caught off guard

The fountain in Princes Square, Launceston, 2002-2003.
Probably taken with a Minolta XG-M, on Ilford HP-5+.

Moskva 5 - first results

There seems to be a funny sort of light leak in the form of a reddish "stain" on the top right of the image (therefore bottom left of camera), I'll have to figure out if this is from the bellows or  perhaps the body of the camera itself.

Speaking more about the camera itself, it is a weighty sort of thing but feels good to use. I've never quite liked the way the shutter has to be cocked with folders, and this one is no exception - feels a bit tough. But I do like the focussing mechanism (this image being out of focus is my issue, not the cameras) and it's not an overly complex camera to use. This one will definitely get more use in future.

I need to come up with a name that isn't such a mouthful as "Moskva", though. I thought about "Moscow", but eh. Perhaps "The Mok5"?

Agfa Isola - first results

Again, there appears to be light leakage from the lack of tightness of the roll. It wasn't unexpected.

This isn't too bad a camera, but it feels awfully light, and it's only marginally more complicated than a Holga, so it might not get a lot of use. But I do like it.

Zeiss Ikon Nettar - first results

Not too shabby. The results are probably on par with my sadly defunct Isolette. There appears to be a bit of light leakage around the bottom of most of the images, which stems from the roll not being very tightly wound. If anyone has tips on how to avoid this, it would be helpful.

I think this would make a good camera to take when my wife and I got for day trips hither &/or thither - it's fairly compact, simple to use, and in such good condition I could never imagine a situation where it would fail completely. I just have to get that winding issue sorted and I think it'll be close to perfect.

Pointy

I always like buldings with these kind of rooves.

Not sure if it's a pity it's blurred (the dreaded B-switch).

Gate

More CH Smith. More urban dead space.

Pineapple

Pylons behind the derelict CH Smith warehouse in Launceston.

Waub's Bay

New Year's Eve 2009. A shame I missed all the lightning.

Some recent shots

A local vineyard recently held a food & wine day, so I loaded up the Minolta with some highly prized Kodak 400 (hey, I needed some 400 & it's the only stuff I could get at short notice) & took a few happy snaps.

I was also introduced to Van Dieman Brewing, whose Ragged Jack amber ale (all their beers are named after features of Ben Lomond) is possibly my favourite beer right now. There's so many good local brewers around right now, I feel spoiled for choice. And seeing as this is a film related blog, my current top 5 local beers are:

1. Wizard Smith (english style amber ale, Boags)
2. Ragged Jack (amber ale, Van Dieman)
3. Ironhouse porter (dark, Ironhouse)
4. Hefeweizen (weisbier, Moo Brew)
5. Boags Premium (lager, Boags)

If you can find any of these, & you happen to have a similar taste in beer as I do, you won't be disappointed. There are also some other local small-scale brewers: Wineglass Bay Brewing (east coast), Two-Metre Tall (Derwent Valley), Seven Sheds (Railton), & Taverners (Launceston)...all worth trying if you can find their products!

Weekly Vintage Image: 11

I don't know whether I can make the assumption that this is the MS Princess of Tasmania (no, not that princess), the first vessel of any meaningful size to provide a connection between Tasmania & the mainland by sea for all & sundry. It appears to be moored on the eastern bank of the Mersey River, which is still the spot that the current Spirit of Tasmania I & II drop off weary (and slightly green-ish) tourists & locals to do whatever it is they feel the urge whilst in Tasmania.

There does seem to be far less on that eastern bank than there is nowadays. It's hard to judge from a 40+ year old still image just where along the bank this is...

Weekly Vintage Image: 7

A little bit Village of the Damned, no? No idea who these possibly-evil cherubic sailor children are, but an astute guess whould be they're relatives of some sort.

Weekly Vintage Image: 6

There she is, my great grandmother, in all her Queen-Mothery Sunday best. If someone had no knowledge of the culture of Tasmanians in the 1960s, they could be forgiven for thinking that all important photographs should happen underneath the clothes-line.

Those with an intimate knowledge of Burnie will notice an empty patch in the background off to the right where the roads intersect: the current site of Burnie's municipal pool.

Weekly VIntage Image: 5

The image might be a bit blurry, but the scene is familiar to me from my youth - this is the view from my great gradnparent's garden, a few doors down was where my uncle lived, and a couple of streets to the left is where my grandparents lived. So I spent a bit of time around this area as a wee tacker when our family made visits from where-ever it was we were living at the time.

Not sure about the anonymous sunbather, though...

Weekly Vintage Image: 3

And that would probably be my great grandmother. Where this was taken, I have no idea - while the slides were boxed up & kept safe & dry (kudos), nobody seems to have thought it a good idea to write any kind of notes on the off chance everyone in the photo might one day have, er, "passed on".

Weekly Vintage Image: 2

This would be my grandparents & one of their 4 kids. Dad? One of his brothers? I can't tell, unfortunately.

If anyone can identify the location, please do. I am assuming it's probably Sisters Beach (about 40 minutes drive west from Burnie) as I know one of my pop's brothers had a shack there, but the quality of the scanner combined with the age of the slides means it can be a bit hit & miss picking the spot!

Old slides

On the day of my wedding (February 2009), my dad gave me a shopping bag full of slides. Originally I had asked him to bring down some boxes of slides he bought in Hong Kong in 1984, which I used to enjoy looking at as a wee tyke - I thought it'd be fun to have a look, but mostly I wanted the tiny plastic projector he bought with them. However, somewhere along the line he also dug up another, much larger, and far more important box of slides.

You see, the slides were taken by my great grandfather, and feature images of my dad & his family in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Unfortunately I lack a projector to view them large (dad forgot to bring this down), and my flatbed scanner just doesn't cut it. The above images were attempts to scan with a flatbed - not totally flash, but a start.

These are probably some of the few images in existence of my dad as a child. Photography wasn't a huge part of nan & pop's lives when their kids were growing up.

It's nice to have a photographic link to the past. Dad says his nan & pop (ie. my great grandparents) used to go for a Sunday drive with their grandkids quite regularly. In fact the first slide I looked at I instantly recognised as a view of the Great Western Tiers from the Bracknell area. I hope to find a few more gems when I get them scanned (whether I buy a cheap neg scanner & do this myself, or have them done by the local photo chain, I haven't decided).

A couple of photos from Strathmore, a property behind Evandale. Incidentally, this is where I was married 4 weeks ago. These shots are from the morning after our celebration (bear in mind this is not representative of where our wedding actually took place...that was in the garden area around the other side).

Ilford XP2, Minolta XG-M, 50mm lens. And, if I remember correctly, the first time I've used the UV filter. Whether it had any effect on the resulting film is difficult to say; some say UV filters are only good for protecting your lens from scratches. I have a weak theory that as we have higher levels of UV in our skies down here (thanks to proximity to the ozone hole), it's not completely unneccesary. But I have nothing to back that up.

--

Following this wonderful day, we spent three weeks in sunny New Zealand by way of honeymoon. I took 10 rolls of Fuji Reala 100, 2 rolls of Fuji Velvia 100, and picked up 2 rolls of Kodachrome 100 (which went unused). I think I have 3 rolls of Reala left. I'll be developing those in the next few weeks - more correctly, Stallards will be developing them, and I will be paying them - so I'll post the results as they happen. First time I've used Reala or Velvia, so it'll be interesting to see the results. The Reala I shot at 80iso on advice from a friend, the Velvia I shot at 100 as I've heard horror stories about correct exposure...and as I'm new to Velvia (and slide in general), I thought it best to stick with the safest path, and branch out if I feel like it later.

I'm excited to see how the Reala comes out, as I've had nothing but good results with the standard consumer-level Fuji film (Superia 100, 200, 400), and Reala is supposed to be the bee's knees of Fuji neg. Green is supposed to come out wonderfully vivid, so we'll see...Heidi kindly obliged by buying and wearing a wonderful green knit from Akaroa on our third day in NZ, I guess that will come out pretty amazinglier and stuff.