On Friday, April 20tth I managed to take some time for myself at the end of the day. I used that time to self indulg in a little me time. Okay that might sound a little perverted but I really was allowing myself the time to do some of the things that I love to do; create images in the darkroom.
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| Tofino, BC, January 1st, 2012 |
Recently, I have been working to get better at printing. I have changed the paper I use, done some research about ideal contrast filters and started using a better quality film. The main difference between my printing now and my printing previously, the amount of contrast I am using. I used to like images with a lot of contrast. However, in my old age, I have started to enjoy the subtlties of images that have an amazing range of values.
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| Salt Spring, Summer 2011 |
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| Mt Washington, February 2011 |
I have to appologize for the quality of the scans, my scanner is giving me poor results recently. There should be more details in the lights with the chicken. I had another reason to get into the darkroom, I needed two prints for demos in class. I do this project called strip composition. The prints are cut up into regular intervals and glued back together. This year I decided to print images of birds; a chicken and a whiskey jack (aka gray jay).
As I posted, not long ago, I decided that I am going to switch back to using my film camera. Not exclusively, that would be silly, however as much as possible. I enjoy the process of paying attention to all the minute details and the aesthetic experience of the click, when I push the shutter release.
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| Parking Lot, January 1st, 2012 |
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| Tofino Breakfast, December 31st, 2012 |
This final image below, is my favourite of the day. I love the contrast and density. Further, the image itself is interesting. The people in the photograph are all friends with each other and have been for years but not friends with me. This image really reveals how I am an other in this group, they are friends with my wife.
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| Rental Shop, January 1st 2012 |
I’ll get into the darkroom to create some more prints soon. I really enjoyed getting back in there. I also have a few more ideas for a project very similar to my final sculpture image.
Comments
You've given me the print-making bug SO bad, my friend! …and I'm loving the lower contrast/wider range. When I go through my older work I'm like, wow, I sure pumped the contrast and blacks hard in everything.
The portrait of Kim heading out to surf has a great 'fleeting moment' feel to it… isn't it charming and refreshing to not look at the back of the camera after and ask someone to repose or change an element of the scene? Discovering what you created at a later time just extends the charm.
Lovin' your blog!
Thanks for the feedback, Sean. We need to book more time, before the summer break starts, to get back into the school and make some more prints.
I have a few more images from this roll of film that I want to make, more surfing images.