Garish - Retooling

Dairy Queen, U.S. Route 63, Stewartville, Minnesota, November 2011

It has been quite a long while since a film emulsion has excited me.  It used to be a quarterly -- sometimes even monthly -- event.  But with the ascendancy of digital and the waning of film, it's become somewhat akin to listening to a favorite band's long-awaited release on vinyl.

The last time I got this excited was the summer of 2010, when I returned from Barcelona with a number of exposed rolls of Kodak Ektar 100, and found that not only was the color superior to Agfa's old Ultra 100 emulsion, but that its grain was even finer than Agfa Ultra 50.  It was as though Eastman Kodak had retooled Ektar 25, but made it jump two stops without any loss in resolution.

Well, with the demise of Polaroid, I am starting to run out of their wonderful 669 and 690 Polacolor pack films I use in the Polaroid Colorpack cameras. So, preparing for the inevitable, I purchased a few packs of Fuji's FP-100C Professional pack film, which replaces Polaroid 690.

Now, while I shoot Polacolor for its obviously "off" colors (who doesn't love their loam green and cyan skies of 669 film?), I found the color way truer than even the 690 film, which was a vast improvement in color accuracy over 669.  In fact, the above photo recalls Fuji's marvelous E-6  emulsions, and instantly reminded me of many transparencies I have made on their Astia and Sensia films.  (The above has not been tweaked for color balance, nor for saturation).

Even more astounding was the exposure latitude on this stuff!  Whereas Polacolor (in either 669 or 690) would have had lost detail and murky shadowing in the darker areas, the Fuji maintained detail in both the shaded and shadow areas.

This is an astounding find!  Although this film has been around for a while, I was a Polacolor diehard.  I still prefer to use it (I honestly don't shoot it for reasons of color and tonal fidelity - I use it because of -- not despite -- its flaws).

Still, I have a new snapshot stalwart awaiting me when I run out of the great old stuff, and I am looking forward to new ways of seeing the things I shoot.

 

Garish - The Next Generation

 Trans-Canada Highway, near Lytton, British Columbia, Canada,

July 2011

I am not, by training nor inclination, a nature photographer. When God was passing out the Ansel Adams and Galen Rowell genes, I was in line for the Walker Evans and Pete Turner DNA.  Still, if nature has been altered, trimmed, and adapted by the hand of man, then I am attuned to this mutation, and it piques my interest and captures my eye.

Case in point: These young growth conifers in the mountains of British Columbia. They fascinate me as to how mankind can harmonize with nature, in a Grandma Moses sort of way

I'll leave the Muir Woods to those who can do it way better than I.

Road Less Traveled

 U.S. Route 12, Oakdale, Wisconsin, September 2011

Not to sound like Andy Rooney, but Have You Ever Noticed that whereas the old independent strip motels that dot our byways off the Interstate have character, that you would not want to actually stay there?

That's because they're are often run down, unhygienic, and you certainly wouldn't want to take a shower in Cabin 1 on some lonely, rainy night.  

I would much rather stay someplace luxurious and civilized, such as the DoubleTree Suites, in Minneapolis (/sarcasm).

Happy Accident

Trans-Canada Highway, outside Parkbeg, Saskatchewan

August 2011

Shooting with my Polaroid Super Colorpack, I had left the focus ring set at 5 feet from the previous photograph I took, a portrait.  I retook the shot, but actually prefer the heavily-diffused look (called "soft focus" nowadays, a euphemism for "out of focus").

I can't pull a Pee Wee on ya, and say "I meant to do that."  I didn't, but so what?  The results are just the same.

Concrete Cathedrals

Grain Elevator

U.S. Route 150, Fithian, Illinois, June 2011

I saw this beautiful example of an early-20th century granary in rural Illinois, when I felt the pang of regret that I hadn't brought my Rolleiflex SL-66 medium format camera, my traditional tool for capturing these specimens of what photographer Chris Faust calls "commercial archaeology."

But then I remembered:  I had a medium format camera with me, a Polaroid Super Colorpack 108-format instant camera, loaded with color 669 film.  Thanks to Photoshop, I was able to tweak this into something silver halide.

Garish: The Next Generation

Unger Store, State Highway 13, Unger, West Virginia, May 2011

Some times, as a photographer, I luck out:  Unger's General Store closed down about four years ago, and I missed the opportunity to photograph this old country store, which had played such a crucial part of my teenaged years: I would often ride my old Team Raleigh ten-speed from my house outside of Berkeley Springs, West Virginia, to rural Frederick County, Virginia.  Sitting atop the ridgeline after a steep climb of many miles, Unger's store was just about the point when my bike bottle went dry.  Though there was no air conditioning in the store, just dunking my hand into the pop cooler to grab a glass bottle of Coca-Cola immediately reinvigorated me.  They made Coke with real sugar back then.  Today, you have to find a place that carries Mexican Coca-Cola to experience Coke as it ought to taste.  

My bicycle journeys took place some thirty years ago, but driving up Route 13 and finding the place still intact made it seem like yesterday.

Garish: The Next Generation

Waffle House Restaurant, Arlington Road, Brookville, Ohio

June 2011

This is not a "Poladroid."  This is not something I tweaked in Photoshop or Lightroom, to make it look like a Polaroid print.  No, this is a Polaroid print, taken on 669 film with my Super Colorpack camera (which I bought on eBay for $3.50; may the Colorpack III rest in peace) just this week.

And, this beautifully stylized Waffle House restaurant -- which appears right out of the 1950s, with its lush landscaping -- looks simply stunning on real Polaroid film, a nice stash of which I keep stored in my Frigidaire.  You see, while Polaroid film will most often render washed-out looking skies (as it does in this print), it was engineered to also produce heavily-saturated colors (also evident here), something the techno-geeks at Poladroid didn't exactly factor into their bit crunching.  Like Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell sang, when music was also made in the analog format by artists who could read music and play instruments, "Ain't nothing like the real thing."

Baby.

Summer is here!