film photography

Film photography with Roos

Analog, Nude


I recently had a visit from Roos, this beautiful young lady wanted to know how it would feel to be (in lingerie or naked) in front of the camera. But perhaps she would be too timid to pose nude … and if possible also anonymously.

No sooner said than done … I spent an afternoon with Roos, and we completed two rolls on the Rolleiflex TLR. I grabbed the first roll from a ‘giveaway’ box from one of my colleagues at KISP in Ghent. It was no longer in the packaging and I had no idea how old it was. Film rolls have an expiration date. Was it 10, 20 or 30 years old, about when the colleague received his education?
It was a roll with a high (Ilford Delta 3200) ISO value, which allows you to photograph better in dark conditions. Given its age, I gave it 2 stops of extra light, and developed it a little longer. The film came out of the developer completely gray, with a fuzzy image that needed a lot of digital amplification to get a somewhat visible image. (after developing I scan my negatives for further processing, as I don’t have a darkroom for making prints… and don’t take time for this either).
The second roll was more controlled, recent film (Ilford HP5), exposed and developed according to standards. What is quite remarkable to me is that after post-processing there is hardly any difference. Film is very “stretchy” and “forgivable”.

I think the images have become very intimate and remain anonymous. I was apparently able to gain enough confidence quite quickly to also make nudes. That is perhaps partly my merit, but also largely due to the strength that lies within this woman in particular, but also within women in general. The anonymous character also gives the images something universal and there is less ’embarrassment’ if there is no face on it. Roos is very satisfied with the result and here on my blog I can show them in full power, in their full honesty.

The camera for this sequence was my good old Rolleiflex. Focusing is difficult with this one as well. Focusing goes through a frosted glass behind the top lens, the accuracy of which is deplorable. ‘correct within half a meter’ is the motto when I work with this camera. Since we were shooting indoors, it was also necessary to use the widest aperture, resulting in the shallowest depth of field. Wrong focus will result in a blurry photo anyway. Flou artistique. The grain of the film completes the image. The photo is taken through the bottom lens, 6×6 cm negatives on 120 roll film. You take 12 photos on a roll. I bought this camera in a lot of 5 cameras, a few were still usable. The rest is just good for decoration.

Thanks for reading and watching!

A little bit of fashion … the sequel

Analog, beauty, location, people, photo gear, portrait, street, Uncategorized

remember these: … A little bit of fashion ? Those were all taken a couple of years ago in Brussels, when I met Erika Albonetti for a morning session. They were shot on film with the Rolleiflex twin lens reflex I have been cherishing for a couple of years now.

Time for a new ‘working collectible’, (although you’ve seen some results before with this camera here). The Fujica GW690ii, with a fixed 90mm f3.5 lens. Nicknamed the Texas Leica, it handles more or less like a Leica, but then one for big hands 😉

See the comparison with my Fuji X100f here, a big chuck of camera:

It is a viewfinder camera, but then in the medium format class, the negatives are with their size of  6×9 cm also huge in comparison with the X100f sensor size. (14.66 times bigger area)

This large format gives a narrower depth of film, so even with relatively closed apertures you still get narrow sharpness and softer backgrounds.

Like a lot of analog camera’s of older age, the Fujica has the shutter built into the lens, not in the camera. The shutter is a leaf shutter, a bit similar like an aperture, so opening from the center of the lens. The shutter speed is to be set on the lens as well as the aperture. focusing is manual and the viewfinder proves to be a lot more accurate than the matte screen on the Rolleiflex.

The camera itself is very simple in operation, there’s only a switch to be set to the right type of film 120 or 220, two shutter release buttons (one on top, one on the front side) and a film advancing lever (which you need to crank one and a half turn for a complete transport). There’s no built in light meter and no electronics at all, despite its rather modern looks and recent built year(1985), that’s rare. It has a built in frame counter (counts one unit per 10 frames) on the bottom of the camera. If the counter says 10 it has shot 100 frames. It also came in 6×7 (GW670) and 6×8 (GW680) film formats. These camera’s are well known for their robustness, with a fixed lens and so little things that can break, that seems logical. It weighs 1440 grams. It is frequently sold on Ebay, for prices ranging from €400 – €700.

As said before, focussing is a lot easier on this camera than on the Rolleiflex or for what its worth with the Voightlander Bessa I also have and which has the same film size but only a metering scale on the lens. With the Fujica I get every frame to be sharp (if I pay attention)!

Altough I still like the square format more, I’m ok with this 2×3 aspect ratio which we all know from current digital reflex camera’s. The number of shots per roll gets more limited though (8 in stead of 12) and thus you even need to be more attentive for each shot.

The images were made in Brussels, with Sofi ka, an Ukrainian model traveling Europe on a regular basis. We had a walk in Brussels in the morning, enjoying beautiful light in the city.

I shot this film in colour (Kodak Portra 160) and then another film in Black and white (see below). One film, alle shots: Sofi Ka in Brussels.

All negatives are ‘DSLR-scanned’ and converted to positives with Negative Lab Pro in Lightroom.

I also shot another film, which apparently was a gift from someone, and after further investigation by Ilford, the film turned out to be from 1992 … it came out all mottled and speckled, including the backpaper frame numbers in the negatives 🙁  bummer, although some people seem to appreciate the artistic qualities of it. …

Mjeah, maybe with a little bit of sepia colouring and some vignetting 😀 let me know what you thing

that’ll be all for today, thanks for reading!

Ludwig

 

 

 

Lily plays pingpong

Analog, erotic, location, Nude

Some of you may or may not know the series of children’s illustrated books about the life of tiny (no caps), a little girl going trough all kinds of adventures, domestic or somewhere in a near/far garden.

It was very popular at the time I was a kid, and very beautifully illustrated. Titles were very varied but always started with the name tiny, check out the titles below on the www and you’ll see what I’m talking about. They were largely translated and distributed worldwide.

tiny op de boerderij (tiny on the farm)

tiny vindt een poes (tiny finds a kitty)

tiny doet aan sport (tiny does sports)

tiny viert feest (tiny has a party)

 

and that inspired me to do my own series of images, with a girl named Lily (Lilith actually, but to make the story complete I call her Lily) In my stories Lily is not the overly enthusiast girl from the original series but a ‘nothing ever happens here’ version of her, sometimes showing boredom or unhappiness. I made this series during the summer workshop week in August 2019, Lilith stayed overnight and we had an hour left before the participants would show up. I used the Rolleiflex TLR to make these shots. Enjoy!

• Lily cleans the workshop •

• Lily goes  cycling •

• Lily feeds the chickens •

• Lily gets firewood •

• Lily plays ping-pong •

• Lily makes firewood •

• Lily helps the plasterers •

• Lily gives water to the vegetables •

hope you enjoyed viewing this little fun series as much as we did making it, and sorry for not cleaning the dust speckles.

thanks to Lilith Etch for being my ‘stand-in tiny’

see you soon,

thanks for visiting,

Ludwig

Strolling trough Paris with the Rolleiflex – Kodak Portra 160

Analog, street, Uncategorized

For the first time I had color film with me for the Rolleiflex. One of the first times I shot Kodak Portra 160 too. I had limited myself to black and white because this is easily self-developed at home but not this time. (although I took a bunch of BW film with me too 😉 You have seen those images here)

Disclaimer, these images have been shot in 2019, you’ll notice why.

I think color has an added value in a lot of these images, and as a photographer it is also fun looking for images that benefit from color. I think I look differently when having the mind set to ‘color film’ than to ‘black and white film’. In this aspect I found this an interesting exercise.

The images were lab developed, scanned using my ‘DSLR setup’ (see movie link above) and imported into Adobe Lightroom using the Negative Lab Pro plugin. This software alone is worth an in depth study. I think the images get a sort of vintage feel due to the colors of this particular film. Enjoy!

 

Strolling trough Paris with the Rolleiflex – B&W

Analog, location, street

some images from last summer.

all taken with the Rolleiflex 3.5 TLR on Ilford film (FP4 and HP5plus)

• too hot for Uber •

• Split interests •

• Follow the guide •

• The Hoop •

• Are we lost? •

• A goodbye moment •

• The gang •

• Tagging on command •

Soon I will post some images of Paris in colour, taken on Kodak Portra 160, a première in my film-photography career! Stay tuned.

Thanks for watching,

Ludwig

Sahri at the swimming pool – film

Analog, beauty, location, people, portrait

always fun to combine digital and film photography, and get my ‘working collectables’ off the shelf again. This time I shot a roll on the Rolleiflex, and one roll on the Voigtländer Bessa 6×9 folding camera. The latter is even more difficult, as it has no matte screen to focus on, and a very tiny visor that ‘remotely’ gives you an idea of the framing of the shot. You might find a dust spot here and there, oops. I have the films developed in a standard photo lab, and then scan them just the way I scan my B&X films, with the Canon 5Ds and 100mm macro lens. I use Negative Lab Pro for converting them to positive, but I need to find my way around in that program. It’s good but I don’t feel I have everything in control yet. Rolleiflex images first, the square ones, then the Voigtländer images.

Both films Kodak Portra 160, enjoy!

 

The ‘I am’ video finally released

Behind the scenes Video, location, Nude, Uncategorized

As a registered 18+ Youtube user you can see the video on my Youtube channel, but for your convenience I’ll put it here trough Vimeo:

It was a fun day, I didn’t really adapt my shooting to the cameraman, but still, there was some influence at least. I’m quite pleased with the results of this day, look for yourself, you’ll probably recognise some of the scenes from the video. The film shots are black framed.

Shot on film: (Rolleiflex Tlr 3.5 Planar on Ilford Film)

 

 

and then one more, as a tribute to the cameraman Franswa. You can see me make this shot at 4.52 in the film!!

 

thanks for looking, If you want to make sure to see everything I publish, you might consider subscribing to my blog. You can do this on the bottom of the welcome page, click the + sign.

 

 

Deux heures cinq

Analog, location, Nude

5 minutes past 2

Shot in a beautiful house somewhere in Belgium.

Model: Sahri Nimi model

Camera: Rolleiflex tlr 3.5

Film: Ilford HP5 plus 400 – developed in Ilfotech LC29

and a couple of minutes earlier it was exactly 2 O’clock and the behind the scene’s cameraman was looking at what I was about to be doing 😉

 

sorry it took me so long to post again, I have been working on a lot of different things lately, and I’m having my first ‘available light’ workshop in about a week now, so things have been busy.

see you again soon, I have some wonderful images on the shelf.

Ludwig

Winter – Strolling trough the white wonderscapes with the Rolleiflex

Analog, landscapes
We had a nice little snow cover yesterday in Belgium, and there was almost no wind, so the snow beautifully draped itself on every little twig. I had a day off yesterday, so I decided to go for a walk with the Rolleiflex. I had two rolls of Ilford FP4 125.
I also wanted to explore the possibilities of over- and underexposing, and adapting the development to compensate. I did not really have high contrast, as the sun was hidden, but still I thought the time good to experiment. I exposed on roll of film at 30 ISO, so two stops over box speed, the other one at 500 ISO, two stops under.
It is not because the process is so tedious and slow, that I choose to work on film, but because it makes me think differently about photography. You cannot be in a hurry, things will go wrong, you have to rethink your process not twice, but 4 times, or things will go wrong, you need to be respectful to your film and your camera, or things will go wrong, you need to stay alert when developing, or things will go wrong … (I’m happy not to have switched to darkroom printing, or this list would be at least double this length)
It is similar to slow food, lessons in yoga, a classic concert, a visit to the sauna, a massage or a poetry evening, it makes you completely zen.
Enjoy watching the winter in Belgium, I’ve put a lot of love in it!
www.ludwigdesmet.com
all images available as fine art print, starting at 99€

Working Collectibles – Yashica 635

Analog, location

A long time ago I started a couple of posts called collectibles, old and forgotten (or maybe not?) film photo camera’s, but still working fine. Today a new chapter to this series, the Yashica 635 TLR.

This camera is a twin lens reflex camera, featuring a Yashicor 80mm f/3.5 viewing lens and taking lens. It has a Copal shutter with shutter speeds from B – 1sec to 1/500sec.

This camera is visually very comparable to the much wanted Rolleiflex TLR camera that I use often in my sessions with models, it has about the same size and weight, both have a waist level viewfinder and a back lid that opens from the bottom. This Yashica 635 has the the added benefit that it came with a 35mm film adaptor (next to the standard 120 roll film system) that allowed for a more versatile use. I have never used mine with 35mm film (I don’t have the adaptor), so I can not report about that. The use of 120 roll film is very straightforward, and very similar to the Rolleiflex camera. An empty roll goes on top, the film roll goes in the bottom and is guided with rollers towards the top roll.

A very important difference in both camera’s is that with the Yashica, the shutter is not linked to the film transport.  I have been used to the Rolleiflex, and this camera prevents to fire the shutter twice in a row, so you have to transport film in order to be able to expose film. With the  Yashica you have a separate shutter winder, so you can do as many exposures you want on a single sheet of film. This is an important difference, that caused me quite some double exposures lately, as well as some missed shots because the shutter had not been tensioned.

Quality wise, this camera produces good negatives, a bit softer maybe than those coming from the Rolleiflex, but certainly having a good sharpness (if you manage to focus right, which is hard to do with the old matte screens).

Now for some images taken with this camera. (a series I did on the local fair in Ronse a couple of weeks ago) All images on Ilford FP4 Plus 125 ISO rated as 100 ISO)

thanks to my model for the day, Emily, this was our first collaboration.

 

If you would be interested in buying a camera like this, they are very affordable, especially compared to Rolleiflexes.

Working Collectibles – Agfa Isolette

Working collectibles Voightländer Bessa I 

 

thank you for coming by, come again soon for a year-round review about 2018

Ludwig

Michelle at the flight club

Analog, beauty, location

from this summer, early in July, I was in the Netherlands with my wife and I could spend some time there photographing. I had a meeting with Michelle, and in a last minute arrangement I could shoot at the local glider plane club. Michelle had this very classy, classic looking set, a slim fitting skirt and a beautiful blouse, and there was this plane waiting for the thermal to build up. I shot a couple of rolls in this setting, this is my selection.

• Michelle at the flight club •

I had the film developed by a local lab here in Belgium, but I was not really pleased with the quality of the development, and the care they have (not) given to the films. Lesson learnt, better take time to do my own developing at home. This has cost me a lot of retouching spots, dust, scratches, and the results are only ‘just good enough’ for publishing on the web.

best regards,

come again soon, and if you feel like, subscribe to my blog!

Ludwig

 

with Vita outdoors – why I still love shooting film from time to time.

Analog, beauty, erotic, location, Nude

from a while ago,

I shot with Vita Goncharuk in a public park near Brussels earlier this year. I was a bit worried about not having a location with full and agreed access, so we shot outside. The park is open to the public, and you might wonder if there are no risks of being caught. There is actually not really a problem as long as you are not shooting porn or really shocking the eventual witnesses. If you get caught by the owner of the place, you might get expelled from the premises, but they can’t file a complaint unless they can prove you did harm to their person/business/property.

Some people have been asking about public wandering around. First of all, get this agreed upon with your model. Most professional models don’t care much, some don’t like it. Vita didn’t mind at all. When somebody shows more interest than normal, I just go to them an say hello. I do a little chit-chat and then I give them one of my business cards and mostly they disappear after that, or they take some more (comfortable) distance. Some even send me an email about my website or my work afterwards. I even had one person sending me some behind the scenes images. (with Erika in Brussels)

The weather was splendid, the camera did very well, All shot on Ilford film, with the Rolleiflex TLR camera. I love the look of film, it gives a soft, rich tonality and it has some imperfections that are creating a romantic atmosphere. It has a natural grain, that adds to the softness of the images. The medium format (6x6cm) camera has a great shallow depth of field, (hard to focus though) and enough detail in the negatives for really big enlargements. It can’t beat the current 50Mpx camera’s, but its very close. I also love the time-span between shooting the images and having the developed film ready for scanning. The fact that you do not see results is a benefit for working slowly. When shooting digital, I get a little overwhelmed by the immediate results, which stresses me to shoot more and more and more. When shooting analog, I thing about every image, about light, about framing, about what to leave out of the frame and what to get into it, about pose, about a possible story, … I feel that I do not take the same amount of time when shooting digital. You shoot far less images when shooting film, but you get as many good ones than when shooting hundreds of digital images. … I experience a great feeling of joy when seeing the images on the developed film for the first time. They are a physical result, they have a more ‘real’ presence in my opinion than digital files. Film is not dead, at least not for me, and I’m sure for a lot of people with me. 🙂

I have about ten more films that just have been developed, but need scanning and retouching … come back again soon,

Ludwig

 

 

two for the price of one …

Analog, location, Nude

well yes, sometimes things don’t go as expected, certainly when shooting with an old camera and film, you are having no instant feedback and surprises occur 🙂

there is no automatic film advance stop, so you have to look for film frame numbers in the dark red window at the back of the camera. Clearly I saw something that wasn’t there.

shot with a Voightländer Bessa I 6×9 film camera, with Kodak TMax400 film, in a small roof flat in Leuven (Belgium)

Model Yana Mood, click for bigger version

 

the camera:

Strolling trough Cambridge with the Rolleiflex

Analog, street, travel

in my series ‘strolling trough … ‘ a new chapter, coming South from Scotland last summer I had a stop in Cambride, where I shot a couple of rolls of 120 film with my Rolleiflex.

I find the Rolleiflex to be a fairly good camera for street photography. Since you are looking down as a photographer, people don’t really notice you as being one, and you can stay unnoticed a little longer, enhancing the chances of taking a good shot. I got trapped once in this series, you’ll see 🙂

All shot with Kodak TMax 400 film, on a grey day.

 

Selfie time

Graveyard

Aftermarket

Mall security

Sale

Arbitrage

EAT.

Trapped 😮

Enjoyable time with friends. Not.

Cows on the bike path

 

And two more shots from a village called Osmotherley, near North York moors National Park (UK), where I camped the night before.

MG

Chinese warriors

Cacti

beauty, erotic, location, Nude

A cactus (plural: cacti, cactuses, or cactus) is a member of the plant family Cactaceae, a family comprising about 127 genera with some 1750 known species of the order Caryophyllales. (From Wikipedia)

A small series of images I did about a year ago together with Kate in some semi-public glasshouse. The glasshouse was the only place where it was more or less hot enough to do nude work, and Kate didn’t care about the public character of the place, we met only very limited people, and managed to keep out of sight of most of them, at least we think.  😉

Taken with the Rolleiflex 6×6 TLR, on Kodak TMax400 film.

hope you liked that,

come again soon,

 

Ludwig

With the Rolleiflex in Scotland – Part III – Ardrossan harbour

Analog, travel

I still had time to spend, same day as part II – Dunure

I had a ferry at about 18:30 hrs, for good three hours to Campbeltown. Waiting time always inspired me to take pictures, for me it is a perfect pastime, and it might result in some nice souvenir images. I tried to check in at 16:15, but they didn’t take checkin for my ferry until half an hour before departure time, because they have very limited waiting lines. One at a time is their slogan 🙂

I had parked my motorbike along the harbour quay, quite deserted at that time, except for two young men fishing. Time to eat a bit and look around. Always something to discover in a harbour. It’s an important traffic hub, and it mostly has plenty of character. It started raining and I pulled my motor into the open garage for shelter, I shouldn’t have done that, because the floor was full of oil and diesel smudge, and almost caused me a crash late in the evening, because my tyres were all slippery. (didn’t realise it until I took a sharper bend). What you see in the images: the local fuel store, the ferry that was sheduled before mine, waiting to be loaded, the harbour, a boat workshop and some more of the harbour.

After shooting and waiting for a couple of hours I could check in, but not board yet. Rain started pouring again, now for real. I got wet, I got cold, couldn’t go anywhere because I was stuck in the waiting line. The ferry went well but I didn’t really get warm again. I managed to put up my tent at about 22:30hrs, in the dark. Happy to have a good warm down sleeping bag. (I slept at Peninver Sands – I hadn’t seen the owner in the evening, so in the morning I called him to pay my bill. ‘I’ll be there in 3 minutes he said’ when he arrived we did a little chat, when I asked him how much I owed him, ‘a bike and a tent’ hes said, he thought a bit and made a little calculation and then said ‘Oh, never mind, a lot of people wouldn’t even bother calling me’ and he wished me a good trip. Scottish hospitality I presume.)

One roll of Kodak TMax400, shot with the Rolleiflex 3,5. All images of this film shown.

next I had three days of bad, really cold weather ahead, I left the Rolleiflex in the bag till my arrival at Osmotherly, back south (North York Moors NP.) for a village stroll. Soon to come.

thank you for watching,

Ludwig

With the Rolleiflex in Scotland – Part II – Dunure

Analog, landscapes, location, photo gear, travel

See here for part one – Glentrool.

Coming from Glentrool, and taking the ferry in Ardrossan late in the evening, I could spend a couple of hours at ease in Dunure, a very small fishermen’s town a couple of miles south-west from Ayr.

That is one of the main joys of travelling alone, not being influenced by companions, to make way, or to discover more things on the go, but just decide for yourself when and where to stop. I had driven past a small road sign along the A719 pointing to Dunure, and then another one, and I saw the rooftops of the houses just along the coast, from this main road, so I decided to turn around and check it out. It proved to be the ideal midday stop. What you see in the pictures is Dunure Castle and surroundings, in some images you will see an island in the distance, (Isle of Arran). Some images of the harbour area, and the facade of the Harbour View Coffee shop, where I had lunch that day. It is the first place that shows up on Google maps when you zoom in on Dunure, and very well documented by pictures as well. Little did I know 🙂 They provided me with a fine meal, and a place to charge my cellphone. Lovely lady-owner, very friendly and servile.

Time was all overcast when I arrived, but with sun coming trough after noon. A very enjoyable time there. I shot one roll of Kodak TMax400 with the Rolleiflex 3.5 6×6 camera. So here you see the entire film, I have not made a selection, you see what I’ve seen and what I’ve shot. Lab developed, home scanned and digitally redeveloped in Adobe Lightroom. You’ll notice some scratches on the left side of the images. These are probably from the lab, that’s why I decided to start developing film again myself. Oooo, it’s been like 25 years, exciting 😀 … (edit: scroll down for the link for part III)

part III of this series, another roll of film shot in the harbour of Ardrossan

The study

Analog, beauty, Nude, portrait

there is a collection in this house, of wild boar’s, in all shapes and sizes, on paintings, sculptures, drawings, teeth, … everything that reminds of the wild animal living in the heart of the Belgian Ardennes has received its place on these walls, in this castle …

the study is the most quiet space in the castle, where one can stay all day without being disturbed. Old books are being well taken care of, and this place is not influenced by day-to-day matters.

Meet Eva Evian, my model for this day, experiencing the atmosphere of the place, enjoying the quite and calm of the day.

All shot on Kodak TMax400, with Rolleiflex 3.5 camera.

#everypictureastory

 

thank you for watching,

Ludwig