A couple of months ago I shot a fairly large project on color negative film and it was fun to shoot it again. Mostly to know that I got the image right and not to shoot tethered or to worry about creating web galleries in the evening. Instead I worried about the film arriving safely at the lab.

After my shoot I spent a day or so wandering around Southern Virginia shooting anything that caught my fancy. Just me and my big old Fuji 6×8 Rangefinder. Fuji made a 6×7 and 6×9 for the world market and 6×8 for the Japanese event photo market. The cameras are nicknamed Texas Leicas.

I would like to shoot more film as long as I don’t have to scan it. C-41 processing in DC is handled by Dodge Chrome and they are very good but it does take a few days. Often I just FedEx the film to Millers in Kansas or Richards in California. Richards Lab and Millers offer pretty decent scanning of the film at the time of processing.

It is a shame what is happening to Kodak. They tried to sell their digital and patent rights, then filed law suits against companies that are now huge (with deep pockets) in hope of stavingoff a financial disaster, followed by the bankruptcy filing and the now very real threat of being de-listed from the New York Stock Exchange.

The Great Yellow Father in Rochester has certainly been humbled by the changes to the communications industry.

Earlier this summer I shot a small campaign for LOMO cameras using old Holga, Diana and LOMO fish-eye cameras.

The brief was shoot whatever I wanted with any LOMO, Lubitel, Holga or Diana camera and break the rules by using outdated film. I just happened to have a box or two of Fuji 160 NC that was five years out of date. My goal was to make the images as retro and anti-digital as possible. The images were used on a tourism web site plus the new La Sardina camera special edition for the Commonwealth.

Foamhenge

Martha Spencer

Martha Spencer photographed with a LOMO fisheye camera.

Stevie Barr, Ace Banjo Player, founder of “No Speed Limit” and general cut-up.

Galax Fiddler Convention

Johnny Appleseed

Over this past weekend I shot a bunch of 120 film as a test for a couple of film-based projects. I shot two rolls of Fuji Acros 100 in my Graflex Super D. That film was shipped off to Dalmation Lab in North Carolina as a test. I ran two rolls of Portra 400 through my Fuji 6×8 rangefinder, also known as the Texas Leica and one roll each of Fuji 160 color negative through my Lubitel and Holga. Chrome Dodge is going to process these rolls.

I’ve been shooting primarily digital for seven years and it feels a bit strange to drop off film and have to wait a couple of days to see the results. However, I also find it comforting because I know I nailed the images and it is what I did for so many years.

These two images were shot on a bike ride about forty minutes apart. This is the Jefferson-Davis Highway overpass on Four-Mile Run, a tributary of the Potomac River. I remember as a kid, heavy rainfalls would send a torrent of water down Four Mile Run. The original railroad trestle would catch everything that floated downstream and the run would eventually become damned. Often the water would back-up to Arlandria and flood Mount Vernon Avenue. I remember walking through flood waters in Arlandria to Zavarelli’s music to buy a Jimmy Page Tonebender pedal for my Gibson Melody Maker and Silvertone Twin 12. After two strong hurricane seasons in 1969 and 1970 the trestle and bridge were replaced.

I have written several blog entries about Kodachrome the past few years. Last summer, I penned a piece about how Kodachrome influenced my life.

Here is the link to “How Kodachrome influenced my Life.”

David Burnett wrote a piece on his blog titled Adios Amigo. Well worth reading. Follow this link to Adios Amigo.

Several years ago, in the old typepad version of my blog, I wrote a piece about Shorpey’s and their incredible Library of Congress collection of 4×5 Kodachromes from the forties. That blog and the posts are long gone. Shorpey’s is still going strong and a visit to their site is a joy of rediscovery. Check out these 4×5 Kodachromes from the early years of World War II.

Western Wind Farm treated with Exposure 2 as Kodachrome

Case Study on my use of Exposure 2 on the Alien Skin site.  

When I started shooting in high school, I lived in a small town in central Michigan. My two choices for color film in those days were Agfachrome CT-18 and Kodachrome II. Both needed to be sent to the lab by U.S. Mail. I’d scour the back pages of Modern Photography to find the best deal for Agfachrome or Kodachrome mailers or the film/combo package that some dealers offered. As a high school student with little funds, I usually would go for a three-pack or ten-pack and try to make every image count. I’d spend my evenings studying the yearly photo annuals of U.S. Camera and Popular Photography. The people whose photographs touched me were Hiro, Arnold Newman, Bruce Davidson, Pete Turner and Jay Maisel. I wrote Hiro about interning at his New York Studio and he sent me a gracious note asking me to stop by the studio when I came to New York.

I choked about going to New York on my own with no financial support. Instead I headed to DC and the Corcoran School of Art and started working at Charlie Scheer’s National Camera near the White House where I met my next set of influences. Frank Johnston of the Washington Post and Fred Ward of the Geographic were mentors of sorts to me along with the wonderful Fred Maroon. All of them influenced my approach and style. Frank shot B&W for the Post, but Fred Maroon and Fred Ward were masters of Kodachrome. My heros shot Kodachrome, the Geographic used Kodachrome with a special messenger run for their film at the Gaithersburg, Maryland processing facility. Kodachrome was the film to use. I remember “RUSH” processing of Kodachrome. You would drive your film to the Gaithersburg lab, hand it over with a store film envelope to someone who reluctantly met you at the side door and then you could pick it up the next morning or have it delivered to your camera store. I also remember shooting 120 Kodachrome for an editorial feature, waiting a week for the processed film and then shipping by FedEx the selects to the photo editor in New York. I can not imagine doing that these days.

Copyright Jay Maisel

How can a film influence a style or approach? The beauty and simplicity of Kodachrome was, you knew what to expect. If you shot under fluorescent lighting you added a 30 or 40 magenta filter and nine times out of ten, you were good to go. If you needed a little pop for color at sunset or in the afterglow, you added a bit more magenta. Usually a twenty would do it. In the early morning pre-sunrise mist, Kodachrome would give you soft colors. In crisp sunlight with bright colors you were good. Add a polarizing filter and underexpose by a half-stop and you were golden.

When I look at my pictures from High School, I see the beginnings of my style. The use of empty space with graphic patterns and always influenced by color or form. Kodachrome helped me achieve my early style by allowing me to trust its consistency and bold colors. Now that Kodak has announced the retirement of Kodachrome, you hear of people buying up as much of it as possible at often prices that seem foolish. Yes, I have a stash of Kodachrome 64 and I plan to shoot it this fall in Haiti. I’ll send it off to Dwayne’s in Kansas and wait patiently to open that box of mounted slides for the last time. When Kodachrome 25 was announced, I recall professionals in DC coming into National Camera and buying up as much of the Kodachrome II as they afford. Seems like history is repeating itself.

Alex Webb, Bill Allard, David Alan Harvey and Medford Taylor were all Kodachrome users. Their photography showed me how to use Kodachrome in low-light and to push past the cliche colors into a softer palette.
In the past I’ve written small posts about scanning Kodachrome transparencies and on the amazing collection of 4×5 Kodachromes from shot during the forties that can be seen at the Shorpy’s web site. Take a look at the collection of images at Shorpy’s. Kodachrome on 4×5 is amazing: clean rich blacks, intense skies and a smoothness that you can only come from large format.

Kodak has decided to retire Kodachrome and Dwayne’s will continue to process the film through December of next year.

Today I uploaded another two-hundred plus images from my Chesapeake Watershed project.

The collection is priced as Rights-Managed for licensing and as individual prints.

I’ve shot just about every river and stream within the Chesapeake Bay Watershed from the air.

It has been a major labor of love. The Chesapeake is an immense watershed that is impacted by population growth, sprawl and erosion of its shorelines. It is beautiful, fragile and resilient.

I hope you enjoy the views.