It's been quiet for me recently with photos...no show at the moment. And I've been learning the craft of large format film. Very enlightening. It's changing the way I look at taking photos, and makes me even more conscious when using digital cameras as well. I've made lots of mistakes in this process. The first batch of 4x5 film was loaded backwards--I was essentially exposing the back of the film! That "first" photo below, the one with the flower, candle and box was one of these. WAY under exposed negative, so I had to over compensate in printing. Not really sharp and weak contrasts.
The slight downside is that I have to be patient. I have taken what I think will be some nice film photos, but I have to go into the darkroom again and develop, then print. This all takes time. When I do color, or have a lot of film exposed, I will consider sending to the lab at least for developing the film. After that, I can either print myself (black and white) or scan the negatives and send out for printing.
It feels like I've gone through an entire college curriculum over the last year. But the foundations are important, and enable me to take a more instinctive/intuitive approach now (as it becomes more second nature).
