Realfeatures Blog

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If wet plate collodion field photography, trekking and weight lifting happen to be your 3 hobbies, then this one’s for you.  Complete with a portable lab, that folds up into a massive wooden backpack the whole kit weighs a “mere” 12.4 kg (without tripod), circa 1870 that was apparently ultra light. When you see how small the camera (about the size of a 4×5”) looks compared to the lab case, it gives you an idea of the mad proportions of this “travel photographer’s” kit.

Dimensions: H. 107 x L. 92 x P. 80 cm - 12,4 kg.

This is one of many amazing cameras on display at the “Musée français de la Photographie” (the French photography museum in Bièvres, a small town near Versailles. The place is absolutely crammed with cameras form the classic Rolleis and Leicas to some incredibly strange modified large format models…

L: A camera for a carrier pigeon!

R: A modified technika Linhof 4×5, turned into a giant twin lens reflex, now that must be really light!

L: This large format camera was huge at least 20×24″ couldn’t find any info on the strange periscope-like lens. Designed for a narrow L shaped studio perhaps!

R: A Rolleiflex with a transparent panel showing the mechanism inside

ZEISS IKON - Contarex in perfect condition with a selenium cell

Musée français de la Photographie
78, rue de Paris
91570 Bièvres
Tel : 01 69 35 16 50
Fax : 01 60 19 21 11

http://museedelaphoto.fr/

After a portrait shoot with my 4×5 I used a couple of sheets more of 12 and 15 year “vintage” expired polaroid - I was amazed that the Polaroid 55 negative gave as much detail (I believe I was told when it was given to me that it was about 15 years old!) The print came out ok too but of course not with the proper exposure since the shot was exposed for the negative…

© Cedric Arnold

The Polaroid 52 print rendered a huge amount of grain - it obviously doesn’t “age” as well…

© Cedric Arnold

Sorting through hundreds of negatives, slides, contact sheets was a painful process but some completely forgotten images resurfaced, notably random color, black and white 6×6 and 35mm images taken in London’s Brick Lane / Hoxton / Old Street areas between 1999 and 2001…

Sunday morning in Brick Lane © Cedric Arnold

Another Sunday morning in Hoxton Sq © Cedric Arnold

More to come soon…

PHOTOZERO 2009 / BANGKOK

Don’t miss this if you’re in Bangkok this weekend March 13th-15th

At Raindogs Bar

© Michael Coyne www.michaelcoyne.com.au

By photographers for photographers, the second annual meeting of PhotoZero will take place next week in Bangkok. World class photographers including Nic Dunlop, Jason P. Howe, Paula Bronstein, James Nachtwey, Michael Coyne & Thierry Falise will showcase their work, and engage the audience on the important social role played by documentary photography. And everyone is welcome.

We hope you can make the time and join the discussions and be part of this experience.

Entrance fee: 200 baht (includes food)

Drinks and food from 1700. Slideshow at 1900 sharp(ish).

More info map and detailled shedule here

www.photozero.org

Email:photozerobangkok@gmail.com

Another shoot for Bangkok-based fasion house Hey Pilgrim! We went for what has now become their signature style, using LCD-projected images for backgrounds. The collection’s name is “Sir Realist”. An invitation to have fun with angles and backgrounds…

So here it is a straight scan from a sheet of 12 year old Polaroid 52! Almost sounds like I’m on about a single malt Scotch. The emulsion tore in places and the chemistry didn’t spread all over… I won’t pretend I don’t like the result. Not exactly a practical way to work but fun… 12 sheets left

Working on a  large format (4×5) project made me want to investigate the possibility of shooting some polaroid… Aware of polaroid’s demise I didn’t set my hopes too high to find what I wanted, but did manage to get my hands on some polaroid 55 (the stuff that is going for stupid prices on ebay) via friends and some polaroid 52. It’s all hopelessly out-of-date of course. We’ll see what happens…

The end of Polaroid 55 (the positive / negative magic envelope) prompted a state of panic and shooters bought everything they could get their hands on; enterprising ebayers did that too and we are now seeing packs of 20 sheets going for 189+ USD! That’s a mad 9 dollars 50 a shot! Now, call me over-optimistic but I wouldn’t be surprised to see an announcement sometime mid 2009 (don’t quote me on this of course) telling us that Fujifilm or even the Chinese makers of the more than descent Shanghai film have bought the Polaroid 55 patent… China is producing loads of film and with the rise of “art photography” someone there might well go ahead and decide to do this. It will probably be a bit more expensive than before due to a smaller production and it probably won’t be 100% identical but it will be the next best thing and won’t be 10 years out-of-date!

Going through a pile of slides, contact sheets, negatives at the moment in an attempt to finally digitalise most of my stock. Re-discovering pics I’d completely forgotten about in the process… Taken in London in 1999, I think… I’ll post more as I go along.

Vincent Bethell, the naked Protester

Somewhere in the vicinity of Victoria Station…

“Most things in life are moments of pleasure and a lifetime of
embarrassment; photography is a moment of embarrassment and
a lifetime of pleasure.“ -Tony Benn-

Here’s a portrait of Tony Benn I took back in 1999 in London © Cedric Arnold / realfeatures.com