C-4 Yourself...the results are in.

 Results from the Argus C-4

Back in mid-February I wrote a little post on the Argus C-4, and I finally finished the roll of Eastman 5231 that I'd loaded.  It was great to give that camera some use, as I am pretty sure that I haven't used it in almost a decade. Here are a few examples of the scans from the roll.  Overall, I'm pretty happy with the results.  The Eastman 5231 is a great match for this camera.  While it's a cine film, it's pretty much the same as Plus-X.  Developed in D96.

Bill Pivetta outside of our local camera store.

People fishing below the destroyed Craig Lake Dam on the Swannanoa River in East Asheville.
Hurricane Helene's damage is still quite evident. 

Resilience of nature.

I-240 bridge over the French Broad River

Rail trestle over the French Broad river

Good results from one of the best cameras produced by Argus!

A Developing Story

Film from the Arizona trip

Over the past few months, I have shot quite a bit of film.  Thirty-seven rolls on my October Arizona trip, and another 13 rolls during my November Ohio-Virginia trip.  That’s 50 rolls, and really raises my count for the year. Of course, the chickens come home to roost, which means that I have had to do a lot of film developing. The black and white film always gets done first - and while I tend to shoot a lot of different b&w films, there are some that I use more than others. Using only one b&w film does make the developing end simpler, but no, I am not that type. Therefore, the b&w developing takes longer since I have to work out the developer and time for each different emulsion.  The Massive Development Chart is what I use as a reference, as well as my developing notebook - which I’ve been keeping for almost 25 years. Lately, I have been using a lot of D-76, followed by Black White and Green, D-96, and HC110.  

On my recent trips I did shoot a lot of color film, even in medium format.  I used my Pentax 6x7 quite often during the Arizona trip, and I think the addition of a 3D printed right hand grip really makes the camera easier to hand hold.  I confess that I have not used the Pentax 6x7 very often over the past few years, and the Arizona trip was the most use it’s had in a long while. Most of the color shot on that trip was with my 35mm K-mount bodies, the Vivitar V3800 and the Pentax KX, and then the Pentax 17. As I was getting ready to leave for Ohio in mid-November,  I sent in the E-6 films to Dwayne’s Photo in Parsons, KS, and the 120 C-41 to Reformed Film Lab in Florida.  The developed film returned shortly after I got home from the November trip. 

I developed the 35mm color film at home using the FPP Color kit for ECN-2 and C-41 films.  I use a sous-vide in a 5 gallon tote to keep the chemistry at 42°C.  I have 7 Jobo tanks that take 2 rolls of 35mm, so what I do is this: 

Number each tank and record what rolls are in each. Work from Tank 1 -7, hanging the film to dry in the same order.  Since everything gets the same development, it doesn’t matter what rolls are together, except that I do keep ECN-2 films separate from C-41, since I don’t want remjet particles polluting the non-remjet in the same tank.

For a developing session like this, I mix a fresh batch of developer.  The kits are said to be able to develop up to 25 rolls, but after 18-20 rolls, I mix up a fresh batch. At $20 for a kit, it’s still a HUGE savings over sending the film out for development. 

In looking over the lists of what I shot, here is the breakdown from the two trips:

Here’s the actual number of rolls:

1 Amber T800

2 Eastman 250D 

3 Fomapan 200

1 Fomapan 400

1 FPP Derevpan 100

1 FPP Retrochrome 400

1 FPP Svema FN64

1 FPP Xray

4 Fuji Acros 100

2 Fuji Color 200

1 Harman Phoenix 200 II

1 Ilfocolor 400

4 Kentmere 200

7 Kentmere 400

2 Kodacolor 100

1 Kodacolor 200

1 Kodak Color Plus 200

1 Kodak Ektar 100

3 Kodak Gold 200

1 Kodak Max 400

1 Kodak Tmax 100

2 Kodak Tmax 400

1 Kodak Tri-X

1 Lomo Color 100

1 Lomo Color 92

2 Lomochrome Purple

2 Lomochrome Turquoise

3 Rollei Retro 400S

The Lomochrome films were used in a Holga and my Rollei 35TE.  The Holga gave me some wonderfully wacky images, and the sharp lens on the Rollei definitely gave me some nice images, and with those color shifts from the Lomochrome - very surreal imagery.  Most of the 35mm films were shot in K-mount bodies - Vivitar V2000 for the b&w, and Vivitar V3800 and Pentax KX for color.  My Leica M2 shot a roll of b&w and two in color, my Pentax 17 1 b&w and 1 color, and my Pentax 6x7 for 120, with a few b&w rolls in my Lomo LCA 120, and of course, the Holga.

Now that I’m done scanning all of the negatives, the editing and deciding which ones are the “keepers” come next.  B&W definitely requires less editing. With color films, there’s typically a lot more that needs to be done until I have something that I am satisfied with.  Spotting, adjustments to the color and so on, takes more time. In the end, I’ll have several hundred images on film that I will have to evaluate.  Still, film gives me something that seems “organic” and despite the work that’s required, I enjoy the process.  I have plenty of digital images from those trips, too, and while they require much less work, I don’t have the same feeling about most of them.  There is something about seeing an image on a piece of thin acetate that has a tangible bit of reality about it.  

Here are a few examples from the film I shot.  I’ll go into more detail in the captions.

On the Lewis and Clark Trail in Missouri.  Vivitar V3800, Ilfocolor 400. Oct. 12.

Coolidge, KS. What appears to be an old bank building. Vivitar V2000, Kentmere 400

Offerle, KS.  10/13/25.  Vivitar V3800, Kodak Max 400

Grants, NM, Route 66. 10/15/25. Vivitar V3800, Fujicolor 200.

Just past the Arizona Welcome Center, I-40. Oct. 15.  V2000, Kentmere 400, red filter

The oft-photographed GANO abandoned grain elevator near Kinsley, KS. Oct. 13, Pentax 6x7, Kentmere 400

Saguaro National Park, 10/18/25. Holga, Lomochrome Purple

Pima Air and Space Museum, 10/18/25. FPP X-Ray film, V2000, 85b filter

Lowell ghost town, S of Bisbee, AZ.  Pentax KX, FPP Retrochrome 400. A perfect film for this vintage scene.  10/17/25.

Chiricahua National Monument, Rollei Retro 400S, V2000, red filter.  10/19/25.

Bisbee, AZ.  Lomochrome Turquoise, Rollei 35 TE.  10/17/25.

Pipe Organ formation, Chiricahua Nat. Mon., Lomo Color '92, Pentax 6x7. 10/19/25

Shell and Chevy. Lowell ghost town. Pentax KX, Kodak Gold 200

I still have a ton of editing to do on these hundreds of images, and I'll be sharing more on my Flickr pages (mfophotos).

Grants, NM, Route 66.  Pentax 17, Kentmere 200.

Early Riser For A Change

 I've been in a bit of a creative funk lately.  Partly due to working on writing for some projects, I haven't been doing any thing photographically that's notable.  Some of the places that I really enjoyed taking a camera to have lost their attraction because of the damage from last fall's hurricane Helene.  I used to be an early riser back when I was working, as I was usually up by 6 am.  These days, it's a rare day that I am out of bed before 8.  Well, this morning was different - I was awake early, and looked out the window and saw that we had some thick fog outside. I got dressed, grabbed a camera bag and was out the door by 6:30.   

Because we are in the mountains, it's not unusual to have low-level fog in the mornings, and usually it's gone before 9 am, or at least so attenuated that it's not worthwhile going out in search of some good foggy scenes. I could see that this morning was different, so I grabbed my bag with the Nikon Zfc to get some instant gratification if I saw anything that was interesting.  This morning was just what I needed to get back in the groove.  I was full of energy as the fog cloaked familiar scenes into mysterious tableaus.  

My Nikon Zfc had a TTArtisans 35mm f/1.4 manual focus lens attached, and it was the perfect combination for this morning.  For one, auto-focus lenses hunt around in fog, so just keeping the lens at infinity and f/4 to f/8 was all that I needed to do. I shot at ISO 100 and 200 for the most part, so handheld shots were possible.  The thing about fog is that if reflects and scatters a lot of light, so it's actually brighter than you think because above the cloud bank, it's a perfectly clear sky.  Unless of course, it's at night. I was prepared to work quickly, because the fog could dissipate at any time.  So, in the span of about an hour, I drove and visited several sites that I felt would be interesting, and they were!

My first stop was just down the road from my house, at the Weaverville Mulch Yard.  The mountains of mulch looked like a mountainous view, with the diffused light creating silhouettes of mulch piles.

My next stop was a little over a mile away at lake Louise Park.  There, the water and the fog created a very special combination of diffused light and reflection.

After that, I ventured right into Weaverville, and shot some street scenes, but the views into the nature park were the most rewarding.

I then drove over to Reems Creek Road, and the old Balcrank factory building was dissolved in the mist, much to my delight.

A little farther on Reems Creek Road, I stopped at the Karpen Soccer park and was happy to see that a lot of the damage along Reems Creek had been ameliorated.  There were some great views of the creek and the surrounding vegetation that caught my eye, especially the bamboo thicket on the opposite side of Reems Creek.

In the span of a little over an hour, I shot a lot of images in b&w, and I am quite happy with what I got. There are a lot more excellent images other than the ones  shown here. The Nikon Zfc really did the job. Sometimes it just takes getting up early to set the day off to a good start.  Carpe diem, they say.

Why the iPhone is a pretty good camera

My latest issue of Monochrome Mania is available from my Etsy site - Monochrome Mania No. 10, Pocketing Memories.  It’s a departure from most of my issues in that all of the b&w images were originally taken with an iPhone, not a film camera.  I’ll admit that I had some trepidation in putting this issue together, since it’s a departure from my previous issues -- but wait! Monochrome Mania is about the b&w image, no matter how it’s produced.  Having a tangible product and not an e-zine  is what Monochrome Mania is all about.  

 I purchased my first Apple iPhone in 2017, and it became a secondary image-maker, and a readily available photographic notebook.  I often shot with it to record exactly where I was, since the location data accompanies every image.  Many times, I use it to gauge how an image may look in square format, or in monochrome, and it becomes a tool that accompanies my film use.  Beyond that, however, it’s also a creative instrument that allows me to photograph a scene and see the result in real time, and store it away in my pocket until later.  My first iPhone was an SE model - smaller and less expensive than what is currently available.  It was replaced with an iPhone XR in 2019, which I am still using.  

There’s no doubt that camera phones have killed compact digital camera sales, since for many people, their camera phone does all that they need.  Always ready and easily pocketed, camera phones have sophisticated software to provide the user with images that probably are far better than they would have gotten with a compact digicam.  There’s also the idiom that the best camera is the one you have with you, and for many, it’s going to be a smartphone.

So, the latest issue has been curated to show a variety of images - some grouped by subject matter, and all have been taken since about 2017.  As you go through the issue, I have some commentary on Walker Evans, who totally embraced the then new Polaroid SX-70 as a creative instrument.  I think if you take his comments about the SX-70, they could easily be applied to the camera on a smart phone.  Of course, printing an image is important, and you can now purchase small printers that connect to your phone via Bluetooth and print your iPhone images as if you were using a Polaroid -- at a lower price point.  Something that I think more people should do with their photos.

You should also consider that you can take your smartphone images and turn them into b&w negatives in your favorite image processing program, and make digital negatives that can be used to make cyanotypes and other alternative-process analog prints.  

I have been very happy with the comments by readers of this issue.  In several instances, they were inspired to use their iPhone as a “real camera” and take time to compose and use the filter that matched their vision.  Others have told me that this is my best issue so far, in terms of the images and the presentation. 

Hopefully, you’ll read the issue and be inspired to use your smartphone or at least happy with the images that I present.  That’s what Monochrome Mania is trying to do - engage you in the world of black and white photography, in all of its facets.

Monochrome Mania No. 10, Pocketing Memories is 40 pages, including the covers. At $10 + shipping, it's still a bargain these days.

 

Widening My Horizon Part II

Using 35mm film in a Pentax 6x7

Back in mid-February, I wrote a post about some ways to get panoramic images with a 35mm film camera.  At the time, I had not yet shot anything with a panorama mask and 35mm adapter in my Pentax 6x7.  I ordered my panoramic 35mm adapter from Clever3dPrints on Etsy, and it arrived soon after. The adapters to fit a 35mm cassette into the 120 roll film spot work very well.  The panorama viewfinder mask fit over the ground glass, but I think it's a 1/2mm too thick, as the prism doesn't snug in tightly with it in place.  Second, the 35mm adaptor to go over the film gate doesn't really fit well, and wanted to rub against the shutter curtain so I decided not to use it, and expose the entire width of the film. 

The back of the Pentax 67 opened up, showing the supply
and take-up cassettes, and the taped-on leader.

You need to set the film to 220 on the Pentax 6x7 pressure plate as well as the 120/220 selector button on the right side of the body.  To make sure that I got as much out of the 36 exposure roll, I taped a length of exposed 35mm film to the end of the fresh roll that was connected to the take-up cassette.  The take-up spool is an empty cassette (obviously oriented upside down. As it turns out, I need to make the leader a bit longer, as there was a length of unexposed film at the beginning of my roll.  The 220 setting is necessary if you are using a 36 exposure roll, and you should get close to 19 shots, unless you respool your own film and make it a 40-exposure roll.  

The beauty of using this without the panoramic mask in the film gate is that I get 24x70mm negatives, excluding the sprockets.  If you are sprocket freak, then you'll appreciate the exposed sprocket area. Compared with my Horizon 202 (more about that in another post), it's a bit wider - 12mm. I used the Pentax 55mm lens on the 6x7, which is about equal to 28mm in 35mm. The Horizon 202's lens is also 28mm, but the crop with 6x7 55mm lens  results in an image without any distortion that one sees with the Horizon camera.  

The obvious drawback with this setup is that the film still has some exposed frames that will be ruined if you open the back in daylight, unless you forgo shooting to the end of the roll.  I brought my camera back home and opened it up in my bathroom/darkroom and rewound the film into the original cassette.  I shot a roll of Ultrafine Extreme 100 and developed in D-96.  To say that I was happy with the images is an understatement.  All of my shots were handheld. The D-96 came from the FPP store.  All of my frames were scanned on my Epson V700 scanner.

Some results.

Dillsboro, NC

Dillsboro, NC

Rt. 197 up Ivy Knob to Cockscomb Mtn.

The French Broad River at Ledges Whitewater Park

After I scanned in the negatives, I was pleased at how big those images could be viewed. Zooming in revealed a lot of detail, and a print from them would be quite striking.  You may ask why not just crop any 6x7 negative post scan to be a 24x70mm negative, and my answer is:

• You can no longer buy 220 film that is fresh
• There are so many more emulsions in 35mm
• The viewfinder mask defines your image area
• It's part of the process

In part III of this series, I will discuss my experiences with my Horizon cameras.   

  

Tasma NK-2 Film Review

Over the past few years I have been able to sample the interesting films from the Film Photography Project store.  The Svema films such as the FN64 and Svema 400 are really nice films in my opinion, and I have been using them rather frequently.  One film that I have not tried until now is the Tasma NK-2 100 ISO b&w film.  I am not sure why I hadn't tried it earlier, but after shooting two rolls of it in the past week, I feel that I can offer a quick review.

First of all, the Tasma film originates from Russia, and is described as a b&w motion picture film.  The Russian site says that the factory dates from 1933, so Tasma has a long history. The film is on a PET base, not acetate, and consequently is extremely tough and will not tear like an acetate-based film.  It's also thinner than typical 35mm films, much like the Svema stocks that I have used, but seems not as flimsy as the Svema.  The Tasma NK-2 film is fresh stuff, according to the FPP site, and has a sort of cult-status. 

The Tasma NK-2 rolls are in 24-exposure cassettes from the FPP, and are DX-coded.  I would prefer 36-exposure rolls, but then again, with these limited-availability films, the shorter rolls are a good idea, especially for testing.  The film loaded easily onto the take-up spool in the Nikon F3HP and the Yashica FX-7 cameras that I used.  I set the ISO on the cameras to the box speed of 100. 

DEVELOPING

I checked the Massive Development Chart, and the information on the Tasma NK-2 seemed rather odd, so I consulted the FPP pages on Flickr, and found two developers that I use: D-76 and XTOL.  Leslie Lazenby's recommendation was XTOL stock at 7.25 minutes.  Another photographer (Tom Napier) recommended D-76 straight for 7 minutes.   I find the MDC listing a bit odd, as I have only seen examples with people shooting it at box speed.

Other developers and times that I have found (all at 20°C):
HC-110 B for 10 min
D76 Stock for 10 min
Diafine - 4 min each in A & B

I developed in D-76 for 10 minutes, and did a water stop, followed by 7 minutes in fixer.  I washed in water and used Permawash to remove any fixer followed by a good rinse.  Both rolls came out beautifully. The film dries perfectly flat, and scans beautifully on my Espon V700.

Nikon F3HP with 19mm Vivitar lens:

Yashica FX-7 Super with 50mm f/2 lens.

Overall, the Tasma NK-2 is a very easy film to work with, especially now that I have a developer or two that I can use to get satisfactory results.  The tonality is certainly acceptable, and it is fine-grained.  I can see no reason why anyone would not want to try some.  The fact that it scans so well should be a key point in using it.  I think a bulk roll of it from the FPP store is next on my list.