Toy Panorama Camera Revisit
Occasionally I look back at photos I have taken in the past and I start to see something I couldn't before. When I did my toy panorama camera shootout, I got the results I expected but still found myself disappointed in the photos. For this reason, and despite the absolute fun I had getting these shots, I pretty much ignored them.
Now I'm looking at them again and thinking "If I saw that on someone's photo stream on Flickr, I would think they look great". I often get so hung up on process and equipment that I fail to see a success when it occurs. So, why aren't they on my photo stream? I don't have an answer for that. I do have a tendency not to include too many lomo style or toy camera shots on my Flickr account, mostly because it will start to look like most other photo streams.
With the huge advantage of the film to digital workflow process, I was able to make these shots more interesting than they first appeared. I am a big proponent of changing as little as possible in the digital side of the workflow, so my images are generally only cropped, levels applied and colour balance fixed. I will occasionally use the clone tool to remove dust or spots from photos, but not usually with these toy camera shots. Imperfections are what make these toy camera shots stand out.
With these changes made, and some sensible level adjustments, Some of the shots really started to shine.
So do yourself a favour, go back through you photos and take a second look, you never now what you might see now that you couldn't before!
A big thank you to the Film Photography Podcast guys for linking to me on their Facebook page! Keep up the good work guys, always looking forward the new episode!
Serious 6×6
There's something about the 6x6 format that feels more serious and professional than 35mm. This is strange, as a lot of fun toy cameras (the Holga and Diana for eg.) use this same format.
As you may have read a while back, I picked up some Shanghai GP3 film on the cheap recently. I've shot a few rolls, but my developer was dying fast, so I hadn't had the chance to develop them. This past weekend I was invited to Brisbane for drinks. Taking the opportunity I grabbed some developer while I was there.
This is the first time I've used Kodak's D-76 developer. Once it's mixed and ready to go though, it's just as easy as the liquid concentrate Ilford chemicals I had been using (LC29 and Ilfosol 3). Using D-76 in a 1:1 solution (1 part D-76, one part water) and developing for 14min (@ 20 degrees) with intermittent agitation, and there's the result.
I'm very happy with the results, and will surely be using this combination more. These two images were scanned in with my new scanner, and with minimal post processing (levels, no sharpening). There was a couple more shots that turned out OK, but these are the two I'm most happy with. Overall, my experience developing this roll was much better than it had been previously with medium format.
An Extra Dimension
3D cameras have been around for a very long time and with the recent popularity of 3D movies hitting cinemas it has never been more popular. 3D photography is a very simple theory: take 2 photos of the same scene while positioned as far apart as your eyes would be. That's all there is to it. There will be some processing required later on so you can see the 3D image, but that's all the raw materials you need.
Camera makers have known this for a long time and have even made ready-to-go 3D cameras. Most of these 3D cameras have 2 or more lenses and use regular 35mm film. The camera that took the above image has 4 lenses and uses 2 35mm frames to record the final result (4 half-frame shots). The original intent was to send you photos off to the camera maker who would then print them onto a lenticular sheet (the ones you move left and right to see the effect) for you, that is why the camera takes 4 images.
A perfectly good 3D result can still be had from the camera by taking frames 1 and 4 (on the camera, lenses 1 and 4 are the same distance apart as an average set of eyes) and running them through an anaglyph program to produce the final image. A pair of red / cyan 3D glasses are needed to view them, but they work very well.
These 3D cameras are so much fun to use, and people really love seeing the results in 3D. I can highly recommend tracking down one of these cheaper models and giving it a shot. The most common makes are the Nishika series (N800 and N9000) and the Nimslo cameras. They are simple, plastic toy cameras, so there's not a lot of settings to worry about, these are definitely in the "just get out there and shoot" category of cameras.
This post is just a quick introduction to this camera and what it can do. As soon as I get the time, and some internet access at home, I will put up an article in the techniques section to explain it all in full with some helpful pictures to guide you through making the 3D anaglyphs.
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