Great Wall of China

This is the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall located 45 miles from Beijing.   It is one of the most thoroughly restored segments of the wall.

Photographed with a TL-120 using Provia 100F pushed one stop.    No tripod, I get good results with this camera using a waist-level finder and letting it hang around my neck.

Steven Lederman – August 2016

MISSINGLINK“THE MISSING LINK” –  I decided to submit this after being inspired by a negative image of Dorothy Mladenka’s in an earlier Folio loop, or in a different folio (MF3D II?).  I actually shot this during work hours.  I was hired to shoot an industrial video and decided to bring my TL-120-1 with me.  After Principal Photography for the industrial video was completed,  I wandered around the factory pretending to take production stills.   I originally planned to get this roll developed by dr5 – but for some forgotten reason that didn’t occur.  Captured with the aforementioned TL-120-1 on some type of Ilford black and white film.  I believe I used a Vivitar 283 fill flash.

STRUNGOUT“STRUNG OUT” –  one of the plusses of the TL-120-1 is its ability to capture greatly-detailed close-up portraits.  This image was captured  during a jam session of “The Ass Moles” on December 20, 2008.  Despite the fact that we never released a commercially-available recording, we did commission Cal Schenkel (of Frank Zappa record cover art fame) to create a piece of Ass Moles-inspired art for us.  TL-120-1 using Fuji Film (Provia?) with a Vivitar 283 flash.

BARNTOBEWILD“BARN TO BE WILD” –  In 2014 I learned a slew of farms were slated for demolition so that condos could be erected on their land.   This is one of the images from the resulting photo excursion that documented some of the doomed farm buildings.  This image was captured with a TL-120-55 modified with Sam Smith’s machined lens board, using Scala film and processed in dr5’s DEV 2 (sepia).

ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS FOR LIFE“ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS FOR LIFE” – No need for an explanation.  Captured with a TL-120-1 on Fuji 220 film using a modified winding sequence (with the red window gaffer taped shut).  Processed with a CPP-2 Jobo unit in my basement bathroom.

Matt Neima – August 2016

Matt hasn’t shot alot of film lately, but still wanted to participate in this loop of the folio. Since members of Folio B haven’t seen any of his images, I suggested that I be allowed to pick out four slides from his past body of work for submission to the Folio. He agreed and asked me to curate.  My image descriptions will also serve as my comments.  Matt usually shoots with Fuji Provia 100F film (not for “Ferry Dock” of course), and a Sputnik.  He has also owned two incarnations of the TL-120 – a TL-120-1, and a TL-120-55.  As these selections span seven years,  I’m not sure which camera or film was used for each one.

MATT NEIMA ALBION FALLS“Albion Falls” – captured in Hamilton, Ontario,  Summer 2004 – I selected this shot for its composition, varied lighting, depth and detail.  That particular area of Hamilton / Ancaster is home to a great number of waterfalls.  Matt has captured a lovely rendering of one of them.

MATT NEIMA PRETTY WOMEN“Pretty Women” – Misha, Sandra and Kim,  in Matt’s backyard,  2009 – I selected this image simply because I think it’s a great portrait.  You can invent your own back stories for the expressions on the women’s faces.  Thought went into the stereo composition – there are foreground elements,  the main subjects, and a slightly soft background which serves to highlight the main subjects.

MATT NEIMA LAKE HURON“Lake Huron” – captured in Pinery Provincial Park,  2010 – As you may know, it’s not easily to properly expose snow.  Especially when it’s 30 below, ho ho ho.  I like the repeating hilly motif from foreground to mid-shore.

MATT NEIMA SELF TITLED“Self Titled (Ferry Dock)” – captured in Vancouver’s Ferry Market 2011 – I selected this image for the wonderful use of the dr5 process, the composition, subject matter and the sharpness of detail.

Matt died of cancer October 1, 2016. His generosity and support for his friends will be missed. [JRT October 3, 2016]

Corn Dogs and Lemonade

Corndogs and Lemonade low

CNE midway

 

I spent a whole afternoon scouting angles for shooting time exposures at the Canadian National Exhibition midway. After I had shot two rolls of my well planned scenes, I had one frame left over. I quickly looked around for a nice angle and took this image to finish the roll. It was the best one of the lot. I feel quite fortunate that two spotlights on the corn dog stand were burnt out. Either one would have made this shot impossible, or at least very diminished.

TL-120, Provia 100f, f22, four second exposure (I’m pretty sure).

 

Flowers on Stone

Juneau is a gold mining town. WA070Every where you turn, you find remnants of the placer and hard-rock mining. South of Juneau, a pier stand abandoned in the water. Its pilings are bleached and trees grow from its surface. On the shore stand the pillars which supported the rail-line out to the pier.

When it was a working facility, the ships from Seattle would dock here in Dupont to offload their cargo of dynamite. It would be trundled down the rail-line to an elevated warehouse along the shore. From there, smaller loads would be transported by boat to the mines in Treadwell, Douglas, and Juneau.

Excepting the iron bits, the pier, dock, and warehouse were built from local materials. This image may be better named, Flowers From Stone, as the concrete is covered with the efflorescence from the beach sand and gravel.

I tried to set the focus and aperture to let the distant pier fall out of focus. I think I could have opened the aperture a bit more.

Lunch on Ice

Once again, I’m chasing the retreating ice.WA069 More often than not, there is now a kayak pulled up on the rocks after I’ve walked all the way out. It would be a lot quicker way to arrive than on foot!

In this case, this group arrived in a pair of kayaks and settled in for lunch before doing their exploring. The “rock” they are on is actually a gravel-covered block of ice. The ice will melt over the next couple of months, leaving only a pile of sand and gravel. The fall rains and winter snow will probably wash the remaining sand down into the lake by spring.

The area of darkened ice on the face of the glacier is an area where the under-ice river flows out into the lake. The in-rushing water is leaving ripples in the otherwise still lake.

Submission 2014

I wanted to dedicate my submission this year to David Lee, who was a great master of medium format 3d and who I was lucky enough to meet.  His work has been an inspiration to me.

  1. Busan Igidae park, this was a beautiful park, this picture was taken on a windy day with the waves crashing in the foreground, and the Busan skyline, and bridge in the background. This was shot with the tl120 at f/11 1/250.
  2. Gyeogju, this is a hyperstereo with 50 foot separation Fuji gf670w fuji velvia.
  3. San Francisco. I took this picture in San Francisco, please excuse, the ship motion artifacts between the two shots. Fuji gf670w 60 foot separation.  David Lee met me and drove me up to the viewpoint for this shot.
  4. Gyeongju temple:  This is a wooden bell in the temple on one of the excursions of ISU Korea 2015.

Thank you for allowing me to share my work.  I have enjoyed yours on this round

Nik Sekhar

Do Not Talk To Prisoners Through Bars!

burnet-barsaTaken in Burnet, Texas in 2014. This historic jail was built in 1884 of hand-hewn rock. It has an apartment for the sheriff who is also the jailer. On the second floor the county library was founded. The former jail is still being used by one of the county departments. The city of Burnet is nestled in the heart of the Texas Hill Country surrounded by rolling hills, lakes, beautiful geologic formations and historical sites. The historic square features buildings from as early as the 1880’s and offers a variety of unique shops and eateries. Drive in or take the Hill Country Flyer Historic Train (which is what we did) from Cedar Park, located on the edge of Austin. Watch the Burnet Gunfighter’s fight it out at the Old West Town on Saturday and Sunday. Taken with the TL120, available light handheld.

 

 

On Spaulding Meadow

The Spaulding Meadows are popular all year round. These are not meadows with cultivated hay fields. These are meadows in the second sense of the word, being areas of grass and flowers near the treeline. In the winter, they are very popular ski destinations, but the snowfall was so scant this year that there was virtually no skiing at all. They will often have snow in them until May, but by February 2015, the snow was gone. The images in this set are from a pair of trips I made to try to capture the combination of snow-free meadows and low-angle light.

Scan000118Spaulding Ponds

The ponds and pools in the meadows were still solid enough to walk across, so it made for very easy access to all corners of this space. I nestled in under a couple of trees to try to capture the frosty glint on the branch tips. I provided a little bit of fill-flash in an attempt to brighten the gloom under the trees.

Scan000119Two Towers

Despite the level of the clouds, I think you can gauge the height of the sun. This was about noon, so you can see that the sun doesn’t get very high in Juneau in the winter. I think this image effectively contains infinity without containing a horizon. This is a very common condition in Southeast Alaska. The weather is very close and we are often hiking in the clouds at less than 1,000 of elevation. This image was made at about 800‘ with my TL120-55.

Scan000117Spaulding Close Up

While enjoying a cup of tea and taking in my surroundings, I found myself staring at a tree. My attention was drawn to a low-lone branch. And further drawn to the tufts of needles on a twig on that branch. And here it is. I would have liked to close in on a single tuft, but the TL120-1 can’t focus closely enough.

Impermanence

Scan000120Glaciers are slow. In idiomatic English, to move at a “glacial pace” is to move so slowly that a casual observer will not notice the movement at all. Yet over the years I’ve been making images featuring glacial ice, the rate of observable change is phenomenally fast. Even as I compose and capture an image, the ice is melting and the image is disappearing. The majestic, glowing cavern of today is the rotted, open-top canyon of the next week. It is dry open rock the week after that.

The folks at Extreme Ice Survey make time-lapse images of melting ice around the world. Two of their cameras are trained on “my” glacier, the Mendenhall, and their one-minute video covers seven years of activity. Time-lapse video is an excellent medium to convey the enormous change which takes place at a “glacial pace”. I don’t have an MF3D time-lapse video. I create still images. I offer you only a single still, and ask, “How do we identify the ghosts?”

Today, fourteen months after that image was made, those ghostly people still walk the planet. The blue palace at which they marveled melted off into the ocean long ago.

[Edited July 8, 2015 to add]

I visited the ice this week and am saddened by what I found. Because of the continued ice-recession, the walk is much longer and harder than it was a few years ago, and the destination is a pathetic shadow of its former self.  This may be the final image of my ice series.

From our guest, Matt Neima

Killarney Park

Before I forget, thanks to Steven Lederman for scanning these pictures for me! I think this was Delta 100 and processed by DR5.

This picture was taken on the chikanishing trail. Spoiler for me is the right image has a reflection or something that once you see it (sorry!) it becomes very distracting.

I wonder if it’s possible to touch up the emulsion to fix this….

Rondeau Park

Talk about harsh lighting! I think this went around in the IMF3D folio. Some people liked it, some people really didn’t like it. This was taken with my Spud a long long time ago.

Ricketts Glen

Taken with the TL-120 in Pennsylvania on a camping trip with James Mutch. There are a lot of waterfalls in a small area here. At one waterfall J and I watched a pro photographer taking a classic fall colour waterfall shot. His assistant held a maple branch with red leaves in front of the camera while he took pictures.

Whistler

Taken with a TL-120 on the same trip to Vancouver a few years back. At that time I posted a picture of my nephew on his roller skates. I’m hoping this is a new image to this folio.