The Frugal Film Project Lives Again

I bet you’ve been seeing this coming for a while now… or not because no one actually reads this, but that’s not the point. I’m trying to connect here folks, gimme a break, m’kay?

The Frugal Film Project, Buy a cheap film camera, buy some relatively cheap film (there is no such thing as cheap film in 2026), shoot one roll each month for a year. I can do that, right? Hell yes, I can. Except of course that I tried it last year and failed. I started in May and made it through four months. In September I did not get a single shot in, never mind a whole roll. Oh well.

Now, one year later, let’s try again. There’s a twist this time though. Last year I decided to use my little Soviet TLR, a Lomo Lubitel 166 Universal that I bought for a little less than $50 on eBay and much to my surprise it actually worked. I also decided to use Kentmere 400 film only to realize as I was packing up to shoot the first roll that I didn’t actually have any of that film so I changed my mind and went with Kodak Gold 200. How’s that for thinking on my feet, eh?

The twist this year is that I am actually going to try and do this twice. I am going to follow last year’s plan of the Lubitel and Gold, but I am also going to try to follow last year’s original plan of the Lubitel and Kentmere, though I don’t have any Kentmere 400 right now (deja-vu all over again) so we’re going with Kentmere 100. Let’s call the Gold roll Frugal Film Project 2A, and the Kentmere roll Frugal Film Project 2B. I have a roll of project 2A from May 1st and project 2B from May 5th. Both rolls have been developed and all 12 shots from each roll came out okay. We’re off to a good start. Two of them, actually!

Here’s the first roll. These were taken at the ocean.

We start at a little spot off the road where you can see some fishing and charter boats. This is not actually the ocean, of course. Is it a bay? A little harbor? I’m not nautical enough to know the proper term. Also, dig that friggin weird line through the photo. My first roll or two that I shot in this camera last year had that on a few shots but then it went away. Now it’s back. Hooray.

Next we go to Hampton Beach and we see my biggest issue with this camera. Not only is it almost impossible to focus on the little focusing screen, but for some reason I cannot keep the friggin’ images level. I don’t think I lean this much when I stand still but who knows. Do I have one leg significantly longer than the other? What is the actual deal?

On the road to Plum Island, stopping to look at planes. Some day I am going to hang out here and shoot some planes actually taking off. Someday.

Check out the amateur’s shadow. Friggin’ hack.

Next we have Plum Island itself. This is the mouth of the Merrimack River, where it dumps into the ocean, and the Plum Island Lighthouse.

And there you have it. The Frugal Film Project take two, roll A. I am such a nerd.

Now we move on to take two, roll B. We leave color film behind and move on to the magical mystery tour that is black and white. We also travel from the ocean to Boston, where I sort of expect to take most of these pics in the future. This was a walk along Newbury Street, a little stretch of Mass Ave near Berklee College of Music, and then on Comm Ave.

So maybe I finished the roll before I made it over to Comm Ave. Sorry about that.

Right then, two rolls of medium format, 120 film shot on a cheap camera by a cheap, talentless red head. Two instances of month one of the Frugal Film Project. I haven’t figured out where I will go for June’s pics. I’d guess that at least one of the rolls will be in Boston again. We will all just have to wait and see together.

It Works

Check it out, folks. My new/old/used camera works!

My first Digital SLR camera was a Nikon D90. This is a Nikon N90… no relation. Though if I am honest, once I found out that the camera with almost the same name as my first camera could autofocus and do all of the stuff I was looking for, it made it seem like a no brainer that I would eventually get one… because I am a nerd, through and through.

The first roll used a AF Nikkor 70–210mm 1:4–5.6 lens and Kodak ColorPlus 200 film. I took some pics at home in the back yard, in Lowell along the Merrimack River, and then downtown in Methuen. At first I thought they were a little overexposed, but on second view I think they are pretty much okay. Here’s a random sample (of the pics that suck the least).

The second roll was through a AF Nikkor 50mm 1:1.8 (2) lens. I added the (2) to the name because I already had a lens with the same name, but this one is a little different. Is it better? Well who knows. I do know that it fogged up on me a little. At some point I’ll do a side by side comparission and see which one I prefer. For now, I think this 50mm prime might be the better of the two lenses that came with the camera. The film in this round was Kentmere 400. Also known as cheap black and white film. I went to Walnut Grove Cemetery in Methuen and then walked across the street to the Methuen Rail Trail which includes the Mighty Spicket River.

And there we have it. A shit load of examples of how my cool new autofocusing film camera actually works and isn’t a leaky mess.

Insert an emphatic sigh of relief here.

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.

New Camera Day

Happy new camera day, everyone! I bought a Nikon N90 35mm film camera from eBay about a week ago and it was delivered today.

The last two cameras I bought from eBay were broken (a Nikon F-401 with a broken aperture dial and a little Nikon Coolpix S7000 point and shoot that every image comes out blurry) so I was nervous about this one. Would it work? Would it show up in pieces? Who could really say?

Fortunately it seems to be in good shape. It’s practically mint condition, which feels weird to me. It had batteries in it already, which made me a little nervous, and all of the functionality I know how to test seems to be working fine. When I change the aperture or the shutter speed the light meter display changes. When I set it to a slow shutter speed it takes a lot longer for the shutter to close than when I use a fast shutter speed. I can set the ISO and the metering. Most important, with the first of the two lenses I’ve tested, the autofocus works. That sound you hear is my huge sigh of relief.

I won’t truly know if the camera is okay until I shoot a roll of film and get it developed and scanned and see the results. For now though, so far so good. I put a roll of film in it and took a few pics in the back yard. One of these days I’ll take it out in town and finish off the roll. I might go for two test rolls. One with the 70–200mm f4–5.6 lens and one with the 50mm f1.8 lens. I already had an AF Nikkor 50mm 1:1.8 and this new lens is the same name and the same specs but the physical lens itself is a little different. One is probably a minor update of the other. We’ll see how it works.

I have been wanting a camera like this for a while now, but it was the addition of the zoom lens that drew me in and made me pull the trigger. The lens is in really great shape. Like… how is it in this good of a shape? This kit is at least 30 years old. Was it stored in a safe or something?

I don’t know what the back story is. I just know that for now at least I am feeling good about all of this.

Photos: The Next Generation (Film Edition)

I put up a post the other day with some photos I took when I went to the ocean and Plum Island. At the time I said there would be a film edition of the post to follow and this is it.

Sort of.

I shot two full rolls of film. One 35mm and one 120. I also finished off the last few shots from an old roll of 35mm. I got them all developed and the scans came back the other day and last night I uploaded them all to Flickr and now it’s time for another post here.

Sort of. I am saving the 120 shots for another post. These are just 35mm pics. I’m also thinking of trying to sort of mirror the previous post. This plan probably won’t last for long, but let’s see.

The sunrise view sort of sucked, but I got a little glimpse of it. This is my Nikon FG-20 shooting my first ever roll of Lomography 800. I like the way the sun flares. At least the tiny bit of the sun we could actually see.

I think my plan to follow the first post is already dead… maybe not. I think this is from Salisbury Beach but I’m not sure. This is from my Pentax K1000 shooting Kentmere 400.

(note: on second look, I’m pretty sure this is Hampton Beach when the digital post was still at Salisbury Beach. Let’s not worry about that now though)

This next picture is crap, but speaking of sun flares! Woah!

Here’s one that I took on both film and digital. I can’t tell which is better. Maybe the film?

Another that I can’t tell whether it is better or worse than the digital version. This was with a 50mm lens and the digital was with an 85mm so the crop is different. Is crop the right word? I don’t think so.

The digital version of this is way better. Oh well.

Shooting black and white at the beach seems sort of silly, but I kinda dig it.

That moment when the sun came out… nice.

I thought maybe the light was better at this spot when I was shooting film than it was for digital. Maybe not.

Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant. Please don’t explode, m’kay?

For the birds, at Hampton Beach.

More birds. I don’t think I have enough bird-centric film pics to stay on track with the previous digital post. Sorry.

Plum Island airport.

Why do I always stop here on the way out to the lighthouse? I haven’t a clue.

The Merrimack River from Plum Island.

Dig that blue water.

And by this point both 35mm cameras were out of film and I was not going to take the time to reload so this is where this post ends. There will be another post from this day that will have the 120 film shots. That’s going to be grouped with some pics I took in Boston last week. I’ll explain later.

Oh, Canada

Were we in Canada this week?

Yes.

Proof?

Sure…

Two Photography Notes

Two things happened today that are related to photography fun.

First: I didn’t need it but I did it anyway. I bought yet another camera from eBay. A Nikon F90. It was on my list of cameras to look for when I bought my last film camera last year. I ended up going for a much cheaper Nikon F401 which turned out to be broken. It came with a nice 50mm lens though so it was worth it for that.

Similarly, today’s eBay purchase had more to do with the lens. There were two in the sale. One was another 50mm. That’s fine. The other was the reason I pulled the trigger. It is a 70–200mm zoom. I don’t have a good zoom lens that works with any of my film cameras. I do actually have a couple of zooms but they are both in seriously rough shape. Here’s hoping this one works out.

The camera itself looks good. Will it be broken like the last one? Probably, but who can say. It has autofocus and that’s what I really want. If the camera and the zoom lens both work out okay I will be very happy with this deal. If only one of them works, I’ll still be happy. If it’s all junk? Fuck.

What was the second item of note today? I took a bag full of cameras to Boston and went for a 6–7 mile long photo walk. Yikes! I started on Berkeley Street and Commonwealth Ave. I walked up Comm to Mass Ave, then cut across to Newbury Street and walked back down to Clarendon Street. I shot two rolls of film. The sunlight was pretty good, though it was a lot cloudier than the forecast I read last night said it would be.

When I finished that loop I switched from film to digital and did the same route in reverse. Also, that was when the sun went away. I’ll post the digital highlights later.

For now… my legs are super tired from all that walking. I’m old, leave me alone!

Four Year Weigh In

Today is May 4, 2026. Four years ago today I went under the knife and had my stomach rewired. Gastric Bypass Surgery. I try to honor the memory of that day by stepping on the scale and weighing myself to see how things are looking.

When I first decided to work toward getting the surgery I weighed 452 pounds. About four months later when I actually went through with it I weighed 431.4 pounds. This morning at about 4:30am when I got out of bed I weighed 231 pounds. I am still down 200.4 pounds since the surgery and 221 pounds over all.

I was really hoping I would still be under 230. Hell, I was hoping I could get back below 220. I am actually up 12.4 pounds since last May the 4th. There is no reason for me to be upset by these numbers. I have always known that they would creep up over time. Still… shit. My next weigh in will be in six months on November 4th. Until then…

Happy Star Wars Day, I guess.

Photos

It’s been a while but I did something mildly creative this morning. Not really, but a little bit.

For the first time since August I filled up a back pack with cameras and went outside a-shootin’. Digital, film, the works.

More often than not when I start feeling the photo-takin’ need I head to the ocean at sunrise. That’s what I did today. As sunrises go it sort of blew chunks. The forecast I read last night said it would be clear skies at sunrise today. It was not. Not even close. There was a little gap between the horizon and the cloud cover that sort of let me see the sun when it rose, but it was a pretty underwhelming view. Thanks to our friend the Nikon Z5 with the cheap-ish 85mm Chinese made lens I can show you what I’m talking about…

At least the waves looked cool. They were about as high as this little corner of the Atlantic Ocean gets.

There’s our friend, Mr Sun. It was trying its best to break through.

My sunrise stop this morning was at Salisbury Beach which is on the Massachusetts side of the state line. I was planning on starting at Hampton Beach in New Hampshire, but I needed to stop for gas and I knew there were a few stations on the way to Salisbury so I wouldn’t have to go out of my way. Also, Salisbury is closer to home so it gave me more time to take care of things before the sun came up.

After a few minutes on the beach I wandered around the area a little bit looking for things to shoot… and I ended up more or less shooting the same things that I almost always shoot when I go there. Oh well.

Someday I will be there when these lights are actually on.

Artsy chair pic alert:

Lame life preserver pic alert:

Every now and then the sun would break through the clouds and we’d get a few seconds of glorious golden hour light but the clouds kept getting in the way and blocking the sun. It was a little frustrating.

After a few minutes of wandering around I got in the car and drove up to Hampton Beach. That’s two towns North across the New Hampshire state line. I stopped at a usual fishing boat view. Again, the sun kept breaking through and going away. I think I got some good light here using one of the film cameras, but not so much using the digital.

As usual, let’s all say hello to the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plan before it blows up and melts everyone.

Out on the beach itself, would it surprise anyone to learn that this pic was a total accident? It probably shouldn’t.

The seagulls were my friends today. They mostly didn’t run away from me.

Again, when the sun cooperated the view was fantastic.

I left Hampton Beach and headed South to Plum Island to say hello to the Merrimack River and the Plum Island Lighthouse. I made the obligatory stop at the airfield as well.

By this time the sky was pretty blue. The clouds were losing the battle.

Is the water at Plum Island the bluest water on Earth? It’s gotta be in the running, right?

I mean… seriously… just look at that.

I don’t know anything about this boat except that I shoot it every time I come here.

And in closing… the Plum Island Lighthouse… which has to be the most underwhelming lighthouse in the world. I mean it’s not even as tall as the trees that surround it. It’s also not even on the water. It’s a little ways down the street from the river. How effective can it be?

There you have it. A few highlights from this morning’s wanderings. I also shot some film. I had a black and white roll in my FG-20 that was loaded back in August and still had a few shots left (Kentmere 400). Last night I put a roll of Lomography 800 into Dad’s K1000 and a roll of Kodak Gold 200 into my medium format camera. I finished all three rolls and mailed them off to the lab to get them developed. Hopefully I won’t have to wait too long to share the film version of this masterpiece of a post. Be on the lookout.

Will there be another photowalk tomorrow? Depends on the weather. I am off work again on Tuesday too so there could be something then, again if the weather cooperates. Hopefully it will be better than today but who knows.

It felt good to just go outside and shoot stuff, even if it was really cold on the water. Summer is coming. Maybe some day soon I’ll be able to repeat this experience without wearing a winter jacket. That would be sweet, huh?

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.

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