So, what have I learnt about medium formattery this month then? Bugger all really, this month most of my lessons have been about photography in general and how much I hate autumn.
Inspiration has been sadly lacking recently yet this hasn't stopped me from buying stuff for the Bronica even though I'm not using the damned thing. This months shopping list includes a 50mm lens a polaroid back, a UV filter, a CP filter and a waist level finder.
The 50mm lens was a bargain, there's a mark on the outside but the optics are spotless but do you know what, despite the rumours that it's equivelant to about 36mm on a 35mm (full frame for you 1s and 0s lot) square wides just aren't that wide it seems. Oblong pictures, despite being ungodly do have a certain advantage when you're trying to use distortion. Still, square is where its at (aint that right Joxby)!
The Polaroid back was another bargain, 99p! And you lot say such terrible things about eBay. However it wasn't quite as cheap as it could have been after I wasted all but one of a pack of polaroid because I loaded it wrongly. I won't be making that mistake again. What I also learnt is that polaroid is as hit and miss trying to develop in the cold november air as it is shoving it down my boxers trying to get some heat into it! Leave it indoors I say.
The waist level finder, oh how I love the WLF, I though the metered prism the camera came with would be perfect but you know what, the metering is rubbish and the eyepiece doesn't get on with my glasses.
Okay now onto the real lesson I've learnt this week. I hate autumn, not just because its bloody freezing but because it's too short, well the good bit of it is too short. The weekend before last I went for a walk with the wife and dogs around the woods at Calke Abbey, now I'm no landscaper, far too young to find fields interesting, but the colours on the trees and the golden leaves on the floor that lined our route were inspiring. Perfect for some mountain bike sportraits thinks I. Unfortunately it was too late that weekend so I starting planning to do it this weekend just gone.
What a difference a week makes, virtually no leaves on the trees left and what was on the floor had that brown colour of decay, mmmmmmmmm, pretty. Added to the ugly scene I was now faced with was my wife the unwilling model, embarrased by wearing mountain biking gear, embarrased by standing in fron of the camera and most of all, miserable at the baltic temperatures we were encounering. Oh how she suffered for my art, oh how she made sure I knew just how much she suffered. Next time I'll just get a pro in and to hell with her insecurities
Lots of lessons this month, the most important being, when you see an opportunity seize it because in a weeks time it could have turned to ****.
MFV OUT.