Taking a Pentax 67 out and about

/

The light was really nice this morning

One of the things about old cameras is that they like a bit of exercise. And, with the weight of some of them they give you a bit of exercise too. Ho ho. (With the increasing use of ChatGPT in these hallowed pages I feel I must make it clear that I personally came up with that line). Anyhoo, I loaded the Pentax 67 up with a roll of film and took it round the block today. The good news is that the camera made all the right clunking noises when I pressed the button. I processed the film and the pictures are all in the right place too which is nice (and not guaranteed with this model of camera). You get an awful lot of detail with a big negative, and the perspective of the lens is really nice.

More of these are coming to our area thanks to the wonders of de-regulation…

Pictures not of trees

/

Not sure about the passer-by

If you think my life has turned into a succession of days when I take an old camera out, rattle off a few snaps and then rush home and process them, you might not be far wrong. But then again, I am supposed to be on holiday. Or something. Yesterday it was the turn of the super-heavy Pentax 67 camera. This takes amazing pictures every now and then. I’d wanted one for ages and this year I’ve managed to get one of the earliest versions. I’m painfully aware of the possibility that the next time I wind on to the next frame there will be a twang or a whizzing sound and that will be that. But today all went well. We had a wander round the Fruit Market in Hull and we were blessed with nice light and some very impressive clouds. I’ve just got the shots off the scanner…..

Spurn lifeboat looking good

Hull tidal Barrier

The Deep

Humber Street

Developed in Rodinol 1+50 for 9 minutes. Negatives look quite dense, but otherwise OK. The last shot ran off the end of the film, so I might want to position the next film 1cm or so before the arrow mark in the camera next time I use it.

Pentax 67 at Hornsea Mere

/

Quite pleased with the detail in the clouds. Less pleased that the clouds were there in the first place…

Hornsea Mere is one of my favourite places on earth. Which is nice because it’s just down the road from our house. We went there for a coffee today. We could have had a round of golf too, but the weather didn’t really merit it, and we were missing our golfing enthusiast.

It was a bit windy for rowing

I took some pictures with the Pentax 67 camera. This takes huge pictures (you could fit around 50 Minox pictures on one Pentax frame). It is great fun to use but I’m still getting used to it. I was using some outdated film (expired in 2016) but I still got some reasonable results from it.

It looks even better with the lens cap off..

The Pentax 67 is a big heavy camera which is a bit hard to use and difficult to focus. I love it.

Roll film developing mayhem

/

This film had some lovely pictures on

This is turning into a photography blog. But I can live with that. I’ve started developing my own pictures. The starting point of the process is getting the film out of the roll and into the plastic spiral that goes inside the developing tank. I put the film and the developing tank into a light tight bag with elasticated holes for my hands. I then wrestle the film into the spiral (which reminds me of a pinball game), put the tank and then take it upstairs to add the chemicals etc.

The first time I did this it just worked and I was quite smug about this. The universe must have heard me. After a couple more successful loads I had a complete failure. I actually got cross with the whole thing (a very rare thing for me) and the result was one ruined film. Oh well. At least it gives me a spare film to practice with. I had similar problems today, but this time I had a plan. I rolled the film back onto the spool, put the roll of film into the developing tank (along with the black light-tight centre piece) and took my hands out of the bag for a breather. Then I got my old film and spent twenty minutes practicing until I could do it with my eyes closed (which was kind of the point). Then I tried it again and after a couple of false starts I managed to get the film into the drum and take it upstairs to process. Turns out that its necessary to practice once you’ve used up all your beginner’s luck.

“portrait of the artist as an old man..”

I was quite pleased with how the pictures came out.

This is my standard “tree test” picture. Now with added leaves.

“Bark and bokeh”