Frugal Film Project 2022 - July

 I started this months Frugal Film Project roll of Ilford HP5 with the intention of using my Pentax SP500 as my everyday carry. I would try to take it out with me and grab a few shots here and there as the month progressed. That idea went out of the window pretty early on as I got totally engrossed in other things. By now you will know that I start things with the best intention of getting it done, but squirrels are attention grabbers. I only managed getting out with my Pentax SP500 for a couple of days, but I did take some photos this month.

I began my roll of Ilford HP5 for July with a trip to our local hospital, the Royal Albert and Edward Infirmary here in Wigan with my wife. Health issues have been getting attended to after being parked for a couple of years because of the pandemic and I accompanied her to an appointment. I knew she would be there for a while and covid restrictions are still in place which meant I couldn't go any further than the reception area. My camera gave me something to do whilst she was there.

When we arrived at the hospital my first composition was waiting for us in the car park, a beautiful late 1950's VW T2 microbus, the split windshield model with two bench seats in the back. I had to grab a couple of photos. This VW is a much loved example of the now highly collectable early T2 from the 1950's. It wasn't a restored example either. It looked like it is used regularly and well cared for. It also had a disabled persons "Blue Badge" on the windshield which made me very happy.

I always like to see an old vehicle being loved and driven, but especially by someone with mobility issues. Here in the UK a Blue Badge is issued if the applicant has difficulty walking or has to use a wheelchair. The owner of this Vee Dub can't walk very far, if at all, but they can drive there in style and I heartily approve. I also took a few photos around the hospital grounds then popped into town for a bit of shopping before returning to collect my wife. The Hospital is a mix of the original late 19th century hospital and the more recent architecture that was built at the turn of the 21st century. We have always been given excellent care there over the years.

I didn't go for many walks this month as we had a heatwave here in the UK that topped out at 40.8 degrees celcius or 105 degrees fahrenheit, a record temperature for the UK. We love to moan about the weather here, it's either too hot, too cold, too much snow or it's raining various family pets. We are damn good at it too. The media drives the hysteria at times as they love to sensationalise every aspect of life here. All I wanted to do was drink cold snacks and relax as this spike in the temperature never lasts more than a few days. It's also terrible for just about every form of photography with the exception of infrared. So I did that.

It's the last Tuesday in July and I finally got out with my Pentax to finish the roll and just had a relaxing wander along the local farm roads. I tried to shoot things I hadn't looked at in a while and a familiar composition that I just cant pass by without taking a photo. I really like that tree. I also tried to capture a honey bee doing its daily foraging. I wasn't too successful at that, but hey, I tried. Photographing insects with a manual focus lens is challenging enough, but a pre-set aperture lens ups the difficulty a notch.

I think I am really getting the hang of this Meyer-Optik 30mm f/3.5 Lydith. Yes, it's a fiddly thing to use, but once you get the muscle memory in place it becomes easier over time. I will master it eventually, but for now I will take being able to use it competently as a win. I am enjoying it more with each walk and that is all the vindication I need for buying it in the first place.

If you enjoy my work, please consider a donation to help me continue my journey via the Ko-Fi buttons on the page, all donations are gratefuly received. Here are a few photos from my July roll of Ilford HP5 for the Frugal Film Project 2022. As always I have put them and more in an album on Flickr you can visit using the link below. I hope you enjoy them.

Frugal Film Project 2022

Infrared Film Photography with Adox HR-50

Photographers are always looking for something, be it compositions or new artistic pathways we all need a new challenge from time to time and I am no different. I have been looking for a new challenge to keep the old grey matter ticking along on the long road to recovery and I found it on a video on you tube from one of my favourite landscape photographers, Thomas Heaton.

Thomas published a video where he spoke about having one of his digital cameras converted to capture Infrared photos, there's a link to Thomas' video below. This intrigued me enough to think about having a go at Infrared myself, but I don't have the cash to have my DSLR's converted and to be honest I quite like them the way they are. However, I can certainly afford to try it with film.

I posted a question to the #believeinfilm community on Twitter asking for advice about infrared film photography. It wasn't long before the good folks there gave me a ton of very helpful advice on which films to try and what filter to use along with examples of their work, which is stunning! There are some very talented photographers in the #believeinfilm community willing to share knowledge and encourage folks like myself who want to try something new. You set me on the right path and have my eternal gratitude.

I took a little time to sift through the advice to see what my options were. I was advised to use a good quality IR720nm filter. Light is composed of various wavelengths from ultra violet at short wave lengths, through visible light and onwards to infrared which is 700 nano meters and longer wavelengths. The IR720 filter would block all visible light below this wavelength whilst allowing light above it to pass through and get captured on my film.

My choice of film was dictated by its sensitivity to infrared and, after a lot of reading on the films that were suggested to me, I chose Adox HR-50 35mm B&W film. The data sheet supplied by Adox gave a spectral sensitivity number of 780nm in the infrared range which allowed a fair bit of infrared light to make its way to the film once my IR720nm filter completed it's "Doorman" duties. (I now have an image of my IR filter dressed as a doorman saying to UV light; "not today, you're not on the list!") I ordered a filter from the bay of evil and four rolls of Adox HR-50 from Analogue Wonderland and waited for the day I could give it a try.

This gave me a little time to choose a camera to use for the initial attempt. I decided I wanted to go full auto to remove my ham fistedness from the equation and chose my Minolta X-700 with MD 50mm f/1.7. I set it to P (program) mode and locked the lens aperture at f22 so the camera would be the one deciding what aperture and shutter speed to use. I also chose a cable release and fitted my L bracket to make transition between landscape and portrait viewpoints easier on my tripod with its arca swiss type clamp.

When my orders arrived I loaded a roll of HR-50 into my Minolta X-700 in my darkbag, this is important with HR-50 as it does suffer from what is known as "light piping". Loading it into your camera in a darkbag or in very subdued lighting stops this from happening. Once done I packed my camera and IR filter in my bag and set off to the location I had chosen for my first attempt at infrared film photography.

The appointed day was bright and sunny with some high cirrus clouds to give my compositions a little more interest. I have been studying the trees at the old mine workings a lot this year and felt infrared would give me a different view of them. I also chose to shoot one frame with the IR filter and one without the filter to give me a chance of having some useable images should something go awry. This would either be an inspired choice or a terrible mistake, but I wouldn't know which one until I developed the film. Don't you just love the antici....... pation!

It didn't take me long to use my roll of Adox HR-50 as there are lots of trees to choose from, tall ones, small ones, in clumps and lonesome ones. I tried to position my camera for the best light and the best of the cirrus clouds for the background. I'm told the time of day doesn't really matter as only the longer wavelengths of light are getting through, so I made the most of it and was soon heading home with a full roll of film to develop.

I developed my film in Kodak HC-110 dilution H (1+63 from concentrate) for 9 minutes at 20 celcius and soon had it hanging to dry in my bathroom. I scanned it using my trusty Ion Slides2PC 35mm scanner and removed dust spots and scratches with Affinity Photo. All I can say is WOW! I learned 2 things with this exercise.

1: Infrared Film Photography is freakin' cool!
2: The Minolta X-700 can see in the freakin' dark!

I am blown away by the photos I was able to produce with my Minolta X-700. In truth the camera did the hard work, the metering is just incredible. There will be a part 2 to this exercise as I have to try to reproduce the results, but this time I will be making my brain hurt and using my Minolta X-700 manually. I have to bring my skills up to par with my camera.

Here are a few images from my roll of Adox HR-50 shot with my Minolta X-700 and Kood IR720nm filter. If you enjoy my blog and want to help me continue my photography journey, please consider making a donation via the Ko-Fi buttons on this page. Every donation is gratefully received. As always I have put these photos and more in an album on Flickr you can visit using the link below. I hope you enjoy them.

Thomas Heaton's Infrared Video
My Infrared Film Photos Flickr Album

Agent Shadow 400 - FED 2

 In 2021 I was given a sample roll of Agent Shadow 400, a new film brand from Stephen Dowling at Kosmo Foto. The aim was to raise awareness of his Kickstarter campaign to raise the necessary cash to make this film a reality. I had already backed the Kickstarter when I got the sample roll and I was happy to write an article about it on the Casual Photophile website. Thanks to the excellent film photography community, the Kickstarter was a success and the film went into production.

I had chosen the briefcase box with five rolls of Agent Shadow 400 and a graphic novel titled "The 36 Frames" and my kickstarter reward arrived not long after Stephen announced they were being posted out. I'm very happy with the quality of the presentation box, graphic novel and the packaging of the film itself, a lot of care has gone into them and it shows, but what about the film? Well, I managed to get through a backlog of things to do and was finally able to load a roll of Agent Shadow 400 into my FED 2 with Jupiter 8 50mm f/2 lens and decided to meter at 400 iso so I could compare with my previous experience of the sample roll.

I spent a week picking out a few shots here and there as I went about my daily business or headed out for a wander around my local area. I also took it with me on a trip to visit my daughter and grandchildren and captured some shots on my journey. I was using it as my "daily driver" and metered using the Light Meter Free app on my android smart phone. 

My FED 2 was as solid and dependable as ever. I had been rotating through my collection this year and hadn't used it for a while, but it didn't take me long to get reacquainted with it. I realised I had missed the industrial clunkiness of this Ukrainian built rangefinder camera. As I have mentioned in earlier blogs, I had wanted one for a while to scratch my Soviet rangefinder itch and it has not dissappointed me.

When it came to developing my roll of Agent Shadow I wanted to try something different from my sample roll that I shot last year. I chose to develop my film in Kodak HC-110 dilution H 1+63 from concentrate. I haven't seen any mention of developing Agent Shadow in HC-110 dilution H on the Massive Dev Chart nor on the list that Stephen very kindly provided on the Kosmo Foto website (there's a link below).

I have grown quite fond of dilution H for my B&W films and after some research and a bit of math I came up with 12 minutes at 20 celcius. This seemed a reasonable figure so I set to it and soon had it developed and hanging to dry in my bathroom. I scanned the film into my computer with my trusty Ion Slides2PC 35 mm scanner and removed dust spots and scratches with Affinity Photo.

My sample roll of Agent Shadow 400 came out rather nice when developed in HC-110 dilution B and when compared to dilution H for this first production roll I could see a difference in the grain straight away. The longer time in a more dilute solution tamed the shadows of a bright sunny day and gave me plenty of detail to work with in Affinity Photo, but did leave me with more grain which to be fair isn't bad. It fits in with the "Film Noir" theme Stephen uses in the packaging and promotional material.

My experiment with dilution H was a success and I have shown it is a viable solution for the home developer. Next time I will try dilution E 1+47, which has been commented upon by several folks I follow on social media to be a sweet spot for this film, but that's a story for another day. Or maybe I can go for a night shoot and push it to 3200. All I need is a dark, stormy night an an owl hooting. If you want to try Agent Shadow it is on sale now on the Kosmo Foto website (link below)

Here's a few of my photos from this production roll of Agent Shadow 400. If you enjoy my blog, please consider making a donation using the Ko-Fi buttons on this page and as always I have posted these photos and more in an album on Flickr you can visit via the link below. I hope you enjoy them.

Buy Agent Shadow 400
Agent Shadow Development Chart
Agent Shadow Flickr Album

Frugal Film Project 2022 - June

June marks the half way point of the Frugal Film Project 2022 and I have yet again been a little late shooting my roll of Ilford HP5 in my Pentax SP500 with Meyer-Optik Gorlitz 30mm f/3.5 Lydith. This hasn't been a deliberate ploy on my part, I've just been distracted by Squirrels.

There's a rather nice looking Squirrel that is shaped like a Goodman Zone Z1 and, well, it's been taking all my attention (the last time my attention was so utterly distracted I married her). I managed to get out for a walk on the last day of June that dawned bright and sunny, so I packed my Pentax loaded with Ilfords finest half pint in my bag and toddled off into town.

My walk began in Mesnes Park, the jewel in Wigan's crown and I will never tire of a walk around the park taking photos. I have learned a heck of a lot about photography there from composition to sunny 16 and all avenues between. It is my favourite classroom and long may it continue to be so. There was a few groups of primary school children there with their teachers so I kept my camera away from them, which is not easy in a big open space. A little discretion goes a long way sometimes.

My walk then took me to The Galleries which is looking more empty and dishevelled with each passing day. Large wooden hoardings have been erected to stop people walking through the once open walkways around the site and the indoor sections are also boarded up. It's a very sad sight as this is now the second time many of the people of Wigan have seen this area get run down for redevelopment in their lifetime. There are still two stallholders in the outdoor market clinging on until the bitter end, but it wont be long until they are moved indoors and the outdoor market gets closed off for ever.

I spent the rest of my walk getting some photos of the town centre, capturing its Mock Tudor architechture mixed with more ornate buildings from prosperous times for the town when Iron, Coal and Cotton drove the local economy. We do have one Brutalist concrete edifice that used to be Wigan Council offices, but it's now empty and boarded up for whatever comes next for it. I finished my roll off at Wigan Parish Church and headed home in time for lunch. I developed my film the next day in HC-110 dilution B and hung it to dry before scanning it into my PC with my Ion Slides2PC 35mm scanner and tidying them up with Affinity Photo.

Here's a few of my photo's for the June Frugal Film Project roll of Ilford HP5. It may have been a sunny day, but the big cumulus clouds had me exposing for the highlights without thinking about it. I would have got better results with an orange filter, but oh look, Squirrel! If you enjoy my photos please consider a donation to the Ko-Fi fund using the buttons on this page, every donation is greatly appreciated. I have placed these photos and more in my Frugal Film Project 2022 album on Flickr that you can visit using the link below. I hope you enjoy them.

Frugal Film Project 2022