In our photography we use well established rules to help us compose our images. Although one shouldn’t be too restrained by so called ‘Rules’ they do provide a starting point, when learning, to compose a pleasing image. These compositional rules have been well established for years and been used by artists.
There are also other aspects of fine art that can be helpful in creating a good image with impact. We have discussed in the past how we can use ‘figure to ground’ in photography to make a subject stand out by contrast against the background.
Many Street photographers adjust their exposure value to create dark shadows devoid of any detail which creates a dynamic graphical shape within the image. They may also use direct light to illuminate the main subject within that dark graphical shape.
This method of creating an image with strong contrasts between light and dark is known as Chiaroscuro, an Italian word literary meaning ‘Light-Dark’. In painting it is used to suggest volume and modelling in the subject.
A master of the use of chiaroscuro was the artist Caravaggio. A good example of his is ‘Calling of St Matthew’.
A favourite contemporary artists of mine who also demonstrates a good use of light in their pastel paintings is the Canadian artist Sally Strand.
In her words she explains her use of light within her paintings:
‘I relate to small moments of life that are often overlooked. These moments resonate with me because they are familiar—we see ourselves in them. They sometimes suggest things beyond the obvious. Painting mundane objects or tasks provides me with a challenge to portray the commonplace in a compelling way, to make the usual unusual and worthy of notice. ‘
This is also a good video where Strand explains how she sees the different light values: https://youtu.be/axlnVZjCjNA
Developer: Fomadon R09 (same as Rodinal) diluted 1+200.
Patterson developing tank.
One of my more recent projects in the darkroom has been to explore further options on how to process my black and white film.
I would in the past just follow the normal method of a 30 second agitation and then 4 inversions of the developing tank every minute. This over the normal timing of somewhere between 8 to 16 seconds depending on film and ISO rating.
The dilution of the developer would be 1+1 of 1+3 for something like Ilford ID11. For Fomadon R09 or Rodinal it would be the normal 1+25 or 1+50 dilution. Temperature would be 20° Centigrade.
I have though seen mention of what is called Stand Development which is using a very dilute developer and just leaving the film tank standing for a very long time, usually about an hour without agitation.
I have in the past been put off by problems others encounter using this method such as bromide drag which leaves streaks on the negatives. It’s always seemed to me to make sense to create the situation where the exposed film emulsion gets influenced by active developer equally across the surface.
However, I thought it might be time to attempt this method on a roll of film exposed for this purpose and wouldn’t be missed if it all went wrong.
I have been reading the books ‘The Art of Black and White Developing’ by John Finch and ‘Ilford Monochrome Darkroom Practice’ by Jack H Coote.
Bishops Stortford on a misty evening.
I was keen to see if I could increase the acutance of the negatives by inducing something called the adjacency effect. This is where bromide, a by product of the action, collects at boundaries of high to low density.
This bromide inhibits local development along the line of these boundaries and creates what is known as a Mackie line which increases perceived sharpness along these lines. The one problem of this release of bromide is that it can also cause streaking on the negatives caused by the bromide falling to the bottom of the tank when it is left standing without agitation.
Bishops Stortford on a misty evening.
So, having thought I would give stand development a try I read in the ‘Art of Black and White Developing’ that Rodinal type of film developers are good for this style of stand developing.
It was recommended that the dilution was 1+200 and the development time be 2 hours so that is what I decided to use. I chose Fomadon R09 developer which is a similar type to Rodinal and the film I chose was Fomapan 200.
I stood the developing tank in a water bath at 20° centigrade so that the temperature wouldn’t drop too far during the 2 hour time.
Bishops Stortford on a misty evening.
I shot the film at 100 ISO rating to ensure good detail capture in the shadow areas.
The images were taken on some very dim and misty days in December and I was very pleased with the results and didn’t get any bromide drag streaks on the negatives. I will definitely try this method again.
Bishops Stortford on a misty evening.
The first series show the evening shots. I also took some on a very dull day on a walk along an old unused railway line.
Along the old Buntingford branch line.Along the old Buntingford branch line.
How to create a PDI multi-image document for something like a triptych.
Creating document.
With Affinity Photo open – Click on File – New
Dialogue box opens – Click on ‘My Presets’ so we can save our document for later use.
Under ‘Layout’ on the right set document units to ‘Pixels’ .
To create a landscape document set width to 1600pixels and height to 1200pixels. Make sure you have the orientation set to ‘Landscape’.
If you want a portrait format you can just click on orientation ‘Portrait’
If you want a square format then just change the 1600pixels to 1200pixels.
Other settings:
DPI: 300
Colour format: RGB/8
Colour Profile: sRGB
Before you go any further you can click on ‘+Custom’ at the top and it will save these settings under ‘My Presets’ for later use. If you right click in the preset you’ve just created you can rename it.
Click on: ‘Create’
We now have a document of the size open with a white background.
Changing background colour.
At this point you can change the colour of the background. I like to use a 30% grey background.
Go to the tab ‘Colour’ on the right and click on ‘Greyscale’
Move the slider to 30 for a 30% greyscale or any other shade you wish to use.
Using the ‘Flood Fill’ tool click on the background and you should now have a 30% greyscale background ready to place your photos on.
Placing images.
Click on ‘File’ – ‘Place’ and chose an image from wherever you have stored your images.
Click and drag on the image background you have created and this will place the first image. Don’t worry too much about the size and position of the image as this can be adjusted once all images are on your background.
Make sure at this stage that you have the ‘snapping’ set to on at the top as this is useful in aligning the images once you’ve placed them on the background. You can move the images to the edge of the background and pick up the centre snap shown as a green line that pops up or move them near the other images to use the alignment of edges snap shown as a red line. You can click on each image and resize and reposition as required until you have the final setup.
You can also place text on your final layout by using the ‘Text Frame’ tool. Text can also be aligned by using the same snap alignment tools.
Text type size etc. can be changed by clicking on font et at the top of the page.
Saving the multi-image document.
Once satisfied then click on ‘File’ ‘Export’ and save your completed multi-image document to wherever you wish to save it.
As well as exporting to an image file of the type of your choice you can also save the file as an affinity file type .afphoto so that you can edit it further later.
Having just loaded up my Olympus OM2n with a roll of Rollei RPX 100 it has prompted me to write up my results from the last time I used this film
Back in 2019 I had a couple of days out with my Pentax P30 and SMC Pentax-M 50mm f1.7 lens and loaded with a 36 exposure roll of the Rollei RPX 100.
One day was spent through Bishops Stortford and the second day was Saffron Walden which is a lovely town in Essex, and a favourite of mine.
I developed the film in Ilford ID11 diluted 1:1 for 12 minutes at 20 deg C.
The camera that I used for the test.
My first location was on a walk through Bishops Stortford.
Bishops Stortford.
Top of Wind Hill, Bishops Stortford.
Looking down High Street, Bishops Stortford.
The Gourmet Turk restaurant which used to be The Boar’s Head pub.
Church Street, Bishops Stortford.
The multi-storey car park. Bishops Stortford.
My second location was the lovely town of Saffron Walden.
On the corner of Freshwell Street looking up Bridge Street toward High Street
Looking down Bridge Street Saffron Walden.Looking up Bridge Street, Saffron Walden.
I scanned the negatives using a Plustek 8100 scanner and was very pleased with the results. The negs have good tonal variation and contrast so it’s prompted me to stock up with some more of this film.
When I retired four years ago I decided to get back into more serious photography as a means of having an interest that I could pursue.
I joined the local photography club and started entering competitions. This was using a modern digital camera. However, I started seeing some good old film 35mm cameras on ebay which piqued my interest in maybe getting back and doing some retro film photography.
The Olympus OM2n that I used for these photos.
So, two years ago I started using old cameras and developing my own black and white films. The negatives would then be scanned to digital copies for use on social media etc.
That then, of course, led me to thinking that wouldn’t it be nice to get back to some old retro printing in the darkroom using traditional silver gelatin printing methods.
I had semi converted our loft in our house to a craft room 10 years ago. I had redirected the electrical wiring and extended lighting and power circuitry. Flooring was the next thing to go down followed by rooflights and insulating between the rafters. We are fortunate that our house has quite a high ridge line so the loft has a high area in the centre without having to disturb the main load bearing structure.
Flooring down and workbench installed within truss structure. Next stage is installing windows and insulating between rafters. I also stapled multi-foil insulation under the rafters for additional insulation.
I was also able to create workbench areas constructed off the load bearing trusses down each side of the roof. I was aware that I couldn’t put a lot of load on the roof structure so the way I had done it meant that it could never be used as a proper room and heavy things such as furniture couldn’t be put up there. It was though adequate to allow use for crafts as nothing I was using was heavy.
The room as it was converted was great as a craft room but we never really used it as such as we realized that as we are still capable of going out we would rather be out and about than stuck up in the loft doing crafts. For me the plan was to do model making and for Liz it was bead and card making.
So, we were quite happy to let things go and spend our time going out and the craft room didn’t really get used. Then, along came Covid 19 and we had a lot of spare time on our hands.
So, jump to 9 months ago and my current interest in doing some photographic printing. The first thing I had to do was to make some blackout curtains for the Velux windows. The windows which were a big advantage for craft work were something I could do without in a darkroom where you have to work only with a red safelight.
The darkroom all setup with the blinds in place and the red safelight on.
So, some material purchased from ebay along with self-adhesive velcro and I’d made the blackout blinds for the windows.
Next thing was the equipment required to produce prints from negatives. I used to do photographic printing as a teenager and had kept all the equipment, the enlarger, developing trays, safelight etc but here’s the cruck, when I was going to convert the loft I had decided I wasn’t going to use that anymore in the digital age so had chucked it in the council tip. I had tried giving it away but no one wanted it. At that point everyone thought that film photography had died.
Fortunately for me, 10 years later a fellow member of my photography club was clearing out his garage and wanted to just get rid of all the kit to do printing. It was actually better kit than I had before as that was purchased when I was a penniless teenager rather than a penniless pensioner.
So, next stage was to get all the kit up and running. It hadn’t been used for a while and some of the electronic things didn’t seem to work any more. So things like the enlarger timer were taken out of line and replaced with an ordinary in-line torpedo switch and the timing done with a mechanical timer.
In an ideal world a darkroom should have a wet area but for my room I had to make do with using a couple of the large plastic darkroom trays that I had acquired to wash the prints. All used chemicals and dirty water goes into a bucket and is carried down to the bathroom for disposal.
All set up and ready to go and an order sent off to Ilford Photo for some paper developing chemicals and Kentmere VC Select 10” x 8” silver gelatin paper. I setup an oil filled radiator in the loft. Although the heat from the house would rise up through the open loft door I did need to make sure that the temperature in the room was maintained at around 20 deg C. so additional heating was required.
An actual scan of a silver gelatin print produced in the darkroom. Henry Moore, Mother and Child.
I had been running out of subjects to photograph but fortunately the Henry Moore Gardens in Perry Green had decided to stay open in December so thought that would make a good subject for some film photography.
A scan of an actual darkroom print. I thought it was a good opportunity to get some close ups of the sculptures with water on them.
Whilst I have been using Ilford black and white films by preference I’d also been trying out using some unusual film. One such was Rollei Retro 400s which is actually a film originally produced in Belgium for aerial surveillance (more on that subject in another post). It is what is termed as super panchromatic and is sensitive to more of the red spectrum. I thought it would suit the subject of Henry Moore sculptures very well with it’s increased contrast.
My first trials were to actually test the effectiveness of my blackout arrangements. I set everything up and placed a coin on some photographic paper with all lights including the red safelight off for 20 minutes. Developing this showed no witness of the coin on the paper so that proved the blackout arrangements were OK.
Next test was with the previous arrangement but this time with the red safelight on. This proved that the safelight itself was effective in not fogging the paper.
I was using multigrade paper so set the colour head settings on the enlarger to give a grade 2 mid range contrast and my first set of prints were just to do a couple of test strips. First set 5 seconds apart to get the ball park figure then another set 2 seconds apart. I also established that the photos of the Henry Moore sculptures looked better with a bit more contrast so reset the colour head settings to give a grade 3 paper.
I did some 8” x 10” prints and were very pleased with the results. Unlike when trying to print using an inkjet printer the black were actually a warm tone black rather than a blue hue as produced by the inkjet.
I have also recently processed the higher contrast Rollei Retro 400s film and produced some prints from those which I’ve been very pleased with.
A document scan of a silver gelatin print produced in the darkroom. Rollei Retro 400s film.
A document scan of a silver gelatin print produced in the darkroom. Rollei Retro 400s film.
Next stage in my lockdown crafts is to mount and frame some of the photos. I think a set of three framed Henry Moore prints would look good on the wall.
My latest project whilst in lockdown is to increase the contrast of my black and white film photos. I’ve been reading about various new 35mm films that have come on the market that were designed for uses such as aerial surveillance or use in ATM machines. Even some that emulate the old black and white film stock produced for the movies in Germany. Many of these films are 2 to 3 times the price of my regular black and white films such as Ilford HP5+ or Fomapan 400.
This got me to thinking though that maybe I could emulate some of these films by using my regular film stock and altering exposure and development to increase contrast.
For a given film and developer the variables are duration of development, Temperature of developer and agitation. Activity (whether the solution is used more than once) can also be a variable but for these tests I’ve used one shot methods. Increasing development time increases both the density and the contrast of the negative image but also increases the speed of the film and the granularity of the image.
My test is carried out using a pair of my Olympus OM40s loaded with Ilford HP5+. I also used another roll in my Ricoh KR10 Super which I intended to shoot at box speed but then alter the agitation of the tank from 10 seconds each minute to 30 seconds each minute to see how that effects the final outcome.
The two Olympus Om40s that I used for the test.The Ricoh KR10 Super which had the third film loaded.
The Olympus camera exposure meters are set to the normal ‘off film’ setting for centre biased exposure. One camera will be shot using an E.V. of minus 2 to enhance depth of the shadow areas. This gives an effective film speed of 1600 ISO. This film will then be developed in Ilford ID11 diluted 1+1 for the regular time plus 20% to enhance the contrast. This will give me a development time of 15.5 minutes. The second camera is set to an E.V. of zero and the development time in ID11 diluted at 1+1 will be the regular 13 minutes.
The Ricoh was set to 400 ISO and the dilution was 1+3 to improve sharpness and also agitated 30 seconds every minute. This in contrast to 10 seconds every minute which is my normal method.
Maybe semi-stand development might be the answer, but that’s another test for another day.
My first test day was carried out during a walk through Marks Hall Arboretum. I thought trees would make a reasonable subject during these times when my ability to get into London for some architecture is limited. The day was a bit overcast so I thought this might show up better any increased contrast.
The test using the Ricoh was conducted on a bright and sunny day taking photographs of a church and a local wood.
In part Two I’ll be looking at the results and comparing the photographs!
A few experiments in printing black and white photographs.
These days we are all so used to instant gratification and seeing photographs almost instantly on social media. There is nothing to beat holding and viewing an actual printed photograph though.
I’ve recently rediscovered the pleasure of darkroom printing of my black and white photos onto silver gelatin paper. The experience of seeing the quality of the tonal range of a printed photo is quite something. This led me to thinking about doing a comparison between the same photo negatives scanned digitally and printed on an inkjet printer and those produced by the traditional darkroom process.
I should, at this stage, point out that I’ve had problems in the past producing black and white prints at home using my inkjet printer. They look acceptable until you put them against a good quality black and white reproduction. The inkjets always seem to have a slight blue tinge.
Scan of image printed using an Epson SX200 inkjet printer
The first example is a scan of an image printed using an Epson SX200 inkjet printer. This is a 4 cartridge printer with only one black cartridge.
Scan of an image printed on an Epson Stylus Photo 1500W printer.
Both of these prints appear to be not too bad but you can only really see the difference when put side by side as in the next image scan. As you can see, the image on the left lacks punch and has a distinct blue tinge. The image on the right was printed on an Epson Stylus Photo 1500W inkjet printer. This printer has six cartridges but still has only the one black cartridge. It appears though that it can achieve a much improved tonal range with richer blacks.
That’s until you compare the image from the 1500W to those produced by other methods. My next comparison was to compare the image above and on the right to those printed from my Smugmug site and have them delivered mail order and .
Left image printed on 1500W inkjet printer and that on the right from SmuMug site.
Not bad and the one on the left has a slight blue tinge. The one on the right commercially printed is definitely better but as they are reasonably priced and are delivered to me in 2 days it’s not really worthwhile printing from home.
As for quality, I know one can print better on an inkjet printer if you are prepared to pay a £1000 for the printer and up to £50 per cartridge for replacement cartridges. These printers usually have 9 cartridges because they include 3 shades of grey so that can mean and ongoing layout of £450 which is outside most people’s budget.
Before we leave this subject I should point out that the photographs used as examples were all taken on 35mm Ilford HP5+ film around the Barbican, London. So, I should say that there is one alternative to the above methods and that is going back to traditional methods of producing the print in the darkroom by printing from an enlarger onto silver gelatin paper. In my opinion this gives the best result in terms of the blacks really being black and the range of tones are fantastic. Of course, not everyone has the opportunity to use a darkroom but an interesting comparison all the same.
Print on the left printed with the Epson Stylus Photo 1500W. The one on the right is a silver gelatin print produced in the darkroom.
All photographs printed on lustre finish premium quality paper.
Whilst we have had restricted travel I’ve been lucky enough to be able to visit the Henry Moore Gardens and Studios. It’s just a few minutes drive from where I live and just a few weeks ago I took the opportunity of a stroll around the grounds with a film camera loaded with a 36 exposure roll of Ilford HP5+ loaded into my Olympus OM2n.
The visitor centre building is quite an interesting shape in itself.
It had been raining which always adds an interesting perspective to the sculptures. Three Piece Sculpture: Vertebrae
I think it’s a good idea to get the interaction of people to the sculptures.
Using one sculpture to frame another is a useful compositional tool.
Knife Edge Two Piece.
I was rather glad that this lady had decided to take a seat for a while. Reclining Figure: Angles
Reclining Mother and Child.
This one of the best shots I’ve ever got of the Large Upright Internal/External Form. It usually has a bright sky behind it which makes the exposure very difficult. I got in close this time to exclude exposure those influencing highlights.
I’m very pleased with the quality of the photos and I think the HP5+ film is certainly ideal for capturing the sculptures on a very dull day. The tonal range of the images is very good and I haven’t noticed too much grain. The film was developed in Ilford ID11 diluted 1+3 for 22 minutes. I would normally develop for 20 minutes but this was the second use of the developer so I added 10% to the time.
It’s good to see Sheep Piece back in the field after being away on tour for a while.
During this second lockdown period I thought it would be a good opportunity to try out perfecting some new film photography. I’ve used Fomapan 400 a fair bit in the past but decided to try Fomapan 200 for a change. Maybe not the best idea during the dull weather we’re having just recently but at least I can get to using a large aperture and throwing the background out of focus.
So I decided to do our local walk which starts at a small church. I first had a look round the churchyard. Churchyards are always good for some texture and interesting light shooting.
The small Church of St Thomas’ at Perry Green, the start of our walk.
A misty day forming a drip on the tap gives it an extra element.
Detail of the church.
Further along our walk we pass the Henry Moore Studio and Gardens. Even though it’s closed at present there is an opportunity to still see some of the sculptures.
Large Figure in a Shelter by Henry Moore.
Hoglands, Henry Moore’s home and now a museum reflected in the visitor centre windows.
The walk takes us round the perimeter of the Henry Moore grounds and then along part of the Hertfordshire Way.
Along the Hertfordshire Way.
My favourite gatepost subject on the walk.
So, what of the film. I developed the Fomapan 200 for 13 minutes in Ilford ID11 at 20 deg C. Ilford ID11 is my go to developer at present. As it’s a powder developer it has an almost indefinite shelf life in it’s powder form so I can purchase a couple of boxes without having them go off before I can use them.
I quite like the tones of Fomapan 200 but not sure the grain appears to be much smaller than Fomapan 400 and I have to say that I think I prefer to use Ilford HP5+ for most of my photos.
Olympus OM2n and Fomapan 200.
I will though try the Fomapan 200 out with another camera/lens combination. This set was photographed using the Olympus OM2n fitted with the 50mm f1.4 lens. I intend to run another 36 through my Pentax Spotmatic fitted with the 55mm f1.8 Takumar lens.
Film: Fomapan 400. Rated at 400asa. Developed in Ilford ID11 dilution 1+3 for 23 minutes @20 degC.
Film scanned using Plustek OpticFilm 8100 through Silverfast 8 software.
Agfa Optima 1035 Sensor
Why I chose this camera?
Having an interest in analogue photography I like to follow a YouTube channel called Analogue Insights (link at the end of this post). Recently, Max, who is the host of the site has done a review of the Afa Optima 1035. It seemed to be the ideal camera for some Street Photography and as a coincidence there was one on Ebay in mint condition which I purchased for £56.
The camera and it’s features.
The camera is built of metal and is very compact and takes 35mm film. It has zone focusing but if turned upside down it has the distance scale on the underside of the lens. Zone focusing is something I often use for Street Photography so that is fine. The viewfinder is very large and bright for such a small camera and it is equipped with a nice f2.8 40mm lens. The zone focusing settings are shown in the viewfinder which is handy. The exposure is fully automatic but there is an aperture setting on the lens. This though is only operational when using flash.
Zone focusing seen in the viewfinder.The zone focusing on the top of the lens.
Design philosophy
The camera was one of a series of cameras produced by Agfa through to the late 1970s and the simplistic design philosophy has as it’s roots in that of post war German industrial design. The design is a reflection of the design principles by such great designers as Dieter Rams who was instrumental in the design of the sleek and understated household goods for Braun in that era. “Good design is as little design as possible.” These few words encapsulate the philosophy of Rams. The British-American designer Jony Ive, Chief designer for Apple until 2019 once said of Rams that his work is “beyond improvement.”
This camera was designed by another German design studio. In 1967 Norbert Schlagheck and Herbert Schultes formed the design partnership Schlagheck Schultes Design GmbH and took on work of designing products for AGFA Gevaert AG. The design partnership was located in Munich and they were Influenced by Dieter Rams and his 10 Principles of Good Design. They were responsible for delivering designs for several classic cameras, along with other products. The design for AGFA provided a new and more modern direction for the camera-maker with the large red sensor shutter release being instrumental in the catch phrase for the product of ‘The other red dot camera’. This being a reference to the logo on Leica cameras. Not quite up to the standard of manufacture of Leica of course.
The results of my first trip out with the camera.
I recently was able to visit the National Trust property of Anglesey Abbey. Having just received the camera through the post I thought I’d load up with a roll of Fomapan 400 black and white film and try it out. It was an overcast day so not too much contrast but the white statuary in the grounds set against a dark background of foliage proved to be ideal for a test and I’m quite pleased with the results. The camera was a joy to use and handled very well. Manual focusing was very easy with the 400 ASA film providing small enough apertures to get some depth of field.
My next test of the camera will be to take it out on a trip doing some Street Photography.
Nicks Pics 