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Harwood Mills

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Cape Henry Lighthouses

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Colonial Parkway

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My new vintage soap dish... a.k.a. business card holder!

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Color Film in Monochrome

Lately, the trend of cross processing film in chemicals designed for a different type of film has been attracting more and more attention and enthusiastic fans. Usually, color slide film is processed in chemicals meant for color negative film, but it can also be done in the reverse. 

The following photos have been cross processed as well, but with a different twist.

The images were taken on a roll of color 120 film, using a Holga. I was curious about the images and  wanted instant results... so mailing in the film for processing in a professional lab wasn't my first choice. Instead, I developed the film using the materials I already had on hand: instant coffee, soda ash, and pure vitamin C.

Those three ingredients are mixed with distilled water to create a stain developer called caffenol (or more precisely, caffenol-c, since it's the variant with vitamin C for speedier development). Caffenol is normally used to develop black-and-white film. But why not try it with color film as well?

Reflected tree line

To my happy surprise, the film did just fine in the caffenol, and all the images turned out mostly clear... maybe with just a slight haze. I chose to scan the film in color, leaving the color cast just as the scanner read it. It varied a little from one photo to the next, some appearing brown-toned while others have a green, golden, or even eggplant tint.

Harwood Mills

Peeking into a barn

 

Smithfield

I'm sure I'll be processing color film in caffenol again soon!

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York River

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Historic ship in the harbor.

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Beach Day

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Magnolia Blossom

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Another digital still life... but film versions are in the works!

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I'm working on a still life series with fruit and sheet music. A Polaroid camera, a pinhole camera, and van dyke printmaking will all be involved.

Pears

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 Follow me...

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Magnolia & Blooms

World Pinhole Day

In celebration of World Pinhole Day this past Sunday, I took a walk around our neighborhood with my trusty Holga WPC (Wideangle Pinhole Camera) in tow. Pinhole photography is an enjoyable challenge in that it takes photography back to its foundations. A pinhole camera is nothing more than a dark box or chamber of some sort (a camera obscura, literally) with a tiny hole in one side and light-sensitive material inside on the opposite side. And that's all you need to capture an image! As impressive as modern advances in technology are, sometimes it's refreshing to go back to the basics.

 The Holga WPC does offer a few conveniences over a bare-bones shoebox or coffee can pinhole camera: it has a shutter mechanism with a cable release and of course the advantage of being able to shoot a roll of film rather than a single image. But the concept is still wonderfully simple: dark box, pinhole, film. No viewfinder, no light meter, no camera settings at all. I enjoyed my walk and eventually decided that these flowers in my neighbors' yard would be my chosen subject. 

I've been warming up to the Holga WPC over the past few months and getting a better sense of the correct exposure times. I'll be ready to share more results soon!

Curious Camera Competition

This weekend, ArtsEye Gallery in Tucson opened the 4th Annual Curious Camera show. Curious Cameras can be vintage, pinhole, plastic, instant, or phone cameras - all nontraditional and all a heap of fun. I'm honored to have my photo "Behind Bars," taken with a Polaroid Spectra camera and Impossible Project film, featured in the show as one of 30 honorable mentions.

Behind Bars

To see the full exhibition online, please click here: Curious Camera 2012 Gallery. Thanks!

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Pitchers

Casertavecchia is a tiny medieval town about 45 minutes north of Naples, Italy. Its Romanesque cathedral, narrow cobblestone streets, lush green surroundings, and hearty cuisine are reminiscent of more popular tourist destinations in Tuscany and Umbria. It's a hidden gem, and I have many good memories from it... as well as these two quirky half-glazed terra cotta pitchers.

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Roses in a Glass Vase

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Orchid Lampshade

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Here she is again: my favorite magnolia. 

A familiar subject this week!

Foggy Morning, Infrared Style

What happens when you photograph foggy landscapes with an infrared-converted camera? 

There's only one way to find out!

 And the results are in. I ended up with a set of milky, silvery, somewhat pearlescent-looking images.

 

  The leaves on the trees are green, but they show up as a whitish gray in the infrared photos. This one stands near a road, sidewalk, and several buildings. But in the fog, you'd never know it.

 

 I love how the fog transforms the world.

 

And of course: my favorite magnolia. 

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Simplicity

Optiko: Analogue Photography Zine

I'm honored to have one of my infrared film images featured on Optiko's website. Head on over to Optiko to check it out: http://www.optiko.co.uk/#/blog/4553704839/Britta-Hershman-Magnolia/1496175

Magnolia

I'm happy that the chosen photo is one of my favorite tree. It was taken with my Holga loaded with infrared film and equipped with an infrared filter over the lens. The exposure time was just over one second — enough time for the fast-moving clouds to become blurred.

A big thank you to Steve over at Optiko!

Spinach Anthotypes!

 You might remember my blog post about making an anthotype (a plant-based print) using beet juice and watercolor paper. But beet juice isn't the only plant material that can be used for making photographic prints: liquid extracted from of a number of leaves, flowers, and roots will work.

For my second round of anthotypes, I chose spinach. A handful of fresh spinach leaves yielded just the right amount of liquid, which I painted onto watercolor paper and exposed to the sun with a positive image on a plastic transparency placed over it.

The sun acted much more quickly on the spinach than the beet juice, and within just a few hours, these prints were done. Voila!

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Trees and fog... two of my favorite things!

Digital Infrared

I have been dreaming of infrared photography for a while now and am slowly working my way through my tiny infrared film stash. But I was recently lucky and blessed to have the chance to try my hand at digital infrared photography. Having the digital camera's instant feedback was very helpful... it made it much easier to get the exposure right. Needless to say, I had a blast!

A camera with a standard infrared conversion offers lots of possibilities for creating dreamy, surreal images. Green leaves and grass will turn a silvery white, while blue skies take on a beautiful sepia tone. I love it. Of course, the traditional pure black and white, high-contrast infrared look can also be achieved in post processing, making the standard conversion a versatile option.

 Familiar scenes take on a different appearance. The resulting look doesn't appeal to everyone, but I can't get enough of it.

Interesting cloud formations are always helpful...

...and a wide-angle lens is a must!

I think I've found a whole new way to fall in love with photography all over again!

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There's no denying it anymore: the  trees are in spectacular bloom, and the temperatures have been rising. Much as I love the melancholy beauty of winter, it's time to shift focus and welcome the delicate blooms of the new season.

Springtime Blossoms