Photo of the Week 2025-08-11

 

I've come upon an unexpected, though not entirely surprising fork in the road on this leg of my photographic journey. Returning to film photography required a return to some older, in fact vintage gear, some of which I've mentioned in previous posts.

 

Today's image started with an opportunity to acquire (at no cost) a few Canon FD film camera bodies and lenses. This led me to pick up an adapter that would enable me to use the lenses on my current digital bodies. I'd intended the set up to be used mainly for quickly testing performance and operation of the vintage lenses which can suffer from a number of issues relating to age and poor storage conditions. Initial test shots using our Wheaten Terrier, Sullivan, as captive subject were very successful and inspired me with something else to explore.

 

And explore I did ...

 

' dreamy knapweed '

One of the vintage lenses in my arsenal is a 1971 vintage Canon FD 55mm f/1.2 Chrome Nose and ... what's the sense in having a f/1.2 lens if you don't shoot it wide open? 

 

Right?

 

Right!

 

This image captured in mid day sun, along a local concession road where chicory and knapweed are in abundance. Shot with my lovely, very clean copy of the 55mm f/1.2 on my 2020 vintage Canon EOS R5.

 

Using vintage lenses means manually focusing and wide open at f/1.2 near the lenses closest focus distance proved a challenge hand held. The conditions may have been better suited to using a tripod to steady the camera and using the rear LCD display magnified to focus because the depth of field is very, very thin.

 

And what does a 1971 vintage Canon FD 55mm f/1.2 Chrome Nose look like. This ...

 

It's a hefty beast for a  'standard' lens, weighing in at 565g (1.25 lbs) due to it's all brass, metal and glass construction typical of the day. By comparison a typical 50mm standard lens today can weigh half as much. Of course comparable premium lenses are comparable in weight but without the solid feel and tactile helicoid focus system.

 

With results like this, there just may be a return to the shallow DoF style that some knew me for a few years ago.  

 

DJE

Photo of the Week 2025-08-04

 

I may have dipped back into film photography but I have no plans to abandon digital. They are both part of the process and journey as I continue to explore photographic horizons.  

 

' wildflowers at sunset '

 

' shoreline at sunset '

In summer, the sun sets north of the bay mouth and can't be seen directly from the cottage shoreline. Still, the colours still echo to the south, bringing the scene to life.

 

As I worked on these images a familiarity stirred. Not just of the of the location but of a moment almost a dozen years ago, with a very similar sky, when it was very new to me and a new chapter began ...

 

 

DJE 

Photo of the Week 2025-07-28

 

Guelph recently held it's Downtown Community Garage Sale and I decided to go even though it was a very hot and humid day. You never really know what you might find at events like this.

 

While I did find a few photography related items, lens caps, camera strap, lens rest beanbag etc., I also found George a military Veteran. He was selling some military memorabilia and we struck up a conversation ...

 

... what does this have to do with photography, my journey and this weeks photo? Well stay with me here. Upon return home, Lynn asked how the event was. I told her i picked up a few little photo items and met this really nice guy George (last name withheld here). That was when she got that look in her eye and I showed her the business card he had given me. She said there was a family by that name on the street where she grew up. A few clicks of her phone later she was asking "is this him?". Lo and behold, she knew him and his family from her childhood days.

 

I reached out to the email address on his card and said "small world" then explained. A few days later we were downtown for a meet up for coffee with George and his wife. Lots of stories and anecdotes from back in the day were exchanged and our conversation about military history continued. We share an interest, kindled by different fires but with lots of common ground.

 

After the exchange of contact information, a txt here, email there, I was digging through my photos of Holland from 2019 looking for one to George and came across this previously unprocessed, unpublished image from my night in Nijmegen.

 

' The (Night) Crossing '

In Nijmegen, Netherlands, there is a bridge to commemorate 48 US Airborne Soldiers killed in the crossing of the Rhine, Sept 20, 1944. Every evening a Dutch Veteran, along with many to accompany them, will march across to a memorial on the other side in tribute to those fallen.

It was a privilege to make the march when I visited in 2019. This image is from my solo trek back across to my car after the sun had set. Made with the venerable Canon EOS M5 and that lovely 24MP sensor that responds so well to my processing. Noise reduction and little else applied to this capture.

 

And there you have it. A friendship rekindled, A memory rekindled. An image found.

 

DJE 

Photo of the Week 2025-07-21

 

This weeks post is being written later than usual. It's Monday morning, already nearing 8am, I'm cottaging solo for a few days to make some progress on a shed renovation project and tuckered myself out yesterday. Some until-now hidden wood rot took a little more time to rectify than I had expected so by the time I'd made (maple pistachio encrusted trout fillet) dinner on the BBQ and cleaned up I decided to let blog writing slide until the morning ...

 

... well, it's now morning and I sit enjoying coffee, listening to robins, cardinals, blue jays, gulls and crows through the open cottage windows as the day makes itself ready.

 

I recently picked up a vintage Canon FDn 50mm f/1.2 and needed to test it while the return window was still open so I mounted it on an R5 with an adapter to make some digital images I could inspect right away. The condition of the lens, cosmetically and optically is excellent and I'm very pleased with the results. In the near future, I'll shoot some film with it likely on the New F-1 body but for now ...

 

' Blackbridge Mill in June '

' Blackbridge Mill through the Gate '

I missed the (manual) focus justa tad on the gate image. Focusing at wide open with this f/1.2 beastie presents a challenge, or maybe it was my posture as I stooped awkwardly to get the framing just the way I wanted. Not so young eyes or not so young body, not sure which one to blame ;-) 

 

DJE 

Photo of the Week 2025-07-14

 

My return to shooting film is certainly not an abandonment of digital, I will continue to shoot with modern digital cameras. This leg of my journey still sees me wielding some of the most advanced digital camera bodies and lenses available in addition to 40-50 year old film SLR's with manual focus lenses. At times these worlds collide and vintage manual focus lenses find their way onto digital bodies by way of mount adapters that became popular with the introduction of the mirrorless camera format.

 

As of this writing, I have been using local processing labs to develop film and provide most negative scans with processing and any printing done using my established digital workflow. At some point there will be a return to the darkroom, first to develop B&W film. Wet darkroom print development is a possibility but a ways down the road.

 

Combining Film and Digital, some call it " Figital " , is an interesting hybrid experience. I have been abruptly reminded of dust, scratch and fingerprint issues with negatives. The images in this post were scanned at home using an Epson v500 photo scanner I picked up used with negative holders sourced from a 3rd party. The native Epson software for scanning was easy to use though admittedly I have not had a lot of experience with it and would like to investigate some of the advanced scanning options. Film used was Ilford XP2 that had expired back in the 90's. Following some online advice, I decided to increase exposure x2 by rating the film at ISO 100 and then had it processed normally in C41 process as designed.

 

' white clapboard church '

 

 

 

' sunlight sermon '

' fence & monument 

' post interment '

 

' buggy barn '

 

 

 

 

 

I have a number of takeaways from shooting this roll and working with the resulting images. The capture experience with the Canon FTb-n was quite enjoyable. The camera is fully manual with 'match-the-needle' exposure setting using the shutter speed dial on top plate and aperture ring on the lens. Of course the lens was manual focus and the film had to be manually advanced for to the next frame, something that I kept forgetting to do as I've gotten used to the conveniences of digital. A note on film advance, I've decided not to advance the film after I make an exposure but wait until I'm ready to shoot again. This will leave the shutter uncocked (no spring tension of the shutter) in case I don't make any more images and the camera sits unused for a bit. The mechanisms were robustly built back in the day but like me they have seen a few years so no need for more tension than necessary ;-)

 

More of my thoughts on Figital in a future post ...

 

'click' 

 

DJE