For Those Just Tuning In
Hi everyone, I figure this is an opportune moment to re-introduce myself for those recently discovered my blog. My name is Bill and I’m a photography geek, this medium is a personal passion of mine and thankfully I don’t earn a living at it.
Checking out previous posts, you’ll notice I still shoot with film and use mostly manual focus 35mm and medium format cameras stretching from the mid 1950s to the 1990s. As a byproduct, I collect cameras from this time period, in particular Nikon, Leica and Rolleiflex, not a cheap hobby but a lot cheaper than collecting and restoring vintage Porsches.
People ask why, film it’s simple I like the workflow besides I spend enough time in front of the computer with work as a marketing communications consultant. That being said there are few digital camera systems I have my eye on but I’m not in a rush to invest just yet.
I process my own black and white film. I’m partial to Ilford’s HP5 400 and Delta 100 ISO films along with Kodak Tri-400 and Fuji Neopan Acros 100 in medium format for black and white. Each film has it’s own signature that can be influenced by the choice of developers and I’m partial to Kodak’s HC110 and Xtol as well as Ilford’s ID-11.
As for colour film I shoot what’s called C-41 which is more commonly known as colour negative. For now I'm dropping my colour rolls off at a processing lab, that may change once I figure out a process to do it at home. My go to colour films are Kodak’s Ektar 100 and Portra 400 along with Fuji’s Pro 400 H.
The photos posted on this blog are scanned from the negative by an Epson V500 flatbed scanner. It’s not bad but there is far better out there, comes down to what you can afford. I use Vuescan control software saving the images in Tiff format and do minimal post processing in Aperture. As a rule the only adjustments I make are cropping, dust removal and if necessary minor adjustments in the colour curves function.
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