found film

Perhaps the only thing better than finding unexposed expired film for cheap on ebay or in a resale or antique shop is finding exposed expired film in a camera you find for cheap online or in person. I got a windsor diana clone as part of a lot of cameras I bought a couple months ago. Actually, the only reason I even bid on the lot was because of the windsor. As I recall there were a number of 126 cameras in the lot, disc cameras--stuff for which you can't get film. But I saw the diana clone and figured this was a cheap-ish way of getting the camera. (Things on ebay marked as diana clones can get insanely expensive--this just said that a windsor camera was included in the lot.)

I was delighted to find that two of the cameras from that lot had exposed film in them. (In all, there were probably 7-10 cameras in that lot that had film in them but there were only two that had b/w film in them with most of the roll already exposed.) The two images here are from the windsor. There was also a tech model 72 126 camera with film in it. When I was in maine this fall, I picked up a kodak instamatic x-15 with film in it for 4 bucks. Ironically, the x-15 had been part of the lot referred to above, so I didn't technically need another. I just wanted the film inside. I asked if I could just purchase that--the woman at the antique store said no, i had to buy both parts. To be clear: I wasn't looking to save money--I just didn't want to lug home and then find a place to store another camera, particularly one I wouldn't really have occasion to use. The images from the found films can be viewed here.

the bend project

Now that the manuscript is finished, I've promised myself that I'll spend more time writing (and writing more regularly) here. I started the bend project a couple months ago. I was feeling pretty burnt out with most things related to photography. I didn't want to test new cameras or film. I'd gotten tired of that and without any conference travel plans on the horizon (having a chance to take pics places I'd normally never get to is the main incentive for doing conferences these days), well I'd grown pretty bored with things. Inspired by a flickr contact's seemingly endless creative projects and experiments, I decided to try to take a photograph of the same (approximate) point on a riverwalk path with each camera in my collection. I've only got 20 in the flickr set so far. For a time there, we were walking the path once a day. With the snow, the semester starting, etc. I've not gotten back there as often. Still, I figure that if and when I'm back there, I'll take with me another camera or two and see what else I can add to the set. Having only gotten to know this fabulous place in December, I'm eager to see what the walk looks like in spring, summer and fall! Featured below (top down) are bend pics taken by the holga, a 110 vellum film plane camera and a suprema camera with a vignette jelly lens. The first image of the bend was taken with the vivitar vivicam 8025.

on inverted (or inverting) images

Ctrl+I in photoshop will invert an image. Here, I've put together some before and afters. The first image (above) is the color negative as photographed with the digital camera, the one below that is the image after inverting it in photoshop. With the bottom pairings, I grayscaled the photographed negative and then inverted it.

alt scanning--a comparision

the image to the left was scanned in the "normal" way--with my epson perfection v500 scanner. the middle image was window scanned with crumpled wax paper beneath it. the image to the right was scanned using the viewlex previewer jr. the original tree image was taken with a banner camera--a diana clone. i really like the way the b/w images window scan--in nice, rich sepia tones.

alternative scanning (part 2)

As ever, flickr has been the most amazing learning tool. I saw this image posted by a contact and wanted to learn more about how it was created. As an aside: My general method when using flickr as a learning tool is to seek out images that appeal to me and learn how the composer made them--most times this has to do with finding out what type of camera, film or processing technique they used and if I can afford the camera, film or stuff for processing, I'll give it a shot. 200+ cameras later, I was happy to find something to experiment with that allowed me to repurpose or remediate the negatives I had on hand. And that gave me reason to use craft supplies that I'd normally never have occasion to use. Following these directions and after looking at the most amazing collection of scanned negatives I've ever seen, I rigged up my own lo-tech scanner (my kitchen window) and starting experimenting with different textures--pages of my manuscript, crinkled wax paper, bubble wrap, textured craft paper, pieces of a plastic milk carton. The general method involves taping a texture to the window, placing the negative over that, and taking a macro shot of the negative and then inverting the negative in photoshop.

Since I was almost finished with my book manuscript at the time I learned about this technique, I decided to pull out some old vacation negatives and place those atop pages of the manuscript. I then started experimenting with different materials place below and on top of the negatives--there's a sampling below and still more here.

alternative scanning (part 1)

I picked up this viewflex previewer jr in an antique store in maine last fall. you can feed strips of 35mm negatives through the top (or bottom) of the mechanism and view each of the images before printing or, in my case, scanning. using my canon powershot s5's macro setting, i can take images of what appears on the screen and invert those images in photoshop. inverted "as is" results in a very blue image (see below), so i flipped them to grayscale in photoshop.

(bulk) roll your own

I bought this watson bulk film loader on ebay some time ago but didn't have the time (or frankly the nerve) to try it. Around the time I got the loader, I also ordered a couple 100 ft. canisters of some expired efke kb--one of my favorite b/w films. Since I didn't want to risk ruining either of the efke films, I also bought a canister of expired fomapan 100. This was about 1/2 the cost of the efke and figured that I'd rather test that than risk ruining the efke.

Though the person from whom I bought the loader said that it was NIB and/or hadn't ever been used, my biggest concern was whether or not the mechanism was light-tight. My second biggest concern was that the mechanism would be light-tight but I'd mess it up. In the end, I unspooled a roll of 24 exposure 35mm I had around the house and ran that through the loader before I messed with the canister of fomapan.

To ensure that i don't accidentally pitch the film canisters that I'm to use for the bulk loading, I mark those with some leopard tape.

I'm not sure how this all works out in terms of cost. The side of the watson box boasts that one can "reload cassettes for less than a penny a frame." Like any (or most) new endeavors you put out so much up front, it takes awhile to see the financial benefits. I don't recall how much I paid for the loader (maybe 20 plus a small shipping fee?), but the reloadable cassettes (got these from freestyle, not dx-coded) were 16 bucks for 25. Just had to place a second order for these.

Then again, saving a few bucks wasn't necessarily the biggest motivator for trying this. I wanted to try bulk loading and I also wanted to buy up the expired efke! If it were possible to bulk load 120 (i.e., if they sold a machine similar to the watson), I'd definitely be down for that as a way to control costs!