I won’t be posting here for the foreseeable future. I don’t really have that much to say and there are very few readers. You folks who are on the zine mailing list, if I do anything in print down the road of a zine like nature, you will get a copy. To the dedicated few, thanks for reading.

Cheers!

Shooting film is a crapshoot, you never know what you are going to get. That is part of the fun, but can also be a frustration. Scanned three rolls of almost all double exposures, and of course some I liked and some I didn’t. Here are a few of my favorites.

Probably doing less in camera doubles for a while. Have something different I want to try, something I’ve been experimenting with. More to come.

Cheers!

I don’t have a darkroom, nor have I ever made darkroom prints, even back in the 70s and 80s, so being able to scan negatives into my ipad in some way is a must. I had a nice Epson flatbed photo scanner, that could do both 35mm and 120mm negatives, but it got sold with all the other film stuff a few years back. It had to be run through a laptop, and then the photos moved to dropbox so that I could access them on the ipad. A couple of years ago I got one of the tiny 35mm scanners that loads the photos onto an SD card, and it works nicely. Scanners for 120mm format are hard to find and more money than I want to spend right now.

The first roll of 120 I shot, I had the camera store also do scans, an extra 8.00. The files are very small, and I was not particularly pleased with the quality. Then I found this little gadget from Kodak for about 35.00.

There is an app that you download to your phone that flips the negative to a positive image, it even has a few editing tools on the menu. It’s a cardboard box with a battery operated square plastic light-box, that’s it. It only works for 6×6 or square format negatives, so it is quite limited. It is also dependent on the quality of the camera on your phone. Fortunately I had just upgraded my phone to an iphone 12 mini, which has a far superior camera than the one I had. I have been practicing with it on some of my old 120 negatives shot on a Holga plastic camera, and I am most happy with the results. Here are some I’ve done.

Developing stuff is on the way, so I am about to be relatively self sufficient in processing my film.

Cheers!

I presently have three rolls of exposed film at a local camera shop being developed, and by local I mean it is a 30 minute drive, about 20 miles one way to get to it. Like everything else, development costs have gone up, and there can be a 10-14 day turnaround time to get the negatives back for black and white film.

When I quit shooting film a few years ago, I sold all my stuff including my development gear, bad choice. I developed all my own black and white film for two years when I was shooting only film, it’s not that hard. When I got the new camera I thought it was going to be for special projects and such, so I planned on using the local lab to process it. I am now changing course.

I have about 15 rolls of partially exposed and unexposed film, so it’s kind of silly under the present circumstances not to get my own developing gear again and do it myself. There is a new all in one developer and fix in one bottle that I am very curious to try.

Shooting film is a creative practice for me, and being hands on for as much of that process feels important, even beyond the obvious significant cost savings benefits.

Cheers!

Been playing with printed photos and collage again. These photos, three of which I posted previously on here, are all out of the fujica medium format film camera, scanned to create digital files and then printed on my printer. Like the ones previously, this is 16×20, but is on black canvas this time.

I also just purchased one of those label makers, the same kind we played with in junior high in the mid 60s, also totally analog I must say. More fun will be had with that I am sure.

I recently bought a folio carry case for these art creations, and that reminded me of artists schleping their art around to galleries and such, trying to get by the “gatekeepers”, get a show, exhibit or find someone to represent them toward that end. All areas of art have gatekeepers, the discerners of what is worthy of being shown to the world, a more public exposure than the artist could get on their own.

I have submitted work in that way, with mixed results. Mostly I have not been let past the gate. I self published my zine through a local printer, and as far as this new art project, I do not feel inclined to submit it to anyone for a show or exhibit. In a perfect world, I would find a cheap space that I could rent for one weekend, or even better, a room in an abandoned building to squat in for a one day pop up show. Then there is always getting a tent and a table on the side of the road, like the velvet Elvis painters.

The gatekeepers reminds me of the Zen term, gateless gate. It’s the spiritual gate seekers think they need to walk through on the way to enlightenment, the irony being that when and if an awakening occurs, the first thing realized is there never was a gate, that the state of awakening needed no path, no gate, and was always available right where they were.

Hey keepers, there is no gate. There are plenty of workarounds for artists to be seen, more being created every day. We’re already visible right where we are.

Greetings from the work in progress rambling on about whatever blogging aether. I have been adopting the label of free range photographer for a while now, but as I continue to wander that ever expanding range, photography seems to just be the departure point lately. I still play with the camera, especially the Fujica film camera, and there is something in the area of a publication of some kind with that work that is circulating in my brain, but I am also drawn to making other things.

I have put up photographs of the collages I have made, and since that time I have made three more.

These are made using prints of my prior photos, as well as pieces of random watercolors I did. I really enjoy doing these, so I expect it to continue. Contemplating going more open ended, maybe free range creative?

Cheers!

“The Creative Act: A Way of Being”, a great book by Rick Rubin.