My Third Eye

I took this picture last Saturday in Bluffers Park, Toronto. I shot it with a Yashica FX-D 35mm SLR. I got this camera on eBay, and because part of the exterior was in really rough shape, I got it for a song, not much more than the cost of a couple of disposable cameras. It is in good working order however. The film I used was Polypan F. I got some rolls of this film from my friend Mike in exchange for a developing tank, as detailed in this post. I then went online and bought 90 metres of this film (almost the length of a football field!) in bulk so I can roll it myself, for about $40 after shipping. And since I develop my own, I save there too.

Who says film photography has to be expensive?

As I write this, my father has passed away, and it is a time for reflection. Among the many debts of gratitude I owe my father, one I am thinking about this morning is how he instilled in me his love of photography.

In 1975 I bought a Brownie Hawkeye camera at a garage sale for $1.50. As a gift, he bought me rolls of film (the now discontinued 620 format) some flashbulbs (not cheap!! we have it easy in the strobe era) and processing. Some time later, he let me use his Voigtlander Vito B camera. This camera pictured below (not my father’s, just a representative sample) is a beautiful precision instrument.

In 1977, when I was 15 he made it possible for me to buy my first SLR, my Yashica TL-Electro, which I still have. I used that camera for many. many years; the last roll of film I shot with my Yashica was of my eldest daughter, when she was born. Both cameras are “retired” but have places of honour in my collection of cameras.

The bulk of what I do know about photography was learned on these two cameras, so every time I snap a shutter in a sense I am paying tribute to my father.

Thanks Dad.

Today’s image is from the summer of 1977, and I again go back to my grandparent’s acreage outside Truro, Nova Scotia. This old see-saw, like everything else there, is long gone. Only the silver in the negative seems to be immortal.

I don’t remember if I ever printed this negative back in the 70′s, and certainly never looked at it all that closely. What amazes me is the sharpness of most of the image. My old Yashica TL-Electro was very much a budget model, a few rungs below the Nikon, Canon and Pentax classics of the day. But the 50mm f1.9 lens that came with the camera had a reputation for amazing sharpness, and that reputation was deserved.