything. I'll post them as soon as the scanning is done.


4 kommentarer:

  1. The shot of the bannister is lovely. Very moody. Wish I could see the print since it's that much better!

    SvarSlett
    Svar
    1. Thank you very much, Jim. I like that one a lot too, so I'm really glad you liked it. I hope the owners of the stairs like it as well :))

      Slett
  2. Love the ballet shots, Roy - wonderful!

    SvarSlett
    Svar
    1. Thank you very much, Michael.
      I'm just out of the darkroom. Printed the first one up here on 30x40 Ilford ART300 paper just like the one above only with a bit added contrast compared to this version. For the exhibition, if it makes it through of course...

      Slett

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