One of the things I’ve noticed about my film shooting is that I tend to be very cautious since it costs me roughly $0.48 per shot. It’s not much but if you take a look at how much I shoot it can really add up quickly. Not to mention that all my supplies are shipped here from New York because I have yet to find a reliable supplier of film and developing chemicals. So I tend to think about my shots before I shoot them now. That is a good thing because I end up getting more good shots than bad ones. And it also means that I get less shots total because I’m only shooting the ones I like instead of just shooting everything I see.

So last weekend was fun but quite crazy. And this coming weekend looks like it’ll be just as intense. I only hope that I can get some rest somewhere at some point…. but I’m not really complaining.

And here are a few pics from the shoot with Natalie to enjoy!

Natalie - Window

Natalie - Window 2

Sunday morning I will most likely shoot more film to make corrections on what I learn from my first two rolls of ISO 400 film.  Sunday afternoon will be a publicity shoot that will most likely include a poster shot along with various other shots for advertising and 23 headshots. I’m hoping that it isn’t a madhouse and that the client is ready and organized. I hate when it’s chaos. you always end up paying more than you should and not getting as much as you want when you’re not organized for a photo shoot. So all in all it’s going to be a crazy weekend but it should be lots of fun! And of course I still have to find a location for the Natalie Minx shoot next week!

Below are some preliminary scans from my last shoot.  These were digitized by holding the negatives up to a light and photographing them with my Nikon D80

Now mind you, I had a lot more confidence in the chemicals than I did in my ability to get the film on the reel without destroying the film.  so this proves that if I can do it…. then anyone can!

It was super easy and the directions that came with everything seemed to be spot on!  I’ll scan a few of the images in and post a few on here a bit later

Anyway I’ve been on a photography kick in a really big way.  The first movie in the series of photographer documentaries I got was a PBS film called “Ansel Adams: American Experience“.  which just blew me away.  I thought I knew all about Ansel Adams and his contribution to the art of photography… but what I didn’t know was anything about Ansel except for his love of the wilderness and his work to preserve it.  If you get a chance to watch it I highly reccomend this little jewel of a film.  They don’t go too much into photography…ok, about as much as you would have to since they are talking about Ansel Adams!  But they really delve into his life and how he lived, where he lived, and the things he did during his life.  I was shocked at how much time they spent talking about his life outside of photography.  But for me, that information seemed just as important as his art.  Just my opinion, I could be wrong.

The next film in my queue of documentaries about photographers was “William Eggleston in the Real World“.  This film really kinda grabbed me in an interesting way.  I found it extremely hard to watch.  The filmmaker decided to more or less just follow William Eggleston on a few photo trips.  so there is not a lot of talking in the begining of the film.  it’s like you’re just watching a guy walk down the street and take pictures.  but as they started talking and showing some of his images.  I was amazed at how interesting the images were and his process as well.  Whether I liked the images or not they made me think.  and they made me think about photography in a really different way.  I’m always worried about not getting the whole picture and here is a guy who seems to be only shooting 10% of it sometimes.  but it’s interesting.  I can’t really say that I like or dislike his work.  Only that it changed how I think about photographs now.  And even the filmmaker acknowledges this power of Mr. Egglestons work.  But definitely watch this one as well.  If for no other reason to expand your mind…  without any hallucinogens!

And third film in my roundup of photographer documentaries… “Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Impassioned Eye“.  I just got it in the mail today and so I’m just about to pop it in the player and sit back and watch.  I don’t know anything about Henri Cartier Bresson, but soon I will.

J

P.S. as of the time of writing this, I am still wating for my plastic Diana medium format camera to arrive… hopefully soon!

My journey with film starts with me as a child playing with a camera that shot on 110 and then disc film came out and someone bought me a camera and some film. It was purely for snapshots that I was doing this. But film to me always held some kind of magic. I spend an afternoon taking pictures, and then the film would get sent away to a place I couldn’t have known about. And I promptly forgot what I took pictures of. A few days later the pictures would arrive and I would marvel at how cool it was that the places and people of my life were forever immortalized on these small pieces of paper. I though it was pure magic. And how, as a kid, could you not be amazed at this technology!

Later on in my life, I met a wonderful woman who was a photographer and she got me once again to play with film. I dabbled but enjoyed it. It was never going to be a serious thing for me since I had my mind set on being a musician or a sound engineer. So when she left my life, I gave up photography completely.

As I start looking into the idea of shooting on film once again, all of these memories come flooding back overwhelming me. I remember how insecure I was to try and crack open a 35mm film canister. I remember how silly I felt trying to feed the film onto the metal reel for the first time. I had a wonderful guide showing me exactly what to do, but still I held back. The fear of failure or of looking silly stopped me from taking it any further than that. Now is a different story. I feel excited, as well as scared of taking a leap and trying something different.

Today I am buying a medium format camera and all the equipment I will need to shoot and develop my own film. Of course I’m taking the lo-fi approach since I have a rather high end camera and can make my digital shots look like film. So I thought let’s take a different approach to film. The camera I’ve chosen is the Diana+ by lomography. at $49 it’s almost cheap enough to be a disposable 120 film camera. and of course I’m buying film, developing tank, and the chemicals to make it all happen. However I won’t be making my own prints for a couple of reasons. I don’t have the space to build a darkroom in order to make my own prints and secondly what I want to do is to scan my images so that I can post them online and have prints made through Deviant Art or Red Bubble.

So there you have it! Film! In 2010 even! It’ll be fun to see what happens and of course to learn something new… again!

As for updates… I’m healing well.  Still no heavy lifting and I’m resting a lot more than normal.  But then again that just means that I’m getting the right amount of sleep now instead of my usual 4 or 5 hours a night.  So in general I feel better than I have in years!  The big lesson to have learned from all of this… slow down! And stop working so hard!  So my new years resolution is to do just that!  Slow down and work smarter not harder.  I’m hoping that this will result in more time and money to do what I really want to do… creating nude art!

Sera 12/20/09 - Waimanalo