Some thoughts around the Olympus Pen EE-3

I just had a good read of this nice little blog entry starring the lovely Olympus Trip 35 a couple of days ago, and thought I'd just as well throw in a few thoughts about the tiny little sister of the Trip 35, in other words; Meet the wee little Pen EE-3.

A lovely little thing it is with no problems fitting inside the palm of even a smallish hand.

It's actually one of very few film cameras I have bought at a physical store in my life, as this little gem and also my first SLR was payed for over a counter. A Nikon F-401 was bought brand new some time in the mid to late 80's, and the Pen EE-3 was bought only two or three years ago well used but very far from worn out, from a shop dealing with second hand cameras in Arundel, South Downs in West Sussex over in England during "the almost never ending road trip" with the old LR Defender driving from Norway all the way over to England via France you know, then all over the hills and far away, before heading back home the opposite way. I think the shop where it was bought is simply called Arundel Photographica, but I'm not 100% sure. 

Anyway, about the camera:
You may think the Trip 35 is as simple as they ever came out of the Olympus factory back in the days when these were made? If so, please take a tiny step back and have a closer look at the Pen EE-3. There is absolutely nothing there that needs to be adjusted as long as you manage to have your film loaded and the ASA adjusted to the right level (between 25 and 400). There's no focus or anything else to be bothered about, besides you got the option to override the fully automatic shutter/aperture combination to adjust the aperture manually if needed or if you just feel for it. 
That's it, actually. Everything else is nothing to think about. No focusing or no anything else. A true point and shoot with an optional manual aperture setting. How cool is that?

A stealthy little camera even though it's got the classic chrome appearance from back in the days. It's not shiny though, and there are no bells and whistles whatsoever inside this thing. 

The Pen EE series was introduced in 1961, and seem to have ended it's days around 1983 or thereabout. The EE-3 model discussed here apparently was on the market from 1973 to 1983 according to Wikipedia. 
We are as you know by now looking at a half frame, fixed lens, fixed focus, fully automatic selenium cell metered viewfinder camera. It doesn't get much better than that for a small camera, I'd say.
The fact it's "only" a half frame camera must be as good a reason as any to stay away from it you may think, and if you don't at the same time see all the good reasons for actually getting one you are of course right. Half frame is nothing for serious photography, that's absolutely very well observed, but then again photography can be so much more and there is absolutely no reason to be that serious all the time. Grab a tiny camera, throw in a roll of film and go have some serious fun while snapping all the things you normally would just leave be.

To me the small EE-3 is one of them perfect pocket film cameras when traveling light. It's tiny, it's built into a good old metal chassis, it gives you nice exposures without having to give it a second thought, it's pretty much invisible and it actually also have a quite good lens attached to it from the factory. No, it's probably not the most expensive construction ever made out of glass and a few plastic rings, but it does the job in a nice way. We are talking about nothing less than a 28mm f/3.5 Zuiko lens, which should be equal to something like a 40mm on a standard full frame 135 camera. So that's nice enough data for the lens, me thinks. I would of course like it to have one more stop available, but then again you can rarely have everything you want. 

The automatic exposure function on the camera is as simple as it is genius actually. There's supposed to be two different shutter speeds (1/125s and about 1/30s) built into the thing. The aperture sets itself to the right size according to available light measured by the selenium cell as you push the release button down towards the point of trigging the shutter. If the camera finds there's not enough light to get a decent shot, a physical "red flag" will show up inside the viewfinder, and the shutter will be locked. This can however be manually overridden if you wish, by using the manual settings on the ASA ring on the lens. Another cool thing is that this way you can also measure light in one spot by pressing the shutter halfways down to lock the aperture and the shutter time (AE lock), then move the camera to compose your picture before you press the button fully down to take your picture. It works like a breeze. 

Topside view. Film counter, the rewind crank and even a hot shoe in addition to the obvious release button. You also got a good view of the only adjustment possible to make, the ISO ring on the lens. 

Another quite cool thing about half frame cameras is of course the fact that you can squeeze a lot of tiny snaps out of one single 36 exp. roll of film a bit dependant on who actually made the film (as some like to throw in a couple of shots extra just for the heck of it). I think 76 or 77 pictures is my personal best using a roll of Fomapan some time ago. 
The huge backside of the half frame format is of course grain which is the obvious limit and sometimes a showstopper when putting the negatives inside a scanner or even the enlarger in the darkroom. You will soon discover that there is a limit on the size of paper you need to pull out of the stack to get a decent paper copy. On the other hand this is not the camera you would bring along if your mission is to make serious prints for huge walls with pin sharp details and such. We got other cameras for those pictures, we film wasters. 
Another no-brainer and a real kick in the butts to go grab one would be the price. My camera bought over the counter down in Arundel over in England cost me less than a roll of colour negative film. Not that I buy too many rolls of colour negative film, but that's a story for some another day. I payed nine pounds for it, and it works like a dream. 
Something of real value when buying used equipment would be the lack of plastic you would have to hack your way through to start using what's inside. It's extremely annoying, and the plastic seems to end up in the ocean anyway, so better avoid it if possible. I simply payed my nine bucks, slipped it inside my pocket and went out on the street before putting a film inside and started snapping away.

This is a camera for all those fun pictures, and not exactly for any serious business as I have mentioned well enough now. I would say it's even good enough for a trip into town to do some fun street snapping for those of you who like to play with that sort of photography. It's a lot stealthier than any more modern camera in need of batteries. The shutter is dead quiet and a roll of film goes a long way. There is no annoying sound as there is no motor installed to wind the film forward or backwards either. OK, the manual winding wheel do have a tiny bit of annoying sound if you're sitting inside a very quiet place, but out and about in the field no one is going to hear it or take notice. Even the lens should be of perfect length for street work I would think.
The negatives are only half the size of a standard 135 camera for sure, but what you loose in size you get back in mood and originality and loads of fun. And a bit of grain, yes.

You will not find anything you didn't expect when you turn it around to have a closer look at the bottom plate. There's the ever present release button for the winding mechanism, and the threaded hole to be able to attach it to a tripod. Not that you ever will do that, but they threw it in for the same price anyway. In my case you also have the film reminder. Quite useful if you load it up and put it on a shelf for a while. There's about 72 snaps on a roll you know...

There are even more good things to be said about the little Olympus Pen EE-3. There will always be room left somewhere to bring it along no matter where you go. If you're out shooting with other cameras there will always be a tiny bit of room left for this little thing to make you able to snap up a few frames on some location just for fun, or if you're going places where you first thought you would be better off without any camera at all, it's also the perfect one to simply slip inside a pocket before you run out the doors. 
Due to frame size and the forever on-going discussions and mentioning of grain out there on the forums these days, you might want to load this camera with quite low ISO film around the 100 mark. Personally I'm a bit more relaxed about all the fuzz and would just as often throw inside an ISO 400 film for that matter. I find 400 ISO to suit me better in the long run, as the light up in the northern latitudes can be a bit dull at certain times of year. 

So if you think you have all the cameras you ever needed and there's nothing more to wish for, you might have a go with the oh so lovely little EE-3 (or any other EE for that matter...) from Olympus. They are cool as heck, cheap as chips and also come with a huge load of fun factor already built into them. Something like 17 millions were made, so there should still be a few around ready for grabs. 
And if you still feel you got enough cameras, you may have a son or daughter wanting to try something simple just to start off somewhere? The Pen EE-3 would be perfect for that as well.

All pictures of camera above was shot out here at sea this afternoon using an old iPhone. 
All example snaps below has been taken with the above camera. 
My film scans sucks as usual, but that's what you get from me. You should know that by now anyway. 

Oh yes, we were there! In the midst among the crowds, fighting to get a glimpse of the pile of stone at the end of a bridge. OK, it's a lovely old pile I admit. I might pass again some other time, but at a different time of year. 

I got absolutely no idea where this might be. It's in Scotland for sure, maybe somewhere out on the Isle of Skye, but could be anywhere over there I'd say.

I'm pretty sure this is somewhere on the east coast of Scotland. Somewhere in Aberdeenshire if my memory serves me just a tiny bit...?!

Sea cave, east coast of Scotland

Outside a sea cave, east coast of Scotland

Went for a hike on a nice summers day

We went for a short but quite nice photo walk, me and one of my mates a while ago. In fact it's getting close to two year since this nice little snap was taken now, and I think it's about time we go for a reunion of some sort. He's a dedicated film waster himself as well, you see. So we sometimes have things in common to talk about. 
Oh, and he used to be working in the same company as me, steering ships in some direction before turning a bit and then go in a different heading for a while, then repeat. 
Nowadays he's a captain on a smaller vessel, but they probably have ten times as much fun over in the part of the world where they are earning their daily crest these days compared to the sort of work I am stuck up doing for some time yet. 
The last thing I heard from him was that he was going west but had forgot to stock up on film. I mean who would travel over to the islands in the west without enough film in their pockets?? 
Beats me...! I heard some very good samaritan on the islands were able to help him out of the mess though, so thank you lots... just in case he forgot all about his manners and stuff and forgot to do so himself. You never know these days with the young folks, but knowing this guy it's probably all sorted by now.

This was taken with one of the rangefinders for sure. I'm not quite certain if it was with the flashy M3 or the black and stealthy M6, but a rangefinder it was! Oh, and it most likely had the 35mm lens attached. It was a very nice day indeed, this summers day in 2018. It was the last picture on the film, so for once I was lucky with that one. 

On this day when the above photo was taken, his ship called into port in my hometown. I picked him up and we drove off to hike up to the Skjonghelleren cave (sorry for the norwegian language only link). It's a quite big hole in the mountain, dug out by nature itself quite some time ago now. It's an interesting place for sure, only a mere half an hour walk from our new apartment. I might try my luck up there with a camera one day if the weather gets better at some point. 

I can't remember exactly what we were talking about when sitting on this wooden bench below the mountain where the cave is, but I can se a thermo flask with coffee, and I can see Stian-René having my Rolleiflex inners wide open and something that looks like a 120 roll of film in his hand. He was probably removing the exposed spool, as this was snapped after we were done exploring the cave. 
My best guess is that we were having a good chat about ships, and cameras, and film and maybe about the old cave up there in the mountain side. 
He probably developed the film a bit later, and found that there was nothing wrong with the camera he borrowed for a few hours on that day. As it happens there is still nothing wrong with that lovely machine. 
Anyway, he's a nice chap for sure, Mr. Stian-Renè.

Camera straps - The usual missing link

I got quite a few cameras. Probably too many, I confess, and there I just said the words. 
Luckily for me that was not what I was not going to discuss right now. Today it's all about those easy-to-forget minor details. Today it's all about camera straps.

Common to many, if not in most of my cameras, have been that they either lack a good old strap, or they are in possession of a rather poor example of the sort. There seems to always be something wrong with them. Some are too wide, most of them are cumbersome to slack out or tighten in, they are getting torn in the wrong places, they might be too stiff or just too much of whatever else bad issues you can come up with. Something just had to be done!

Nikon used to make a quite good, simple and cheap one (oh yes, I'm a cheepskate for sure when it comes to stuff like this), made out of some quite narrow black web or whatever material they were using. I got a few of them hanging on a couple of F3's and a Nikkormat, and I quite like them. The only thing wrong with them would be the "cumbersome to slack and tighten" issue. Everything else with them is actually great. And then I also got a nice and quite soft leather strap (feels expensive, I got it with some other camera) attached to the elder rangefinder from Germany, which is absolutely great. But that's it! Everything else I got is just crap.
I even got a more or less useless (way too stiff black one) leather strap from the very same company who make these rangefinders. That one used to be attached to my M6 and probably cost a fortune out of the pockets of whoever bought it back in the days.
Anyway, most of my cameras have been living their lives in my possession without any strap at all, which annoys me at times as this simple fact sometimes keeps me from picking up a camera to bring along. 

So, what would a cheepskate like me do about that, you may think? 
Well, I have been searching up and down through the WiFi to find some of those old Nikon straps I was talking about, but the last time I checked on the huge marketplace out there they were way too expensive. I would need at least ten of them, and preferably rather 15, but since I quickly figured out that was going to cost me the equal amount to quite a lot of film, I decided to go for a different approach. 

The answer to it all came falling into my lap some time ago now. I found out one day that it was due time to change out a couple of the old ropes attached to my otherwise very good tent. Off I went to the store to buy a good sized coil of some parachute chord or similar. At the very moment I got that in hand, I figured out the obvious answer to my camera-strap nightmares. 
The first strap I made was way too fancy. It took forever to weave it together, it came out way too short and it was not possible to extend or shorten it. It was simply not what I wanted at all. 
I ditched the whole idea for a while until one day a friend of mine stumbled upon this page on the internet as he was actually searching for one of the photographs shown a bit further down the page. The actual snap was taken during that very ugly war you know over in the east some time ago by the owner of the camera you see pictured at the top of the page. It might even have been snapped with this very camera for all I know, but that's not a part of this story at all. You can of course read a lot about it in the article, but that's for a little bit later please.
I immediately fell for this idea of a strap for a number of reasons. Simplicity, cheap, durable, strong, and it had a very convenient ring attached which I knew would come in very handy for me when I walk around on the ship, and even at home as I simply can hook it into a carabiner which I usually carry in my belt and/or on my backpack when I'm out walking. 

A couple of examples. Neat and nice, strong and cheap as chips.

It has also proven very good for hanging my camera inside my cabin when at work during really bad weather. The furnitures inside my cabin are usually being thrown around when the waves are getting nasty, and keeping cameras on top of the couch is usually not a good idea when the situation is like this. Since I started using the new straps my cameras have been hanging safely up there on their hooks in a very nice manner because of this clever little ring tied up in just the right distance from the camera body. Yes, you could also hang the cameras by the strap itself, but there's a huge difference between a large swing and a tiny one, I tell you that much. You can see for yourself below and figure it out, and I'm sure you will agree which one is the better solution. 

Like this!

NOT like this!

I could of course have tied in any ring you would get pretty much anywhere, but as I have served my time in the military I have also thrown my fair share of hand grenades over a stone wall, as you did when you were told to do so back in the days. 
I actually had quite a few of them old rings sitting inside a box, as I collected some of them when our combat training was over. 
I had of course forgot all about them years and years ago, but had quite recently stumbled upon them and nearly thrown them away for good as we were starting the process of clearing the house to make it ready for selling it a few years back. Well, for some reason I did not throw them away, and now I even knew exactly where to find them, so down in the basement I went and picked them all out of the box and started to produce some good camera straps, finally. 

Unbreakable, probably. 

A nice feature with this particular type of ring is that it's quite wide in diameter, and it's made out of material that will not rust. It's not aluminium, and it's not steel either. I guess there has been quite some money put into the choice of material used on this little detail even though it was made for something designed to just blow up. 

The only difference from my version of the strap compared to the old and very simple Vietnam version of it is the fact that my strap is double and can such be extended or shortened as required. It's done in three seconds flat due to a couple of rather clever "sliding knots" I learned years ago when doing something very different standing on deck of my little boat. 
Another difference could be the material in the strap itself. I don't keep a supply of original parachute cord in house, so had to go for a cheaper material. It's plenty strong and durable though.

The solution to one of my previous nightmares turned out to be this simple little knot. Drag in or slack out, and your camera will sit exactly where you want it to.

I have been using these straps for a period of time now, and I simply love them and will most likely make a few more as well. They are simply "the shit", as the young daughters keep on telling me good things are called these days. 

Cool, huh?

Steel Wheels

I recently stumbled over a couple of old and exposed films inside the darkroom when looking for unexposed film to bring on board the ship a few weeks back. Got curious and threw them into some HC-110 developer to see what they were all about. 
Found some more or less ruined exposures from the summer of 2018 when we were dry docking the ship in Curacao. Some of the exposures was sort of good, others not so much. It seems I need to add at least another stop of light when I'm using the orange filter on the 21mm for the rangefinder. I'll try to keep that in mind. 

The weirdest thing about Curacao was probably that we still had to pay with the old Dutch currency of Guilder. Oh well... it's not absolutely true to be honest, because this Guilder was the Antillean Guilder which probably was a bit different. 

No.4 

They somewhat reminded me of something from an old horror movie from the 70's these cranes. They were slow walkers though, on their huge diameter Steel Wheels. Using the orange filter seemed to have been a mistake as usual. The skye was a perfect invitation for it though. 

When will I ever learn...?

Leica M6, 21mm f/2.8 Elmarit

Anyway, there was a lot of steel and concrete around the place. At least where we were spending most of our time down there, which obviously was in the dry dock area on the island. It was a huge dock by the way. Our vessel only took up a fraction of the space inside for a couple of weeks or so. 

The vessel on dry land. 

It's always a bit exciting for the chief engineer when the vessel is getting high and dry like this. There's a few bits to think through before they can pull the plug and get the water out of the basin. It never will go according to plan though, because the guys in the dock never seem to understand our needs. They never seem to understand that we're not exactly doing this every week either. 

M6 with 21mm f/2.8 Elmarit. 

There was a lot of cranes around the dry dock. As usual I couldn't resist to point my camera towards a few of them, as I like to snap things protruding up towards the sky for some reason. 

See what I mean? Got the looks of the perfect predator this thing. 

Leica M6, 21mm f/2.8 Elmarit

Why process film at work seemed like a good idea, and some early thoughts on the Foma Excel film developer

I need to put up a warning to you all before you read much further:
What was supposed to only be some little thing went way on to become quite a lengthy post due to the (in my head anyway) complexity of the themes brought up by myself as I went on writing on this piece. OK, there is nothing complex in here as such, but I needed a few more words than originally planned to explain myself well enough. As usual.
One thing grabbed the other, and before I knew any of it I was too far gone. That happens at times, as we all know. 
If you got no interest in a couple of different Foma developers or the Foma P powder fixer, or if you never travel with film (through airports and such) or if you got no interest what so ever in how to, and not at least why on earth, arrange a floating darkroom in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, and further if you couldn't care less why in heavens name anyone would see the benefit in doing so, well I suggest you save your heart from high blood pressure (if it's not too late already due to this sentence) and simply jump ahead to a different blog. This post is most likely going to be quite boring, or even lethal for some, I assume. 
I'll post a couple of film snaps all the way down below at the end, so you can scroll down there before surfing further on your way through the web and have a look at them if you like. I'll be quite happy if you do actually. 

Here we go;
As you probably already know if you did read the last couple of posts, we're in the process of building up a very simple and low tech film developing lab on board the vessel I work on. There are a couple of reasons why this still seems to be a good idea, but the original thought was for educational purposes and short term facilities only, as there are two or three young lads (anyway that's what you call them when you passed 50 yourself way too long ago now) on board, all eager to learn how this film magic works in practice.
Well, this was a couple of trips ago now, and it turned out during their time off they were actually eager enough to start some home education by themselves before they came on board on the previous trip to this one. Again, this of course means they are no longer in need of any direct hands on help from anyone at all, especially not me, and they are of course developing film more or less like any pro these days. Which is brilliant, of course.

So, this is it! Our little corner in one of the stories and workshop areas where film is being processed. Chemicals for most normal film processes is up on the shelf, together with most of the stuff you'll need to get the deed done. It's not fancy, but it seems to work well enough. As you might understand this corner doubles up as a soap and washing equipment area. Sorry about the pixels and and all that, but for plain documentation I have to admit there are benefits...

A little close-up of the point of interest. I see one of the Paterson spools has been hidden away somewhere else, but it will show up again some time I'm sure.

However, it turns out there seems to be another good reason for developing film on board when at work in 2020, and I am of course speaking of the fact that airport security scanners are getting more powerful these days. A new generation of machines (or not new as such, as the same technology have been in use for check-in luggage for about 20 years already) are being installed in all major airports as we speak, probably to speed up the process at the security checkpoints. 
I very much like the idea of getting through the security check a lot faster than the usual tedious way, but I don't like the new machines likeliness of frying my film in the process, which they probably will if you have been listening with both ears to what Kodak, Ilford and others in the film production business have been talking about lately. 
Up until now I have been bringing my unexposed film inside my carry on luggage, and just simply dropped-in-a-tray-and-through-the-scanners-they-fly without any issues at all. I have been doing the same thing with my cameras, loaded with film and everything. No problems at all.
I have been traveling like this with film in my bag for many years now, back and forth through anything between two and eight scanners on each trip every six weeks year in and year out. I'm sure some films in my bag must have passed probably 20+ scannings of the old sorts, and I have never had an issue I can possibly blame any X-ray scanner for.
The 20+ number is just taken out of the air of course, because I have not been counting, but I travel a lot for work and I sometimes travel far, and I usually would just grab a good little bunch of film before I leave home and just tuck them inside my bag. Some rolls will be leftovers and just stay inside that same bag during multiple trips without being used, and that's why the number of X-ray scannings could reach such numbers and probably above for some films. As time goes and everything in the world is the same, you start to relax after some time, and airport scanners is far from your worst enemy after a few years doing this. 
But now there's a new beast on the block, and we traveling film wasters have to deal with it in some sort of way. 

By processing film on board I will of course be able to reduce the amount of X-ray scans a lot compared to my previous "regime". 
In addition I will also have to do something about my earlier habit of bringing film back and forth multiple times. 
The idea is of course simply to bring un-processed film on board, but not back home if I can possibly avoid it. I might also get better at buying film in whichever country I'm working at the moment, but that's an even trickier task as there will most likely be no time for any shopping like that. I work on a ship you know, and a ship earns it's daily crest at sea, not by wearing out the ropes tied up alongside some half-rotten pier somewhere. 

OK, so what's out there to expect when traveling halfway around the globe nowadays, and what has happened since some time in the second half of 2019? Well, much of the same as before, I would say. 
The few operators of the new type of X-ray machines I have bumped into have been quite cooperative up until now (with a couple of exceptions of course), but you never know when that luck is going to change on you.
For this trip I tested out my "new" concept by really bringing quite a few of rolls of 135 and 120 film on board. I dug deep into the film drawer and even deeper into my freezer (because we have now moved to a new location where I got a dedicated almost-film-only-freezer) and pulled out 80 rolls of film (just counted two minutes ago to make sure the numbers were right...) which seem to have been laying around for ages anyway. Since I can't see these rolls being used with any benefit at home I thought I better bring them on board to play around with. 
I brought some C-41 color negative film spanning from ASA 100 to 800, some rolls of E6 process positive film (low ASA stuff from Fuji), and finally a bunch of B&W film of various types from 50 to 3200 ASA. 
These were the ones picked to serve as crash test dummies through the various airports from home and over to where the ship is located, way off the coast of Louisiana at the moment. 

Leaving Norway (2 traditional and old fashion scannings) was no problem since there was no new type of scanners to be seen up north as for yet, but already down at Schiphol lies the first major test. No problem and no discussions at all about having all my rolls of film passing on the outside of the scanner to be "hand-checked" (whatever that really means), so thanks a lot for that Schiphol. Anyway I knew this was going to happen, as I have always been able to speak to the folks on this airport, and they always find the time and take the effort to listen to what you have to say. 
I went through the security twice at Schiphol, due to in and out of the airport because I had to stay overnight at a hotel before flying further on the next morning. The same friendly attitude were experienced both days. 
Then the next one on the list was Atlanta airport, USA... Heck, I finally managed to get my film hand-checked there as well, but I really had to speak out loud to make myself understood and/or heard, I'm not sure which of the two made it through to the receiver in the end. 
It's not my favorite game to play, coming in to a security checkpoint facing a fully wound-up security officer when I'm just out of a 12 hrs. flight without any sleep, and hardly had any sleep the previous night either... you know the deal. Add to this also the state you're normally in after well over an hour in immigration queue and interview... I say no more!
I must add that the minor issue through security at Atlanta Airport was probably due to one single operator in particular (could of course also be myself, but for once I really doubt it as I actually felt proud of my own reaction for days after this), as my friends who were standing in a different queue had no issues at all having their film hand checked, seeing only friendly faces and was taken very well care of. 
I also need to add that when leaving the US on the previous trip out of Houston towards Europe there was no problem at all. They were more than happy to hand-check my film both when coming in and leaving the country. In fact the operator of the new scanner in Houston actually suggested a hand scanning by himself when being informed that I was traveling with film. He knew everything about the new machines frying abilities and built-in film zapping technology. 

As a result of all this new extra hassle and possible show stoppers during traveling, I realized it was time to think seriously about developing film on board when at work. As liquid developers also are a bit tricky to travel with for obvious reasons, I decided to try bring some powder developer and fixer packed into my checked-in bag, and just cross fingers that no one would start questioning the content of the packs. Due to time issues (placing my order a bit late, as you do of course) and relatively long delivery time from a couple of different companies, I ended up having only one option if I wanted to bring any B&W developer for this trip. 
Foma in Norway was able to ship everything I needed on the same day, so I just had to go for it and cross my fingers that the two different and to me totally new and unknown developers worked as expected (or hoped, as I have also read very little about them). 

I had two types of powder developer ordered, the Fomadon P (also marked as "type D76") and the Fomadon Excel (supposed to be an X-tol type, or clone). I also ordered a few packs of crystalized or powdery Fomafix P, which obviously would be the fixer. 
The two developers comes well packed in a quite small and neat plastic bag with a cheap paper inlay telling you what's supposed to be inside the package. Nothing fancy, as usual from Foma, but it does what's needed and nothing much else. I mean why would anyone need a fancy bag anyway, as long as it survives the travel in one piece and one doesn't have to guess what's hiding inside?
The fixer comes in a nice little cardboard box of puke green color with proper mixing instructions printed inside the box. English instructions are printed in understandable phrases inside both developers and fix, just in case you wonder. 
The developers both consists of two equal sized paper bags of powder, noted in the mixing manual as "big bag" and "small bag". OK, it's not that bad, as one bag has only a small amount of powder inside, and the other is rather full of the stuff. I actually figured the most empty one had to be the "small size", and mixed myself 1 liter of the Fomadon Excel developer according to instructions as soon as I had film ready to get wet. 
The developer mix quite nice and easy with water at rather normal temperatures, and is ready for use quite shortly after throwing the powder in. I decided to go for a 1:1 dilution, keeping 1/2 liter of stock for later use. The user manual suggests to use stock solution, or at least there is no words about any dilution. It also indicates a 12 rolls capacity for 1 liter of developer, which seems to fit well enough with my finding of about 20 rolls. They are always operating on the quite safe side, and I've seen it often enough to know that's the way it works. More about that a bit further down.

As the Foma developers seems not to be among the most popular developers around, there was little or no words about developing times and the like to be found around the places I usually go to check for this sorts of information. Foma delivers data for their own films and developer combinations, but no other films was mentioned. Personally I was going to develop a roll of Ilford PAN 100, and Massive Development Chart wasn't very cooperative in this case. 
I could of course have used a lot of time asking around the web and as usual get as many different answers as the number of people answering me, so I dropped that and did it my own way. I mean it was just a lousy B&W film anyway, and normally there is hardly any chance that a masterpiece had stuck on any of the frames, so I went for X-tol times and decided to add a smallish fraction of time to it just in case. 
Well, I am happy to inform you that the trick worked well enough. The negs came out in a way that seems both lovely and fine, but I have to add that I have only been able to check them with a not too good loupe as for yet. I'll pull a lens off of one of my cameras tomorrow and have a better look, but they really look great from a distance to be honest. 
I mean I even developed a roll of good old Shanghai GP3 in the stuff a couple of days ago, and though you might have a hard time believing it, that bugger also came out as good as they ever get. You should know from years back that I really love that film, at least when you're lucky enough to not have issues with the numbers from the backing paper sticking onto the film emulsion. 
Well, there was nothing of that sorts on this roll, so it might be an over-layer from an older batch. The last rolls I bought of this film all had rather big issues with the backing paper, so I expected this one to be the same thing. Luckily it was not. 

And this is what they looks like, the packs of Foma developer and fixer I brought over from home. At least they don't take up a lot of space, or add too much weight in the suitcase when traveling.

I have yet to try the Fomadon P developer, which should be of a D-76 type if we are to believe what's printed on the front of the pack of the thing. At least the Excel developer looks very much like the X-tol stuff, but I need to warn you that I don't have any deep knowledge of that particular chemical either. In fact I've only had a few films developed in X-tol and that was years ago. Anyway, the grains came out on the fine side, and the contrast seems to be absolutely fine when looking at the negs. 
Since the Fomadon Excel developer was mixed about two weeks ago we have totally developed 9 films using half of the stock solution to make 1 liter of 1:1 developer. No visible issues as for yet, but I might not stretch it any further, and will probably mix a new batch from the rest of the stock we got up on the shelf. Value for money seems to be on the good side of things. I payed NOK 45,- for the Excel developer which I would probably have no problems getting 20 films out of if I could avoid storing the 1:1 mix for more than about one week. That's just a tad over NOK 2,- pr film which is good enough even for me. 
The Fomadon P (D-76) is a few NOK cheaper at 41,25 for a 1 liter powder pack.
The Foma P fixer is in the same area, NOK 42,- for a 1 liter pack. 
They are very handy packs to travel with, and I just realized when going into their website to check the prices that the before mentioned plastic bags containing the developer powder now seems to have been changed to cardboard boxes similar to the box the fixer was delivered in. The color seems to be a bit nicer than puke green though. Not that less fancy colors on their boxes should keep us from starting using Foma products if that's the direction we wish to throw our hard earned cash of course, but I will not start talking about that again.
What's obvious is that there is a quite huge difference in price when comparing Foma and Kodak developers. I will get three packs of 1 liter Foma developer for the same amount of money I would need to pay for one liter of the Kodak equivalent here in Norway.

I'm posting a few examples from this experiment with the Fomadon Excel developer below, but needs to put in (even more than) a few words just to make sure you know what you're looking at. 
The two snaps of the negs were taken with an iPhone by holding the neg in one hand and balancing the phone in the other trying to hit the shutterbugger using my right hand thumb at the same time. Ever tried that? Well, be my guest. Second the "window" I shot the thing through is a salted down and by all means dirty thing only there to throw some half decent light inside of my cabin, so there's a lot of stuff shining through the negative. In addition you get everything in the background all for free of course. Sea, clouds, a handrail on the outside and what have we all. Look at the grain, and nothing much else. Don't even look at what seems to be a very low contrast, because the neg is quite a bit more contrasty than it seems to be in the digital snap of it. I tried to crank it up a bit inside the phone, but the damn stupid software wouldn't allow me to do it for some reason. See why I usually go for film? Even the simplest task on any digital platform makes my blood pressure rise to dangerous levels because of things I got no way to control the insides of. 

Your personal blogger up on top there. One of them engineers had grabbed hold of the Rolleiflex for a moment and decided to "shoot the Chief". If you look away from all the faults brought in by the digital convertion apparatus, this is not actually bad at all. Shot on a roll of Kosmofoto 120 film, which effectively just mean Fomapan 100. Lovely film all the same, and I liked the results from the Fomadon Excel developer. 

One of our new Polish crane drivers and AB's. It's the same with this neg. There are stuff going on in the lower 1/3 part of the thing, so just look a bit away from that. Snapped in the Pentax 67 with the 45mm f/4 lens attached, on good old Shanghai GP3 developed in Fomadon Excel. Great stuff!

It's the 3rd engineer. The proud owner of a lovely Pentax 67, and the go-to chemist if anything like would be needed, which usually happen in this job, especially when you got a film lab on board and need something special to get something done. He just did something crazy to be able to develop E6... but more about that another bright day. 

The crane driver once more. Snapped with the Rolleiflex on the same roll of Kosmo film again. This was done hand held at 1/8 of a sec. due to rather dark conditions. Actually I think I might even would have got away with 1/15 on this one, but there was quite a bit too less lighty inside that hole of theirs inside their cave out on deck. They got good coffee out there though. 

Oh... and yes there's also a couple of snaps down at the very end having nothing to do with the rest of the post at all. They are only there because of the promise I made hours ago at the top of this thing to the ones who didn't want to read the whole post. I can't blame them for just jumping down here by the way...!
Did anyone actually read much of this nonsense at all?? 

Take care!

I just found this inside a batch of scans I made quite a while ago. It was snapped on constitutional day (May the 17th) a couple of years ago. It was a warm day, and the fury dog called Scot had found a nice place in the shadow to cool himself down a bit. I had the 85mm f/1.4 beast attached to the Nikon F3 and decided to give it a go at full aperture. I rarely do things like that, but this scene sort of asked for it there and then. Not sure about what sort of film this was though.  

This is a more recent snap and scan for sure. I was walking around the ship on crew change day with the M6 rangefinder in hand, grabbing a few shots here when possible. I even went inside the smoking room. I very rarely pass that way, but sometimes you see and hear things in there, and the world is no longer what it used to be before you went inside that door. 

Leica M6, Summicron 35mm with yellow filter. Could have been Kodak Tri-X film, but I'm not sure.

Oh well... it's obviously just another quick snap from the engine room. I think it was the light/shadow thing that made me open the shutter for a little while, but I am no longer sure about the point of doing so in the first place. Leica M6, Summicron 35mm with yellow filter. Unknown film, but might have been Kodak Tri-X

Planning the holidays, we are

I know, it's way too early to start planning the summer. At least it's way too early for that up and over where I come from. It's getting a bit easier every year though, as nowadays there's only about two of us left involved in the planning, which probably makes you wonder even more why we're starting this early thinking about three short weeks in July? 
Well, it's just because it's required sort of. At least if we would like to get what we want out of the trip. 
We're not going very far, mind you. We're not going to where the weather is warm either. And there will of course be a lot of rain. And fog. Won't see much at all, most likely. And there will most certainly be a zillion tons of midge per cubic meter worth of breathable air. 
But we're quite used to all of that sorts, so we'll be fine we will. 
Oh... and crowds. I forgot to mention the crowds. I tend to forget them until I'm there.
If you happen to be in the area around that time, don't hesitate to give me a shout. Would be great to meet up for a chat and to waste a few frames of film together.

Will go over the sea to here it seems, or at least somewhere quite close. 

Scanned neg taken out of the Olympus Pen EE-3 half frame toy. Ilford PAN 400 in HC-110

Not here we won't go. We've been here some time in the past. Might go again some other time though.

Same film and same camera and developer as above. 

I had a rather short but nice session of developing film this morning. It's been Sunday after all, you know. One was a roll of Ilford PAN 100 saved out of the very tiny little Olympus Pen EE-3 half frame thing, but they were not the snaps shown above of course as the scanner facilities on board is non existent at the moment. I sloshed it around in some (to me) new developer from Foma. Powdery stuff, so easy to carry in the luggage over from Norway. I tell you a bit more about it some other day, of course. The other film was a (hold your hats) C-41 thing containing a myriad of strange bits called colors. In addition it was of very much unknown origin (marked LOMO, I discovered later...). It has been snapped up inside the light tightness of a very nice and bulky (in the right spots) Pentax 67. Oh no, it's not my camera as you might remember from my last post, as I just borrowed it from one of the engineers who most kindly trusted me to carry the thing around the ship for a few days. On the other hand he has been seen strolling out and about with my Rolleiflex in hand, so I guess we're even, sort of.  
The C-41 show-off is nothing but an experiment, of course. As it happen I got a bit more than a few rolls of the stuff inside my cabin on board the ship, so I just need to try my best to put them into some good use, as you will do when you got film that came to you in ways you no longer remember any details about. 
And talking about strange film; I just loaded a 120 size roll of Ilford Delta 3200 into the old Rolleiflex. I wonder what I was thinking, but we will see some other day what came out of it. 

Other than that it's been another one of them quite warm days here way out in the Gulf of Mexico. Strange place to be honest. One day it's freezing cold and breezy, and the next you wake up thinking you have been sleeping on top of a good old coal fire. The sea is calm to moderate more or less all the time down in this area though, with literary no waves at all to speak of. A tiny wee bit different from what we know from back home this time of year, as you might know all about. At least it's been nice and flat like this whenever I have toddled along working in these areas. Hence no wonder actually, the yankees are building their ships with almost no freeboard at all, can you imagine that? Also then no wonder the US supply vessels had a rather short career when they first were brought over to do work out in the North Sea some time around late 60s and early 70s. The poor guys on deck were constantly walking around wet on their tiny little feet, and probably got very well tired of it at some point. 
I don't blame the yankees though, because after all there had to be some Norwegian hot shot who first had the bright idea to bring them ships over. Without lots of further hesitation we started to design our own vessels, a bit more suitable for the conditions present in the North Sea. 
Well... what works in one part of the world does not automatically work in other parts of it. That's for sure.

For throwing plastic and stuff around to be taken away by the breeze and brought around in circles until it hits the ocean and other bits of nature however is a completely different thing, just saying! To actually stop doing that will work perfectly fine all over the globe. Totally true story! 

For some odd reason I seem to like these sorts of features people have dug into the landscape. At least I like to snap them up when they have already been put there anyway. This one was particularly nice with it's cables hanging useless around. Makes you wonder why they have not pulled the thing out of the soil some time ago, actually. Well, I might go that way and try snap it once again as the cables are a lot less visible on the film than I imagined they would be. 

Snapped with the M6 rangefinder with the 35mm some time ago. Yellow filter attached. Film unknown, as more or less usual.

I think I might just as well go try to get some sleep now. 
See you around some other day, hopefully. 
Stay safe!

Still around, mind

Hi ya, all you old friends of this tiny little blog. I know it's been way too long, but all sorts of things like life and stuff came in the way and might as well do the same thing at some point in the future for all we know. Just don't delete me off your reading lists and you'll probably find a few words and a snap or three coming through every now and then. 

You might have thought that little "Hi ya" up there sounded like a very overseas way to greet you all? Actually that was the plan mind you, but only because I'm actually o'er there. Or actually right here as it happens. In the US of A that is. 
Been here for some time now actually, but soon to move back down south to Brazil if we are to believe what's being told about the further plans (better known as rumors...) and all that. 
But first I'm going to finish off this trip here in US waters, and then I'm going home for a few weeks before joining the ship again down south somewhere. Rio de Janeiro, most likely. 

You know for sure you must be quite some distance away from old Norway when there's more than one railway track going in the same general direction...

Pentax Spotmatic, 50mm f /1.7  Ilford PAN 400

Galveston, TX

America is great of course, as we all know from before and also are being reminded quite often these days. Lots of space indeed, and else seems to me to be just like it used to be back in the days I was here the last time about 12 years ago, or something like that. 
It would probably feel even bigger if I was able to move around on my own a bit more, but I'm rather stuck at one single place, as you usually are when being placed to work on board a ship. 
Anyway, I managed to get hold of a few rolls of that legendary B&W film they have made for quite a while over here. It was not cheap though, if that might ease your minds a bit. It didn't work any better than it used to do either. None of the pictures shown today are shot on that sort of lovely emulsion, just to have that mentioned straight away. I think it's all Ilford PAN 400 to be honest. I will of course show you a few master pieces snapped on Tri-X at some point when I got something ready for you. 

You see we got ourselves a darkroom on board the ship these days. Well, only for developing film of course, since else we would be forced to invent a gyro stabilized enlarger to be able to print on paper on board the vessel. Could be done, of course... but I'm not sure what my employer would say about that to be honest. I think we should just be happy that we're actually able to do film, and leave the other matter be. 
It started last trip when the third engineer brought his Paterson tank and some C-41 chemicals on board. We soon found it to be a good idea that he left his tank on board, and also try to get some more chemicals on board as well for this trip. So he brought some E-6 chemicals, and I brought a few different B&W developers. This trip we have developed all three sorts of films with no obvious failures so far. 
Sounds nice, huh?

From just south and east of Pier 39 in Galveston. A facility for shipping out grain has been built here some time ago. I guess they still use it, but not on the day I was there and made this snap.

Pentax Spotmatic, Ilford PAN 400

Galveston, TX

Nothing much else is new I guess, besides I got a few new cameras of course. Just old scruffy things with bad lenses, sticky shutters and no working light meters of course, so nothing to jump through the roof about. The "new" Spotmatic is a great one though, if I should mention only one of them newcomers. Lovely old thing, but the light meter is dead on that one as well. 
I'm also borrowing a Pentax 67 from the Third Engineer right now, so that's probably the best thing for the moment. Huge, bulky, heavy and absolutely lovely brick of metal with a lens and a shutter. Or two lenses, to tell the truth. You might see a few scans later on when I get home and hopefully still own a working computer. Seems like this one is getting closer to it's end of lifetime these days, but we will see. I can do nothing but knock the woods and say a few words over it every time I start up the old thing. It's from around 2010 after all... a dinosaur these days, I know. 

I don't know, to be honest...! Probably somewhere up between Galveston and Houston, TX. Somewhere on the highway due west of Texas City or something like that, I guess. Thought I'd just try a shot in the blind more or less. I'm glad I did.

Still with the Pentax Spotmatic. Same lens and same old film as above. 

That'll be all for now. No great stories from America yet folks, but I'll try to put something together for the next post. Hopefully it's not going to take a year or so to put that one together. 

See ya!