Wildcat No.28-5

1966 Buick Wildcat, Sooke, British Columbia, Canada, October 2017.

History not forgotten

Fur Brigade Trail (No. 10-3, 11-4, 11-6) Peachland, British Columbia, Canada, September 2018. Copyright © Gary Nylander. Digitized from 2 1/4 x 3 1/4 negative. Baby Speed Graphic, 101 mm Kodak Ektar lens.

Several years ago I purchased a baby Speed Graphic along with a number of other photographic items. The camera once belonged to a well-known newspaperman, Alec Merriman of Victoria, B.C. Included was 3 boxes of old film (expired 1965), 2 1/4" x 3 1/4" Kodak Royal Pan (400 ASA), each box containing 25 sheets, one box was half used, the other two never opened. The camera came with a couple of film holders and a third holder that held 12 sheets and by "shuffling the deck" a new sheet of film was dropped into place by pulling a level after a photo has been taken.

 After a long period of procrastination, I decided to load up the old film holders and take it out for a walk with my sister and her partner who came to visit with me. We walked along the beautiful and historic old fur brigade trail that runs between Peachland and Summerland in the Okanagan Valley of British Columbia, Canada. The trail is known for its spectacular views of the lake and valley. I shot more than a dozen sheets of film, some of the view and others in a lovely little-forested area dotted with some small gnarly birch trees.

After my guests had left I processed the film in Kodak HC-110 film developer, dilution "B", aside from some overall fog and some edge fog, where the box might have been opened at some point, I was able to make some quite nice usable pictures, despite the film being quite grainy. At some point, I will shoot the remaining film to see what that yields. The images posted here were copied with a macro lens on a digital DSLR camera and then enhanced in my daylight darkroom (aka computer).

When I have used up the old film I will have to source out some new film of that size ( 2 1/4" x 3 1/4"), I think Ilford sells it as a special. A 120 roll film adapter would be handy, but apparently, my old speed graphic has an unusual back so there are not many roll film adapters around that fit it. The lens looks sharp, the rangefinder seems accurate and the shutter speeds are all working along with the aperture. So its worth using the camera and making some possibly great pictures with it.

This is why I shoot film

I use film for my fine art work because it inspires my imagination in ways that I don't get from shooting digital.

 I have been shooting film since I was 15 years of age, after more 40 years of film usage I still feel that film has value in today's digital world. Some back ground: I have been a newspaper photographer since I was 18 years of age, I started out shooting black and white film with my Nikon F2 camera. Today its all digital and I have to say that I love shooting digital for my newspaper work, back in November of 2001 the newspaper I currently work for, the Kelowna Daily Courier bought , Nikon D1H digital cameras for the photo staff.

 I would never want to go back to film for my day to day work assignments at the paper . Digital is a must in photojournalism, I wouldn't want to be with out it, as it's awfully convenient to use.

Shooting film on my time off is a whole different story, for one I have no deadlines to contend with, so it doesn't matter to me that I can see my pictures right away, I feel as an artist, I want to slow things down a bit so I'm okay with taking some time create my work. For more than twenty-five years I have been using a 4 x 5 view camera with black and white film, I have shot a number of different film types, Kodak Tri-X, Kodak T-Max and Ilford HP5. I totally love making images with my large format view cameras, using 4 x 5 inch film sometimes 8 x 10 inch film. Almost all the work you see on my website, my blog here and my Facebook page is done with view cameras.

 I am frequently asked, why film and why a view camera? some think its bulky, time consuming not easy to use which is probably true. One of the things that I have found that with shooting film is not so much that it makes me a better photographer but that it clearly makes me look at my subjects in a far different way than using digital, its hard to explain, I am much more selective in terms of how I photograph my chosen subject when shooting with film.

 I have not found a digital equivalent to the view camera, but to me there is nothing more beautiful than looking at my composed image even though it is upside down and backwards on the ground glass screen of my view camera.  It's really that beautiful and inspiring to look at, a direct 'pure' image coming through the lens, in some ways a truly 'raw' image.

These days I work with a hybrid system or a digital scan-workflow, I shoot sheet film and then scan the negatives with a flatbed scanner a Microtek F2 ( read my review here ). I also hope to do more contact sheet printing in the wet darkroom from my 8 x 10 negatives, I have always been inspired by the work of Edward Weston, what I love about Edward's work was the simplicity of his craft in making his wonderful images, his darkroom consisted of just a few trays, printing frame and darkroom lights, he was able to set up almost anywhere.

 I would say that shooting film may be a little crazy in this digital age, and may seem like the hard way to produce an end product when the easier route is to shoot digitally, but then so is running a marathon, there are a lot easier ways to cover the 26.2 miles by pounding the ground with your feet. Also I feel that there is a sense of accomplishment in that some film cameras are not easy to use, but then neither is playing a violin, it takes years to get good at playing such an instrument, but the effort is well worth it, in terms of one's personal satisfaction and knowing that you have worked hard for something and earned it.

Another analogy to music , some musicians might use a whole range of instruments to create their music,  for example Yo-Yo Ma plays with a 300 year old cello, or some musicians play with the latest electronic instruments while others might use a mixture older non-electric and electronic instruments. I think that that great photographs can be taken with a variety of cameras either film or digital with no camera or work flow better than the other, it comes down to what is best on a personal level for each and every artist.

A method of developing sheet film

This is a technical blog post on my current method of developing large format sheet film using standard 4 ( 101 mm ) inch plastic drainage pipes and stainless steel film developing tanks ( see photos above and below ). A bit of back ground, I have been developing my own film for the past 40 or more years, first with 35mm film, I have been developing sheet film of various sizes for the past 37 years or so. I have tried and used various methods, from trays to dip and dunk with film hangers, the simplest but not the easiest is the tray and shuffle method, favoured by Edward Weston and many others, I tried this for a while, but ended up scratching too many negatives. For a long period when I had a real darkroom I used sheet film hangers with tanks, they worked well, but agitation was tricky so I ended up making my own version of film hangers with wire clips attached to sheets of plastic, they worked and rarely did I have a negative come out of the SS wire clips that I made or had uneven development. 

 About 12 years ago I down sized my darkroom and no longer have a "real" darkroom except for my windowless bathroom, which I use for loading film into developing tanks ( all dry ) and changing film in my large format film holders (mostly 4 x 5). My film processing area is in the laundry room of my house, its small but works well, has running water etc. 

 I thought for a while about how to process large format sheet film in daylight tanks, I don't recall how I found the plastic drainage pipe and put two and two together, I remember have some 4 inch ( 101 mm ) plastic drainage pipe laying around the workshop from another project, lo and behold, I found the drainage pipe fit just nicely inside the round standard stainless steel developing tanks, those tanks come in various sizes in terms of length, mine are the large ones, they hold 4 rolls of 120mm medium format film, since I only had two of the big tanks I bought two more.

 I cut the drainage pipe into 5 inch long lengths and drilled 1/2 inch ( 12.7 mm ) holes for the chemistry to get in and around the film, buffed off any sharp edges, I found with a slight curl of the film and enough tension that two sheets of 4 x 5 film would fit inside of each piece of drainage pipe, the problem was how could I stop the film from sliding around during development ? I solved the problem by going to a plastic store and bought some 1/8 inch thick soft plastic sheeting, these I cut into squares which are fitted in by pressure inside the cut to length plastic pipe, so they are divided, these act as a partition inside the plastic pipe, this way each sheet of film had its own separate chamber and does not move around. Each of the big stainless tanks holds two of these 5 inch long film holder pipe, so when fully loaded each tank holds 4 sheets of 4 x 5 film. 

 Some people might find that this method uses a lot of chemistry, but it actually works out to be quite economical. Total volume of chemistry is 1400 ( 47.3 US oz ) I am currently using Kodak HC-110 Film developer,  ( the one litre size of concentrate  ) at the time of this article is  priced around $30 (cdn).  I mix that 1:3 for my "working stock" from this I use it at 1:11 ( 117 ml of working stock to 1283 ml of water ) or ( 3.9 oz of working stock to 43.4 oz of water ) this will develop 8 sheets of 4 x 5 film, the entire 4 litres of HC-110 mixed stock will develop something like 200 to 250 sheets of 4 x 5 film or about 50 to 60 8 x 1 0 sheets. I have been using Ilford Rapid Fix which is one of the longest lasting fixers I have ever used, I would guess that it would fix something like 300 to 350 sheets of 4 x5 before becoming exhausted. My development times are 9 minutes and 30 seconds @  20 C or 68 F.

 I have four big SS tanks which I load up all at once this way I can process 16 sheets of film, I start the film processing procedure, I process just as if I was developing a bunch of rolls of 120mm film or 35mm film, I usually start with two tanks, pour in the developer , start the development timer, use a standard inversion agitation method, then once that is done, go to fix etc, once the first batch of film has completed developing I start the next two SS tanks, so by the end of an hour or so I have 16 sheets of 4 x 5 film hanging on my drying rack. 

 With this method I have developed up a 100 sheets in one long day, but often its more like 64 sheets , what I also do is if I come back from a trip and say have a 100 or more sheets to develop is I will develop 16 sheets a day, after work, this way by the weekend I have most of my film developed. Another handy thing I use is the Massive Dev Chart for iPod, iPhone or iPad 

 So how does it work?, I have using this method for over 11 years now, the developed negatives are excellent, nice even development, they look beautiful!. The plastic drainage pipe has never worn out, and even if it did all I would have to do is go and cut off another piece, drill a few holes and away I go. The big SS tanks are quite expensive new, but can be found used , they would last a life time or more for most folks. The whole system is simple and durable and can be used with out any real darkroom, only need a dark place to load the film, a film changing bag can work for that purpose. I always load my films dry and the pour in the developer through the plastic lid on top of the tank which is securely in place ( always double check ). I guess the one draw backs of this method is the tanks are heavy to lift, each tank hold about 55 oz ( 1626 ml ) of chemistry, so when loaded plus the weight of the SS tanks and plastic holds they weight 4 or 5 pounds, ( 1.8 to 2.2 kg ) a bit of a work out for sure when they have to be picked up and inverted for agitation once a minute!Also I have tried using this method for developing 5 x 7 and 8 x 10 sheet film with some modifications to the plastic drainage pipe, ( no plastic dividers ), slow to develop 8 x 10 as I can only do 4 sheets in a hour, but it gets the job done. 

 This is just one method, some folks reading this will have their own method, there is no right or wrong way. I hope for people wanting to learn how to develop sheet film this will give you some ideas.