20 Years Later
Same camera and lens as was used for the image that was posted here yesterday. This was taken the other day on T-MAX black and white film, twenty years after yesterday’s Ektachrome slide. Also of note, the camera was already 14 years old when I shot yesterday’s photo. I’m real happy that the old gear is holding up well and still producing such nice images. It’s a fun diversion for me to work with the old analog gear. It takes a lot more thought and patience to produce a good image than with modern digital equipment and I feel that it is a good mental exercise for me as well as being artistically rewarding.
Fun With Film
I make my living with state-of-the-art digital cameras but lately I have felt myself missing the experience of shooting on film with my old mechanical cameras. I still have every camera I’ve ever owned and recently I dusted off a couple of them and put them back into service. I have started to shoot again with a select few of my old favorites. Specifically they are a couple of Polaroid bodies, a 35mm SLR and a medium format TLR. This negative is from the medium format body, specifically a 1966 vintage Mamiya C33 Professional Twin Lens Reflex camera. It’s like having a reunion with a long-lost friend.
Old is New Again
I put my ancient Polaroid SX-70 back into service this week with a pack of black and white film. I have been feeling the urge to get creative with some of my old gear and this is where I started. The shutter on the camera lags right now from lack of use and tends to overexpose the images. Additionally the internal mirror has years of dust accumulated on it and I deliberately did not clean it. The combination of the dirty mirror and the inaccurate shutter makes for some very unique images. They come straight out of the camera with a beautiful vintage look that otherwise would take a lot of work to create using a digital camera and software. Here are the very first usable images that I’ve produced with it since pulling it off the shelf along with a look at the camera, a work of art in its own right.
