first film pics

A couple of picturesfrom my first black and white film in the recently acquired Pentax Z1.

sluice gate gear, old mill keighley.

[IMG]http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb316/davem_08/sluice-gear-Keighley.jpg[/IMG]

and sluice gate gear detail

[IMG]http://i210.photobucket.com/albums/bb316/davem_08/gear-detail-keighley.jpg[/IMG]


interested to hear comments especially from those more used to film cameras..


Dave

Very good. I remember the sun from March!! I like 2nd and might jiggle the composition if it was mine.

Get your blacks more black. (probably in development). We could never get our blacks dark enough for our tutor. Perhaps he was a bit too keen on black, blaaaaaaaack.... etc

Is it a green filter to bring out brickwork?

How are you developing them?

What film? The grain looks really fine.

I think all the info you need is in the negs but I think they are a bit light for my taste, you could sort that easily in PS

Again which film and speed did you use?

I like the subject, really suits mono. I can see why others have said they're a bit light, but I think retaining detail in the shadows is important and I can't fault that. I often struggled to get the contrast right when scanning.

The film was an Ilford HP5 400 and yes rheses were taken one sunny lunch time in march.

The film was processed and printed by Snaps photos. They scanned the negatives at 4mb to give me a jpeg.

I did try tweaking highlights in elements and the effect was good. But that seemed to defeat the idea of using film so I posted the originals to get an opinion from you.

Taking these realy made me think of the subject matter and what I was trying to acheive. Some of the other subjets on that particular film did not work due to the lack of contrast and interesting detail. It is amazing the difference removing colour makes.

Would using a filter have helped darken the photos? If so which ones?
ken you mention the grain - would I have got a better result with a more grainy film?

I have another set taken with an MZ50 developed as above I may post one or two of those.

Thanks for your comments

Dave

Film is sensitive to UV, (or is it the metres) if its bright you can use a yellow or orange to reduce the glare. Orange blocking more than yellow. I pretty much left the yellow filter on all the time. Also redder filters darken blue skies.

Green filter helps accentuate brick work. I think. Red helps foliage.

Have a look in your charity shops for a John Hedgecoe book which probably has all the info.

www.rodenstock-photo.com/en/main/products/filters/filters-for-black-white-film/

Google on ...

Hi Dave,

When printing the neg on to paper you have to make adjustments to contrast & exposure, dodging/burning (and a whole lot more) are often used on specific areas. When scanning you may have the same adjustments to make (all scanners, films and developers are different). The concept of an 'original', except from slide film, is a bit blurry.

John.