First Shots With Velvia

Durdle Door

Nikon FM, Clubman 28mm, f8@1/125s ISO 50, Fuji Velvia

Well, I finally plucked up the courage to try out some slide film and got my self 4 rolls of the famous Fuji Velvia 50. This is the favorite film of many of the worlds landscape photographers for intense colours and sharpness, it is a lot slower than I am used to at ISO50 I normally shoot with ISO200 and you have to be spot on with your exposure but the results when you get it right are amazing.

Pictures From Sweden

Nikon FM, Nikon 80-200mm f4, Fuji superia 200

I Recently had a spare half day in Sweden so I took the camera out and explored some of the islands around Göteborg. These island are quite stunning and I was blessed with plenty of the famous Scandinavian light. I took a ferry out to an island called Donso, which is to the south. The islands are very quiet many don't even have roads this one has a small nature reserve so I took a stroll round here.

My Birthday presant, a 35mm Scanner

As it was my birthday last month I decided to treat my self to a dedicated 35mm scanner. after a bit of rummaging around and realising I cant afford a Nikon Coolscan V I found a Plustec 7300 which fitted the bill perfectly. I got mine from Campkins Cameras in Cambridge where I get most of my stuff from. Its a proper camera shop staffed by people who know what they are talking about and while their prices aren't the cheapest they are competitive and you always get what you need with good service, worth paying for to me.

Flash Gun Fun

This weekends task was a fairly simple one, in the box of stuff there was a few old flash guns. 3 were still in there boxes and now work perfectly, 1 was loose and had some battery acid damage to the battery cover. This is a Sunpak auto 321 model and is quite compact but well jointed so it can be used to bounce the flash in just about any direction. This could be quite a useful tool as the other flashes are either really big or really small! so I set about trying to restore it.

Camera Fair Bargains

On January 12th I dragged the family bright and early on a Sunday morning to a camera fair in the hope of picking up a bargain. I've never been to one before so was expecting a bunch of bearded old men in wool jumpers and smoking pipes. Actually it was quite an interesting event, only a handful of beards and the odd woolly. I took along a few old bits that I didn't want in case I could use them as trade in or pass them on to a good home and set myself a limit of number of bits to bring home and a price limit. The first is important as given half a chance I would come home with a mass of bits I don't need much to the wife's annoyance.

Toothache Update

Got the tooth ache fixed. Yay!

Had it pulled out and now it hurts. Boo.

Replacing Light Seals And Mirror Damper

Well today was the day to replace the seals! I have suspected that they have been leaking a bit of light into the film chamber as it was quite a loose fit, also some images have had a slight colour cast to them or its struggled with other colours. So after a bit of searching around I brought a complete kit from an eBay seller called "interslice". The kit is of a very high standard and even includes a little tool that's just right for the job. The kit costs around £12 and came within a week from the USA.

Some pictures of the FM

Got the light tent out the other day and decided to use the FM and some of its lenses as subject. I used a Canon 300D with 50mm f1.8 and a 75-300mm f4-5.6 lenses. Lighting was the 1000w lamp mounted on a tripod and the camera was also on a tripod.

Click the images for larger versions.

I have tooth ache

I don't like it. It hurts. A lot.

First Proper Pictures

Well I've got the pictures back and they're....Ok!

A few were taken in Goteborg on a cold dark night and I stupidly forgot to bring the cable release along so most were blurry from camera shake but a few came out Ok. The others were taken while visiting an old friend in Norfolk. We took a stroll along Wells beach to find the most amazing sunset and dramatic unusual light as well as some seals on the beach! these were all taken hand held with the 50mm f1.8 on Fuji 200 asa film. They are still a bit to grainy but that may be partly due to the low light levels.

Out of the box....

Well I've got all the stuff home unpacked it and thoroughly rummaged and tinkered with everything. So now I have 2 boxes of old kit and from it I've put together a set of all the good stuff.

So far there is:

• Nikon FM black body
• 50mm f1.8 Nikkor
• 28mm f2.8 Clubman
• 70-200 f5.6 intercity (?)
• 2x Teleconverter