Friday Night

Classic 80's

Long exposure of Wes's new place

The Weather (below and above)

I took this photo about and hour ago(11:00 am) and I think it proves that a good photo can be taken at anytime of the day - you just have to be a little more creative/careful to get a good one around mid-day.

Anywho - I've been working two jobs, a bit under the weather(well, the weather might be under even me lately), and injured my neck - so I'd like to apologize to my legions of readers for the light posting the last few weeks....

Spring @ Night

When they first started putting 'Live View' on DSLR's I didn't really see the point. I thought that I would always use the viewfinder(and for the most part I do) - but I have found a few really good uses for it. These nighttime, long-exposures in my yard are the perfect example. The 'live view' mode makes it so I can see in the near dark and also digitally zoom in and manually focus far more precisely.

Happy Easter

The Bunny was here...

Brake Job

You'd be amazed how hard it is to track down some bolts for the calipers of a 1991 Toyota Camry...a regular wild goose chase.  

Long, Boring Exposures

We need some nice weather - I'm reduced to messing around with my camera in the living room.
Long exposure - then sneaking into the scene and holding real still - a ghost appears!

In this shot I was spinning around with the camera - then I added a gradient layer to the background blur created by the TV and lamp.

I have a huge(literally) idea I'm working on - maybe its sapping the rest of my creativity for photography....more on this soon...

New Camera Self-Portraits

Today I picked up two really interesting cameras at the thrift store - when I got home instead of taking my usual 'product shot' style photos of the cameras I took some self-portraits with them. Above is me with a Soviet made Lubitel 2 - re-badged as a Kalimar TLR 100. Below is a Polaroid Land Camera 850 - the thing is a beast. I'll have the usual photos and write-ups of them on the camera page tomorrow....

Collaging

I hadn't done a film collage with prints since I was in high school...So early one morning I headed to a place in Akron I've always wanted to photograph with my Minolta X-700 and a roll of Kodak Portra 160VC. The above photo is me putting together the results - below is the rough draft.

I was standing a bit to close to my collage subject - I had hoped to make the collage consist of more photos and bigger.  A lesson learned.  

I've also scanned the negatives from these shots and plan to have Photoshop make a digital version of this collage.  

To Shoot or Not to Shoot?

This is Laura at the Beer Engine in Lakewood - we went up there to visit friends and then headed over to the Grog Shop to see the Royal Bangs. I didn't bring my camera to the show. It was one of those nights where I just wanted to enjoy the show and hang out with friends. When I have my camera with me taking the best shots I can is all that's on my mind - I wish I could turn it off but I can't. I've missed a lot of good bands staring at the back of my camera thinking about how I can improve the photos....

Sunshine!

Flowering bushes next to my house.

Sigma Odyssey

So my Sigma 10-20mm f/3.5 lens has finally returned from its second trip to New York without me. I had sent it in for service. The first time it went to NY after a bunch of confusing e-mails and conversations that made no sense and I received it back with a weird invoice. I wanted it serviced for a blurring issue caused by decentering of the elements - the invoice stated that there had been a micro-AF adjustment done. That wasn't the problem but at least they didn't charge me.

This time I talked to a gentleman who actually works on lenses and he assured me if I labeled the box "attention Paul" that he would look at it himself - he even let me use their UPS account to send it in. The communications this time were clear and I seemed to be talking to professional sounding English-speakers. Paul called me himself when the lens arrived at Sigma Service - unfortunately I learned it was a "grey market" lens with no warranty. So 150 bucks later my lens is back - and hopefully fixed. This is one of the first shots I've taken - I need to do some testing to see if they really fixed the problem. The invoice this time says they replaced the rear element - but Paul told me they were going to "rotate them". Either way, its my favorite lens and I really hope it will finally be sharp.

Akron Commercial Color Lab

This was the first roll of film I had developed at Akron Commercial Color Lab. I decided to try them out after coming across their website. I had been using Dodd Camera but between their pricing and the wait to get my film back I wasn't too happy. I really like ACCL - it only cost $3.60 to get my film developed and put into a binder ready negative sheet(not the flimsy drugstore kind) and it was done the same day. They process C-41 three times a week, E-6 twice and black and white once. They also do digital enlargements - which I'd like to try out - it be nice to move my business from the 'net to a local company.

I shot this with my Nikon L35 AF and expired Fuji Super HQ 200.

Sprung

Finally, a beautiful day in Ohio. Laura and I went over to my parent's for dinner.

I've written before about how I just love certain photographs but can't exactly explain why - here are two of those that I took tonight.

Jenga!

Saturday night was 'Game Night'. Lindsey, Laura and I played some Sorry! then some Jenga! and drank some beers. All the while I messed around with my Canon 7D and a fish-eye-adapter.

It was a good night.

Pola 'ROID RAGE'

Yesterday I finished photographing the latest additions to my vintage camera collection, mostly some Polaroid cameras that I recently bought at the thrift store. I have yet to shoot with these cameras (besides my failed attempt to shoot some long expired 600 film) - but next time I'm up towards Tremont I want to pick up some of the Impossible Project's film at Aperture and try them out.

I'm currently trying to figure out a better organization for my Vintage Camera page - it is easily the most popular part of this website. It seems to be getting a bit unwieldy for the blog format of simply posting my latest camera to the top of the page...I don't know, I'll think of something... below are a a few different Polaroid 600's

The Darkest Room

Today I went over a friend's photo studio and picked up a bunch of darkroom gear that he traded me for some work. I could tell he hated to let it go but was happy it would go to a home were it would get some use - he hadn't used the stuff in a long time.

I can't wait to get everything set up and try my hand at developing my own negatives and making my own prints/enlargements. I haven't done my own developing in probably 10 years. The stuff he gave me is really nice stuff - the Beseler 23C II enlarger is a classic. I have a couple other photography projects to finish up before I can really get to work on setting this stuff up properly but I'm really, really excited about getting back in the darkroom...

Aunt Laura

Today I took some baby photos and family portraits for Laura's sister and brother-in-law. I snapped this one of Laura with her niece and new nephew when we were changing "scenes".

I can hear you from here sitting there saying "AWWWW!"

Kodak Portra 160vc

Today I scanned a roll of Kodak Portra 160vc I recently shot with my Minolta X-700. I'm still not to sure about the best settings to use with my Canoscan 9000f, it took a bit of work in Photoshop to get some of the colors to look like the images that I had printed from the film. Later this week I plan to pick a shot and scan it with multiple settings to get a better idea of the best ones for what I'm doing. I have found that using Canon's FARE software to remove dust and scratches saves lots of Photoshopping.

I was really happy with the Portra 160vc film I shot - the colors were really beautiful. I'm working on a collage with some of the 4x6 prints I had made. I'll have a digital photo of the analog project soon.

Random Drive

Usually hitting the road hoping that photos find me never works out - but today I took a random drive and a few did. The above shot was taken on West Market Street - I like framing stuff.

The above photo had to be taken - that sign in a rundown abandoned building - love it.

Detroit Decay

Its become pretty common for photographers to head to Detroit to capture some of its post-apocalyptic vibe. When I went to Detroit to see a band in 2004 I had heard things but had no idea the extent of it(now I've seen multiple magazine spreads and gallery shows about the wreckage). I spent the night in Detroit after seeing the band play and the next day did some exploring. I found this neighborhood in the shadow of the Tigers' stadium that was a pretty mess. The amazing thing was people were buying these houses and a few had already been fixed to their late 1800's grandeur. I was amazed that these things could be saved - it looked like they were ready to collapse under there own weight at any minute.