An Awwwwww Moment...

Kiev 60 Arsat 80mm f2.8 Foma Fomapan 400 Adox Adonal 1:25 - Three of the neighborhood feral cats using a lawn chair to escape the mid day sun. One adult and two kittens showing the softer side of cat life.

Scanned with an Epson V500 Photo using Epson's OEM software.

Hen of Chicks...

Kiev 60 Arsat 80mm f2.8 40mm extension tube Foma Fomapan 400 Adox Adonal 1:25 - A just watered Hen an Chicks plant basking in the mid-day sun. My first experience using Adox Adonal (Rodinal) at 1:25 dilution. Sharpness is great and grain is better than expected. I love the magnifying effect of the water droplets.

Scanned with an Epson V500 Photo using Epson’s OEM Software.

Of Pin Holes, Electrical Tape and the Big Ass Peach

Adox Golf  Cassar 75mm f4.5 Fomapan 400 Adonal (Rodinal) 1:50 - I love my Adox Golf. The Golf is the perfect medium format snap shot camera. It is simple, compact, has a nice lens and an uncoupled rangefinder. I bought mine off eBay in great conditional, the overall appearance is mint and the original leather case is in perfect condition, exactly the day to day shooter i wanted.... or so I thought. On shooting the first roll a discovered a hidden flaw, a pin hole somewhere in the bellows. No big deal, I have dealt with these before, a half an hour in a dark room with a flash light inserted into the back of the camera and the offending leak was found and patched with electrical tape. Problem solved.... I happily headed back out on an overcast day and shot my 2nd roll and it came out fine, but the key word here is "overcast." A few months pass and I had to do some traveling so decided to pack the Golf, again its size makes to the perfect travel companion along side my Nikon P7000. Most of the trip saw overcast skies, but I did manage to shoot most of a roll of Fomapan 400, saving the last few shots for the trip home.

Those of you that have ever driven through Gaffney, South Carolina on I-85 have seen the "Big Ass Peach," apparently also called "The Peachoid," but I prefer Big Ass Peach, it is more accurate, from the right angle it looks like a Big Ass. My plan was to pull off and get a great analog shot of the peach on my way home. I reached Gaffney and merged off the interstate and headed for my target. I pulled into the parking lot of the Fatz Restaurant conveniently located at the foot of the Big Ass Peach and stepped into the glaring Mid Day Sun to take my shot. Well, as you can see above, I missed a pin hole. I got the same result on my shots of the Possum Trot School, located on the same exit. So out comes the flashlight and electrical tape for another round of pin hole finding... Note to self, Test in direct sunlight....

untitled exposure no. 8

Adox Golf  Cassar 75mm f4.5 Fomapan 400 Arista 76 1:1 - Spring Hill Cemetery Lynchburg, Virginia. I repaired the pinhole on the bellows of my Adox Golf and needed to test it in daylight. Fomapan 400 is s beautiful film for it's speed and really shines with Arista 76 Developer 1:1. The quality of the Cassar 75mm is also apparent in this shot. I am slowly mastering the uncoupled rangefinder in this camera and the Golf may become my Pocket Medium format rangefinder for choice. That is, unless I track down a Original Mamiya 6 with an "unfogged" Zuiko Lens.

Icy Fingers

Kiev 60 Arsat 250mm f3.5 Fomapan 400 F3.5 - Winter's Ice Fingers show themselves in a Black Walnut tree.

Finally Snow Exposure no. 3 and 4

Kiev 60 Arsat 250mm 3.5 Fomapan 400 Adonal 1:50 - The first snow of 2012 in Lynchburg, Virginia, and my first to use my newly acquired Arsat 250mm f3.5. The lens is a metal and glass monter, but feels good on the bulky Kiev 60. Also my first use of Fomapan 400. As expect the Adonal (Rodinal) plays up the grain. I deliberately shot a little under exposed to avoid blowing out the whit snow.