Sometimes people like what I do – Jeep tours 2019

I don’t need to be famous, I just want to be loved.

These ones have gotten quite a lot of love over on the IG so far–thanks to my supporters for sharing them.

Waving all the flags

I have a flag picture that I took years ago, this is a bit of an updated one.  I’d seen this truck driving around Colorado Springs back in 2019 and every once in a while parked at the old honky tonk by our office.  My photo instructor wanted to see better up-close pictures which I got around to taking after the class concluded.

The flag you can’t see is the Revolutionary War yellow “Don’t Tread on Me” flag.

Happy Independence Day.

Slipped through the cracks

These are culled from four rolls of Tri-X that I shot during the final week or two of taking Advanced Photography, from which this post was taken.  All that semester I had had my instructor Stacy to go through and edit the shots, help me pick out which were the best shots.  But she never got to look at these last four rolls, so even though I had them developed before the Summer break started I never looked too closely at them, I think I just wasn’t feeling too confident with my own editing skills back then.  I feel more confident now, but still I’m sure some day someone might go back through all my shots and say, “Well why didn’t you include these?”  So it goes…

I started my Instagram going in mostly chronological order and have gotten through all of my VA4110 images plus these.

I had just purchased my 2/35 Super-Takumar lens so was trying it out quite a lot back then, and found that I really liked that particular focal length so I didn’t take it off the body for weeks.  Even though I started shooting Nikon in early 2020 I didn’t buy my 35mm f/1.4 AI’d Nikkor until nearly a year and a half later.  Since I have though, that and the 50mm f/1.4 are nearly the only two lenses I use.

Schoolroom Shenanigans, Pt.II

Part II of my school career at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs.  You thought I wouldn’t have more?

I’ll miss this time of my life…

See Part I.

Territory Days in Old Colorado City, Pt.II

Here’s Part II.

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Territory Days in Old Colorado City

From 2019.  Colorado Ave, the old main drag and original US Hwy 24, is shut down for a few days for the local version of the county fair.  Working in the area all I’d experienced before had been using detours to get around it, but living in the area that summer I decided I should walk down and check it out, shooting I think 2.5 rolls of film.

Can you tell I have problems editing?  I actually broke this up into two parts because I like all these, and am also too busy right now to go through and make deep cuts.  Several of my coworkers made it into this series.

Peak construction

Pike’s Peak is working on a new donut shop that was supposed to be finished around the same time as the new Cog Railway.  It looks that the new summit house will be finished first, though who knows.  Here are a selection of shots that I took Summer 2019 as a documentation of the ongoing work. (And yes I know I have some shutter problems)

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Workin’ on the railroad II

Here are a few shots taken Spring/Summer 2019, some of the last of the old Pike’s Peak Cog Railway built 1890-1891. (And yes I know I have shutter problems)

Some of the construction once they tore up the rails, etc.

The metal refuse pile as it was the day after they tore out the rails.  If I’d been up there earlier I could have brought back my weight in railroad spikes but I did come away with a few plates and bolts.

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What’s in the future for Ferrania?

I’ve always tried to be upbeat and positive regarding Ferrania in the past, and certainly this year must certainly have been hard on them. I suppose some will read the announcement and accuse them of abandoning their original promises (well, the phrase “Our Kickstarter campaign must evolve into something new…” probably sets off some alarm bells) and honestly I don’t know what Ferrania is ultimately saying myself.  They throw out a hint at color film (note: they never use the word reversal) down the road but wisely have not committed to anything; in the past laying out projected timelines hasn’t worked well for them.

I just hope that they actually are working on color reversal film and that it will be happening soon.  I like the P30 but it’s no substitute; I’ve hoarded my 5 Alpha rolls for years now but it’s my plan to shoot up the rest of it this year and buy some of the fresh regular production rolls.  Here’s a compilation of what I was shooting back in January and February:

It’s good stuff, but very slow for what I do so I don’t anticipate using it much.  On the other hand, if they had made just another ASA400 film I’d complain about that too (I have in the past).  Actually I’d love to see P30 slit as super 8 or at least 16mm: considering how fine-grained it is it would look lovely in small-gauge.  I hope Ferrania thinks about some of the underrepresented markets out there, like Double 8, Double Super 8, especially in 100ft rolls there.  Hopefully P30 will work with reversal chemicals but it can of course be scanned too, and even just selling long-length cans of super 8 film (not loaded in cartridges) would be great for those who load their own cartridges, like those shooting single-8 cameras.

But I am still eagerly awaiting some Ferrania Chrome 100 and it does get frustrating sometimes when all I hear about from Ferrania is updates on P30.  That said, I hope readers can tell which side of the fence I fall on here.  I want only the best for Ferrania and hope they are tremendously successful.

Why I love Takumar lenses

1. An image quality that is unsurpassed for the price point
2. A build quality that is second-to-none

Pentax made 4 series of lenses going back to the late-’50s.  There were:
Auto-Takumar
Super-Takumar
Super-Multi-Coated Takumar (S-M-C)
SMC Takumar (mostly cosmetic differences)
I try to get the S-M-C and later lenses for the better coating; evidently at the time Pentax had developed the best lens coating available and nearly every other lens maker was paying Pentax for the technology.  I’m not planning to write a detailed history of the brand here, so I’ll stop with what I’ve said.  A lot of my early information came from this site, very helpful.

Since it’s been 5.5 years since my last post professing my love of Pentax I thought I’d go back through the archives and compile some of my favorite pictures; they’re generally in order of when I shot them and it should be readily apparent how much Tri-X I’ve been shooting (a lot) compared to everything else (not much).

These lenses have a special character which I really like, they’re plenty sharp too, and extremely sturdy (also: damn heavy).  Hold one in your hands and turn the focus ring: if this doesn’t make you want to try a Spotmatic out at least once then I don’t think we can be friends.  I will however understand if it doesn’t become your main camera outfit after shooting one because there are other SLR systems that are much more advanced.  That’s ultimately what made me move on.  We had a good run together and I’m sorry to say goodbye to these wonderful lenses.  If only Pentax had made a body worthy of their greatness!

The Spotmatics are a great line of cameras but do have some inherent weaknesses which were never overcome.  Build quality is standard 1960s which is to say solid and sturdy, no complaints there.  I learned to live with stop-down metering, and screw-mount lenses.  Actually if both bodies are hanging around my neck I’m much more comfortable unscrewing a Takumar than a Nikkor, so far!  Though considering the modular (and advanced) features of the older Nikon F, Pentax did make some pretty strange choices in camera design at the time, for all that they did right.  The most complained-about features (screw mount and stop-down metering) were corrected by the mid-’70s but quality started dropping fast soon after, about the time they went to the M-series lenses.  I used to wonder why Pentax got such a bad wrap but can start to understand with some of the later stuff where they obviously had to introduce cost-cutting measures to keep going.  They still made some quality gear (including their first and only pro-level camera starting in 1980) but eventually were acquired by the closely-associated budget line, Ricoh.  Pentax was always playing catch-up to other brands and trying to recapture their former glory by then.

But it was just about 10 years ago that I first bought a Spotmatic  (an SPII) with my first Takumar, at a garage sale for $5.00.  It looked pretty much like my mom’s Minolta XG-A (chrome and black) and I didn’t know that the lens was made by the same company as the body; I almost didn’t buy the camera because I thought I was getting a cheap off-brand lens, but at $5.00 it was still a deal so I took it.  I asked the owner if there were other lenses that I couldn’t see but she said no.  Later I studied the lens and body closer and did find that they both had Asahi marked on them so I knew at least I wasn’t getting an off-brand lens thankfully.  Shooting a few rolls in 2010 convinced me that this lens was something special so even with acquiring a few more advanced cameras soon after I kept coming back to the Spotmatic, kept buying Takumar lenses.  I’m sure I’ll still pull out the system from time to time, I’m certainly not planning on getting rid of it.