landscape photography – tim dobbs photography

Lomography Babylon 13 Kino film .. Overcast day and no tripod .. let’s go for it ….

Everytime there is a new film released onto the market I always try to get a roll or two to try.

So when Lomography announced the Babylon 13 and Fantome 8 kino films I immediately purchased some.

As they are 8 & 13 iso respectively and as I have a slight aversion to using tripods I have been waiting for the brighter weather to return here in Wales.

Last weekend the weather was looking pretty nice for a change so I dug out a camera that I have not used in ages .. my Ricoh X-RX and the Pentax 50mm f1.7 & 35mm f3.5 and proceeded out to my usual haunts here in the Garw valley.

By the time I was ready to leave it began clouding over but I had loaded the film so I went up the mountain anyway hoping that I would have enough light to be able to had hold at reasonable apertures.

As it turned out I only got to f5.6 once with most of the shots either wide open or f4 at best.

On my return I checked the massive dev app to see what I could develop it with and decided on ilfotecHC 1+31 dilution for 9 minutes.

The negatives looked fine out of the tank if slightly underexposed at first glance.

When dry and I cut them into strips for scanning it was apparent that this is a very curly film stock so I was imagining problems with my Epson v500 but apart from a few frames that I had to manually locate rather than the thumbnail scan method it went well.

Once into Lightroom the film was a revelation .. I was expecting soft, dark images due to not being able to stop down and hand holding at 1/30 sec but no .. the images had bags of detail and plenty of tone in both highlight and shadow areas.

The grain was pretty much non existent which is expected from such a low iso film but still it was nice to see.

Would I recommend this film stock? … definitely I would but with the caveat that you need good light or a tripod to get the best results even though I seemed to get lucky on this occasion I think as the Pentax 28mm f3.5 is a really sharp lens even wide open and the metering on the Ricoh did an excellent job too.

Well here is almost the whole roll as I bracketed a few frames so had multiples of certain images.

Click on an image to view larger

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek

I also have some zines over on my Etsy store if anyone wants a look .. or message me to buy direct ..

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/timdobbsphoto?ref=seller-platform-mcnav

Expired Portra 800 & a slightly faulty Yashicamat 124G …

I have been using my Yashicamat 124G quite a bit this year as it is such an easy medium format camera to use and gives great results but the last 3 rolls that I have shot I have noticed a bit of a problem.

After loading and winding on to frame one then making the first shot the camera will not wind on.

The only way I have since found to carry on shooting with the roll is to fire the shutter again.

When this happened with the first two rolls I ended up with a double exposure as I was unsure whether or not the camera had actually made an exposure … this roll features such an image.

Obviously after 2 rolls having this problem when it happened on the third occasion I placed my hand over the taking lens and fired the shutter which saved the first frame and allowed me to wind to the second frame.

The strange thing with this roll is not only was the first frame a double exposure it also overlapped as you can see in the second image, it has only done this once so I am at a loss to what is going on.

I have shot loads of rolls with this great camera over the years with no problems whatsoever so if anyone out there has any ideas please let me know please.

So here are a few of better images … it was a really overcast drab day (which is why I used Portra 800) which really did wonders with the greens.

Even though the film expired 8 years ago I still shot it at box speed and processed using the Tetenal C41 kit.

Click on an image to view larger ….

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek

20 minute walk with some ilford HP5 and my Yashicamat 124G …..

I have had my iMac for about 6 months and it has been great for everything especially photo editing in Adobe Lightroom in 4k but since the Big Sur update it has been running like a snail in treacle with all the Adobe products.

I used to edit using a PC which was starting to slow down a bit which is why I upgraded to a new 6 core, 4k iMac so in a fit of extreme recklessness I went and bought a new PC 2 weeks ago (gave my PC to my son so I don’t feel that guilty) and I wanted to test it out so loaded my Yashicamat with some trusty HP5 and went out to bang off 12 frames just to test my workflow from scanning to editing.

Considering I shot the roll in only 10 minutes I was pleased to get 12 keepers albeit very similar shots.

The PC performed brilliantly without a hitch very fast and smooth and a little easier on the eye as my PC monitor is a 28inch 4k compared with my iMac 21.5inch 4k.

Apple has since given an update to Big Sur which still has done nothing to speed up Adobe stuff so I feel a complete wipe and clean install coming over Christmas.

Anyway here are the 12 frames sorry there is not a lot of variety other than slightly different framing and apertures.

As per usual HP5 looked lovely and the Yashicamat gave excellent sharp images.

Click and image to view larger …

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek

A walk to Ocean Colliery in the mist with Rollei Retro 400S ….. the whole roll

I have shot a few rolls of Rollei Retro 400 and love how you get really deep blacks while holding shadow detail and especially in 120 format how much detail it produces.

A few weeks back it was pretty gloomy with quite a bit of mist here in the valley which screams Black and White to me so I loaded up my Fuji GW690iii and went for a walk up to the site of the last colliery to close here in the Garw valley.

The landscape has long been transformed since the mines went and on the site are 2 lovely lakes.

As the Fuji only takes 8 frames and I didn’t bring any more film with me I had to be selective with my shots trying not to waste any.

So these 8 frames are my walk from the commemorative plaque at the entrance to the site, then the bottom lake & Sculpture followed by the lovely top lake surrounded by mist.

This type of image works well with Rollei Retro in my opinion and I was pleased to have got 8 keepers from the roll.

So here are the images … comments most welcome

Click to view larger ….

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek

Rollei Retro 400s … almost the whole roll

Over the last few months I have shot a few rolls of Rollei’s RPX range which I really liked the look of.

So a few weeks back I was trying to decide what film to shoot that day and came across a roll of Retro 400S which I have shot once before and was not really that happy with how the roll came out developed in Rodinal.

I checked the Massive dev chart app and saw that I could also develop it in ilfotecHC so I thought I would give it a go and compare it to the RPX 400 and the previous roll.

I have been trying to post complete rolls of film recently and this was my plan for this one but whilst out on my walk my Pentax Super A sort of developed a problem.

Nearly every time that I half pressed the shutter to activate the meter nothing happened so I was trying to press the shutter button at different angles with my finger until it worked.

The problem was that on a few occasions I fired the damn shutter giving either totally blurred/black or over exposed frames so this roll only had 31 keeper which you can see here.

I have since used the Super A again and have found that I need to rest my finger towards the front of the shutter button for a second or two and the meter activates every time now.

By using ilfotecHC rather than Rodinal the images were far more like what I have seen on the interwebs … Great Blacks, contrasty and sharp with highlights that didn’t blow out and a really nice grain.

My 1st roll seemed muddy and excessively grainy so if I buy anymore of this stock it will be getting souped in ilfotecHC for sure.

So here are the images … comments most welcome

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek 🙂

1st time shooting Lomochrome Metropolis 35mm … the whole roll

I love trying new films whether they are new emulsions or just a film that I have never shot before.

Lomochrome Metropolis is an actual new emulsion developed by Lomography that according to the write up on their site can be exposed between 100 and 400 iso without any change in development.

Link … Lomo Metropolis

As it was £13 per roll and I only bought one to try I decided on the middle ground and went with 200 iso.

As some of the shots involved the sky I did use some exposure compensation .. the camera of choice was the Minolta X700 with the 50mm F1.7.

The roll was developed and scanned by FilmDev just to get accurate colours so that I can judge if I like the desaturated look that I have seen.

I shot the roll over a week so the beginning of the roll was a bit of street and the rest was a mountain walk here in the South Wales valleys.

At first sight I loved how this film looks, yes it did have a desaturated look which worked well on the street images but when you went out into the countryside it still had that look but the greens seemed to pop probably because the rest of the colours were subtle.

The film was pretty sharp and contrasty, the grain was there to be seen but at 200 iso it was very pleasant maybe at 400 it would be a bit more pronounced.

I am a bit gutted that this film is so expensive as I would be shooting it quite a bit if it were £10 or less a roll that being said I will be buying more but using it now and again depending on what I am shooting.

Well here is the complete roll … click to see an image larger

Comments most welcome

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek 🙂

Shooting expired Kodak EliteChrome 400 ….

Quite a while ago I was gifted a bag full of expired slide film from a photographer friend.

The bag contained plenty of film stocks that I had never shot before mainly Kodak Elitechrome 100/400 and Ektachrome 160 Tungsten.

I have shot the 100 iso previously and it was fine even though it all had a dubious history of storage.

I was expecting the 400 iso to be slightly more more grainy and I was unsure what iso to shoot it at, I only went 1 stop with the 100 and shot that at 50.

I decided to do the same with the 400 and shot it at 200 iso using my Nikon F100 and 50mm f1.4.

The problem was that when I developed it using the Tetenal E6 kit and then scanned it was that the whole roll was slightly underexposed but also blew out some of the highlights so I was glad that I didn’t push it any more as I managed to get some pretty decent images when processing in Lightroom.

Compared to the previous 100 iso this roll faired a little worse showing much more grain and not as sharp overall but I was happy with the slightly muted colours.

Here is a selection of images from the roll .. click to view larger

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek 🙂

Shot my 1st roll of Kodak Ektar in ages … Here is the whole roll

For the first time in a while we had a lovely sunny Saturday the other week so I wanted to shoot colour on one of my mountain hikes.

I considered shooting some slide as I have quite a few rolls of expired film in my fridge as well as a couple of rolls of new Kodak Ektachrome but as I was going through my film stash I came across a roll of Ektar that expired back in 2015.

I am pretty sure that I bought it new and it has been lost in my fridge since then.

I don’t really shoot Ektar that often, in fact I probably have only shot 5 or 6 rolls in the past so I decided to use that for a change.

I do like how Ektar looks when I have used it and also there are loads of gorgeous images on the internet so instead of developing it myself I sent it to the awesome filmdev to get the scans right rather than me having to mess around trying to get the “Ektar Look”.

I shot the roll with my Nikon FE2 and the Nikkor 50mm f1.8 pancake lens that looks and works great with the FE2.

So here is the whole roll including the 1st test shot while loading the film (not very good but as it’s the whole roll I left it in) also the last 2 frames were shot indoors just to finish the roll.

I tried to look for subjects that would lend themselves to the Ektar look namely punchy Reds & Greens.

At the time of writing this blog Analogue Wonderland are running a competition to shoot Ektar along with a super discount on purchasing 120 and 35mm Ektar if anyone wants to take a look (I am not affiliated to them I just love the service they supply) just click the link to visit the website for details.

Comments most welcome, click on an image to view larger

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek 🙂

Expired film day 2020 …… ilford XP1 … the whole roll

Back in March this year just before all this Covid 19 lockdown stuff I entered the Expired film day competition like I have done on previous years.

The whole point is to get out and shoot as much old expired film over a 3 day weekend then submit 3 of you best images with the chance to win some lovely film prizes.

I was luck to win a prize last year so I was very surprised to win again this year considering the really high standard of the other entries.

I have loads of expired film but I came across some old ilford XP1 on eBay so I was excited to give it a go and with fingers crossed manage to capture something worthwhile.

Somehow I messed up and shot 1st frame on my Mamiya 645 while getting it out of my bag with the lens cap on so only ended up with 14 final images.

I rated the roll at 100 iso and it was developed/Scanned by filmdev

I asked them to push it one stop in development as well if poss and explained what I was trying to do with the images.

Here is a link to the Expired film day website … Click here

And here is the image that I was lucky to have selected for a prize … Click here

So here is the complete roll ….

All images on my blog are available as prints just drop me an email

I also have a film only blog over at usingfilm.wordpress.com if you want a peek 🙂

Sunny day walk with my Daughter & some Kodak Portra 400VC …

I have been working all the way through this pandemic lockdown which is a blessing as I think I would have gone nuts if I had to stay home so on the weekends I make the most of it by going on a long walk here in our lovely Garw Valley.

Most weekends if she isn’t working too I have been joined by my daughter who has been eager to explore the many different walks we have here in our vicinity.

I bought quite a few rolls of Portra 400VC from Mr Cad ages ago so I thought it was about time that I shot some of it so I loaded my trusty Mamiya 645 and went out on a hot Saturday morning to do a 8 mile trek around our valley.

After developing the roll I had some issues namely strange light leaks in different places and of different intensities so I immediately thought the camera was at fault even though I have never had a problem like this on any other rolls.

After posting on Twitter asking if anyone had any idea what it could be most people suggested the camera which would have been the obvious choice so I loaded up a roll of ilford SFX and shot that the following day under the same sunny conditions only to find they were all perfect … no leaks so on this occasion I think the problem was with the film itself.

I bought about 20 rolls and have shot 7 or 8 previously and all were fine except this one.

As most of the leaks occurred on the edges I managed to salvage quite a few frames with a little cropping which was pretty easy as it was a 6 x 4.5 frame.

See this original scan sample here

Anyway here are the final images … please click to view larger ….