Friday, June 24, 2011

Autumn in black and white

Late London autumn looks surprisingly good in B&W. And a Kodak 400TX is an excellent film to take it.






Patience is a virtue...

... especially when you do film photography. I haven't developed a single film in 2011 due to many different reasons, but mainly because I didn't feel like it. 

I have now stocked up on fresh developer, my Pentax mirror is no longer stuck, days are long and I have found new inspiration in the fact I will be leaving London in August to a sandier, sunnier, warmer part of the world - the Middle East and Dubai. This will most deffinately affect my film photography mostly due to the fact I am not quite certain on whether B&W chemistry is as easily available as in London and second because I am not quite sure on what is there to take pictures of. But this will show later on. 

As of now, I still have 6 more weeks in London, enough film and developer and enough energy and inspiration to get out. 
Going back to the patience bit. Here is why: 

Do you see the top left corner? Or should I rather say: do you see the lack of any image in the top left corner? Here is the story. This is the first film I developed since November and the spiral I was using felt rather sticky towards the end of rolling the film onto it, so I thought: Whatever, I'll just roll out the film and roll it around the spiral. Big mistake... The film got stuck to each other and as I also didn't presoak it the developer simply couldn't get there... So there you go. Next time - patience. It will eventually get there.  

On another note. This is Delta 100 film. Love it! And given it is currently on a summer sale price at Silverprint might get a couple of rolls for portraits this summer! 
A few more images from the same film. All taken during my resent trip to Germany and France. 



I especially love this last one. It happened because the film was stuck and wouldn't rewind properly. I have found with a few other film that for some reason the spool in the Pentax doesn't take them in as easily as the Acros or 400TX. But sometimes those faults just play nicely together! :)