This last month was such a wonderful adventure! I’ve finally been to another continent, I have seen the moon from the southern hemisphere and danced tango in Buenos Aires of all places! Could it get any better than this? Well, the pictures, they could make it even better if they turn out well too! I actually already developed the 2 rolls that I shot in that little bar in Barracas one night at tango and I’m really happy with how they turned out. They have so much character and although I was mostly shooting at ISO 1600 with the amazing speed of 1/15 I didn’t only get blur and grain! And if the two most difficult rolls didn’t disappoint me, I’m really curious about the other rolls. They will have to wait until I get my Fuji Hunt C41 Kit in the mail though, because I want them all to be processed in the same chemicals rather than switch from the Tetenal kit to the Fuji kit halfway through.
In any case, the trip wasn’t only great photographically and as a travel experience. In fact, I also made quite a bit of progress with my work on the PhD, finding books I couldn’t get in Europe, locating archives, contacting people and hatching new ideas. I’m already working my way through all these new inspirations and I think it will all combine nicely with some of the photography projects I’m planning.
Speaking of projects: As you might know, I’ve been working on perfecting my push-processing techniques and I think I’ve reached the limit with Rodinal and classic grain film. If I want to shoot from the hip in badly lit places like train stations and on the subway, I will have to change my technique a bit if I want less grain. Next up on this venture are tests with pushed T-Max developed in Xtol. As someone who just can’t get warm with fine grain film it’s rather amusing to finally find a reason to use the stuff. By the way, from the examples I’ve seen, I somehow doubt that the combination will perform any better than what I can get out of RPX400 with Rodinal. I’m willing to give it a try though.
All pictures taken with: Leica M6 + Zeiss ZM C-Biogon 35mm f/2.8.
RPX400 @3200 stand-developed in Rodinal.