EH - stills blog

Non-Holga but still interesting

2011-11-17T08:34:00.000-08:00

I took this one on my cell phone of my friend (and lead actor) Paul D. when we were at the opening of our film The Last City in the East. I have a non-photographer habit of hating to take photos during events because I don't want to remove myself mentally from them. And then I regret it later. This time I had my non-famous brand cell phone, this late night picture came out cool.

Photos from France - part 1

2011-08-02T21:25:00.000-07:00

This bunch was taken with a Holga, a Windsor (Diana clone) and a Lomo LCA (russian). I used a variety of Kodak film, I think it was Porta 100 and 400, and TriX, but I don't remember the specifics anymore.

The main thing I learned was certain cameras are easier to haul around, but what made shooting fun was to have a variety of cameras to pick from each day, and plenty of film to burn through. (That said, I'm pretty careful with costs, so I didn't actually use that many rolls, I just composed carefully.)

Like all my other pics, these are uncropped, for better or for worse.

2011-03-15T14:10:00.005-07:00

2011-03-15T14:10:00.003-07:00

2011-03-15T14:10:00.001-07:00

2011-03-15T14:09:00.007-07:00

2011-03-15T14:09:00.005-07:00

2011-03-15T14:09:00.003-07:00

2011-03-15T14:08:00.003-07:00

2011-03-15T14:08:00.001-07:00

2010-03-23T13:35:00.000-07:00

lots of black, yet clearly daytime in the summer

2010-03-16T11:09:00.000-07:00

Holga - a boy and his stick

2010-03-14T14:57:00.000-07:00

2010-03-10T11:45:00.000-08:00

2010-03-09T09:18:00.000-08:00

Holga - burned! But still interesting.

The water, in contrast, looks like black oil.

2010-03-05T08:38:00.001-08:00

Another Holga from the castle series. I like the light chute - otherwise it's just "okay".

2010-03-03T08:40:00.000-08:00

Holga - w/flash & lantern

2010-03-01T10:01:00.000-08:00

Holga - two summers ago. Serious business.

2010-02-26T09:39:00.000-08:00

Holga

2010-02-25T22:35:00.000-08:00

Holga - color! Happy!

2010-02-24T14:02:00.000-08:00

Holga - same day as prevoius post.
White knucle ride.

2010-02-22T18:17:00.000-08:00

Holga - Puyallup fair '07 or '06?
Everyone's doing something different.

2010-02-16T09:36:00.000-08:00

Holga - don't remember when.... perhaps because it's timeless?

2010-02-11T09:28:00.000-08:00

Holga - the boy.

2010-02-08T12:58:00.000-08:00

Holga - this was a long time ago but look how silky the color and image is. The air is "soft", as the Irish say.

2010-02-05T11:01:00.000-08:00

Holga - this roll got fried by the airport xray machine but a couple pictures still looked kinda cool. Like this one!
It turns out that the xray machine they use for humans is more intense than the one for luggage. Nowadays I just hand them the camera and ask for a hand-check. They always look at me like "what's wrong with you?" when I hand them the Holga, and go "is this a camera?"
Back in the 70's, I coulda said "Smile when you say that."

2010-02-03T09:11:00.000-08:00

Holga - macro - curb of the old house

2010-02-01T11:26:00.000-08:00

Holga with built-in flash, plus light from camping lantern.

2010-01-31T22:55:00.000-08:00

Testing my first new Holga in about 7 years, in Summer '09. New Holgas now come with foam inserts to keep the spools from drifting, but I like the DIY cardboard shim method better.

On the first roll I took with this camera, the insert made the film too tight and it was slightly damaged. On this roll, the insert came unglued and I found it wrapped up in the roll when I took it out. Only one picture was slightly damaged (try that with digital!) but I sealed the deal by removing all the foam and rubbing away the glue, and making a nice new shim for the roll out of a square from the film box.

Anyway, I hate foam. It alwasy ends up deteriorating into a tar-like paste after a few years.

2010-01-27T16:57:00.000-08:00

I love this one - I used one of those SplitCams you can get at Archie McPhee for ten bucks. Most of the pictures were total garbage, but this one came out great.

2010-01-25T10:17:00.000-08:00

2010-01-25T10:11:00.000-08:00

2010-01-23T19:11:00.000-08:00

Holga w/macro lens taped to front, Summer 2004

2010-01-23T19:08:00.000-08:00

Holgo, Fall '06

2010-01-23T19:05:00.000-08:00

Holga, summer '09

Introduction

2010-01-23T12:02:00.001-08:00

I've been shooting with toy and Lomo cameras for the last 8 years, but this is the first time I've scanned my prints.

A lot of what's on this page will be shot with one of my Holga cameras, some as-is out of the box, some modified with tape and stuff to shoot close-up, macro, and some using the built-in flash on the later cameras.

My first Holga came without the foam inserts they put in now. We'd stick a hunk of cardboard from the film box under the spool so it wouldn't wobble. I think this is the best method, to the extent that I ripped the foam out of my newer cameras. The reason is twofold:

1. the foam once made the film too tight and stretched it so hard some of the emulsion came off and wrecked two of my pictures.

2. the foam fell off mid-roll and got wrapped into the shot roll of film. This only affected one of my shots (try this with digital!) but I decided that the ugly foam is not worth anything, and frankly, I'm fond of the cardboard shim system.