I’m dipping deep into the archive for this photo. I made it at the 2013 Mecum classic-car auction in Indianapolis. This is part of the grille on a 1966 or 1967 Dodge Charger.
I haven’t been to a car show in a good long time and I’m itching to go to at least one this year. I really love photographing old cars!
I made this with my tiny Olympus XA, a camera I haven’t used since December of 2020. It’s overdue for some exercise! Just look at the sharpness and detail that lens is capable of delivering.
I was looking back through old photographs and found this one of Sophie, who was my cat for a short time after I was divorced. Read Sophie’s whole story here. This blog was just six months old when I made this photograph. I was still reeling from my divorce. I deliberately avoided writing about it here — I wanted to use this blog as a way to move on and look forward. So I seldom told stories about my life as it was happening then.
I routinely left windows open for Sophie when I went to work so she could enjoy the breezes and the outside smells. She loved this window in particular because she could stretch out in it. But I guess fleas jumped in and onto her through the screens, and soon I had the worst flea infestation I’d ever seen. They got into the carpets; as I walked through the house I could see and feel them jumping up and bouncing off my legs. I had to spray flea killer through the entire house three times, each time sequestering poor Sophie to a crate in the garage all day. I never opened a window again, and never saw another flea.
Sophie needed more time and attention than I could give her. Long story short, I gave Sophie to my ex-wife and she gave me the dogs we’d had while we were married. Each of us still maintains we got the better end of the deal. The dogs were a Rottweiler named Sugar and a Golden Retriever-Chow mix named Gracie. Read Sugar’s story here, and Gracie’s here. Since Gracie died in 2013, I’ve remained petless.
Lucy Walker Pentax ME SE, 50mm f/1.7 SMC Pentax-M Foma Fomapan 200 @ EI 125 Ilford ID-11 stock 2021
It’s unusual for me to test a new-to-me old camera and not immediately review it here on my site, as I’ve done with this Pentax ME SE. But this isn’t the first Pentax ME I’ve owned. It’s more like the third or fourth. I’ve written two reviews of the base ME.
I find but two improvements in the ME SE over the regular ME. The first is a smooth brown leatherette covering, which feels good to the touch. The second, which I like a lot, is a split-prism viewfinder patch canted at -45 degrees. The regular ME’s split prism is horizontal, which means tilting the camera slightly to focus horizontal subjects. It’s not a big deal to do that — but the canted split prism all but eliminates that need as next to no subjects are canted at exactly -45 degrees.
I made this photograph in the welcome center in Metamora, Indiana. It’s the most pleasing photograph I’ve made with the ME SE so far. The 50mm f/1.7 lens never disappoints. And Fomapan 200 sings in ID-11 developer.
I’m sure I’ll write a review of the ME SE in the new year, after I’ve put a few more rolls through it. I intend this ME SE to be one of my handful of go-to cameras.
I’m going to make a book out of my favorite photographs from my Yashica TLRs. It should be easy to put together; I’ve already selected the images I want to print in it. I just need to write something up for each photo, much like I do for the images in this “single frame” series.
I’m taking to heart the feedback a few of you gave me on Vinyl Village, that the photos’ reproduction quality was not up to snuff. I printed that book through Amazon. I might use Amazon again, but go with their top-quality ink and paper. I might try MagCloud — it would be a lot more expensive, but the quality would certainly be there. I might do both.
I made this photo with my first Yashica-D on the Clay County, Indiana, courthouse lawn.
My photo essay book, Vinyl Village, is available! Click here to learn more and get a copy!
Thorntown Library Nikon N90s, 50mm f/1.8D AF Nikkor GAF 125 Versapan x/7-72 @ EI 80 2021
I made a few photos on the expired GAF 125 film in Thorntown, a small town here in Boone County, Indiana. This is Thorntown’s library. This is the original building, one of the hundreds of libraries industrialist Andrew Carnegie build around the country. I documented several other Indiana Carnegie libraries here.
I’ve now shared the best of my photos on this roll of very expired film.
Ivan’s Marathon Nikon N70 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6D AF Nikkor Kodak Max 400 2021
Tomorrow I’ll share my review of the Nikon N70, a 1994 35mm SLR. It’s got a crazy user interface that most people hate.
I put two rolls of film through this camera to test it, and one of them was good old Kodak Max 400. I took it up to Thorntown with a few other cameras for an afternoon of photography. Ivan’s Marathon is a favorite subject that I’ve featured on this blog many times. I always shoot it pretty much straight on like this.
