Scrub Oak

A camera test to determine if my new thrift store find had any light leaks or other problems.  Thankfully I’m problem-free aside from a few mechanical oddities and those I can live with for a while.  A 100-roll box of expired Fuji Superia 400 appeared in the photo lab last semester, evidently free, so that’s what I used rather than waste my own film (12 exposure rolls, so I wouldn’t call it cost-effective to process C-41).  Processed in Sprint Chemistry and I used the times for Tri-X; it fogged quite a lot but seems to look alright in scanning.

I see this stand of scrub oak nearly day I’m on campus because it’s right out the window of Columbine Hall (where the photo lab is).  I’ve photographed it at least twice before, here and here, plus it can be seen in the back of these shots as well.

Bristol Brewing

I shot these at my friend’s birthday party because that’s where we were!  Bristol is the largest brewery in Colorado Springs and they operate out of the former Ivywild Elementary School.  It’s a large place housing the brewery, a restaurant, coffee shop and mini-mall.  The gymnasium is a great concert venue/theater and I’ve been to a couple film festivals there.  Ivywild is one of my top 3 recommended restaurants in Colorado Springs.  And of course some good beer there, too.

I wouldn’t say this is all there is to the brewery but it does happen to be part that’s open to the public.

Kodak Tri-X pushed to 1600 in the Pentax Spotmatic SPII with the Yellow 1.4/50 Super-Takumar.

Starr Kempf

I don’t have the full story on Starr Kempf, but he was a sculptor who lived in Colorado Springs.  I think I was told that he was a professor at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs (UCCS), where I currently go.  He made a number of kinetic sculptures (they move with the wind) and originally they were all displayed in his front yard.  The story I heard is that the neighbors weren’t too happy about them or the publicity that they were getting (Kempf’s house is very close to the Broadmoor Hotel), and many of them were removed, either to New Mexico, downtown Colorado Springs, or as depicted below, to a newer section of the university.  I shot them with the pinhole lens on my dedicated pinhole Spotmatic.

Here’s one that I shot with the Trip 35 on Acros.  This was Spring of 2018, the first semester in the brand new “Ent Center for the Arts.”

Acros 100 in the Trip 35

And here are the remaining few on Kempf’s front lawn.

Velvia 100 on the Canon AE-1

.

PSA: I promise I’m not spam.

Something Jim Grey mentioned to me recently as I was commenting on a post of his, my comments were going right to his Spam folder.  I’ve looked at a few of the other places I’ve commented recently and don’t see the comments there either so it must be a widespread thing.  I don’t know how that happened and I’m in contact with Akismet right now to get it fixed.

-Joe

Edit: all taken care of, and I’m back to commenting on posts again.  No wonder I never got any replies…

Steampunk birthday

These pictures haunt me.  I don’t know exactly what went wrong but they didn’t turn out like they should have.  This is the companion piece to the whiskey tasting birthday, husband & wife, and was made using the exact same camera, lens, and film combination (Tri-X pushed to 1600 in the SPII with the 1.4/50 Super-Takumar).  Originally I thought that maybe the camera light meter’s battery was finally giving up the ghost after 9 years, which still might be the case, but the other possibility is just as likely, that I dumped the developer too soon.  It’s actually very believable that I lost count of the minutes and didn’t push this film the full two stops.

Live and learn, I guess.  Besides shooting 35mm I also took a couple photos on 4×5 film, coming at some point in the future.

Ferrania P30 back in stock

Late to the party as usual, but that means I just need to celebrate louder to make up for it.  Ferrania P30 is for sale immediately, at least in North America, as well as brick & mortar stores in Italy.  The rest of you heathens will have to wait your turn.

Get a maximum of 10 rolls directly from Ferrania here.

I don’t have the money to spend on it right now myself, because I just put a camera on layaway down in Colorado Springs, so I’m waiting too.

Edit: And in other news…

Kodak attempts to steal their thunder by announcing the official release of Ektachrome in 120 and 4×5.  Actually, they’re doing a pretty good job.  I could link to the press release, but what’s better is that photographer Steven Schaub did a wonderful write-up which you can read here.