Stereo Southside Sweetie

Hughes' Chocolates is one of those "Only-in-Oshkosh" kind of businesses. They've been operating in the basement of a home on a quiet street since 1942. Most of the employees are still from the family. Last month, Sarah, Andy and I realized after four decades in Oshkosh that we had never been there, although we have always been aware of it. We bought two boxes at their tiny retail counter, at the bottom of the stairs.

It just happens that the boxes are exactly the same size as two 24mm wide boxes and two 60mm boxes, like it was made for a stereo medium format camera. The white cardboard may seem suspect for opacity, but it's heavy grey cardboard covered by a white glossy paper with alligator embossing. The boxes are 45mm deep, but I already have a stereo camera at that angle of view, so it was cut down to 35mm, getting pretty darn wide angle for stereo - an 80-degree angle of view. Most lensed stereo cameras have "normal" angle of view, at 75mm for this format. There's one stereo pinhole camera this size that's even wider at 28mm.

I made it without any kind of template, just laying out parts with a pencil and ruler. One problem here was I made the holes on the front a little too small. They were wide enough, but I couldn't put the upper pinholes any more than 8mm above the axis without blocking part of the image. That's not as dramatic as my normal 11mm rise, but it still was useful in keeping verticals parallel.

Both front and back feature the top of the box, with the shutters on the inside.

Once again, I stole the four .25mm pinholes from the stereo solargraphic project cameras last year.

As soon as the camera was finished, I loaded it with a roll of Cinestill 800T, which I'd never used before, and rushed down to Hughes' to initiate it. They were very gracious and let me take several photographs.

When the film came out of the wash, I was horrified to see I had been cursed by the demons of analog photography. Random light leaks were all along the film's length. In some pairs, the right frame is dark, but in one, the left is more dense. A few have leaks in the corners. Two appear to have the left frame heavily exposed as though the shutter had been partly open, but that's impossible. The shutter is one piece. If one side is partly open, so is the other. I can't explain this pattern. This also freaked out the scanner pretty badly so the color couldn't get balanced the same on most of the pairs.

This is all very disappointing but is a great learning opportunity about how your brain makes up the best picture it can with the information it's got. The light leaks appear as light areas, so I burned them into almost black and desaturated their general red tones. Think of a double exposure. Dark areas are unexposed and available to make a picture. When you merge a stereoscopic pair, your brain does the same thing. If one eye sees a dark field and the other a picture, it will just fill in the image it has. Despite these being somewhat unmatched pairs in color and density with occasional dark blobs, they all merge into a stereo picture, which is my objective, after all.

They are presented here in cross-eyed viewing format, where the left and right images are switched. Crossing your eyes makes a double image. When the middle ones overlap, concentrate on focusing your eyes on some detail in the image and it pops into depth. Some simplified graphic examples are at this link that may help learn to do this.

Here are links to PDFs with red/cyan anaglyphs and parallel Holmes stereo cards, if you're set up for viewing those.

The front porch has a neon sign identifying the house and hand lettered signs featuring special items. This is the only advertising Hughes' does. The small strip beneath the neon directs you to the side door.

 

This is particularly disappointing. Nearly a third of the left frame is obliterated, but in stereo, it's almost unnoticeable.

They let me go around the corner to part of the production area.  Look at all those marble tables, just like in my kitchen.

Our visit to Hughes' in December was inspired by having a glass of Hughes' Chocolate Stout when we went out to lunch, made in honor of the chocolatier by Fox River Brewing, which I visited next. Two young men were working in the production area and allowed me to stick the camera just inside the door. Fermenters #1 and #2 on the left are currently making Hughes' Chocolate Stout.

I bought a six-pack to pair with the Crawlers (Turtles in any other candy store) I bought earlier. There were a few wispy leaks in the shadows at the top, but otherwise the only pair matching in color and density.

Here's my view from the couch again. I thought the objects on the glass table might be interesting. One of my objectives was to see how close you could get and still get stereo. It looks like within half a meter is no problem.

 

This was all very mysterious. There are at least three layers of cardboard between the film and any light, including a layer of black foam core at the top and bottom. The film isn't expired for another year and I removed it from the original foil wrapper. There's a possibility of "fat roll" fogging, but I unloaded the camera in dim light, sealed it with "exposed" tape and stuck it in my pocket. I hate to blame the film, but I don't understand how it could have happened.

To eliminate the camera as the cause, I very carefully exposed a roll of Kentmere 100.

Back to play with the glass table in the sun room

The opposite angle from a little farther away.

Another glass table in another corner of the room.

How about a whole room. Trying to catch the sunbeam that reflects off our neighbor's window and into the dining room. It appeared only intermittently but it looks like it came out at least once during the two-hour exposure. The lights on the chandelier were only on for about 5 minutes.

Outside in the sun for a serious test of the camera's opacity, with a subject a little further away, using the rising set of pinholes. The lanai definitely sticks out from the house.

After the earth rotated back around to face the sun, another light-tightness test, again with the rising pinholes.

There was a little variance in density between the two frames in a few, but not much. Less than a stop. No light leaks. Wish I knew what caused the issues with the Cinestill 800T.

Other than the perfect size of the boxes from Hughes, I had another reason to make a wide-angle stereo camera, which would be appropriate for its local history roots. It seems ready for that project now.

Stereo Southside Sweetie has hand-drilled .25mm pinholes, on the axis and 8mm above it, 35mm from the film, in side-by-side 6x6cm chambers. The Cinestill 800T was developed in a Cinestill quart powder C41 kit. The Kentmere 100 was semi-stand developed in Rodinal 1:100.

Neville in winter

In the taxonomy of photographic conditions, the general category of Pinholica exhibits characteristics of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, not unlike Gear Acquisition Syndrome that afflicts so many lensed photographers. Both also bear a striking similarity to Schizophrenia and even Multiple Personality Disorder. With a medium format camera in my hands, you see a child of f64. Formal, if odd composition, as well resolved as can be with a pinhole (I hate the term sharpness), a still and level camera and a long tonal scale. Very selective of what gets photographed. With 35mm film, there appears the wild, undisciplined Mr. Populist Rules, who must photograph anything he's confronted with despite poor lighting and stability. Not only odd but strange composition, often cropped and edited within an inch of low resolution and believable color. Particularly with plain, brown Neville, who is often put out by lack of use. Both personalities are compelled to display almost every frame.

Faced with Yuletide events to come, 35mm Neville got loaded with a 36-exposure roll of Fujicolor Superia Xtra 400. So buckle up.

We have been making our own holiday cards since 1977 in many media, including multiple exposure silver gelatin prints, Xerox copies and all the generations of laser and inkjet printers. It's really cool to have professional-quality printing accessible now. It's a completely digital, lensed project. It was hard to come up with an appropriately silly, cheerful idea this year, and we kind of stacked parts of about six ideas together.

A double exposure of two more things that kept me from pinhole photography. In the first, the globe is sitting on the living room floor where I was attempting to illustrate the different orientations to the sun on the Solstice and on Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day. The second intended to feature the new black cabinet for the kitchen waste receptacle, which took most of a day to assemble, including skipping a page and having to disassemble several steps. Only its handles are visible, seemingly on the side of the dresser in the living room.

Another double exposure of my annual batch of Polish Tea Cakes. At the right, notice the Variable Cuboid which I loaded with Lomo 800 at the same time as Paterson in November, which is still on frame 1.

The tea cakes cooling while I wash the dishes, my moving figure creating a stern bit of pareidolia in the pantry.

Maciej Zapiór and Artem Koval of the Astronomical Institute ASCR just outside Prague got a grant to create a worldwide project involving solargraph cameras with microprocessor-controlled shutters. When they contacted me, I thought of the top of The Draw on the Fox River in Appleton where I had put three pairs for my stereo solargraph project last year. The camera came in November but John Adams, my collaborator and owner of The Draw, and I couldn't get together for a few weeks for an unboxing video, and then realized we weren't sure if the small tilt of the roof edge was an issue. We took the opportunity to run and firmly affix the 15-meter extension cord down through a former AC opening in the basement just meters above the River.

The annual rite of Lefse.

While Andy and Kristin were in the air from Boston to Chicago, their flight to Appleton was canceled with no hope of another for 24 hours because of heavy fog all over eastern Wisconsin. They took a bus from ORD to MKE and we drove down there and back through unseasonably warm temperatures but still significantly below the dew point. Broke up the terror with a lovely French dinner at Bartolotta's Lake Park Bistro. Neville was along and could have made great photographs, but it was more important to concentrate on getting everyone home alive.

In the living room the next day.

Lunch at Gardina's, with which we had a glass of Fox River Brewing Company's Hughes' Chocolate Stout.

That reminded us that we had never been to Hughes', a quirky little chocolatier in the basement of a home. The retail shop is no more than a closet at the bottom of the stairs, with a kind of unsteady place to hold a tripod.

We followed that up with what really was a creative cocktail at Sturgeon Spirits.

On one of its last days of the season, Sarah and I visited the Paine Art Center's Nutcracker in the Castle. Very little change in any year, but it is worth a visit for the sparkly environment and finding the occasional new detail. Each room has a page open of the bespoke storybook created just for the Paine, here in the Library, which has velvet ropes at both doors the rest of the year.

Finally, a close-up of this sunbeam I've been looking at from across the room for years.

The land of the Sugar Plum Fairy.

Uncle Drosselmeyer's workshop with just a narrow sunbeam.

Birches glowing in the garden.

The Land of Sweets and The Sugar Plum Fairy made manifest in the Conservatory.

One of a choice of four, The Nutcracker, a chocolate cupcake with peanut butter icing, chocolate drizzle, Reese's Pieces crumble, and a little bit of flare from the sun.

You may see a table as a comfortable, decorative place to enjoy your treats, but I see a stable place to put a tripod.

I participated in a visit to Photo Opp by the Photography classes at St. Mary's High School in Neenah. Mark Ferrell and I were assigned to the basement for a we-were-there show and tell about film photography and the darkroom, as well as giving them an opportunity to use the seamless and studio lights. 

Mark kept a group entranced long enough to gather their photons.

Initially reluctant to use the studio, they eventually got enthusiastic.

Mostly pretty sober posing and not as much mugging and theatrics as I might have expected.

John, Mark and I went for lunch at the Moon Water Cafe nearby Photo Opp. Zoom in and check out the rainbow glow of the diffraction spikes on those spotlights.

Our conversation over lunch. I gotta remember to take a seat so the windows are behind the camera.

Having been given the OK for the six-degree tilt, John and I installed the Circumnavigation in Time camera at the edge of The Draw's roof. Spoiler Alert: Notice the lugs for attaching screws at the top of the camera.

Putting those Hughes' Chocolate Boxes to good use. Note the Variable Cuboid is still sitting there.

Waiting for my glasses to be reassembled at the optometrist. I think I'm the hardest person on glasses frames in the world. They put a little Loctite on the screw this time, so we'll see.

During all this, I've had a sore toe, which I admirably have not photographed for you. Trying to figure out why it has been healing abnormally slowly and tingling after a stupid fall I had in October has amassed an amount of data fit for a space telescope, and no definitive therapy has been recommended yet. After blood work, ultrasound and conventional X-rays, waiting for a rescheduled CAT Scan after they decided the day before the procedure not to pull the titanium out of my knees with an MRI, which I had told them I had in two questionnaires. The toe is better now, but the medical mystery continues.

 

A week after we installed the camera, I participated in an around-the-world Zoom meeting with Czechia, Argentina, New Zealand and Australia. As Maciej and Artem were showing the inside of a prototype, I decided to compare it to the photo of the camera on The Draw. The first thing I saw were those screw lugs, and freaked out. My apologies to everyone for the disruption. Just when you thought I was some pinhole expert. We had a quick discussion about solutions, and they went on with their presentation while I emailed John and searched to buy more adhesive. By the way, we had talked about the correct orientation, managed a minor issue with the placement of the power cord, and then turned back around, put the adhesive on the wrong side and mounted it upside-down. Good thing I decided to look at that photograph.

 

Back on top The Draw the next morning.  All better now.

Neville has a .15mm hand-drilled pinhole 24mm from a 24x36mm frame. The Fujicolor Superia Xtra 400 was developed in a Cinestill quart powder C41 kit.

A Salty Dog

As I was about to recycle an empty box of kosher salt, I thought, "Hmmm... Nikon, Canon, Fujinon, Chinon, Crackon... Morton sounds like the name of a camera."

Also, Sodium Chloride was a prime ingredient in William Henry Fox Talbot's original photographic process. A sheet of paper wetted with a weak solution of salt was brushed with Silver Nitrate to form the photosensitive Silver Chloride. Since he discovered that a weak solution of salt provided a more sensitive compound, he also fixed his earliest works in a concentrated solution of salt (soon replaced by Sodium Hyposulfite). The method survives with salted paper prints as a popular alternative process.

This is the first compact series camera to make the shutters into the entire front and back of the camera, which makes it easier to use the designs on the packages I make cameras out of.

And there's the song by Procol Harem.

Otherwise, it's a Compact 30mm with a 90° angle of view. The pinholes are burgled off of one of the solargraph stereo pairs from last winter.

Since I cook a lot, kosher salt is omnipresent for me. 

Yule supplies make shiny subjects.

My view from the couch this week. I misplaced my dust brush.

The spooky lifestyle applied to media traditionally more merry.

Weren't these in another room the other day?

I arrived early for an event at Photo Opp, so I walked down to City Park specifically to photograph the dancers in the fountain dusted with snow. Happily for my color film, they've gotten dressed up a little.

The event at Photo Opp was a visit by the photography classes of St. Mary's High School in Neenah. My contemporary Mark Ferrell and I got to do kind of a witness-to-history lecture on film photography, the tour and demo in the dark room, and guide them through the use of a studio set-up. They had heard of the "red room." It was very enlightening interacting with people who have had a camera in their hand almost all their lives. At one point, I picked up an Argus 75 and said that it was my family's camera in my childhood. "What do you mean - you all shared the same camera?" None of them had ever seen a negative. They had never heard of pinhole photography. One surprise for me when looking at the cameras they were using for the class was that inexpensive digital SLRs come with zoom lenses that only stop down to f5.6! (n.b. Most interchangeable lenses stop down to f16 or 22. This camera is f120, about as fast as my cameras get.)

Even in gloomy early January, the window in the bathroom makes interesting subjects in the textures of the towels and tiles.

Touches of red brighten the composition.

The bright yellow handle led me to reprise the electric snow shovel demonstration. Iron Man was playing when I thought of it, but Rock and Roll High School was on by the time I had to strike a pose.

Down the garden path. It's hard for me to get inspired by the dreary monochrome outside with color film. I'm not sure how successfully I responded to the challenge.

A few shades of brown to play with.

Morton has two hand-drilled .25mm pinholes, on the axis and 11mm above it, 30mm from a 6x6cm frame. The film was Kodak Gold 200 developed in a Cinestill quart powder kit.