Anime Weekend Atlanta 2013 - First Look

This Saturday I spent most of the day roaming the Cobb Galleria and surrounding areas at AWA 2013! I brought along my Linhof Master Technika, Polaroid 900, and a bag full of film and shot dozens of photos.

I have a ton of work to do, developing and scanning photos, but here's a quick peek at 3 instant shots I scanned last night. If you are finding your way here because I gave you a card, let me know who you are and who you cosplayed as! I will have several updates in the next week as I work on the film!

Strickland Mill - Almost Gone

Just a little update on the mill...it is practically gone. The only structures still standing are the water tower, the tower, and the front office building.

Here's a photo, cropped from a 4x5 negative made with the 47mm XL lens and 2-stop GND. on Portra 160VC:

Rusty Red "R"

I took this photo out at a construction site late this afternoon. The bright red dumpster attracted my attention as the sun began to dip lower in the sky, and the rust came alive in the brightness.

This was my first color shot with a new lens, a Voigtlander 15cm APO Lanthar. This cult-classic is from what I understand a modified Heliar design with special Lanthanum glass for excellent color reproduction. I like that it's small, light, still very fast for large format, (f/4.5) and actually gave me sizable movements (I used quite a bit of rise and shift to get this image). I also did a very slight perspective correction and crop in Photoshop:

I also took it in b&w with T-Max 100, but the light had just faded, so I increased the development time to boost the contrast. I like the color version better, but here is the T-Max for posterity, with a slightly tighter crop:

Opening Home Game 2013 - VSU Blazer Football and the Blazin' Brigade

Saturday was the opening home game of the VSU football season. It was a rainy night, but I stopped by and shot a couple of rolls just for kicks with my Pentax 67 and 105mm, 165mm, and 300mm lenses. I used Portra 800 and some T-Max 400 pushed to 3200 in Acufine (I should've developed it a bit longer, it was a bit thin, but it works.). I shot a couple of the game but mostly shot photos of the band (I marched for 5 years with them back in college). Here are the results:

 

Morning Panoramas at Langdale Park

My friend Kaleb and I went to Langdale this morning to shoot a bit. It's the first time I've been able to get down there for months. The river has almost constantly been at flood stage since April it seems. Also, the mosquitoes have been so bad during previous excursions that even 100% DEET spray didn't deter them, and I made a hasty retreat (several areas in Lowndes County have tested positive for West Nile, by the way).

Anyway, I shot some panoramas with my Chamonix and Horseman 6x12 back, all with my Nikon 90mm f/8 lens. I shot T-Max 100 and semi-stand developed it for an hour at a 1:100 dilution (68F), like I've been doing with everything lately. Here are the 5 images I shot:

 

Vertical panoramas aren't terribly common, but I like them a lot. I guess they will be hard to see fully on a computer screen but I think the first one would make an especially nice print.

Wilds of Florida, near Tallahassee

I was out with some friends in the middle of nowhere Florida. I guess we were technically in a WMA, but I really didn't have a clue where we were. Florida has such a large amount of wild land, compared to Georgia - it's great.

We found a gator, dead, on the side of the road, which was strange:

That's Dominick, trying to figure out what happened here.

I also took a couple landscapes. Here's a couple on T-Max 100 (with my Bessa R2S and 50mm f/3.5 Heliar or Nikkor 85mm f/2):

I also took some panoramas with my 4x5 and 6x12 back, using the Schneider 47mm f/5.6 XL. These had a 2-stop GND on them:

Some really great scenery out there. It was so hot though, it was hard to shoot a lot before retreating to the car.

Finally, here's a few 4x5 images, shot with T-Max 100 and either 90mm, 150mm, or 300mm lenses:

 

Old abandoned houses near VSU

I was going through some of my old film scans and found quite a number of things I shot and never posted that were of interest. Almost always when I haven't posted here, I have actually been shooting, but just didn't get around to posting anything. I'm going to try to post some old stuff that I forgot about in the next few weeks.

Back in February I took a few documentary shots of some of the old houses across the street from the Fine Arts building. These houses - and more importantly, the land that they sit on - were purchased by a company to build a complex on with living and retail spaces. There was some outcry to save the old historic homes, so they were offered for only $10 - you just had to haul them away!

No one took them up on that offer, but even now, 7 months later, nothing has been done about them. I'm not sure what is going to happen to them.

Here are a few negatives from my Yashica 124G and Ektar film:

I also took some digital images inside one of the houses - here's three from my D800E, and either 17-35mm f/2.8 or 16mm f/3.5 AI:

Kendrick Johnson Rally - 9/7/13

I took some portraits and documentary photos at the Kendrick Johnson rally downtown on Saturday: