I tend to enjoy the things that I like concurrently. So when friends, appropriate beverages, fires, and photography come together…interesting things happen. Sometimes I feel weird bringing such a large camera to an event, and putting a different sort of effort into my frames. Most people are taking photos with phones and point-n-shoots, with desire for looking good rather than a good looking photograph. So I feel like an ugly ducking for a while; until I realize we’re all there to have fun…and until I’ve had an appropriate beverage.

Some of the frames from these instances are less than ideal. After all, I’m there to spend time with people I enjoy. Photography in those instances is second-hand. Nonetheless, it’s still enjoyable and even though I’m not concentrating as hard on the exposure, I still get good frames. So, who’s having the next party to which I will bring my camera?

I have a very odd relationship with medium format film. I love the technical advantages it offers: quality, depth of field, relative grain size, etc. A lot of my medium format frames come out looking great, and I suppose this is due to the restraints imposed by the camera I use. I have a Seagull TLR with no meter and no prism finder (finder image is horizontally reversed). This necessitates more thought and effort put into making a frame; otherwise we’re using up one frame out of the twelve in a $5 roll. Not exactly economical.

I was so excited to use my new medium format TLR when I bought it back in 2008. So much so that I messed up my framing, which lead to some overlapping frames. (The Seagull TLR I have allows for 6×6 or 6×4.5. I prefer the square 6×6.) Looking at the large waist-level focusing plate was ephemeral; elemental. I loved it, despite the lack of meter and the frustrating horizontal reversal of the finder.

Overlapping frames from my first roll of 120.

I suppose those frustrations, and a constant cognizance for economy, led to only a handful of rolls exposed over these years. (Can you believe I had one roll in the camera for over a year?) But medium format is always on my mind. Always wanting to expose more frames. Thoughts of what to photograph. I have this restricting urge to only photograph meaningful frames with 120 film. After all, it’s an expensive roll with few frames. I’m more willing to fire the shutter without looking through the viewfinder of a 35mm camera; it’s only one frame of up to 36.

From a more recent roll.

In retrospect, some of my better frames have been exposed on medium format film. I’ve been trying more frames; and plan to soon make the plunge into color, and pay a lab to develop for me. Let’s see where this leads..

I’ve had somewhat of a personal renaissance with photography this year. My rate of capturing images and developing film has experienced an exponential rise, which will soon plateau off if only for the sake of my wallet. I’ve sold cameras I don’t use, bought new (old) ones, bought new lenses, bought old lenses, I’ve tried new developers, new techniques, and been reading a lot. Ever since I started in high school, I could always make a decent photograph. Funny how now I realize how little I knew back then about how a camera works and what actually makes a photograph.

The reason for this new section to the dot org is that I’ve felt unfulfilled. I take photos (a process I love), develop them (a necessary nuisance), scan them, and then look at them. It seems sort of anti-climactic. So I wanted something more. Hence, this new installation. What will come of it, I do not know. I want to post some of my frames here, maybe detail some of my experiences in a blog form. This isn’t really a means to an end, but more of an exploratory affair. We’ll see where it ends up, but let’s just hope it brings more good than not.

Cheers!