big eyes

Back when I started my first photography blog I had a digital SLR that I used to take everywhere. I was still undecided what I would shoot, but I was drawn to little details, urban landscapes and structures. It took me a long time to start shooting street and it was mostly my loud and big SLR that held me back. Nevertheless, when you’re shooting structures, SLRs are very nice cameras. Testing the Canon FTb reminded me of this time shooting structures, although I was much more brave with the FTb and occasionally even pointed it at people without a big zoom lens. I enjoyed this walk with the FTb and the results speak for themselves. Definitely a nice camera!

By the way, although I’ve been shooting quite a bit of XP2 lately, I haven’t shown you much of the results yet. This is because I actually pushed these rolls without knowing that pushing C41 film in black and white chemistry is not going to work too well. I developed one of the pushed rolls, but I think I didn’t get too much speed increase out of the half an hour longer development time, although this would normally already be a 2 stop push. I guess I will have to try pushing them in the C41 kit if I want any shadow detail at all. I actually suspect that stand-developed in Rodinal the XP2 doesn’t quite reach ISO 400 either, because the few times I shot it at box speed I got very contrasty negatives with less shadow detail than I expected. Roger, who originally recommended XP2 in Rodinal to me, actually shoots this stuff at ISO 200 and develops it half an hour longer (i.e. like you would develop a 2 stop push rather than a 1 stop pull) for increased shadow detail. When the weather is less gloomy I will definitely need to try this. Until then I will shoot the XP2 either at box speed or pushed in C41 chemistry. In any case, at box speed this stuff is beautiful, even if the shadows could use some more detail.

I will definitely have lots of opportunity to experiment with pushed film, because I shot most of the rolls on this trip at ISO 1600. I think the next experiment will be to push some of these rolls in Caffenol-CL. Since I developed my first roll in coffee in September I have developed quite a number of rolls in this really very nice developer – more than 15 -, but have yet to try it for pushing. I usually push in Rodinal, but after getting such nice results from Caffenol at box speed I might as well give it a try for pushing as well.

In case you’re wondering, I actually shot a roll of colour film yesterday on a walk in the nearest forest / park. It was miserably cold and rainy, so that I actually had some shots left on the roll when we came back. I finished these today with some shots of the Christmas tree. It can’t really be Christmas without that!

All pictures taken with: Canon FTb and Canon FD 50mm f/1.8.
Ilford XP2 stand-developed in Rodinal 1:100, 60min.

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

I was actually not shooting candid street that day, but sometimes it happened anyway.

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

Another one from afar.

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

Delicious black and white! Probably my favourite of this bunch.

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

Before I shot mostly street, I was drawn to this sort of thing.

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

© Lilly Schwartz 2014

And of course I had to test the focus at f/1.8.

Comments

  • Shoot XP2 on iso 200-250. Then a standard C-41 development. If you want to shoot this film above iso 400 it is better to add for each F stop 30-40S extra C-41 developing time.

    • Lilly Schwartz

      Ah, so it rates at 200-250 anyway? Well then that explains things. I’ll try it and C41 and see what I think. I quite like it in Rodinal though.

  • The first photo is truly a wow photo !

    • Lilly Schwartz

      Thanks a lot Zuhair!

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