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Fashion: suited up backstage at OFW 2012

Wednesday, August 28th, 2013

These shots are from backstage at the Oxford Fashion Week Couture  show which was held at the Ashmolean Museum here in Oxford towards the end of last year. I’ve been meaning to post these but didn’t get around it and as tomorrow evening there is another Oxford Fashion Week event being held there I thought it timely to put these up. The backstage area was in one of the massive halls of the Ashmolean but the lights had been turned off at the far end where all of the male models were waiting around to go  line up for the catwalk which made it extremely difficult for me to manually focus my camera. It’s a miracle that any of these are in focus. I was holding my camera with one hand and a flash on a light stand with a big white umbrella with my other hand which provided the lighting in these shots and I’m very pleased with how they turned out. The outfits and styling was by the Clements & Church team who worked non-stop all evening.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi 645, 75mm/2.8 lens, loaded with Kodak Portra 400 film. Developing and scanning by Ag Photolab.

Oxford: lunch hour session

Tuesday, August 27th, 2013

These images are all from the same roll of film made on two consecutive days last week. There’s a big demolition project underway in Jericho at the moment which is close to where I work so I decided to head over there to make some images of the area before it’s all gone. While I was there I had a little wander around some of the Jericho streets and found it to be rather a nice little area to photograph with lots of interesting buildings and architectural details that would be easily missed if you’re not looking with photography in mind. So often we overlook things that are right on our doorstep and that’s certainly the case here. I’m going to make an effort to explore Jericho a little more in the near future.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi 645, 75mm/2.8 lens, loaded with expired Ilford FP4, processed in Kodak HC110 1+31 for 7mins.

Photo shoot: Georgina

Monday, March 11th, 2013

Some rolls of colour film that I sent off to a photo lab for processing and scanning a week ago arrived back this morning and it was nice to see shots from lots of different photo shoots among them, mostly from the end of last year. I usually do all of my own processing and scanning but colour is tricky during the winter because the temperature of the chemicals needs to be kept within a very small tolerance (less than 0.5 of a degree) and my studio where I usually do my processing is an ice box during the winter. After building up a small batch of exposed colour film I decided to test out a new lab I had heard about rather than wait until the weather warms up in the spring and because I usually struggle a bit with colour scanning I went for the option to have the lab do it for me. I’ll drip feed the scans instead of cramming them all in together.

Here are a few shots from a lunch hour shoot I had with Georgina (I think at the beginning of December). We lucked out with the weather and nice wintery sunshine on that day. These were some of the last shots I made and the ones I was most excited to see, especially the two portrait shots where the sun is backlighting but also bouncing off a stone wall behind me to give a soft front light (one of my favourite kinds of light). These shots have had zero retouching done to them, one of the many joys of shooting with film.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi loaded with Kodak 160VC.

One of my favourite kinds of light.

In front of the Sheldonian Theatre.

 

Oxford: Lunch hour session

Wednesday, February 20th, 2013

When the sun comes out so do lots of people to the streets of Oxford. You can feel a completely different buzz on the street when the weather is nice. People seem to be in a much happier mood and that makes for perfect conditions to do some street portrait photography. These shots were all made during the same lunch hour photo walk. I particularly like the shot of Mo, the cat that belongs to James (aka Cowboymod), the hairdresser on Walton Street.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi, 75mm lens, loaded with Kodak Tri-X 400, processed in Rodinal 1:50.

Oxford: Lunch hour session

Monday, December 10th, 2012

Some images from a lunch hour photo walk back in early November. The film was expired Tri-X that I think was dated 2002 which explains the grain and base fogging. I quite like the dated look to these images, there will be more to come from the same roll.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi, 75mm/f2.8 lens, loaded with expired (2002) Kodak Tri-X. Processed in Rodinal (1:100) for 1 hour.

Shop window, Turl St.

Footpath closed

Bicycle, St Giles.

Photo shoot: Georgina

Thursday, December 6th, 2012

These images are all from the same roll of film that I shot during a recent lunch break photo shoot I had with Georgina who I first met at the Haute Couture show during Oxford Fashion Week 2012. What’s not apparent here is the amazing colour palette we had in these shots. The light was perfect and after I finished this roll of black & white I shot some images in colour but that roll is still in my camera because I ran out of time to finish it. Georgina was very nice to work with – very relaxed and easy going – and I hope we can collaborate some more after the new University term starts in the new year.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi with 150mm/f3.5 lens loaded with Fuji Acros 100, processed in Kodak HC110 (b) for 5:30.

Oxford: Backstage during Oxford Fashion Week 2012

Saturday, November 17th, 2012

These images span two shows, The Elysium Show (held at Oxford Town Hall) and The Haute Couture Show (held at the Ashmolean Museum). All of these images are from the same roll of film. There are only 15 frames on the roll so I had to exclude some here because I wanted to make a neat grid. I’ll post the others in a different post. This was the first time I had used Kodak TMAX 400 film in many years so this was somewhat a bit of a test to see how it would cope in low light being pushed 2 stops. I’m stunned at how fine the grain is and how smooth the tones are considering the harsh lighting conditions I was working in (overhead ceiling lights). The results look better than the Tri-X I shot at the same time.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi with 75mm lens, loaded with Kodak TMAX 400 film, rated at ISO 1600. Processed in Kodak HC110 for 7.5mins.

Oxford: Lunch hour session

Wednesday, November 14th, 2012

To break up all of the images I have to post from Oxford Fashion Week we return to our regularly scheduled programming to bring you images of some people that I photographed during my lunch hour photo walks around Oxford city centre. These are mostly from the same day. You’ll notice some familiar faces in amongst this set. I’m very pleased with how these all turned out.

[Tech info:] Bronica ETRSi, 75mm and 50mm lenses. Fuji Acros 100 film stand developed in Rodinal 1:100 for 1 hour. Note the top left image was made on expired (2002) Tri-X. I meant to semi-stand and agitate at the 30min mark but I was processing some other film at the same time and forgot.