Do you ever feel a desire to step outside of your comfort zone in your photography, to capture some images in a completely different way, to return to the basics of our craft? For the last month, I have felt an irresistible urge to shoot some black and white film, something that I haven’t done in over thirty years.
When I told some folks at work that I was planning to shoot some film during a week of vacation, one of them responded by asking if I was making a movie. I patiently explained that I would be putting some black and white film into a non-digital camera. He stared back at me with a look of incredulity and asked if I couldn’t simply convert some of my digital images into black and white.
I still have some analog cameras, but most of them have some electronic assists—I wanted a truly mechanical camera. I found a Nikon F SLR with a 50mm f/1.4 lens on my local Craigslist. The Nikon F introduced in 1959, was Nikon’s first SLR, although this particular camera was produced in 1971, judging from its serial number. The camera is so basic that it requires no battery. When was the last time you took photos with a camera without a battery? The camera has no meter and I ended up using my DSLR as the meter.
What about film? I went to one of the last remaining camera stores in our area and bought a couple of rolls of Ilford HP5+ film, a black and white film with a “box speed” of ISO 400. I ended up shooting it at ISO 200, because it was very sunny and bright the day that I went shooting. (Using the “sunny 16” guidelines, I would have been shooting all day at 1/500 sec and f/16.)
What should I shoot? I decided that an urban environment would be more suitable for my film project than my normal wildlife environment, so I got on the metro and headed into Washington D.C. with my Nikon SLR and my Canon DSLR in tow.
I got off on the elevated outdoor metro platform at Reagan National Airport and my first shot was of the airport’s control tower. I wanted to try to find subjects with shapes and lines that would show up in black and white. (I am including some digital shots of the same subjects at the end of the post. I didn’t try to exactly match the shots, but they give you an idea of the differences in how the cameras rendered the subjects.)
The next shot was of the Metro’s ceiling at the underground station in Rosslyn, Virginia. (You may have already seen a similar shot that I took with my digital camera and posted last week.)
I exited the Metro in Rosslyn and walked across the Key Bridge into Georgetown. From the bridge, I took this shot of part of the waterfront in Georgetown. I like the old time feel of this shot.
One of the first things that you see when you cross the bridge is Dixie Liquors, an old-fashioned liquor store with a really cool sign that I have always liked.
That was the start of my adventure with film. As I had hoped, I was looking at the world with different eyes and was forced to slow down, knowing I had to input manually the shutter speed and aperture and very conscious of the fact that I had no auto focus to help me. I was also shooting with a fixed focal length lens, so I did not have the luxury of zooming in and out. Most of all, though, I was filled with uncertainty, not knowing for sure if any of my shots would come out, worrying that my old camera might have a light leak or that I would mess up the development of the film.
I’ll continue my saga in another posting or two in the upcoming weeks. As promised, here are some digital shots that I took as I used my Canon DSLR as a meter for my manual Nikon.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
I love the retro feel of the BW pics … how did that Nikon feel? It looks like a fun adventure, and using both cameras added the more current view
The Nikon felt great–it had a feeling of solid metal, unlike most modern cameras that are full of electronics and plastic. I am gradually coming to the conclusion that there are benefits to both film and digital–neither is necessarily better than the other.
Great photos and I enjoyed the narration Mike.
Thanks, Dan. I like to think about the process of what I am doing and sometimes I use my blog postings to crystallize those thoughts into words.
I like how writing helps us to do that Mike.
Great contrasts in the photo scenes. I bought a new (beginner level) camera and, just last week, asked a photographer blogger about using it for black & white because I’m working in some historic Colorado topics. I enjoyed reading your process and camera info. I will have fun testing myself!
Good luck on your own adventures with black and white. Most often now, folks will look at their photos after they have shot them and wonder how they would look in black and white. It’s somewhat of a different mental process to try to see a scene and shoot it with the specific intent of seeing it in black and white.
Yes, I do get that urge from time to time, but so far I’ve managed to resist it, though I still have my first SLR, a Pentax Spotmatic, the two Pentax PZ-1s I was using when I embraced the digital world in 2000, and two Yashica-MAT twin-lens reflex medium-format cameras, as well as a full (though disassembled) black-and-white darkroom. I still dream of shooting with film, though. Just out of curosty, where were you able to find the Ilford film, what did it cost, and what did they charge for the development? Did you also get contact prints or do you have a slide scanner? Know what I miss the most? The acrid fragrance of the acid bath and watching a photo magically and slowly appear on a blank sheet of paper.
Wow, Gary. You have a treasure trove of gear. The Ilford film was about $6.00 a roll locally and is less than $5.00 a roll on line at B&H or Adorama.I developed it myself using Ilford chemistry that I procured on line (the standard developer, stop bath, fixer routine)–the only real problem was fumbling about in the dark loading the film onto the reel and getting it into the Paterson tank. I scanned the negatives myself with a Canon flatbed scanner. I bought a batch of darkroom stuff this past weekend and hope eventually to set up the enlarger (a Beseler 23 II) and do a few prints. I have a bunch of film in my refrigerator and several old cameras to test out, including the Kodak Retina IIIc rangefinder I started out with and a Russian Zenit SLR I bought on a trip to Russia in the 90’s.
Nice work, Mike! Your Nikon F reminds me of my Fujifilm X-T1 — its retro look and feel is a big part of the X-T1’s appeal. Perhaps you should post some photos of your darkroom.
When I get around to setting up a darkroom, perhaps I will be able to post some photos of it. As it was, the only time I needed darkness for this initial experiment was to load the exposed film onto the reel and put it in the developing tank. I did that in an interior room in my townhouse that is mostly used for storage. Once the tank was closed, I could do the rest in the light. I did the actual developing in my kitchen and hung up the film to dry on a clothesline above my bathtub. After that, I scanned the 35mm negatives to convert them to digital, so I could post them (and do a few minor tweaks). I now have an enlarger, trays, and stuff, but haven’t decided if I will try to set it up in a bathroom or in an area in my laundry room.
Wow, I’m impressed with your adventure here. One of my cohort members in the Arcanum really went heavily into the B&W format with her Yashica Mat camera, but I don’t remember what film she used. It was interesting to see the difference in the two versions of the metro wall enlarged as much as the computer would allow. I’d forgotten how grainy film is — some people like that look better. I guess I prefer the smoother appearance of the digital view, but you did a great job focusing and adjusting the light of your film camera. Have fun setting up your darkroom!
Thanks, Sue. There are some films like Kodak TMAX that have much finer grain and there are also developers that help to minimize grain too. For now, I am happy that I was able to produce some images. I have acquired a Mamiya twin lens reflex camera and hope to get around to testing that out sometime soon. It’ll be interesting to see how 120 film turns out with negatives a lot bigger than 35mm.
Those were the days, and seeing these photos is like a time machine transporting me back to them. Nice work!
There are some benefits to going retro. I start off my days with a 1954 vintage Gillette razor (yes, you can still get the double-edge blades for it) and whip up shaving cream in a mug. I like the idea of creating things with my hands. I am not ready to give up my digital gear, but I am hoping to integrate some of the lessons I am learning from slowing down and shooting film to make my digital images better.
I took my first photography classes with b&w film 25 yrs ago. I keep saying I’m going to do this…
Great photos. Funny that guy whodidn’t know what film was.
Thanks. A lot of us have fond memories of working with film. Now that I am working only part-time, I have the freedom to return a bit to re-explore the past. I suspect my friend knows about film, but suspect that he never considered that people still use it. For him, I suspect that when he heard me say that I would be “shooting film,” he thought I said that I would be “shooting a film.”
Very cool. I look forward to shooting my Pentax Spotmatic soon! Thanks for sharing. Dave
Shooting with film requires a totally different mindset than shooting digitally, I’ve found. I have some film in my refrigerator that I need to shoot and your efforts may give me the boost I need to reengage with film.