Portsmouth in monochrome

While I was in Portsmouth last month for the Big Film Photowalk I took a second a camera with me, loaded with black and white film, to shoot alongside the Rollei 35S I had loaded with Kodak Gold. This second camera is my all time best bargain when it comes to buying old film cameras - a Yashica Electro 35MC which I bought on eBay for the princely sum of £11.40 including postage! It works perfectly and has a lovely sharp f2.8 lens.

Rather than repeating the images I took in colour I kept my eyes open for scenes which better suited monochrome, like the silhouetted figures above.

Lazing on a sunny afternoon…

One of the stranger sights I saw - a rocking horse abandoned on a street corner!

Photos taken 29 June 2024

The Big Film Photowalk

During a recent trip to Sussex I had the opportunity to take part in the Big Film Photography Walk - a series of photowalks for film photographers taking place all over the country. The location I booked for was Portsmouth and we met at Gunwharf Quays, where we were all given a roll of Kodak Gold 200 film to use. I started off by aiming my little Rollei 35S at the Spinnaker Tower and the film proved to be gold by name, gold by nature in the warm summer sunshine!

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There were lots of interesting details and scenes to photograph

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Further around Portsmouth Harbour there were more details to photograph, but the Spinnaker Tower’s presence was still there on the horizon.

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Architectural details around old Portsmouth.

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At our final destination a busker was relaxing outside the pub in the sunshine and I couldn’t resist the added graffiti on his guitar.

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Photos taken 29 June 2024

Close to home

I’ve visited the church of St Mary the Virgin in Stansted Mountfitchet before, but on that occasion I was on a mission to find some suitable photos for an educational blog I was writing. On this occasion I had a much needed morning off and was determined to do some pinhole photos but needed a location close to home. With a journey of just three miles St Mary’s fitted the bill perfectly!

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One should always have in mind that you can never get too close with pinhole photography - a strategy which worked well with the church piano.

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More close up details.

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As I ventured out into the porch the sun was positively warm (much warmer than inside!) and the ornate wooden arch was throwing interesting shadows onto the door.

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Along with the warmth of the sun, the snowdrops in the churchyard also gave a hint of spring to come…

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Photos taken 15 February 2024

Church to coast

Alongside the digital photos I took at St Mary’s Church, North Stoke on the 22nd January I spent time indulging in some slow photography with my pinhole cameras. Having developed the film I have a set which looks very different but still captures the shafts of low winter sun.

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While I was there I also used my 6x6 Rise pinhole camera, but with an adapter fitted which split the frame into thirds. That film is still waiting to be finished off as every frame requires three separate photos (somewhat more time consuming!) but it’ll be fascinating to see how they turn out when I get some time to complete the roll.

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An architectural curiosity - three stone seats for the clergy to use during services.

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This is my favourite photo from my visit to St Mary’s. Getting really close is one of the things a wide angle pinhole camera really excels at, and my camera was really close to the bible on the lecturn!

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After I’d finished at St Mary’s I sought out some food and then travelled on to Climping Beach. Despite living fairly close by for most of my life I’d never visited before and it’s an extraordinary piece of coastline. The soft, golden sand is interrupted by jagged chunks of chalk and littered with flints - I’d never come across a beach quite like it before!

Peaks and troughs of chalk, kissed by the low winter sun.

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The tide was a long way out but there was still plenty of scope to use the breakwaters as focal points for my photos.

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A mini-landscape of its own, created by a pool of water on its way across the beach.

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Photos taken 22 January 2024

Good things come in small packages

Much as I love using film, the fact is that most available film cameras are old models these days, lovingly repaired and kept going for as long as spare parts are still available. While you can buy cheap plastic 35mm cameras and handmade large format models, there’s been very little in between in the way of new cameras design. A little over a year ago that changed with the launch of the Alfie Tych on Kickstarter; a cute little half frame camera. It comes with two lenses (one specially designed in glass and the other a simple plastic meniscus lens) as well as options to shoot pinhole and zone sieve images. The thought of a really compact camera I could keep in a pocket that gave me so many options really appealed so I backed the campaign and began the long wait.

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In October my Tych finally arrived so I loaded up some film and went out snapping! The advantage of a half frame camera is the feeling you can be more spontaneous and playful. A 36 exposure film, if loaded carefully, can be filled with up to about 80 photos so the cost per frame is really quite cheap compared to larger formats.

I began my Alfie Tych journey during a working weekend in Maidenhead where I took some snaps along by the River Thames. I made lots of mistakes - forgetting to change the exposure setting when I’d changed the lens choice, forgetting to wind on and more - but I had fun. The left hand image below is an accidental double exposure of Boulters Weir but I rather like it!

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A few days later I took it with me on a walk around Thaxted - nothing I haven’t photographed before but I needed to get to know my new friend.

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Towards the end of October I had a trip to Dublin planned for work, so the Tych came too and I grabbed a few frames around the city, including the dock area and the Samuel Beckett Bridge.

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Back home, I took a few shots on a walk around our village, playing with the light and shadows.

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Finally, the Tych came with me to Southend-on-Sea at the start of December for a stroll along the pier.

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Having got to know the camera a little more I began experimenting with the different lenses. The left hand image below was taken with the simple meniscus lens, while the right hand one is sharper - from the glass lens.

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Further along the pier I took the same photo with three different options, although I forgot to write down which one was taken with which lens. I suspect they’re (from left to right) glass lens, pinhole and zone sieve. I can see for my next film I need to be more methodical and keep notes about what I’ve shot!

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The only thing left to do now is figure out what film to pop in my little pocketable camera for the Christmas holidays!

Photos taken October - December 2023