It is 9:45 a.m. as I write this entry and it is already very hot outside. So much for going out to walk or planning a trip, today is a day for hunkering down at home and surviving. I would have liked to drive out to the mountains, I am eyeing a few hiking trips to San Bernardino, but not this weekend. There will be crowds going out there trying to escape the heat, and I don't want to run into them.
I thought I would post a few more photos that I developed yesterday. These are 4x5 black and white images taken with my Travelwide camera. I have really come to rely on this camera, and if anything is getting me through this Covid crisis, besides the support of my family, it is this, 4x5 photography.
These are from the Angeles Crest highway trip I took earlier this week, on Monday, "mi birdei".
I really like this shot above. It was taken with fresh, not my expired stash, fresh Arista 200 film. Now I think I know what they refer to when they talk about tonality. Look at all the range of greys, and also, look at the clarity and smoothness. This is what amazes me. The composition is okay, I realize that, but I am not looking for grandiose images. I also could have increased the exposure and lightened the image, but I don't want to. This makes it almost a grey, overcast day, when in reality, it was hot but with clouds.
Another one from my trip to the mountains. How have I never explored the Angeles Crest highway before? It is a mentality, unfortunately. Others want to go out and see the world, but when you grow up poor in an immigrant community, you grow up hunkering down and surviving. We do have a bleak view of the world. I have been trying to change. Once again, the tonality is beautiful. The image could have been flipped horizontally, I usually scan by putting the negative down on the emulsion side, which means, a flip is in order. I don't think I did that in this case. The clouds could have been more dramatic, if I were doing darkroom work, I would have been burning in the clouds. (I know, I know, that is done with software now.) I have to remember, the Ranch 2 fire was raging during my trip, so there was a thick cloud of smoke arising from the Azusa area.
One more with the mountains. For this one, I am to blame, I didn't wait for the light to hit the trees, they were in shadow. The hills behind the forefront were lit up, but not the front area, and I had to lighten with software. It looks unsatisfying. However, it gives me an incentive to keep on improving.
So these are more images from the mountains. I want to return but, like I said, I am not going to highly-trafficked areas on weekends. With 15 million people in the surrounding areas, all of them cabin sick the way I am with Covid quarantines, I know that people rush in droves to these areas during the weekend. I will not go there.
Today I should be receiving a Graflex Optar 135 lens, to replace the one I grafted onto my Kraken camera (which I have not used yet). I will wait for that lens and mount it on my Busch Pressman 4x5, and take a few photos that I hope to develop today. That will be my photographic trip. Maybe I might go to the Norco Power House, I saw a video a few days ago about this place, a structure covered with street art in a field. I might go today.
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