Category Archives: Film Photography

Inside-Outside

As a photographer, one of my favorite things to do is drive around and come to a halt whenever something catches my eye. One day recently, I had my Canon AE-1 sitting on my passenger’s front seat, pondering what I might like to photograph with it. I got no further than my very own street, when I spotted this car sitting outside one of the houses. Of course, I stopped my car, jumped out, and snapped a few shots.

I have a great love for classic cars. I think this comes from my childhood, when our  family car was a 1954 Pontiac Star chief which my father had named “Kawliga.” Dad even had the car’s name painted on the side of the car. We attended classic car shows often, and sometimes put our car in the shows. This was a big part of the culture of my family when I was a child. So when I began doing photography, old cars were among my favorite subjects. To be cliche, I’d say “they just don’t make ’em like that anymore.”

When you see a photo I have taken of one of these beautifully-crafted automobiles, you’ll know that I’ve photographed it for far deeper reasons than because I wanted to make an interesting photograph; I’ve photographed it because cars like that are a piece of who I am.

Forgotten But Not Gone [Photos from the Past]

When I worked at a photo lab, I used to find it funny that some people took photos so infrequently that they’d have both Easter and Christmas photos on the same roll of film when they brought it in for development.

Guess what? I found one of my cameras, loaded with film, that contained photos from *cough* THREE years ago.

During my trip to England in 2006, I went to a camera fair. Essentially, I picked my traveling dates based on the dates of the camera fair in a town called Wolverhampton. I don’t reeeeeeally know why I did that – I definitely didn’t have extra money to spend on cameras! I loved it though, because I got to see a lot of cameras in person which I’d only seen online. I finally did buy a camera, the Agfa Isola I. The dealer knocked of a few quid because it was near the end of the day and he was looking to unload some of his goods.

Before purchasing this Agfa, I had another camera that was quite similar (a knock-off?) called a Dacora Digna (see some photos I took years ago with it here.) Maybe I didn’t need the Agfa, but I’m just a sucker for inexpensive little medium format cameras!

Real quick, here are some cool features of the Agfa Isola I:

•”Telescoping lens”
• The lens folds somewhat flat when not in use, and with a simple twist, pops out so you can take photos.


(I made a cheesy animated GIF to illustrate this action)

• Two exposure settings: Instant exposure (about 1/35 second, according to the manual – wow!), or bulb for long exposures.
• Two aperture settings: info I find says f/11 (“cloudy”) and f/16 (“sunny”)
• Built-in yellow filter (for black and white photography)

And the photos? Drumroll please…

 Any time I happened to remember about this camera and the photos I’d taken on it, I had a definite memory of photographing my friend Kelsey at Food Not Bombs, wearing a striped sweater. Beyond that, I had no idea what might be on that film. So, three years after the fact, I guess I was right about the details of the photo I’d taken of Kelsey! And I apparently also photographed the Cannon Center.

I think it’ll be a decent little camera medium format camera to tote around with me some times, as well of a reminder of a really lovely day I had when I visited England that one time.

 

Black Friday and Uncooperative

Polaroid Sx-70. Neutral density pack filter. Black Friday 2009.

Oh happy day!

It’s a happy day, if for no other reason than I’m logged onto the internet at my apartment. That’s never happened before!

It’s also a happy day because I went to my favorite camera shop and picked up a CD containing scans of several rolls of film. You should understand: seeing scans of photos I’ve taken is like Christmas for me. Every time. Popping the disc into the computer and looking at those images for the first time, well, is just like unwrapping a Christmas pressie. Every time.

What did I receive on this particular Mini Christmas Day?

Among other things, I received photos from when I was with my brother Jonathan last week. He moved to Montana 4 years ago, and I have only seen him twice since. Because I enjoy documenting my friends and family, it was really important to me to get some photos of my brother. I wanted to make sure we’d have something to remember our day by.

I met with Jonathan at Otherlands. He was on the patio, having a smoke.


My bruvva at Otherland’s

Jonathan has two goals when he comes home: 1) Enjoy as much time as he can, with as many friends and loved ones as he can. 2) Eat his way across the Mid-South at all the restaurants that can’t be equaled in Montana. That means my normally health-conscious brother gladly guzzles gallons of sweet tea,  eats his weight in the white cheese dip at Mexican restaurants (who knew THAT’S something he’d have to do without in Montana???), and makes frequent visits to the BBQ restaurants that seem to dot every corner in this city (hey, he’s only home every couple of years. Why not live it up while he is here? And hopefully he’ll never see this blog and find out that I’ve shared with the world his Memphis eating habits.)


Can you tell I had to forced Jonathan to stand here while I took his picture at Tom’s?


I was pretty glad that the BBQ restaurant Jonathan chose that day was photogenic.

I wish I had more photos to show you. Unfortunately, the rest of the day wasn’t quite as photogenic as what you see here. But I don’t think I’ll need photos to remember going on a quest with Jonathan to find something zombie-related, something red, and something green for him to send to a girl back in Montana. Traipsing around Summer Avenue’s fine selection of thrift and antique stores with my brother will remain in my memory forever, even without photos to remind me.


(For those of you who like to know the technical information on my photos, the shots in this blog post were made with my Holga 120N and expired, cross-processed Fuji Velvia.)

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