Absent without pinhole

I've published at least one post a month for almost ten years. December's almost over so in order to preserve that streak, here's a short digest instead of a more unified story.

One of the things I've been occupied with lately is returning to playing with large format. In order to offer an Advanced Pinhole Photography workshop, I have been building a few more 4x5 Pinhole Lab Cameras, which need to be tested. There's also a box of Arista.edu 400 film that has been sitting around the darkroom for a few years, so the first new camera got a six-exposure test with that.

Arista.edu films, which are relabeled Foma stocks, are famous for being inexpensive but also for their atrocious reciprocity characteristics: one extra stop at 1-10 seconds, 2.5 stops from 10-100 seconds and 3 stops over 100 seconds. As I've been complaining about for the last few months, it's been awfully gloomy, wet and cold lately. It's a little challenging, but I can stay warm and dry inside and leave the shutter open for a few hours if necessary. What I think I've discovered is that after about half an hour, Arista.edu 400 just gives up and any additional exposure doesn't do much. Most of them were severely underexposed. This one done at the 70° 90mm position of the film plane got enough light right next to the windows.

Most of the reason for the test was to see if the whole negative was illuminated at the 120° 36mm position of the film plane. Looks like that worked out.

I've made bespoke cameras for Sarah's blog occasionally. She found a recipe for substituting Count Chocula cereal in Rice Crispy Treats and thought it might be interesting to document her crew preparing it with a special pinhole camera. The pinhole is behind his piercing gaze.

On the back, he is, of course, identified as a Counter.

To get everything to match with limited materials, it was necessary to be only 30mm deep for a 90° angle of view.

The treats were delicious but the pictures of making them will have to wait for Sarah's post. I got one frame to play with when we were done.

The theme for the Fox Valley Photography Group this month was Whatever You Happen To Be Doing This Month. I submitted that photograph. The discussion involved how little so-called wide-angle distortion this extremely wide-angle photograph exhibits and how incredibly close the camera had to be to fill the frame. What struck me was that the foreground squash appears larger than the rear orange pumpkin. It really demonstrates how the perception of depth is affected by the angle of view.

Another perception when working on Sarah's project was what a nice a little camera the Populist is and how easy it is to build. You should make one and use it on the 25th occurrence (The Silver occurrence!?) of Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day this spring.

Neville has been busy documenting excuses why I haven't been doing more pinhole photography, and Paterson the Pinhole Camera has been loaded with Kodak Gold 200 which can almost compete with Arista.edu on its reciprocity characteristics. It can be done but it's tricky to leave a camera around for an hours-long exposure with the Solstice-related holidays happening around you.

A happy and pinholy Yuletide to everyone!

Madtown Monday

During PhotoMidwest's Fall Festival in Madison, two of my photographs were in separate shows with different closing dates. Ralph Russo, who made arrangements for both shows, graciously agreed to bring my picture from the first show to the pickup date for the second so I didn't have to drive over twice. I volunteered to help take down the show.

I've taken pictures along State Street, which runs from the Capitol to the University, several times, but in grab-as-you-can 35mm mode, with others along with me. This would be a good opportunity to just look for photographs. The EyePA 30 was still on the kitchen table. Another roll of HP5 went into it.

It was an impressively dark overcast day with absolutely diffuse light from the sky. I've been complaining about that a lot lately, haven't I?

The Triangle Market was there the first time I was in Madison in 1967. 

State Street Brats is another institution I remember always being here. 

Ethnic restaurants used to be pretty rare elsewhere in Wisconsin. The Mediterranean Cafe, or maybe with a slightly different name, was a regular restaurant with fresh ingredients and reasonable portions. Once inside, I realized it was now another order-at-the-counter place with about four things on the menu. The falafel was good, but instead of a pita, it was in a tortilla I'm sure came from a grocery store. Nobody even looked up at the camera on the tripod on my table.

This lighting display in the Overture Center lobby had to be inspired by a beam from an alien ship. I chose to bring along the 90° EyePA 30 to take this picture.

The stairwell in the Overture Center

Just down the hall from the exhibit is a small seating area across from the Playhouse Theatre, subtly but dimly lit on a Monday morning. Unfortunately, I inadvertently opened both shutters for an over and under double exposure, but some folks enjoy this sort of thing.

After taking down the show, the cavernous freight elevator lobby was on my way out.

With Fox Valley colleague Mike Burman's motto, "Bad weather makes good photographs," echoing in my head, I dropped the pictures off in the car and went back out in the rain which had been added to the gloom. I didn't have to be as careful to stay out of pedestrians' way.

The Western District of Wisconsin Federal Courthouse.

Brutalism became very popular about the time of the Vietnam War protests and I first heard the style referred to as "riot renaissance."

The corner of the Madison Public Library sharpened by the wide-angle camera.

Looking down Fairchild Street from a block away, I didn't recognize this turret on the corner. I must have gone passed it walking down State hundreds of times.

A window display in what is the capital of the Dairy State after all.

The EyePA 30 has two .23mm hand-drilled pinholes, on the axis and 11mm above it, 30mm from a 6x6cm frame. The film is Ilford HP5 semistand developed in Rodinal 1:100. The Mod Podge on the camera survived several minute exposures in the rain.

Fall

When Fox Valley Photography Group leader Bobbi Hague announced this month's theme, she defined it as a broad interpretation of Fall, not just the classic leaf-peeping. It took me a while to get started addressing the theme directly, so the leaves were no longer prime peeping anyway. I loaded the Variable Cuboid with a roll of Portra 160 from a film experiment phase last year and started with the wide angle 80° 35mm front.

The apples on the crabs next to Millers Bay were still contributing to the autumn palette.

It was not all that late in the afternoon, but the November sun was already at the low angle photography textbooks speak about. Further down Millers Bay, this tree was classically past peak with a few brown leaves but was in the dappled shadows of trees behind the camera.

Next to Lake Winnebago, a few trees retained their leaves, part yellow, part still green and part bicolored making the transition.

I know these are crabapples next to the bibliothèque, but I can't help myself titling this "Liberry."

Dense clouds covered the sky for days, but there was a moment of partly cloudy one morning. I switched to the 53° 60mm front and went out into the similarly past peak garden. Two brightly colored oak leaves with a mysterious bunch of multicolored berries were behind the raised beds. They were right on the ground, which required lengthy wrestling with the remnants of the pumpkin vines to adjust the tripod. I never noticed the bright yellow plastic connector. 

Looking around during that minutes-long exposure, two still bright maple leaves were lying among the lungworts. More skillful tripodology, this time a few inches above the ground. As I closed the shutter, I finally noticed they were made of fabric with clear plastic stems. Someone's decorations took a bad hit from the wind.

There hasn't been a cabbage report this year since they have been beneath pumpkin leaves all summer. Stayed alive, but not going to make anything for me to eat.

The dangerous roses on the arbor have made copious hips. This is about 1:2 super-macro with the camera just about 30mm away. Those diffraction equations show optimal performance with a smaller pinhole for subjects extremely close up. We may be experiencing that here. Or the plant shifted a tiny bit in a slight breeze.

It was late morning when these were done. I usually notice the light on this lantern while we're having lunch, and the garage is in the way by the time we're done. The vines had been a spectacular classic autumn crimson in recent weeks.

Flowers are not classic Fall icons, but the Christmas Cactus has been showing off a bit early. 

After several more very gloomy days, I returned to a typical autumnal theme. All those vines produced these three orange pumpkins and all the little gourds. The exposure read 17 minutes when the shutter was opened, but when that was over, it said 41 minutes, so I just left it another hour until after dark. It was still extremely underexposed but recoverable. 

No respite from the gloom. The Christmas Cactus in the directional diffuse light on the lanai again caught my eye. Check out the interference pattern between the screens and the shingles on the neighbor's roof. I can see it in the negative, so it's not a Newton Ring from the scanner. 

The 35mm front on the Variable Cuboid has a .23mm pinhole. The 60mm front has a .30mm pinhole. Both are hand-drilled and mounted on a rising front with 11mm of travel. The Portra 160 was developed in an Arista.edu liquid quart C41 kit.

Bibliomania meets Pinholica

This summer the Oshkosh Public Library had a booth at the Farmers' Market. I follow the "Librarian Learns" YouTube channel and stopped to suggest some questions to the host Mike McArthur, which he solicits at the end of each episode. Also at the booth was Sandy Toland, Community Engagement Librarian. She organizes the Library's annual Photo Contest, which I've been helping to judge since my involvement in the Oshkosh Public Museum's "Then and Now" exhibit, but we'd never met. All our communication has been by email.

This year is the Semisesquicentennial of the construction of the building and the Centennial of the Library occupying the entire place, which had been shared with the Museum. As part of the celebration, they asked people about their favorite book, possibly for a YouTube project. I immediately told them mine was William Henry Fox Talbot's Pencil of Nature from 1844, in which he recalls how he invented photography and tries to describe it to a public who hadn't imagined such a thing. However, it's not in the Library's collection, so I probably wasn't a good prospect for their series.

In October, Sandy contacted me about the photo contest, and that reminded me of our conversation this summer. If I purchased a copy of The Pencil of Nature, would the Library add it to their circulating collection? I worked my entire professional life underneath college libraries and pretty much knew the answer, but there might be some options I wasn't aware of. She replied, as expected, that the official policy of the Library is to accept all donations, but it would then be the Library's property with no expectations of what would happen to it. Whether they were added to the collection was subject to the considerations of all collection development decisions. However, there were no copies anywhere in the Northeast Wisconsin Winnefox Library System, which Oshkosh is part of, and it was a significant title. It's the first book ever illustrated with camera photographs.

Onto the internet to see what's available. My preference was the 1969 facsimile edition, which is often found on the used book market (I check periodically to see what my copy's worth). It's also available in really cheap paperbacks since it's been in the public domain for over a century. A copy of the facsimile edition was buy-it-now priced at about half to a third of what several other copies were and half of what mine cost in 1985. It was rated as "very good." The only note was a 3/4 inch tear on the dust jacket.

I ordered it. If it wasn't in good enough condition for a circulating collection, I could mend it as best as possible (I was once in charge of mending at UW-Stout), and place it in the small library at Photo Opp.

When it arrived, except for the tear, it seemed absolutely brand new. It looked like it had never been read. I immediately took care of that. It's really fantastic to get into the head of someone who was learning about photography as we all do, except he was the first one ever to do it and write about it, which he was aware of and delighted by.

With the entire internet at my fingertips, I wondered if there was a copy of another work that strongly influenced me, Advanced Pinhole Photography from 1905, which is an issue of The Photo Miniature magazine. Each issue of that periodical consisted of a monograph on a particular subject. It presents pinhole photography not as "an optical problem or scientific hobby" but from a "practical standpoint" to "produce pictures with a serious purpose." Once you get used to the Edwardian syntax and vocabulary, it's fascinating to recognize things you see every day and also what's different (not that much). There was a copy on eBay for $19. It also came with a 1901 issue on Color Photography, three years before Autochrome was available.

The Color issue is an extremely dense narrative on the Tri-chrome process, including making the dyes for the color filters and bichromate positives and recommendations for different manufacturers' plates with the best spectrographic characteristics for each of the three negatives. This issue has extensive end notes, including some interesting references to notable camera makers Misters Burke and James, in the present tense. Half the notes consist of several letters that reported on the debate about whether the 1904 Saint Louis World Fair would include photography in the Liberal Arts or the Fine Arts Palace. The decision was to stay in the Liberal Arts, but the Fine Arts Jury would select a representative sample of artistic works for their building. I wonder how that worked out. The Kemper Art Museum's tiny selection from the Fair doesn't include any photographs.

We interrupt our program for Halloween.

Sandy was at the Reference Desk when we met. Although its fate was uncertain, I went ahead with the donation. We spoke about getting involved in public outreach programs and educational workshops and their plans for developing a gallery for local artists. I brought the camera specifically to take her photograph and kept forgetting while we conversed. When she excused herself to help a patron, I took my opportunity. She seemed to stand pretty still, but it looks like quite a few photons made it through her few movements. You can see the Pencil of Nature and another book I donated on the desk.

The first section of this shelving contains the Dewey Decimal Classification 770 - Photography. The catalog lists about 3,800 books so something must be circulating.

In addition to promoting the exhibit at his childhood home downtown, the Library featured the works of Oshkosh native Lewis Hine. It seems like his inspiration in documenting capitalist overreach and resulting human suffering will probably continue to be necessary.

For my double exposure fans at Photo Opp, a sunny corner in the stacks on top of the stairwell leading to the original part of the building.

Several small private study rooms are available in one corner, which reminded me of another Oshkosh landmark covered by "Librarian Learns."

The Genealogical Center is in the original entrance hall under the dome with an upper gallery. The second level was covered by a floor in the 1950s, and the entrance moved to the other side of a new addition. This was the children's library when Andy was a child. I never suspected the dome was right above me.

The room divider in the previous photograph hides it, but there's enough of a gap to put a pinhole camera and look into that 1950s addition, which is now Current Periodicals (another job I had in a library) in addition to the Jigsaw Puzzle collection.

Sunbeams on the tiled floor under the locally made Buckstaff furniture.

Another irresistible sunbeam in a different corner of the original building.

While taking these exposures, I found an odd personal connection. Andy now works for the New England Historic Genealogical Society. On some of the same shelving we used to scour for picture books and early readers, I found collections of some of the Society's periodicals. One of Andy's first jobs for them was getting those quarterlies online.

The EyePA 30 has .23mm hand-drilled pinholes 30mm from a 6x6cm frame. The film is Ilford HP5 semistand developed in Rodinal 1:100.

Beginning and ending the week with Photo Opp - Manic Expression version.

For the Oshkosh Photo Walk and the gala gallery gathering at Photo Opp, I chose to be very disciplined with a medium format camera adhering to a theme of people and their cameras, but I also wanted to take pictures of whatever appeared before me. Along came 35mm HandyCam, made from Fox Valley native materials, full of plenty of speedy Fuji 400.

A call for cleaning and last-minute renovation came out on Saturday morning on social media. Ethan VerKuilen delicately removed black paint with an Xacto knife that had hidden the names of the founders of the original synagogue.

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Alex Simpson installed the gallery hanging system.

Sunday was the photowalk in Oshkosh. Despite having no official role, I felt some responsibility since, this time, I was the native and had suggested it as a possible site. I arrived early at Becket's, a bar and restaurant in the riverside City Center.

Dave Heim, Almon Benton and Graham Watashka got there moments later.

Becket's had generously made their private dining room available for us to gather.

Graham led me up to the parking level through a stairwell I had never realized was there. It must have rained while we were inside. 

The view across Jackson Street, which I had often considered from the ground but assumed some kind of pass was necessary to get up there.

The stairwell in question. Graham slowly walked up and down during the exposure, but he was no match for the bright cement.

It was 46° F with a 16 mph sustained wind, but that didn't stop anyone from going out to photograph the very interesting angry clouds. 

The last boat on the public docks gives an odd bit of color to the scene.

The Weather Service said it was gusting up to 30 mph, but along the river, it might have been more gust than sustained. These gulls stayed put, grimly facing upwind, with the tripod only a few meters away. The second time this had happened to me in a week.

This black leaf on the City Center sidewalk with a few raindrops seemed to characterize the autumnal evening.

No one was in the less damp Opera Square two blocks north.

Across Market Street from the square, the interior lights stood out against the outside gloom.

It just happened to be the meeting of the Fox Valley Photography Group in Kaukauna on Thursday. If it's sunny at meeting time, I go over to the west side of the Library to try to catch the sunbeams.

The meeting room was empty. In case I had the date wrong, I only rolled out a table for Bobbi Hague, our leader who usually arrives before me, and one for myself 

Others showed up shortly.

During the discussion. 

Saturday was the gala event at Photo Opp.

The nave transformed into a gallery with the From Our Streets exhibit featuring Char Brandis, Billy Hintz and Tyler Gajewski and a juried selection from others.

I volunteered to welcome guests and hand out nametags to the photographers, board members and sponsors. 

Featured artist Char Brandis was present at the door with an electronic ticket checker, and one other volunteer had the printed list, leaving me mostly idle. I started to finish my roll of film.

Brandi Grahl unloading something at the last minute.

Almon looking skeptical at my use of 35mm film in anything other than a Leica.

Graham duly documented the arrivals.

A couple arrived on motorcycles. 

Fox Valley Photography colleagues Tim Matey and Mike Burman both had a picture in the show.

Scott Kruger behind the light table, which had been put to use as a somewhat Kubrickian bar.

Decorative lighting under the circular window.

Candles illuminate the stairways.

People in comfortable seats are usually agreeable to a long-exposure photograph. Engaging them in conversation keeps their faces pointing in the same general direction.

Negatives were often featured in the decorating scheme.

Adam James tended the downstairs bar in the less cinematic but very pragmatic church basement kitchen, used for preparing hors d'oeuvres, cleaning painting tools, and washing film until they get the darkroom plumbed.

HandyCam has a hand-drilled .15mm pinhole 24mm from a 24x36mm frame. The film is Fujifilm 400, developed in an Arista.edu liquid quart C41 kit.