Analog film photography and cameras

Thanks @salad they're good kids. Unfortunately looks like my 645 might have a slight light leak..... need to sort that before the summer!

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Saul Leiter vibes. Excellent couple of images imo. If not already you should think about how these images would work in a book, what sequence / narrative etc✌️

Thank you very much for the kind words!

I am indeed working on a proper website and also on some "zines" 🙂

Speaking of - do any of you have any recommendations regarding getting stuff printed (talking about zines / little books etc. not individual prints) -
looking at Mixam at the moment which seems to look good, price wise - anybody used them / can speak of the quality - or maybe have some other suggestions?
Thanks!

I had a zine printed with Mixam a few years back and found them to be good although I have no one to compare them to. The price was reasonable and they helped me sort out some niggles with the layout via email to make sure it printed correctly which I didn't expect them to do FOC.

Here are some shots taken on a Mamaya C330 with a single exposure back and mammography x-ray film. The single exposure back takes film holders and of which I have 3. So you cut the film to size in a darkroom under a safe light (the film is orthochromatic - insensitive to red light) and load them into the film holders which can in turn be loaded into the single exposure back in daylight. There's no reason though that x-ray film can't be cut and placed directly inside any camera in the darkroom. Mammography film, unlike normal x-ray film, has its emulsion on one side only, so there's less chance of it getting scratched. It also has better resolution, I believe.

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^wow stunning
How did you develop and scan them?

Thanks. Because you have to develop each negative individually, a single-shot developer is extremely wasteful. I ended up using an old Kodak formula known as D-23 and a so-called replenisher named DK-25R. You need to mix both of these up from the raw chemicals, but it's not difficult. Using these, I waste less that 2.3ml of developer for each of these 6x6 negatives. If anyone's interested, I can send the formulas - but there's info online about Kodak D-23 and Kodak DK-25R.

I use 500ml glass beakers to do the development and little stainless steel clips, designed to process dental x-rays, to suspend the negative in the developer, fixer and water/stop beakers.

To digitise I use a Pixl-Latr negative holder/diffuser on top of a LED light panel (the type that gets used in household lighting) and photograph the negative with a Nikon D610 camera with a macro lens and extension tube. I then invert the image and make level adjustments in free software called Darktable.

X-ray film is a bit fussy. I discovered that you have to pre-wash the negative in water for 3 or 5 minutes before putting it in the developer and that this water, the developer and the fixer should all be at the same temperature (roughly). I do this at 20°C. One also needs to be careful not to scratch the negative, especially when it's wet. Another tip is to use an acidic fixer (Kodak Rapid Fixer comes with an optional "hardener" bottle). This helps harden the negative once dry.

Edit: another thing, I expose the film at ISO 64 and the film is Fujifilm UM-MA.

^Thanks
Just had a look at Flickr to see who else was doing this kind of stuff and I found you :-)

fucking amazing

These are fantastic. Any lighting or just ambient?

Thanks @amey and @umop3pisdn. Yes, I used a single softbox light in all four of these.

@nankatsu, x-ray film is used a lot by large-format photographers, mainly because it's really cheap. It's not really worth using it with 35mm cameras, but it's a great option for larger pinhole cameras. I'd like to try it one day with a box brownie. Many of those use archaic film sizes and these x-ray sheets can be cut to any size (I use a sliding paper guillotine to cut mine). For a lengthy discussion on x-ray film, see the following on the large format photography forum:

https://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?48099-Use-of-X-ray-film-technical-discussion-with-example-images&p=460200&viewfull=1#post460200

Enjoying revisiting old scans, funny how they grow on you (Kentmere 400 +1 push)

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How do you approach photography with winter creeping in, less light and greyer skies? I am usually very much a good-weather photographer. I like warm tones and interesting contrasts created by strong and sharp shadows.
Any tips for winter photography?

@Oddo quite like that it gets dark earlier / stays dark later for night photography.

winter creeping in

you dont need a darkroom in winter!

What do you photograph at night? The last time I enjoyed that was in New York with lots of Neon signs etc.

@Oddo a lot less than I did pre-kids. Used to shoot a lot of long exposure cityscapes, liked trying to expose the sky without killing the highlights.

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Wow, that's pretty cool. Could be an interesting thing to try. I don't really have any experience with long-time exposure.
Don't even have a tripod.

I had a zine printed with Mixam a few years back and found them to be good although I have no one to compare them to. The price was reasonable and they helped me sort out some niggles with the layout via email to make sure it printed correctly which I didn't expect them to do FOC.

..sounds good - think I'll just try them for a little project 👍

Thanks for the feedback!

Kentmere 400 +1 push

..nice!

Here are some shots taken on a Mamaya C330 with a single exposure back and mammography x-ray film.

They look amazing 👌

Gradients are super nice / tones are so smooth.. also astonishing how three dimensional they look!

Thanks again for sharing ✌️

How do you approach photography with winter creeping in, less light and greyer skies?

Still carry a camera on most days, but shoot a lot less, and most of it is black & white, in the winter months.
Colour film doesn't really make sense for me, with the little (and dull) light.

Any tips for winter photography?

If you never really did long exposures that might be a worthwhile endeavour!
Do get a proper tripod. And do yourself a favour and get one with a ball head.

Bring spare batteries for your things and keep them close to your body (they deplete much faster in the cold).

Probably goes without saying - but get some gloves that keep your hands warm, but that you can still operate your camera with.
Kinda depends on what / how you're shooting, but ideally the camera you have with you is switched on and in your hand at all times (at least not tucked away inside your backpack) - this is harder / more annoying in the winter time, but you kinda have to make it work - otherwise you'll just be carrying your stuff around not actually taking any pictures 🙂

Love this

🙏

I just spoke to a design student who was struggling to find existing photography books that have a chaotic feel. Everything she has found so far have been quite minimal and clean. Can any of the heads in here suggest any names to look out for? Not so much punk zines, just something that’s off grid, layered, textured perhaps