Fresh Scans, Old Photos
I was looking for an image to post on instagram and remembered that I never posted a photo from any of the rolls I shot during a protest in New York that happened back in January 2017. This protest occurred after Trump made an executive order to basically ban muslims from certain countries to enter the United States.
Now, I am not going to go in the politics and talk about where I stand on this. But I am going to talk about my shooting experience and share with you my photos.
These photos were taken with my Mamiya 7II using both the 50mm and 80mm lens. For the first roll I used Fuji Neopan Acros 100 (which has been discontinued), my second roll was Ilford HP5, and my third roll was Ilford Delta 3200. I also shot a roll of 35mm with my Contax G2 which I will share on another blog post in the future (if I can find the scans and negatives)
My Mamiya 7II was pretty new to me. I purchased this camera back in 2016 and shot between 15 to 20 rolls of film. Most of which was used to document my father and to shoot landscape stuff. Covering a protest and that type of photography was not something I have done with my Mamiya 7II before. This camera is actually not a bad choice for shooting something like this, it feels like a bigger Leica M camera so focusing is quick and it’s a discreet camera for its size. The one draw back is that each roll only nets you 10 photographs. So you really have to be patient with shooting and pick your shots carefully. It also takes a while to load film, so you may miss some important photos during that time.
This first roll I shot with was Acros. The sun was out and it was a contrasty day. I didn’t have that much experience with Acros so I wanted to shoot with it when there was a lot of light. I can see why people like this film, it has a lot of contrast which I like for black and white and this film will give it you especially if the conditions for contrast are right. I was able to retain the sky in some photos and have the shadows look alright. Looking at the negatives, there looks like more detail in there than with the scans I did with my Epson V600.
The second roll was with HP5. I probably pushed it one stop but it’s been so long that I don’t remember. This is the film that I have the most experience with and it’s my favorite black and white film. You can easily push this film to 1600 and still get great results.
Next roll I used was Ilford Delta 3200. I have used this on a couple of occasions. I love what I was able to get out of it during this day. Sometimes it does come out too grainy but the film has a lot of character. You can also push it a bit if lighting reduces. Great film for low-light!
It was fun looking back at this and seeing it for the first time since I never scanned it before. All photos were scanned with with an Epson V600 and I used Vuescan software. All images with edited with Lightroom and brought into Photoshop for an extra kick.