My Agave

My agave...

Big Tree

Sequoia National Park, summer 2012.

Chilly Trees

Big Sky, December.

Another roll working its way - a bit too slowly - through the Holga. Have been working on a theme and it takes a while to track down (or stumble upon) appropriate subjects. 

Green and White and Blue

It's a funky thing, that Holga. Part of the fun is never knowing how it will render what you're shooting. Black and white works better when the shutter shudders, at least to my eye. So I was pleased to see the color images from the trip to Montana come back sharp. Using Fuji Pro 160.

Snow

It's hot and muggy in Los Angeles, and it's got me thinking of snow and Montana.

Bayside, Jersey Shore

There are times when I can't decide whether to stomp on this plastic contraption or swear I'll never use another camera. For all the frustration it gives me - even on this roll, where some images I needed sharp are wobbly - I suppose the pleasure of the Holga is in never knowing what you'll get. There is something about conceiving an image and waiting, letting it take shape in your memory as you await the film to come back from processing, that's very satisfying. More satisfying, though in a different way, than the immediacy of the digital camera.

Surfers

Shot this a little over a year ago in La Jolla, before I got over the desire to economize and switched to shoot only 12-exposure (square) images. Another note: all the earlier images, that is those shot up until the last month, were scanned from either proofs or machine prints. I've since switched to having the negs scanned at the time of processing. Means a little photoshop work, but saves trees and means there's no dust from my scanner getting in the way...

Fiddling Around

Most everything I post here is pretty straightforward: I scan the print (or contact sheet, as the case may be) and post full frame images. I was noodling around, though, and was prompted to try stretching some of the Holga images in Photoshop. This one, shot at the Jersey Shore last summer, seemed ripe for pulling out from the original's square. Probably won't post a lot of these, like to play it straight, but thought the effect of adding to the distortion around the edges was a nice enhancement of the Holga's innate weaknesses (and appeal).

The Crawl

The beach offers a lot of opportunity with the Holga - the softness of the sand and water coupled with the soft focus of the plastic lens. This horseshoe crab was scampering across the beach in front of me and, since they are usually only on the beach in their deceased state, I was lucky to capture it.

First Out

So what to lead with? There was a color shot taken early on that made me fall back in love with the texture of film, a richness that the Holga was able to capture far better (at least without Photoshop skills much better than my own) than a digital SLR. But most of the stuff I've shot has been in black and white, and the L.A. images are at the other site, so I start off with this one, taken in late December 2007 in Big Sky, Montana.