Category: Generic

Might Change My Workflow

This is another in an endless line of posts about getting photographic film developed. As usual the main theme is that I am an impatient asshole. Consider yourselves warned.

When I first started mailing film off to a development lab I was sending it to a place in New Hampshire. The lab is close enough that I could probably drive to it and drop it off in person. It’s a little too far to do as a spur of the moment, off the cuff kinda drive, but it was close. When I dropped the package in the mail it was usually at its destination the next business day.

Then I changed labs. Instead of shipping to New Hampshire I was shipping to San Clemente, CA. All the way across the country. The service was a little cheaper, and to my very ignorant untrained eyes the end result looked a teeny tiny hair’s width better. Was it actually better? I don’t have a clue. The question was, does the slightly lower cost offset the extra 4–5 days of travel time to get the package of film to its laboratory destination? At first I thought yes. Now?

My plan for this summer is to shoot film once a month. Last year I was trying to go out and take pictures of stuff any time the sun was out in the early morning on the weekend. It got the point where I was sneaking out of the house 2–3 days each week. That was silly. This year I am going to blitz for one weekend, weather permitting, each month and that will be it. This month had an extra day because I needed to test drive my new camera, but outside of that I plan to stick to once a month.

Next month I think I am going to go back to the lab in New Hampshire. Hell, I might even drive there. Probably not, but if I can find some excuse I might. At the very least I will compare prices between the two labs directly and if it’s even remotely similar I am going to go with the faster shipping turn around time with the closer to home service. 

I dropped four rolls of film in the mail on Saturday. I don’t expect them to get to California until Friday. I am generally a patient person and that wait should not bother me… but in this case I am completely impatient and it does bother me.

Damn it, I am such a freakin’ nerd.

Thanks, DX Code

…and now we wait… again.

I got up early this morning and took my new eBay purchased camera out to finish its test roll… and then I loaded a second test roll.

I went to Methuen, MA’s little downtown area and snapped a few pics and I went to the Spicket Falls dam and took a few pics. That was all it took to finish off the roll of Kodak ColorPlus 200 that was already in the camera.

I loaded a second roll because the camera came with two lenses and I figured I’d shoot one test roll with each lens. So I switched from the 70–210mm to the nifty 50mm, drove to Walnut Grove cemetery and then crossed the street and took a walk down the Methuen Rail Trail. That killed off the second roll.

When I got home I put in an order at The Darkroom for those two rolls along with two additional rolls that I finished a couple of weeks ago. One 35mm and one 120. I just dropped them all off at the post office. Now, as previously stated, we wait to see how things look. The new camera definitely seems to be working from a functional standpoint. Now I just need to find out if it is riddled with light leaks or not. Does the shutter actually work? Who knows. We’ll find out when I get the scans back from the lab.

I had a moment though… a sort of, oh my christ you suck moment. I had just rewound the second roll of film. That was when I realized I never set the ISO on the camera. The first roll was ISO 200. The second was Kentmere 400… ISO 400… I never changed it. Shit. My second test roll is going to have all sorts of incorrect exposure.

Knowing it was miles too late (sorry for mixing units, my Physics teachers would be so disappointed in me) I pressed the ISO button and was wicked psyched to see that it was set at 400! I forgot, this new camera is fancy. It reads the DX code on the film cartridge and sets the ISO appropriately. I didn’t need to reset the value, the camera did it for me. I could have overridden the camera setting, but I wouldn’t have done that. I wanted it set at box speed and it was. Thanks, new camera!

But for now though… we wait.

Nothing Going On

It’s Friday night. The weekend is here. Thank fuck, you know? The weekend… finally.

We have nothing going on this weekend. I have to pick something up at the drug store but other than that… nuttin’.

Man, is that weird or what? It’s been a long time since we’ve had a weekend with nothing going on. 

Like… weird, right?

Tired

I don’t think I have recovered from all of the driving last week. Somehow I feel like I am not terribly tired but at the same time I am terribly exhausted. I don’t get it. I just want to nap, I think.

Well, I want to nap but I also want to put a roll of film through my new camera so that I can find out if it works or not. Functionally I think it is working fine. The question is whether or not it leaks light. I won’t know that until I get a roll of film developed.

I have a doctors appointment tomorrow morning (my annual post-gastric bypass check in with my surgeon) and I was thinking of taking a quick stop along the Merrimack River in Lowell, MA on the way home. I checked the weather though… rain. Shit. I guess I’ll take the camera with me when I go on the off chance I get lucky. We’ll see. If not I might be able to take it for a walk through the bird sanctuary in Methuen on Saturday. We’ll see.

In other news, the new Star Wars movie comes out in just under two weeks. Friday May 22nd sees the release of The Mandalorian and Grogu. I would like to see it opening night, but as long as I get to it on opening weekend I will be happy. I asked my wife and my step daughter if they want to go. I hope so. I don’t like going to the movies alone, but I will. I could always drive up to Burlington, VT again (see previous posts for recaps of the million and a half drives to Burlington I’ve taken in the past 2+ weeks) and see it with my step son, assuming he’s interested. He might not be. I don’t know. My family isn’t quite as in love with Star Wars as I’ve been since 1977. In love is the wrong phrase… clinically obsessed is probably more accurate.

Okay, back to work with you, Sir. This is the way.

Divisible by Eleven

Friday May 8th. Yeah, it’s my birthday. Again. I’m 55 years old. I am divisible by 11.

It’s our only full day in Michigan. I might write up the reason for this trip at some point, but not today. Suffice to say we spent a long day here (and even though it is after 10pm and I am super old, the day is not over). Tomorrow we go home. We will cross the US/Canadian border two more times but one time will be at a new location.

There is a teeny tiny possibility that we might stop very briefly at Niagara Falls. The first time my Dad ever let me shoot a photo with his SLR (a Pentax K1000) was at Niagara Falls. I have a film camera here with me but it’s not Dad’s K1000. Still, it would be fun to take a shot or two of the Canadian falls on film again.

Speaking of SLR’s, I have one coming from eBay at some point next week. I had planned to wait a few weeks before I went out to shoot film again, but now I’ll need to shoot a test roll through the new camera so I can get it developed and prove everything works (oh please let everything work) before I take it out for real. That will hopefully happen next weekend. Fingers crossed.

Until then, I have a long, long drive on the books for tomorrow. An hour or so North of Detroit to a half hour North of Boston. Wish me and my wife and my step son luck on this crazy journey.

Back in the USA

We drove across Quebec and Ontario for ten hours or so and then crossed back into the US in Michigan.

Now Jen and I are in the hotel room where the WiFi doesn’t work. I’m Sad because the three rolls of film I shipped out last week have been developed, scanned, and uploaded to The Darkroom site and I can’t get them onto my laptop.

Crud

Winter is Over

I shipped off three rolls of film for developing two days ago. If things go well I’ll have a few more on Tuesday.

Winter is over, folks. It’s time to blow absurd amounts of money on film photography. Bring it on!

I mean… winter is sort of over. It is still pretty cold out. I went to the store this morning and wore a winter jacket. I’m wearing a fleece jacket while sitting in the living room at home. Still… 35mm and 120 film rolls are out in the mail. It’s that time again!

In other news, in about two hours we’re going to leave the house and drive to the airport in Boston. From there we’re driving back to Burlington, VT and then driving home again. It’s going to be a long day of driving. Maybe I should bring a film camera with me. No… not today.

That Time of Year

It is that time of year again. The time where my loyal readers (all zero of you) start getting inundated with posts where I say something like, just you watch… tomorrow I’m going to go to the ocean and take pics of the sunrise.

I haven’t taken a photo-walk or anything like that since last August. Eight months. I have the day off tomorrow and the forecast calls for clear skies at sunrise. Let’s do this!

The way this works is… I say I am going to go to the ocean to take pics of the sunrise the next day, and then the next day arrives and I stay in bed. That’s how these things usually go. Will that be the case this time?

Probably.

Tough Day

Work kicked my ass today.

That was a tough one.

I have to get through tomorrow (Thursday). If I can do that in one piece I will get to Friday and I have Friday off. I desperately need tomorrow to not suck. I need things to not fall apart for just one day.

I think we can pull this off. Let me rephrase and say I hope we can pull this off.

Yikes, bro.