"Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?"

Negative: Ilford PanF plus 50 (8m DDX)

Exposure: 50mm f/5.6 @ 1/250th

Printed At: 50mm f/16 1m

On: 8x10 RC grade 4

File: 14-26 & 14-27

There are a number of themes at work in this composition - and an overall continuation of the idea of movement. Also I'm aware that for some reason there's a number of train themed pictures in this series, which I think is OK. If you don't, well, too bad. :)

Some of this might seem like a stretch, but stay with me, I had to walk a really fine line with this title. For one thing you might have noticed that there are two file numbers for this print. I took two frames in quick succession as this train slowly went by. As a result, the black bar in the center is dividing the transposed sides of two almost identical images. At first glance it might look like the black bar is simply obstructing the middle of the frame, because there's really not much difference between the front of one car and the back of the next. In this case the cold steel rail is a laboratory construction from my darkroom - not the green field of real life. A black and white photograph in particular is an abstract construction representing reality - but people see these constructs as reality more often then the cold representations they really are.

I like trains for a variety of reasons, one of which is the fantastic efficiency at which they operate. A steel rail perhaps, but nothing could be closer to a green field for modern society than a diesel train pulling a couple hundred cars. This train in particular was carrying some phase of an agricultural progress; corn, I think.

Also in "A smile from a veil" I left the open question hanging about printing paper being sensitive to only part of the spectrum. No one commented with a hypothesis so I wasn't particularly motivated to answer right away. I'm not sure if anyone besides my wife is even reading this. I told her when she had the baby that her primary job outside of raising him was to comment on my blog whenever I post. She does a pretty good job.

So anyway the reason is that you don't need printing paper to be sensitive to more than a small slice of the spectrum. The end result is monochromatic anyway, and you're controlling the light in the darkroom. Safelights work by being red or orange, longer light waves which don't expose the paper but still let you see what you're doing. It's sort of easier to make prints than develop film because of this, when you develop panchromatic film it must be done in complete darkness. This means when I developed this film for 8 minutes in dektol, and 3 minutes in sprint fixer, I was in complete darkness for probably 15 minutes. It's weird to have no difference between eyes open and eyes shut for that long. I can't decide where to look sometimes, and sometimes I don't know if I'm cross-eyed. Sort of an unusual experience. It reminds me of a Quaker service in a way. It's peaceful and reflective.

"A smile from a veil"

Neg: Ilford PanF plus 50, push 100 (9min DDX@70farenheit)

Exposure: 50mm f/4 @ 1/125th

At: 45 +-15 dodge

On: 8x10 RC grade 4

File: 13-28

Subtitle: "I puked." He did- just before this frame.

So I fogged this roll by using old fixer. D'oh! I compensated by lowering the contrast of the lower part of the exposure where Claire's hands are. I need to buy some new fix.

I used some cool film for the first time, and I really liked the results- despite my bad chemistry. I'm going to try some more rolls. Some claim this film is too contrasty for everyday use- and indeed it is very high contrast. For this application it was perfect, as photographing babies is meant to be a high contrast affair. The other cool thing about this film, if you don't know from the name, is that it's panchromatic; sensitive to the entire visible spectrum (and often a bit more). A lot of other films are panchromatic or close to it, but I think this is great film for the price. I think it's definitely got more tonal range than TMax.

Panchromatic is your vocabulary word for the week. Photographic emulsions are often described as either orthochromatic (blue-light sensitive printing papers) or panchromatic (sensitive to the entire rainbow). Quiz time: why would printing papers only be sensitive to part of the spectrum?

"Do you think you can tell?"

Exp: 50mm @ f/1.8 - 1/30th
Film: Kodak TMax 400
File: 12-11
At: -/2m
On: Ilford RC grade 4 8x10

This train was just pulling in to the station on a hazy day earlier this month. Sort of unusual to see an engine like this.

Just kidding. This is a G-scale (1/24th) model train I got a picture of at the train show with Marc a few weeks ago. I played with some of the development aspects to bring out a haziness in the final photo. Since I had my lens wide open, the depth of field was very short. Also the person in the background kind of looks like a big entrance that the train could have come through. The only thing really giving it away is the tracks.