It's been a long day's night, and I've been working, like a dog! Yes, it was an exhausting week, but I think I finished on a high note. I really worked hard to prepare my online classes and I think they were very useful for some of my students. They fell asleep in my first class, which was very frustrating, but in my second class, they seemed to be lively. I can always count on the Argentinean lady to participate, and she really helps me move the class along. So I was happy.
After I was done, I bit the bullet and decided today was the day to open the boxes with the camera components. I received the lens last week, and I received the actual camera body earlier this week (Monday or Tuesday). All the way from rainy Norway! I felt trepidation and was intimidated, but I reasoned, I have to do it now.
The Super Angulon 121mm lens seems fine. It was not as heavy as I was expecting, and it was well-packed in packing nuts. Pink ones, too. I checked the speeds and they seemed to be accurate. It seems fine.
I also opened the box from Norway and took out the camera body. It was light also, the perfect match. I had to loosen the bungee cords to open it up so that I could perform the task of attaching the lens. Yes, the back element of the lens has to be unscrewed, and I had difficulty at first, since it wouldn't budge. I didn't want to break a $330 lens. The front screwed off, but that wasn't the one that needed to be taken off, it was the back one. After consulting a few Youtube videos about attaching lenses to lens boards, I saw that I was on the right track, so I made the effort and put some "elbow grease" into my arms and unscrewed it, then attached it to the camera. It is not as tight as I would like, but I will fix it in the next few days. Then, walked out to the back yard to try to calibrate infinity focus by focusing on street lamp poles. I think I have it, but my loupe (a cheap $15 Amazon product) is really not that good. Now I am motivated to invest in that as well, but not until after mid November, so I won't have to pay until January.
Finally, it was 4:45 p.m. and light was fading fast. Do I just take a photo of the cactus in the backyard? It was half in shadow already, with the sun fading fast behind some trees. I need a more open composition so I got into my car and drove to Buena Vista avenue, and parked next to a power plant which is located next to a concrete river channel. There are incredibly overpriced riverfront houses that face the channel. Yes, the same channel where all the homeless people live under the bridge, but it was the most open place I could imagine that would still be receiving light from the fast-setting sun. Ere Apollo disappeared with his chariot to the other side of the globe, I snapped a photo as tons of cars whooshed by to my left during the rush hour. All I need is to cause an accident by curious onlookers. I will have to get used to the fact that wherever I go with this camera, I will attract the stares of throngs of curious onlookers. That happens to all large format photographers, I think.
I got what I needed, a quick snapshot, but I think I introduced a light leak. When taking out the dark slide, I pulled open the holder because the bungee cords holding it to the body were not tight enough, and so I opened up a slit. Of course the sneaky light rays needed no other invitation to wreck havoc, so there is a big light leak on one side. Also, the composition is terrible, but I was in a hurry because Apollo was like Ben Hur, going faster and faster, waiting to reach the other side of the globe. I also forgot my cable release, which you need because if not, when you trigger the shutter with your finger as I had to do, you introduce movement and blur. But there was nothing else for it, I either grabbed the photo as it was and took the negative home to be developed that night, which was my plan, or else waste another day. I didn't want to waste any more days.
I tried to get a second shot of the library, and might have found a composition of the entrance, but there was a shirtless homeless man sitting under the tree camped out there. There are homeless people camped out almost everywhere in the downtown area of the city called Crown. They don't go to south Crown because the police will rustle them up and force them to leave, but here, they own the place. They own the public park now, it is a homeless city and the last time I went, I saw men going behind the bushes with toilet paper to take care of their needs. They own the downtown shopping mall, all the businesses are gone from there, and they are filtering in everywhere they find a spot in this part of town, approaching shoppers when they go to the grocery stores along 6th avenue (Superior, Walmart, Cardenas which is close to 6th street). They are everywhere, tramping up and down 6th and Main street and even sleeping in the old city center building. I am sure they have encampments everywhere near the railroad tracks also. So, no library photo, but the library looks derelict anyway because it has been closed during the months of the Covid catastrophe.
Next, I tried the local church. I just could not get a good composition, light was fading fast and the shadows frustrated my efforts. So, I went home with one negative exposed, the one I had taken at the river channel next to the power station, and developed it with my Stearman Press tray. It came out! And it was much more in focus than my pinhole images! Now, imagine what I might be able to obtain if I am more careful, don't introduce light leaks, take more time to find compositions and also shoot when I have better light. I am giddy at the prospect.
So, here is my first negative, and inversion to a positive with the help of my crude Mac program:
I sent a jpg of it to the creator of the camera in Norway, but he politely declined to comment about it. I wouldn't have said much either, it was a disaster, but I did keep my promise to send him an image of my first photo. Now, I need to do better! Much better.
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