Bill Smith's Photography

I had a change of scenery last week house, dog, turtle and goldfish sitting in the Beaches in Toronto. The break was much needed and I got a lot done. This time out aside from two shots on my iPhone, I only used my Mamiya C220f. As I mentioned in previous posts, I'm toying of using the Mamiya kit for Algonquin Park this year at the end of September. The big plus for a medium format twin lens reflex camera is the interchangeable lenses, other cameras like that come only with a fixed lens.  The downside, it can be on the heavy, especially if you factor in a 10km+ hike, well another reason to step up my workout routine. Camera: Mamiya C220f, Sekor 65 f3.5 Lens. Film: Ilford HP5 400, Kodak Tri-X 400, HC110 B. iPhone 5S.

I have nothing to post this week, stay tuned for next week where I have lots of fresh material. 

Winter is coming to an end soon. Camera: Mamiya C220f, Sekor 65 f3.5 lens, Sekor 135 f4.5 lens. Film: Kodak Tri-X400, HC110 B. Bottom three images, Ilford FP4, Xtol 1+1.

The ski hill is my sanctuary on winter weekends and the rare weekday I can play hooky. Camera: Nikon FM2, Nikkor Ais 35 f2 lens. Film: Ilford HP5 400, HC110 B.

I love backroads. To explore and embrace the journey instead of the destination. I can't wait to explore more back roads when Spring hits. Speaking of new journeys, I made the switch for Apple's defunct Aperture program to Adobe Lightroom 5.7. Now I'm pretty much a babe in the woods with this bit of editing and archival software. For a while now I've recommended Lightroom to my fellow marketers and communicators as the photo editing software for it's feature to archive photographs. It's my turn to take the plunge. Camera: Mamiya C220f, Sekor 65 f3.5 lens. Film: Ilford FP4 125, Xtol 1+1.

I have this thing for exploring back roads and documenting what I see along them.... Camera: Mamiya C220f, Sekor 65 f3.5 lens. Film: Ilford FP4, Xtol 1+1

Been under a fair bit of stress on the personal front lately and photographing Caledon ON. after skiing has kept me centred over the past month and a half. Can't wait to head back up this long weekend coming up. Camera: Mamiya C220f, Sekor 65 f3.5 lens. Film: Kodak Tri-X 400, Xtol 1+1.

Yes, I like the square crop a lot. Camera: Mamiya C220f, Sekor 105 f3.5 lens, 65 f3.5 lens. Film: Ilford FP4, Xtol 1+1.

I confess I am a gearhead when it comes to cameras, one system I vow to shoot more with is the Mamyia C220f, a medium format twin lens reflex camera. Unlike Rolleiflexes which has fixed lenses, the C220f and the C330 series have interchangeable lenses with leaf shutters. Last week I was hanging out with my friend Lindsay and had an opportunity to grab a fresh portrait, I like this way better than the professional head shot I did for her back in the fall. Comes down the right focal length, 105mm is more flattering than 80mm in medium format. I also prefer black and white for portraits. The Mamyia C220f I think is going to come with me to Algonquin Park this year. The big question is which lenses come along for the ride, this is not a light system.

A few years back I did a photography project and my first exhibition with two friends called "In the Shadow of the GTA Greenbelt." Long after that was put to bed I still shoot within the Green Belt on a regular basis, part of it due to the fact Greater Toronto is a sprawling region and what was farmland 15 years ago is now a subdivision. It is my hope the Greenbelt is protected over the long haul regardless who is in power at the provincial level. Camera: Nikon FM2, Nikkor Ais 35 f2 lens. Film: Ilford HP5 400, HC110 B,

Winter took it's time to show up this year, we had rain and a thunderstorm Christmas Eve, that should say it all right there. We now have a little bit of snow on the ground but I would not call it a dump like last year. Unfortunately the cold temperatures returned as well but unlike last year, that may not last, one can hope for average winter temperatures for a change. The top photos were taken along McLaren Side Road in Caledon,  one of my favourite drives and it started snowing while I was taking the pictures. The others were shot along the West Credit River near Brimstone and the hairpin turn on Forks of the Credit Road that same afternoon after skiing. Camera: Olympus OM-1MD, Zuiko lenses, Film: Ilford HP5 400, HC110 B.

Long time readers know I'm a ski bum, been skiing for 40 years first learning how when I was six years old north of Montreal. This year, it has been a green holiday season and the local hill I go to got things up and running through the magic of snowmaking. It was also quiet because people psychologically didn't think it was winter but just very late November over the Christmas season and stayed away. That meant no line ups which for dedicated skiers and snowboarders meant more time on the slopes. While I'm thankful for the more seasonably cold temperatures, it's just not winter without about 30cm of snow on the ground, just feels weird. Camera: Olympus OM-1md, Zuiko lenses. Film: Ilford HP5 400, HC110 B.

It's time 2014 got shown the door, while my year was pretty good in the grand scheme of things, most of my friends and colleagues had in one form or another a tough year.  Some of them it was career setbacks or relationships going sour, others bad life events, the majority it was a loss of a loved one.  If you suffered a bad case of horrible year, regardless what happened, repeat after me, "2014, I'm kicking your sorry ass to the curb, and don't come back!" I wish you all a safe Happy 2015, it's a clean page, what are you going to put on it?

I'm back on familiar ground and happy to have a camera in my hand for a change. This past weekend I was up in skiing at the Caledon Ski Club, unlike last year when we had real winter, it's looking a lot more like a brown/green Christmas with a bit of half melted snow for accents. Exploring the back roads of Caledon On before and after skiing is going to be the activity over the next few months. Now if we can only get a nice dump of the white fluffy stuff.... Have a Merry Christmas and a safe happy New Year! Camera: Olympus OM-1n, Zuiko 50 f1.8 lens Film:  Ilford HP5 400, HC110 B.

I confess I'm a camera collector as well as a user. One of my systems is the Pentax or M-42 screw mount system, I own a Spotmatic F, a pair of SVs, a S1a and an Asahi Pentax model K from the late 1950s (not to be confused with the K1000) which is a rare beast. So my brother (and worst enabler) told me an independent Leica Repair tech out of the US mid west was selling a batch of overhauled Pentax Spotmatics for $40USD. Granted this was before the Canadian dollar started melting in currency markets so it came to about $55Cdn with postage, how can you go wrong? The Asahi Pentax SP was considered the first SLR camera to offer through the lens metering (TTL) in the mid 1960s and I would consider it the VW Beetle of cameras. Now here's the deal with the Pentax screw mount lens family, their optics were on par with Leica and Zeiss. It the day comes I add a digital body to the camera kit, it will most likely be a Sony A7 MkII with an adapter. Camera: Pentax Spotmatic SP, Super M...

I do headshots for Linked In and other social media platforms. Camera: Hasselblad 500 C/M, 80 f2.8 Zeiss Planar Lens. Film: Fuji Pro 400 H.

What you see below was from my first and only time at the bottom of Cataract Falls inside Forks of the Credit Provincial Park. There's a story behind this set, seven years ago I met with some members of the Toronto Photography Meetup Group and we hiked into Forks of the Credit Provincial Park, one of my favourite haunts. We were told, it would be not a too hard a climb down, famous last words. The climb down was tricky but the climb back up with a camera backpack and tripod without climbing ropes was downright scary. Park staff have now blocked the path to the access point along the rail line and have made it clear that climbing down is not tolerated. I take those warnings seriously. I decided it was time to re-scan the negatives this time with a decent scanner (an Epson V600) into TIFF files for better editing and re-sharing. Camera: Olympus OM-1,  Zuiko lenses Film: Ilford FP4, HC110 B.