Leica IIIC, VC 21 and Kodak Profoto : mundane shots in London

Knightsbidge

Quite a while back actually, I shot a first roll after the IIIC was repaired. But one roll is not enough right?

Notting Hill

So, on a sunny day, I loaded the little fellow with a roll of Kodak Profoto 100 a fool proof colour print film that comes and goes from the shelfs, and screwed the Voigtlander Color Skopar 21mmF4 on its front.

First set of pictures were taken during a big walk to Notting Hill, Portobello road and back.

The area is usually very colourful and have a lovely rendering on film.

And the 21mm give some good dynamics to the pictures.

If you are familiar with my blog, you remember that a couple of years back I bought a metal 21/25mm external viewfinder made by Voigtlander to replace the plastic one that comes with the lens.

The optics of the plastic finder seems to unglue itself and move so its not fit for its purpose. I brought it back to the shop once, then tried to repair it myself, not so easy. In the end I bought the separate viewfinder for about half of the price of the lens ( both new).

As I am in no haste of finishing any roll, a week passed for the next stroll to Brick Lane.

Crossing the City on our way to Brick Lane ( because the tube broke down), we came across this white dead tree which in fact an art work by Maurizio Catellan.

… and we finally hit brick lane and its murals.

And another week passed, until we finally walked by Marylebone (above) and Soho ( Below).

In between, the Thai restaurant below is situated opposite the Aperture Camera shop where the IIIC was repaired.

There is always some action in Soho, but not enough to finish the roll. Luckily there is always a Sunday walk to Hyde Park…

where a lucky young fellow turned 30.

Very happy to walk around with the IIIC again and see that’s its working fine. The 21mm is still a hard beast to master and there are a couple of missed shots with my fingers in the frame. I finally quite like the film, maybe its better for evenly lit scenes. But overall I cannot complain.

The new normal

The usual Shake Shack long queue

The title of today’s post is a trap. It should be called Caffenol week 6, but it starts to be boring. Saturday I finished a roll of Ilford Delta 400, and processed it as soon as I was back home.

The uncle just score

This is my second brew that I kept from last week. I have been careful today to limit the time of processing to 5 minutes at 28 degrees, plus 10 seconds for pouring out.

Back Alley BBQ

The negatives  are still a bit thick but on the better side I would say. I also filtered my fixer before using it. As a result I have very few crap on the film.

Fishing in the shadow of the tower

Another innovation this week is that I cut the roll in two before processing to squeegee. Less chance to scratch by carrying dust over with my fingers, less residual water at the bottom of the film. Unfortunately I did not  count he frames so I ended up with an odd number of strips.

A catch like that

The result : this is my best Caffenol film of these past 6 weeks. I must say it is the best film altogether and choosing a small number of shots from it was difficult.

Chef of wheels

But back to the processing, there was very little dust on the film, and I did only  minimal spot cloning in light-room after processing. I also added 1 more minute to the fixing time, this is the 7th roll with the fixer (It should do 17), it cannot harm.

Sometime we feel we are so small

This is shot again with the Leica IIIc, but with the Summaron 35mmF3.5, which is quite a sharp lens. I measured the light with the handheld Sekonic L-308-s, and used my 35mm Leica finder. The finder shoe was bent during my last move and I think the shot above really shows it.

Reserved

The first three shots were taken around Chinatown last week, while the next three where taken around Marina Bay, where I met some friends by complete fluke. Friends are great picture subjects, lets remember this.

Mannequin

Saturday morning I met some fellow shutterbugs in Haji Lane. The two frames above were shot in a kind of artsy enclave where a  lot of murals can be found.

The world’s on fire

The area is far less crowed than usual, but its still a busy place in the morning, with deliveries for local businesses, people having coffee or photographers bringing models to shoot with the colorful area as a backdrop.

The dancer

We hijacked the model above, thanks, thanks, one shot and we move, my camera is so old, anyway.

Haji Lane usual crowd

That time of the year

We have entered the 7th month of the Chinese new year and offerings are appearing outside maybe businesses.

Lets all go home safely hop you enjoyed the ride.