First roll of Agfa Scala BW slide film

[terri]

I love this stuff. I didn't have anywhere special to go so I shot at Oakland Cemetery downtown. I shot with a kind of relaxed zone system and thought I got nice contrast and tonal range.

Tomb angel

A section of the Confederate soldiers.

Tomb of the Confederate soldier

Closer view

Let me know what you think.

 

[bogleric]

Nice compositions. I am not a B&W nut so perhaps these are just not my style but I think the shadows are too dark.

 

[Jeff Canes]

I like #1 & #2 the most. IMO both of them are some of the best I have seen on the TPF. All have good composition along with a full range on Zone. Very Adams-ISH

Did you scan the slides or prints? How do they compare with the screen?
Did you use a tripod?
Do you think that B&W print film would have came out as good?
How many rolls did you take? Did most of the frame come out as nice as these?

 

[vonnagy]

you go goth girl, I love the spooky graveyard stuff!

Yes, these are fab #1 I love the composition, you framed this quite nicely, love the the cross behind the angel, at first glance it looked like a gargoyles mouth 'eating' the angel. wicked shot :thumbsup:

#2 the gravestones look cool.. tree is a little dark but still a cool shot!

#3 hrrm.. to much dark tree/shrubbery, or maybe i would have positioned the lion in the center. maybe zoomed in closer or try a shot with more of the iron fencing?

#4 This is my favourite. Nice one Terri! I love the texture and mood this sets, very nicely composed! Thank goodness we still have a few people here who do stuff in b&w :thumbsup:


Wish you would post your shots more often, i haven't seen a bad photo post from ya yet

 

[terri]

Wish you would post your shots more often, i haven't seen a bad photo post from ya yet

My infrequent posts are cuz so much of my stuff is still plonk! :goodvibe:

Jeff, thanks for the kind words! I only used the tripod on the second shot. I used my 20mm wide angle lens and was only a couple feet from that tree. This is all from the same roll, yes, and I could have picked a few more, but these seemed a fair representation of what I was getting. There IS plenty of fabulous B&W print film out there, and absolutely, I think I'd have gotten similar results. TMax 100 and TriX 320 are some print films I've used recently, and I also like to shoot infrared a lot to punch up that B&W feel sometimes. :heart:

Bogleric, Mark: I agree that these appear dark, but truly, they didn't scan all that well, IMO. The actual slides are sooooo much nicer, I fear my puke scan job didn't do justice to this tasty film.

Actually, I already loaded the top image into the Daylab and shot a 4x5 sepia polapan image of it. I should scan it and add to this thread later. It looks kinda cool.

signed, Goth Gurl

 

[jack]

hi terri / everyone

i'm impressed terri. for me 1,2 & 4 are very nice.
i havent used that film yet - so i viewed this thread straight-off.
it has nice qualities. not being able to touch and feel that stone,
its hard to know exactly what its like in reality on a dazzling day (?).
perhaps a ND Grad filter would have just taken some of the brightness
of its most highlit areas (with ref - the 1st angelic statue). im no expert -
just beginning to try this filter myself. the exposure looks pretty right to
me. should we be instinctively bracketing when we each go try this stuff ?

excellent terri - thanks for showing..//jack

 

[terri]

Thanks, Jack! My *relaxed* zone approach is to get the indicated meter reading from my camera, then decide what "zone" I've taken it from (Shooting B&W in a cemetery gave me a lot of zone VI that day!) and so adjust exposure accordingly. THEN I always bracket a half-stop up and down from that. It could very well be a filter of some type would have made an impact, but for my first roll, I deliberately stuck with the ol' tried n true approach.

And I'm not certain, but I think my scanner exaggerated some of these highlighted areas. Scanning a transparency has its downfalls and I am far from an expert!

 

[mrsid99]

Remembering that B&W is not my favorite I really like the first one and the last one.
I'd have preferred to see more of the right side of the statue in the last pic but I guess that gate got in the way.

 

[photobug]

B&W slide film? Cool! These are really great shots GG. Maybe you've found your niche.

 

[terri]

Here we go. I ended up just making a couple of emulsion lifts from the sepia Polapan film out of these. I think I like the tonality here; the Polapan is pretty cool film, too! Curious about what others prefer.

Here's the lion:

And here's the statue:

 

[vonnagy]

hey Goth Gurl,

those look quite wrinkly and wet, did you plop on the scanner whilst they were still drying? quite artistic, think you may have found a new art form there terri

I like the sepia colourstoo! Just goes to show if ya take a fab shot, you can do all sorts of fun stuff with it and not lose quality.

 

[terri]

No, they're completely dried down, Mark! They're emulsion lifts - I projected the Scala image onto the Polapan sepia film and then lifted the emulsion from the Polapan and transferred it to watercolor paper. I played with the emulsion a little for the wrinkled and torn effect.

I normally post this kind of thing over in the "alternative techniques" forum, but since the originals were here I thought it might make it more interesting. I'm glad you like them!