Black and White Photography

I had./have a lot of catching up to do with my other 'chores'.  So I'm still behind on photography.  Plus the weather is so gorgeous outside I can almost stand being inside!!

Still haven't received my Epson ink order!!  It has to come today, that's all there is too it.  I've got everything ready - now I need the ink.  I'm also going into town to pick up my framed gelatin silver prints from the Auburn gallery.  They really don't get good exposure where they are and there's too much time and money involved in each one to just leave them 'hanging'.  I'd rather have them here with me.

This morning I've spent almost two hours just working on postings for the High Hand Gallery.  I do the photography for the gallery, the High Hand Gallery's Facebook page, my personal page, my website, my blog, and then on top of that doing their stuff.  Plus I started posting on a local newspaper Events Page for the Gallery.  There's so many media outlets available to advertise on.  I don't mind it but it takes some time to get everything done as I'm sure some of you out there have your own blogs and websites too.

I'm still not dressed and I need to get going here!  I do want to thank everyone who has been posting on my website after looking at my photos.  I'm glad you are enjoying them.  I'm not THAT proud of most of them I guess because they're digital.  My heart is in film and the 'mystery' of it all.  With that said, I really am thinking of just going back to my film images.  I have so many negatives I would never have to take another photo and they would last the rest of my lifetime!  Black and White film is my inspiration.  I'm longing for those shadows - the real ones - the ones that give life it's depth and reality and truism of it all.   Of all of 'us'.  Digital is bothering me...

Contact Sheets

FINALLY, I threw myself back into the darkroom and started whipping out the contact sheets for the 11 rolls of film from my recent travels to Europe. It only took about 3 1/2 hours to complete the task. I normally use RC paper for my contact sheets, no sense in wasting the FB paper on those. I had just enough to make 10 sheets, then had to break into the FB paper for the last one!! As you may already know, it takes a longer development time for the FB paper, and it's just the contact sheets.

There are some pretty cool shots in those thar rolls of film. I was surprised I didn't have very many black and whites of Venice - dangit. But apparently I made up for it in the color photos, as well as black and whites of the other cities. In reviewing the negatives, I noticed that (as I was expecting) some of the pictures from Santorini were way, way overexposed. It was in the middle of the day, it was sunny and hot and bright light bouncing off all those white buildings, even though I stopped it down as far as I could, there were several that were pretty washed out. Then on two other rolls, there would be say one out of the whole roll that was a complete wash, which tends to make me think something is/was wrong with the camera. Maybe it was me?? I just had two of the Minolta bodies worked on, so I don't know what that was all about. I'll have to keep an eye on it - pay more attention as I'm shooting.

I can't say enough about film v. digital. In my opinion, the film captures what is TRULY there: the shadows, the mystery that's seen with the naked eye. Digital captures a MORE perfect scene, then some photographers go back and add the mystery. I mean I took digital black and whites too, and they look good, but not as GREAT as the film images. It's weird. I suppose if I only knew digital to begin with my opinion would be different.

Here's another color image of Cephalonia, Greece. The building was actually a yellow-gold, but the canvas canopy was reddish-orange and it made this shop really pop out! Later, I saw another photographer being intrigued with this same scene.