IG Monthly Best - July 2021

Blockade, Medium Format Look, Friends, and Security

Nowadays ISO 800‐3200 is more or less standard ISO when taking photo indoor/at night using digital cameras. My most frequently used film stocks are all having ISO no higher than 400. This means until Kodak Vision3 500T came under my radar, I have never tried night time photography without a flash. When the 3 rolls of 500T arrived, my first reaction was to call up my friend and go out on a long exposure adventure. With long exposure, even a camera having only f/3.5 aperture is able to capture well-exposed photos at night.

The result honestly brew my mind when I received the scans. I am aware that my Solina is old and far from top of the line cameras at its time, but still, one can easily make out the details of the paved road and the billboard from a distance. At night! I need not mention the light trail left by travelling vehicles, which contrasts nicely with the darker and static portion of the image. 500T is a cine film, which means it was originally intended for motion pictures, and those made available in 135 film rolls are simply film strips cut from a long strip of 500T.

I used to fear getting into trouble or danger while shooting in a crowded place. But bringing a tripod, a cable release and my trusted Solina to shoot long exposure wasn't that bad an experience. People mostly avoided us and we were able to remain still less than 1 meter away from the passing traffic to be able to capture sharp images. That night, I was strangely high, as if I was invincible and I could shoot whatever I wanted, I was in the zone once I have gotten used to the people and the traffic.

The road was indeed dangerous. See the locus of the cars' headlights, crossing into that zone means death or serious injury. One can only squeeze oneself into the relatively safe corner, unable to go further, like trapped. Between where we are and where we want to be, there's a zone full of danger, only the brave could attempt to cross, while our safe space continues to shrink, until there's no more. Oh, you ought to follow the rules, even if that green light never turns on.

One of the eight test shots I made from the first roll of 120 film and Moskva-5. Taken at f/5.6 and 1/25s with a flash, only this image and 2 others were properly focused with proper use of cable release and fast enough (though still slow) shutter speed. The depth of field even at f/5.6 is so shallow even the front paw of Sailo is starting to appear out of focus when I focused on his eyes. Medium format look I guess.

What happened is I had a misconception about depth of field. At a given focal length (note none of my usable cameras uses interchangeable lens), what decides the depth of field is the aperture. Smaller aperture, shallower depth of field. But another factor affecting depth of field is the focal length. The longer the focal length is the shallower the depth of field. Medium format usually use 100mm+ focal length to get a 3/45mm equivalent in 135 format, which explains the "excessively shallow" depth of field in 135 format people's view. To understand more you could check out this and this article.

Moskva-5 was an inpulsive buy. It fills a gap, but not a need. First I saw a Moskva-5 in good condition with the 6x6 mask being sold for cheap on Carousell, but then when I checked with the seller it was sold long ago. Somehow that triggered my want for a Moskva-5. It was supposed to be a win for cheap, and now it'd become a curse I must buy a Moskva-5 to lift. And so I did, on eBay, for 4/3 of the price of that Carousell one and without the 6x6 mask. The camera is tricky to use— I could only focus using my right hand and there's no comfortable way to hold the camera while doing so; shooting with my left hand feels unintuitive as well.

At the end though, it was worth it. I like the medium format look and the large negative produced, which allows me to create larger prints. My goal is to create a couple 8"x12" prints and frame them. Having a medium format camera encourages me to take more portraits. Frame count is very limited (only eight 6x9 shots per roll) so I have to plan carefully each shot, accounting for the lighting, posing and composition. This necessitates a closer engagement with the models, and that brings me closer to my friends/family.

There are times I know I am not going to take serious photos. In such occasion I usually bring along an AGAT 18K or a reloaded FunSaver. These cameras are more than capable of capturing impromptu images during day time and are ok in low light with ISO 400 film such as Kodak UltraMax. These are cheap and compact cameras made with plastic which I wouldn't mind too much if I drop them (I haven't dropped any camera yet). AGAT 18K has a plastic cap protecting the lens and the adjustment rings, and FunSaver I can always buy another cheaply.

This photo was taken in Cheung Chau, after half a day of cycling we settled at a spot for watching sunset. We managed to rent the bike overnight, so we weren't worried about returning the bikes before the shop closes. Sitting there looking at the sunet set while listening to the waves, it was a chill time that I miss and one I don't get very often.

The decision to digitally turn it black and white was because UltraMax didn't have enough latitude to recover enough highlight details (did I overexpose it?). I may have been able to recover more details using Vision3 series film. Color version of this photo looked quite bad, you may be able to see this from the muddled water waves and sky details.

As I grow further into adulthood what I realized is responsibility and upholding a personal image has severly damaged my sense of freedom and independence. I had to act and do things a certain way, and please some people at certain interval to "maintain the relationship". Yet I believe there are relationships that just works, whether we missed to meet up 1 month or 1 year apart.

For my 45mm Solina the slowest shutter speed (discounting B) is 1/25s, which is slower than the safe handheld shutter speed. Most of the time when I open the aperture widely up to f/3.5 using guess focusing, 1/25s almost always result in blurry images. This is one of the rare ones where I get a somewhat usable image. Color is rather pale and flat because I didn't do much post-processing. With Kodak Vision3 post-processing is always required, need to tune that curve to get any level of presentable color—the way Vision3 is designed to be used with.

The day when my friend and I went to do long exposure, we only had my own tripod and shutter release cable, so we had to take turn doing the long exposures. There wasn't much to do except walking around, looking for interesting things to take photo of.

Early July was a particularly low point for myself where there are uncontrollable factors in my life I couldn't really reconcile or balance. One controllable factor however, was photography. I knew using a 500T and cable release to do long exposure, there are going to be impressive results (like the top photo of the month above). Meanwhile, there are certain things I cannot get in life which is still hard to accept. Even with other good things, I still feel like sailing in a narrowing canal without turning back, even a small mistep will get me stuck.