VT Pictures, Ilford Film and Chemistry

Dave Colangelo · Sep 4, 2017

There was some interest in another thread about discussing some of my photos so I'm starting a new thread here to talk about them. The two requested are,

I am also pretty partial to this one,

To give some background on the taking of these photos. They were all shot on FP4 and developed at maker suggested times in DD-X. Fixed in Ilford Rapid fixer for what its worth. The images were shot at what ever my gossen meter was saying on a simple reflective measure. They were shot on a Hasselblad 500CM, most likely with an 80mm lens (but I dont remember exactly it could have been my 50mm as well). They were taken along a river in southern Vermont and you can see the rest of the roll here

timor · Sep 4, 2017

Hi Dave,
My question with this pictures, I mean the top 2 (23 and 24 from the collection),is did you take separate light reading for each of them ? It looks like there is a stop or stop snd a half exposure difference. Something happened there.

Dave Colangelo · Sep 7, 2017

@timor

Yes they were metered a bit differently. If memory serves they were taken from the same spot with different lenses. It was eitehr the 50mm and the 80mm or the 50mm and the 150mm (I don't quite recall). I dont have a shutter tester so there is also a bit of a possibility they were taken at the same EV but one of my lenses is off. All of my blad stuff has been working nicely but so far only my body has been rebuilt so the lenses are as they sit.

Dave

timor · Sep 7, 2017

Yes, the iris of the aperture may not close to the factory specs anymore. Well, you gonna have to take some notes and see, what real transmission they have with different aperture settings.
Also looking at your light meter with the dome mounted on the top of housing, how do you position it each time you take reading ?

Dave Colangelo · Sep 7, 2017

Eventually Ill have them serviced but for now they are well within acceptable range (and I can always push/pull a bit when i print or edit). If i have a free saturday I may run some verbose tests on all of them.

But anyway on to how I meter. I have a Gossen Sixtomat and in this case the dome was off to the side since it was a reflective measurement. Generally my process will be, point the meter at the scene and measure. If i have the lens hood on I have a nice flat surface i can place the meter on to make sure its pointed in plane with the camera.

If the scene is mixed lighting i will just take what ever the meter says. In this case I would apply a bit of zone thinking. Noting that the sky makes up maybe 20% of the second image and the much darker trees make up 60% with the reflective river taking the last 20% I can apply some simple zones to those 3 sections and do some weighting in my head. I then need to think about the image I want, maybe more sky/river definition with dark trees or a blown out sky and lighter trees. From there I compensate as such.

Im still learning a lot so a lot of this is also experimentation.

I have been shooting this same river in a variety of locations again and again for a few years now and am still trying to get an image that properly captures it.