The Wiggle Wagon - Part I

"Is that really 35mm?" one of the locals piped in, having noticed the Nikon FM I had set down on the table.

The place was Garth's Kitchen which I was told was the only restaurant Killaloe Ontario had since the old diner shut down, at least if you don't count the chip truck permanently located out behind the town post office. It seemed not so much like a dining establishment as a farmhouse kitchen writ large. Your waiter and the chef were the same person. There was no swinging door to insulate you from the reality of how your food was being prepared, just a little nook in the corner with a stove and a refrigerator where he worked. Normally there were three items on the lunch menu but they were out of a few things so donairs it was, made from meat that was sliced and done up in a frying pan fresh, right where you could see it if you weren't sucked into the conversations of the other patrons (as I was) or distracted by the featured wall of mirrors arrayed in an eclectic hodge-podge of picture frames.

Cousin Ken at Garth's Kitchen

The "local", I was to learn, was a musician who went by "Cousin Ken" professionally, and I suspect in just about every other sense as well. He seemed about my age, lean with a wiry Van Dyke beard and hair pulled back into a pony tail. I don't imagine anyone could speak with Ken for long and not get the impression he had a few tales to tell, the nature of which you never would have guessed other than that they likely don't involve time in the employ of a law firm or financial services company.

"Your camera there, it uses 35mm film doesn't it?" He sounded impressed, like just the chance to see it would make his whole afternoon. Well, I thought, let's see if make his whole day.

"Well this one's my 35, but my 120 is just out in the car."

The statement had exactly the desired effect. "Whoa, you have 120 too! What is it, a Rolleiflex or something?"

Rolleiflex was an intriguing guess. It's not what I have but like so many other medium format users I'm more accustomed to hearing the perennial "Is that a Hasselblad?" The interest was obvious and it would have been cruel of me to disappoint at this juncture..

"Why don't I go get it and show you."

His enthusiasm went up another notch. "Definitely! If you bring that in and your Manfrotto I'd love to have a look."

I rose to fetch it from the car, wondering if that last bit had been a lucky guess about the tripod, as though I don't own a Rollieflex, my Manfrotto 055 is the one piece of photographic equipment I still own that's been with me since the mid 80's.

"Hey," he added as I reached to door, "maybe I could get you to do a few shots of my Wiggle Wagon."

I had no idea what he meant, but couldn't imagine anything that went by the name "Wiggle Wagon" on which it wouldn't be worth spending a few frames of film. "Of course," I said.

When I returned Ken and his companion Des (or Desmo in his role as on-air personality at CHCR, the local radio station that adjoins the restaurant) moved in closer while I opened the photo backpack that contains my Bronica S2A kit. I realize I haven't said much here about the Bronica since I got it a few months back, but suffice it to say the same chrome paneled, Raymond Loewy inspired design that attracted me to the camera was a hit with this crowd as well. Ken, it was by now no surprise to learn, was at least semi-acquainted with the world of cameras, at least as it existed twenty or thirty years ago, though I'm not sure he had seen anything like the S2A before. He knew about my tripod, he finally told me, because he recognized the characteristic Manfrotto hexagonal quick-release plate attached to the bottom of my Nikon.

The classic selfie as it was meant to be taken, courtesy of Garth's wall of mirrors.

Once the tour of the camera was complete and conversation broadened I kept the camera in my lap, eyeing the waist level viewfinder, wondering if a candid portrait was in order. The Bronica has no in-camera meter but I guessed that with the lens wide open and the shutter set to 1/30th, the lowest I dare go for hand-held, I'd still be a stop or two under with the window light. I had HP5+ with me, but having accidentally left the dark slide at home there was no way to switch backs and so I was stuck with the slower Acros film I had loaded. Ken said nothing but I'm sure he knew what I had in mind, and perhaps knowingly obliging me turned to the window, throwing himself into the perfect light. Shadow detail be damned, I had to take it.

My initial task documenting the experience complete, curiosity couldn't hold out much longer.

"So, you were saying something about some kind of wagon...?"

The Side Arm Camera

A parting image shot with the Nikon F80 while the RB67 sat in the bag 

Should fate ever see me trying to submit an insanity plea in court I can at least submit as evidence in my favour the sheer mass of kit I routinely slog across difficult terrain as a means of passing time. When the Mamiya that is my go-to camera was made it was considered studio equipment because few would be fool enough to carry it for any distance outdoors. Given the commitment involved just heading out the door with it and a few of its similarly massive lenses there never seemed much value in tucking something smaller and lighter weight into the pack. Why would I need something else if I had my favourite camera with me?

As it turns out there are a few good answers to that question after all. I discovered them almost by accident. It started last fall when I started taking my recently acquired Minolta Hi-Matic 9 along when I was out with the big camera. The idea was simply to get a test roll through the new camera that wasn't another 36 frames of the dog looking at me awkwardly. My first outing with it was an off-season visit to a public beach that after decades of decline as a recreational attraction is now being eyed by condo developers. I'd been there before but on this visit I was drawn to the graffiti marked foundation walls of a long-ago demolished building that I previously hadn't taken much notice of.

Whether or not the fact it piqued my interest this time had anything to do with the presence of a more maneuverable, hand holdable camera with which to explore it this time I can't say. What I can say is that I immediately put the heavy pack down and just went with the Minolta. There was no rush, the walls would wait for me had I chosen to set up the tripod and fiddle with the big camera, but there seemed no question that the Hi-Matic was the right tool here. That might strike the majority of you as obvious but my methodical self usually doesn't work that way. I'm used to spending some time with a composition, considering my approach, noticing all the details. The difference here I think is that my subject called for more exploration than analysis.

A shot taken while exploring with the Minolta Hi-Matic 9, again while the Mamiya kit I had with me stayed in the pack.

Since that time whenever I'm out with the Mamiya kit there has always been a 35mm camera along for the ride, though more recently it's been a Nikon rather than the Hi-Matic. It's my side arm, the camera to use for all those situations not suited for pulling out the big gun. Those fleeting opportunities that won't wait for you to set up are the first thing that comes to mind. Even when it seems like there's plenty of time, grabbing a quick shot with the small camera can serve as quick insurance against the unexpected such as an unfavourable change in the light or a Volkswagon camper van parking in the middle of your previously pristine scene while you're setting up.

That's not the only advantage I've found in to carrying a side-arm camera. It's not even the main advantage. The fact is that even though I may gear up in anticipation of shooting with a slower paced, more considered approach doesn't mean this is the way I'll be inspired to work once I'm out there. When you're using a heavy tripod mounted camera deciding to stop and get a photograph is a little bit like pitching camp and doing this too many times can get a bit overwhelming.

My new side arm - the conveniently non-automated Nikon FM

In one form or another I've been carrying a side arm camera with me when I'm out with the big Mamiya kit for months now and I'm still shooting far more 120 film than 35mm. I may even try bringing the Iskra along to see if it works in this role - medium format is still the sweet spot for me. More than likely it will be the Nikon FM I recently acquired. The F80 served well enough I suppose but it won't meter with all my lenses and the way nearly every function possible has been automated doesn't appeal to my sensibilities like it once did. When I think about it it takes far more work to earn the money to buy the batteries that power the auto winder than it does to just use the winding leaver.

Leaving the Tripod at Home

I have always been a bit of a stickler about using a tripod. That might seem pretty obvious for a guy who uses a beast like a Mamiya RB67 most of the time, but it was true even back in the day when owning such a camera was a pipe dream. I had a good tripod (the Manfrotto 055 I still use to this day) before ever considering things like a second Nikon body or additional lenses. Then as now it was always the meditative approach for me. While I've always embraced my contemplative side I sometimes wonder if I let it stifle other aspects of creativity like spontaneity, novelty and whimsy. It's hard to really cut loose with a camera that's stuck to a tripod. It can be done I suppose, (think Salvadore Dali and flying cats) but why make it harder?

Hand held medium format from the Iskra folder. For compact on the go portability I think beats your typical 35mm SLR without sacrificing those big sharp 6x6 negatives, nothing beats this style of camera.

I've been giving some thought lately to what it would mean not to be so tied to a tripod all the time. At other times in my life, when the kids were younger and in my wedding photography career, an overwhelming majority of the photography I was doing was almost the polar opposite of the kind of work I do these days and the Manfrotto was seeing some serious closet time. It's not that I'm thinking of returning to that kind of photography. Wedding photography and having young kids are two things I enjoyed and that I am so done with now. Still, that doesn't necessarily mean I have to accept the limitations of a tripod, not all the time.

In a previous entry When The Tourists Are Away... I wondered if I'd have made out a little better going tripod free with a 35mm camera. Well I did get a chance to make a return visit, this time packing two Nikons - an F80 loaded with Ilford Delta 100 and an FE with some expired Fuji Superia for colour. Also along was the Iskra folder. Going handheld doesn't mean I have to give up medium format after all.

What looked like a toy fence, coming up to about mid shin on me, would have been chest high absent the snow.

The results you can see so there's little need to comment. It was a different sort of day that my earlier visit, generally overcast with an occasional opening in the clouds letting through direct sun. The landscape had also changed in the intervening weeks, with much more snow that in many cases covered over the glassy coating of ice that formed as mist froze. On the other hand it gave the whole scene more of a winter wonderland feel.

The experience I have to say was mixed. On the positive side yes there were shots I probably wouldn't have been able to catch with a camera bound to a tripod, especially in a few cases where there were people in the shot who would have moved on if I didn't have the ability to bring the camera right up and fire. The freedom to explore a subject also came into play now and then as well. It wasn't so much the small adjustments that sometimes need to be done to get the camera positioned in exactly the right spot, I can do this just as well, if not better, when working from a tripod. It's more those situations I'm not sure of such as when it appears an awkward or impossible camera position is required, or that presents compositional challenges there might or might not be a solution for. In short if, it seems there's a good chance the effort to get the shot I envision could be in vain, the added difficulty of having to manhandle a tripod through the process might keep me from trying in the first place.

I once had a summer job at a hotel not far from these. Amazing how many people arrive for the first time expecting a rustic cabin and thinking Niagara Falls was located in a wilderness preserve. In reality it aspires to become the Las Vegas of the North. It seems people don't gamble away their savings like they used to though, which I'm informed is a bad thing.

I have to say though, shooting like this did make me lazy, lazy enough not to bother digging out a filter if I thought it would help, lazy enough that there were occasions where I chose not to take the shot rather than go to the bother of swapping lenses between the two Nikons. Arguably if I couldn't be bothered it wasn't worth the effort or the wasted film anyway, but I just wasn't as invested in the subject or the process and it\s hard to tell myself that's a good thing. And lest it be forgotten, a tripod is more than just the camera gear equivalent a hair shirt meant to heighten our awareness of the photographic process through penance. Even at shutter speeds above the 1/focal length rule of thumb, hand held camera shake can cause enough sharpness loss to erase the benefits of using a top notch lens.

It's all food for thought. It may need some time to digest though, so it's a bit soon to say whether any of this will change the way I do things in the end. I'm certainly not ready to shelve the tripod or the Mamiya, though I can't help but think some tweak may be in order. As always I'll keep you posted.

Budget Time Travel: A Photographer's Guide

The surface of Lake Erie, February 2015. Perhaps if one were to visit this exact spot in another two million years or so it would look quite similar, with sand and rock standing in for the snow and ice seen here.

If you've been following this blog for any length of time you'll know I belong to that large group of photographers for whom location and subject are usually one and the same thing. In order to have some measure of variety in our work travel is a virtual requirement, though for myself and others with similar restrictions on time and finances this need not involve a globe trotting lifestyle.

As I was in the midst of shooting the images featured in today's episode, my mind as usual wandering a different landscape than my body, it occurred to me a photographer could bring similar variety to their portfolios if we could travel in time rather than space, zooming into the future and watching the landscape change around them. Seasons would pass before our hypothetical photographer's eyes, bringing a lifetime worth of change in only minutes. They might grab a few shots as whatever apocalypse eventually befalls us all passes by in time lapse quick time then watch as the forces of climate and geology transform the landscape, perhaps turning a sea-side vista into a desert.

White on white subject matter in not particularly contrasty light made for some pretty flat looking negatives. On the light table the last negative taken on a previous day on the left and the shot taken just previously to the above image above on the right, side by side on the same negative strip. Contrast is fairly easy to adjust in a scan but it should be interesting to see what it takes to print this in the darkroom.

I do travel through time of course - forward only at the rate of one minute per minute like everyone else. I might hope for epoch spanning powers, but alas yet another Christmas has come and gone and once again no Tardis under the tree for me. But if the ability to zoom back and forth through time still eludes me there are times and places where nature transforms a landscape so rapidly as to present the illusion of the passage of geological ages in the course of just days or weeks. Though such occasions often follow in the wake of floods, volcanic eruptions or other such disasters, the trigger may be as benign as a change of seasons. And if you're lucky enough to live by one of the Great Lakes, especially Lake Erie (the shallowest and therefore first to freeze) all it takes is the onset of a solid winter.

In a way this is really the third installment in an unplanned series that started with Embracing the Elements and A Follow Up Visit. The images are from my second follow-up visit made in the first week of February. The location once again is my usual lake shore stomping grounds which, somewhat ironically perhaps, was once the site of a popular summer resort. It's where I go when I don't have much time and don't feel inspired enough to look for something new to photograph.  As you can imagine, under normal circumstances it's getting hard to find anything fresh to photograph, but a winter like this transforms it into a whole new location. A few weeks of cold weather is all it takes to transform my sea side vista into a desert landscape so long as you don't mind the fact the ground is covered by snow instead of sand. (Actually, in a whipping wind with temperatures in the -15^oC neighbourhood, I did mind just a little.)

A shot from the Nikon F80 equipped with a Tamron SP 20-40mm lens and a yellow filter. I didn't have much choice about the filter as it, along with the red filter I attached the Mamiya's 50mm Sekor lens, wouldn't budge once I screwed it on until I got home and everything warmed back up. 

Equipment wise I brought my usual RB67 kit, this time bringing my Nikon F80 sporting a Tamron 20-40mm zoom as a side arm. Obviously I'm not using the Nikon enough as the roll of Ilford Delta 100 I managed to finish that day bore a few family photos that were obviously taken last summer. By the sound of things its built in auto-wind motor was obviously struggling in the cold, and doubly so on the rewind, but it soldiered on admirably and the resulting negatives were none the worse for it. The cold also affected the film back on the RB67 as the mechanism became sluggish resulting in its failure to register that the film had been wound meaning the double-exposure prevention had to be overridden. Of course this meant I had to pay careful attention to avoid double-exposures or accidentally skipping over frames. Not the easiest thing for me. As we've seen, my mind wanders.

There will probably be more winter photography to come over the remaining weeks. The replacement spot meter arrived today (see the previous post if you missed it) and I have some time off over the next couple of days to try it. I also have hopes that some of winter's more unique conditions will coincide with a time I'm free to get out there with a camera. It has to happen sooner or later. Still, if it so happens I don't squeeze off another shot until spring I can comfort myself with the thought that this year already winter isn't another season I let get away.