Frame-A-Day: A farewell to color

128. Forest Park, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Well, it's been a good run, but this is the last color frame-a-day image for a while. It's back to black and white!

I started using the color film a while back first as a camera test, as I wanted to familiarize myself with my Nikon n90s. After that, it was a couple of rolls for film testing, the new Kodak Portra 400 and Ektar 100. Now that all those tests are out of the way, I can get back to my black and white film.

Keep up with my daily picture posts over at my Flickr stream.

Frame-A-Day: Forest Park at Dawn

124. Forest Park at Dawn, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

As much as I enjoy taking landscape photographs, I've never really done the whole 'wake up and get to your chosen spot before sunrise' thing. I know about the soft 'magic light' in the time surrounding sunrise and sunset, but I've never had enough discipline to act on that.

Recently, however, I've been thinking I need to take a more considered approach to my 'frame-a-day' project. Random snapshots of various things can be fun, but if I want get anything out of this project, I need to be putting more into it.

That is not to say everything I post from here out will be nothing short of a masterpiece. As I said above, random snapshots are fun, and they do really help when it comes to photographic dry spells, but there are times I will have to give my photos much more thought than I have been in recent weeks/months. The discipline of shooting and posting more often must now tighten up into shooting and posting more deliberate subject matter.

Frame-A-Day 100: Wassup!

100. Wassup!, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Well, here we are at the big 100. I've shot and processed and uploaded and blogged at a higher rate than I ever have before.

And I'm not really sure what I am supposed to be learning from all of this.

Frame-a-Day 98: Antique Shop

98. Antique Shop, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

I mentioned earlier about my underexposing the portra by 1 stop. Here's an image where I did just that. Inside the little antique shop, I rated the film speed at 800. Because this roll was processed normally (not pushed), this frame was effectively underexposed by 1 stop. It looks just fine to me. The film's grain is a little more evident than in the normally exposed images, but it's not excessive and even tends to lend a pleasing texture to my eye.

Late March Snowstorm

Late March Snowstorm, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Winter's not quite done with us yet, though I am very much done with it.

Frame-A-Day: Plant, steel and brick

95. Plant, steel and brick, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

I'm finally getting a chance to use the new Portra 400 film from Kodak, and I have to say that so far, it's living up to its awesome rep. I've got stuff from the same roll that was overexposed 1 stop, shot at box speed and underexposed 1 stop, and it all looks great.

They just put out an ISO 160 version of the same film. If they could pull of the same trick with Portra 800, I'd be one happy camper.

Frame-A-Day (Now in Color!)

84. Snow!, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Frame-A-Day continues, but I've changed things up for the next few weeks. The images have been shot on my Nikon f4 on Fuji Superia 400 film. Here's to hoping a splash of color helps Spring arrive quickly.

Like, tomorrow!

Frame-A-Day Catch-Up

75. Tomato Cage and Door, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

I've been terribly neglectful of this blog as of late. Not so the whole 'frame-a-day' project, which continues over on my flickr stream. We're up to 75 images now, heading towards 100, which is a bit of a milestone I should think. There are a few change-ups in the project coming down the pike, but no thoughts of quitting yet.

Frame-A-Day 45: Library

45. Library, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

One of the nicest aspects of where I live is the fact that we have a library branch within a short walking distance of my house. Growing up in North St. Louis County, a trip to the library always meant a drive, now it's just around the corner.

The number of people whom I have encountered in my life that do not ever use this amazing resource continues to astound me.

Frame-A-Day Catch-Up: 42, 43, 44

42. Laundromat


43. Another Big Red Sculpture


44. Eye of Sauron?

And that brings us up to date. As I've mentioned before, it's not scanning and posting the photos that is the hard part, it's the writing about them.

Frame-A-Day Catch Up: 39, 40, 41

39. Gourds


40. Abstract


41. Chevy

There are times when I feel like I've hit a dry run.

Frame-A-Day 38: Road Rider for Jesus

This photo marks the beginning of a new film stock: Arista Premium 400. My stash of Kodak Tri-X was running out, and I'd heard the Arista was the exact same film, just rebranded by Freestyle Photographic supplies. Since the film is just a little over $2.00 per roll, I bought myself what might be close to a year's supply.

This first frame seems like an inauspicious start to the new film stock. It's stupidly underexposed. In fact the first 6 or so frames all were. Some of those I can attribute to my own stupidity at setting the camera, but the rest? Halfway through the roll, I started metering at 1600 as opposed to the 3200 I had been using, and giving the same development times. The results are a huge improvement, and I can't wait to get to posting those.

Frame-A-Day Catch-Up: 36, 37

36. Alex


37. Big Balls!

Frame-A-Day Catch-Up: 33, 34, 35

33. Dr. Jones


34. Christmas Tree


35. Workstation

Frame-A-Day Catch-Up: 32,33, 34

32. Mike and Jen


33. Dr. Jones


34. Christmas Tree

Frame-A-Day Catch-up: 29,30,31

29. Snow Day


30. Icicles


31. Bottleworks

Frame-A-Day 28: SLAM

28. SLAM, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Finding things to do around town in winter isn't that hard. St. Louis has a wonderful collection of museums and other institutions that one can visit- completely free of charge. The Art Museum, Science Center*, and Missouri History Museum top that list.

*You might have to pay for parking at the Science Center, however. There are two lots, and the smaller one in Forest Park by the planetarium is free- but naturally it fills up quickly.

Frame-A-Day 25, 26, 27: Catch-Up

Frame-A-Day 25: Cemetary

Frame-A-Day 26: White Christmas

 
 

Frame-A-Day 27: Christmas Day 

Frame-A-Day 24: Nutcracker

24. Nutcracker, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Hardest part about this project isn't in the picture-taking, the scanning or the remembering to post everyday- it's in the blogging. What do I have to say about this picture? It's a group of nutcrackers my neighborhood library branch had out for the holidays. I like the fireman.

Frame-A-Day 23: Gringo Jones

23. Gringo Jones, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

I mean really, who buys this stuff?

Frame-A-Day 22: That's MR. Bubble to you!

22. That's MR. Bubble to you!, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Yeah, I was worried about dropping the camera, but no guts, no glory.

Frame-A-Day 21: Chinese Food For Lunch

21. Chinese Food For Lunch, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

As a photographer, I don't have any problems with photographing people. How could I? I'm a wedding photographer by day and taking pictures of people are the stock and trade of wedding photography. So it's not people, per se, that I have a problem with- it's strangers. And that's especially so for strangers who have no idea until I approach them that they might possibly have their picture taken today.

So that's become another (small) aspect of this project- improve my "street photography" skills to include more photos of people I do not know. As of early January, I only have 3 (the above, the barista, and one more upcoming), so it's a slow start. It is still a start, however.

Frame-A-Day 20: 306 N. Tucker

20. 306 N. Tucker, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Context is everything.

This doorway in downtown St. Louis caught my eye and I had to photograph it. It wasn't because of its design, it's color, or those really nice light sconces flanking it, but because of its context.

It was in this little niche, located below a parking garage. And it just seemed so out-of-place there, with its really nice light sconces and its siding, and it's little mail slot. There are three door buzzers there, so I imagine it leads to a small block of offices, but it's set into a space that seems so domesticated. That space in turn is set into a space that's definitely not.

Twenty pictures in, this is still relatively early in my frame-a-day project. I was still trying for the one photo a day ideal, but unfortunately I didn't take enough time thinking about this image. I knew I wanted to take a picture of this door because of where it was, I just didn't capture that at all here.

I believe in returning to a subject whenever possible if I don't feel I got what I wanted out of it. So I will come back here and try again someday.

Frame-A-Day 19: Montana vs. the Tornado

19. Montana vs. the Tornado, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

I did mention that I was pretty bad at the whole 'Take 1 photo a day' thing, right? One-and-a-half months into this project now I feel that particular restriction doesn't have a place. Yes, it's meant to spur greater awareness- that sense that you only have one shot, so it better be a good one! Trouble is, there were days I kept waiting for that one shot to happen- I didn't want to waste my one frame on anything less than 'worthy.'

So, I've modified the original idea behind the project to be 'Take at LEAST one photo a day.' There are days even that simple goal is a struggle. There were 3 days between this shot and tomorrow's. This is the second reason I want to be able to shoot multiple frames a day: to fill in the inevitable gaps.

But this is the last 'Science Center Field Trip' image I'm posting for this project (I did shoot more). I briefly debated including this one, but it had a quality that I really liked.

Frame-A-Day: Science Center

18. Science Center, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

One of my stated goals in this ongoing project was to get into a habit of regular picture taking- at least one per day. I'm still working on finding my routine, some days it's easier to take up the camera and shoot than others. But I am shooting regularly now- at least 7 images per week if not exactly one every day.

Frame-A-Day: Monty and Sophia

17. Monty and Sophia, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

I was a parent volunteer on a school field trip in mid-December. As such, I was given charge to Monty and his friend Sophia. No one got lost and they both had all their limbs attached when they left the Science Center, so I guess I did a pretty good job!

Frame-A-Day 16: Robots!

16. Robots!, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

My son loves robots. He's absolutely wild and crazy over them in all the ways a six-year-old can be. Dinosaurs are cool, spaceships okay, sharks and snakes are nifty, but nothing but nothing can compare to a robot.

One of these days I'm going to have to make it a project to gather up every single last robot in the house- from the big Robby you see here to the Christmas Tree ornaments to the LEGO battle-droids he recently acquired- and take a big group photo.

This photo also marks the end of my first roll of film in my Frame-A-Day project. Only 16 shots in, I know, but the rest of the roll was actually used for something unrelated that I'm unprepared to show yet. Tomorrow we continue with the next roll of Tri-X, rated and developed same as this one.

Keep watching the skies!

Frame-A-Day 15: Birthday Coffee.

15. Birthday Coffee., originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Free coffee at Borders is cool, it just bites that I had to go there during the holiday season to get it.

Frame-A-Day #14: Laumier Sculpture Park

14. Laumier Sculpture Park, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

Another massive public sculpture. This one located in Laumeier Sculpture park in Sunset Hills, MO. Like yesterday's image, this was shot with a #25 Red filter and the effect the filter had on the tones and contrast of this photo are much more pronounced. The shadows are deepened to almost pure black (the original scan still shows some detail, and I'd be willing to bet I could get a tad more out if I worked a little harder at it), the blue sky is darkened, and the bright red sculpture is lightened in comparison.

"The Way" at Laumeier Sculpture Park

Frame-A-Day 13: Wood and Frost

13. Wood and Frost, originally uploaded by jeffrey_knight.

One of the things about shooting film vs. digital is digital's ability to allow you to change the sensor's sensitivity to light, or it's ISO rating. Shooting in bright sunlight? Drop the ISO to 100 or 200. Shooting in a dark building? Raise it to 1600 or 3200 (or more, with the high-end cameras offering fantastic-looking images at very high ISOs).

Film is of course rated at different sensitivities as well, usually known as the film's speed. The higher the speed, the higher the ISO, the more sensitive to light. Kodak's Tri-X, which is what I'm using for my frame-a-day series currently, is normally a 400 speed film, but I'm shooting it as if it were ISO 3200, basically underexposing it by 3 stops. The long processing time in a highly-dilute developer allows me to get scannable images off the film.

But, I have to shoot everything on the roll as if it were ISO 3200. Which is fine when I'm indoors, but outdoors during the day, that's just too bright. How do you solve that problem, since I cannot change the film's ISO on the fly?

The answer is the use of filters, pieces of glass that screw onto the camera lens for a variety of effects. In this case I used a red #25 filter, a deep-red filter. Using a #25 cuts your exposure by 3 stops, effectively dropping my film back to ISO 400- perfectly manageable even on a bright day.

The downside to using it is that contrast is pushed way up, as the shadows- normally lit by the blue sky- are darkened. This isn't a bad effect, per se, but it is one you have to keep in mind when you are shooting with it. For Christmas I received a 2-stop neutral-density filter, which reduces the light entering the camera by 2 stops. Unlike the red filter, the ND doesn't have any sort of color cast, so it won't have any effect on the scene's contrast, and I will be able to use it with color film as well.

Happy new year, everybody, and here's looking forward to a great 2011!