Tattoo Reflection

I've gotten the look that I'm after. This was done in bright sunlight: Tri-x, dd-x, 6 minutes, 75F. The shots I took in deep shade look fine as well. Au revoir to le testing. BTW, the light meter on the R2A has been very consistent. Luke sent me a note about it being "bottom-weighted" which is definitely true. It doesn't care much about the sky which is nice since I don't either.

Hot

Hot. Very hot... Sidewalks melting... Streets deserted...

Since I got the R2A I've developed 20 rolls of film - one at a time for testing purposes. I'm going to develop one more roll of Tri-x in Ilfotec DD-X and then call it a week.

The rapid winder: now that is an odd contraption. Yet I'm sort of getting used to it. Adds a bit of heft and a small grip to the camera.

Can you use a "real" motorized drive with the R2a? If you can, that's probably a better bet.

Cuts

This was underdeveloped by accident - I read the times wrong - but still not bad (Tri-x / DD-X; I did it for 6.5 minutes instead of 8 minutes).

And always remember - the one group of New York denizens that love to be photographed: hair stylists. If you come to New York and want to find relaxed people who are thrilled to have a camera pointed at them - stop by any of the hair salons on the Upper East Side. I don't know if this generosity extends to the West Side.

On the Corner

of 86th and Lex.

Tri-x in Ilfotec DDX.

tri-x

Cat on Pipe

I'm getting closer... These were done with Tri-x and TMAX developer. I've seen different times for this film. Inside of the box says, 6.5 minutes; TMAX developer says, 6.0 minutes. I did it at 6 minutes / 400 ASA / 6 minutes / a bit less agitation then the recommend.

More Film

Dispite the heat - I've been out shooting a lot. The odd thing is that I picked up a roll of PLUS-X and a roll of TRI-X of all things. I also shot a roll of TMY @ 200. And Fujifilm Neopan 400 has been recommended by a few but I can't buy it in the neighborhood. Maybe on Sunday.

This could be some sort of multi- mid-life film crisis. Ah, I remember the beautiful gray tones I got from Plus-X. And - on top of all that - I actually got some good shots:

- Water main broke and they dyed the water red. So lots of people stopping on the corner with puzzled expressions as if this was some sort of conceptional art exhibit - which in a way it became. Can't say there were a bunch of HCB type of jumping over the puddle - New Yorkers mostly walk around it. But there were lots of puzzled expressions - everyone asking me if I knew what it was all about.

And then I found a stray cat wandering around through these sort of underground passages created by steps and garbage bins - and followed the cat around for about a half hour.

Even found the source of the water main break and took some welding shots. All in all - a good morning.

I think I should at least keep some variables constant - so it's either HC110B or TMAX Developer for all of them...

Oh and speaking of Tri-x and Plus-x there seems to be three types of each:
For example:
Plus-X Pan (what's that the old version from HCB days?)
Plus-X Pan Professional (Ah - you've graduated to a professional, congrats?)
And what I got: Professional Plus-X 125 (shortest development times)

I'm using time / temp. from the box it came in. The times for using HC110B are way to short for either the Tri-x of the new and improved (I hope) Plus-X.


News at noon (tomorrow).

Homeless Corner

Stair Pattern

Eye Patch

I've been standing on the corner of 2nd and 83rd photographing passersby, or high contrast scenes - experimenting again with the film. This fellow was unloading produce for a nearby Italian restaurant and agreed to let me photograph him and yes - the experiments are over.

This was with TMY @ 300 ASA; 5 minutes @ 75F with TMAX developer (1:4) Hopefully that will be my new "standard." It seems to work fine in bright sunlight/shadow and, so long as I expose for shadow areas - works well in flatter scenes. This is from a straight neg. scan without any adjustments. More to follow...

blogger spam

So since I started using the blogger comments, I'm beginning to get automated spam for the usual crap in the comments. I may have to turn on the "login" if you want to comment - or else go back to haloscan if this continues. So far I'm just getting one or two a day which I've been manually deleting.

I'll have to see if their are any other settings that can control this automated junk.

Development / Film

As I mentioned in previous post - I'm leaning towards TMY again. I shot with it a lot in the past - and somewhere along the line switched to HP5 in HC110B. Possibly my tastes have changed since then - but the TMY seems to be a bit smoother. Anyway - right now I'm using TMY @ 400 ASA - in TMAX developer 1:4 at recommended times. But I'm going to experiment with a bit of underdevelopment and making sure I'm still picking up shadow detail. I might take it down about 20%, i.e. the highlights in bright contrasty scenes are still a bit high for my taste. But after a couple of days of experimenting - I'm pretty close.

Cup, Manual & Hangers