Umbrellas - my first ever project (sort of)

[Ed Sutton]

For a few weeks I've been scanning the best or most interesting (not always the same thing) of my negatives from the dark ages for what I call The Dusty Negatives Archive. It's been an enlightening exercise. I've discovered that some subjects I photograph these days had already caught my eye in 1977-1982, the period I was actively taking photographs. Dogs, pigeons, road markings, street furniture - sheep too. There are also ways of framing/composing pictures which have remained very much the same. In those days I had a 50mm lens, a 28mm and a x2 teleconverter which I put behind the 50mm. I could still live with that trinity of focal lengths and sometimes I do use just them. It surprised me how quickly I developed and settled into a 'style' which seems to have pretty much stuck.

In 1982 the student grant dried up and the photography dried up with it. Or rather photography for its own sake did. I still have almost 2000 slides to look through from 1983 onwards, but they are all fishing related having been taken to illustrate articles and talks. It was 2010 when I started taking photography 'seriously' again.

Towards the end of my scanning I found a couple of contact sheets which contained pictures taken one rainy day in Southport in 1981. I shot those rolls of film with the intention of using the pictures as the basis for a painting. There were slow shutter speed pictures of feet, and picture of reflections. However there were also about a dozen on an umbrella theme. It was unusual for me to take so many pictures on one theme, simply because of the cost of film.

I could try to claim that this is my longest running project, as I still photograph people with umbrellas now and then. However, it might be time to revisit this theme in a more concerted way.

And a couple from this century for good measure.

 

[superpippo]

Another interesting topic.
I prefer the colour ones as with umbrellas I feel that it is the colour that stands out on what is usually a grey day.
Of the b&w #3 stands out for me because of the battered shape, the sharpness of the subject and the motion of the car.
The others seem to have a lack of sharpness and contrast but I do like the informality of the shots.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Cheers, Alan.

Colour wasn't really an option in the old days. I couldn't develop and print it myself, and although I dabbled with transparency it never suited me. My developing technique was pretty crap and my scanning isn't much better so I can blame that for the lack of contrast. The lack of sharpness is all down to me!

 

[superpippo]

Dave, i understand the use of b&w in the 'old days'. I only mentioned it to draw a contrast between those and the colour versions. Perhaps with your latest gear you will be able to change the impact of the b&w. Opposite to you, I used to use transparency because the quality that I could get fro the factory processing was so much higher than I could get myself. Unfortunately I had the fag of getting a projector out to view them. Now I have managed to scan them and thus can pop them into photobooks. I still have some 50's b&w of my mom and dad and when I was young and the quality is still pretty good for scanning.

I am envious of your ability to choose (or fall upon) themes - angling, chickens, sheep, umbrellas, abandoned balls - to me this is an interesting and involving way of using the camera, getting out and about and producing a record of what are, often, everyday activities. I thoroughly enjoy reading the sheep posts and looking at the photos.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I've scanned a few of my slides, and TBH they aren't any better than my black and white negs! I'm pretty sure that the meter in my Pentax ME was off as many slides look underexposed. When I bought a Canon in the 1990s I got much better results from transparency film.

I've already done one Blurb book of scanned photos taken in Preston and will be making a couple or three more. One of Southport photos, possibly one of local pictures if there are enough, and another of random stuff. I might even do one of fishing photos some time. It's a great way to have access to old pictures.

The way I come across themes is pretty random really. Most times they find me. I'll just realise that I have a number of pictures which follow a theme, and then I consciously look out for more. Although why I take the first pictures I really don't know. I have plenty of pictures of weheelie bins and traffic cones in my files that haven't become projects yet!

Poultry, however, was chosen deliberately, although I had no idea where it would go or that it would become such an obsession. Sheep became a subject by accident while waiting for the poultry tent to open after the judging at an agricultural show.

There's no masterplan!