My Third Eye

In a previous post I mentioned that my first shoot with a hired model was coming up, and I am happy to say it went well yesterday. I am busy developing the analog film (shot with my Mamiya M645J medium format, on Trix-X black and white film), but below I have one on the reference images, shot digitally.

In the past, almost all of my photography has been reactive, in the sense that I was an observer to a story or scene when I took the image. In this kind of shoot, I need to create the story, as well as shoot it. I must provide every element, and every detail is my responsibility. It is a stretch, but fun and exciting at the same time. I want more.

Another cyanotype this time around. This picture was made at the Riverdale Zoo in Toronto, again using my Rolleicord Twin-Lens Reflex. I created a digital negative and then made the cyanotype below.  The paper has a fairly coarse texture, and I like the effect it has on the image. Just one more reason why it matters to see a print in your hands, not just pixels on a screen.

Yesterday I went out for the first time with my Rolleicord V, a twin lens reflex camera I bought last week. It shoots 6 x 6 cm images on 120 film.

Looking down to focus, on a ground glass with a laterally reversed image will take some getting used to, but that’s what I like; different types of cameras inform the photographic process in a different way.

The lens has interesting characteristics; quite sharp (at least in the centre), but in some of the images the out-of-focus backgrounds have a very vintage look. Quite distinctive, and another step away from the sameness I find that one can get using DSLR’s.