In a Valley of Violence: Filmed on Celluloid

Kodak goes behind the scenes for the movie, A Valley of Violence. The film is shot in 35mm Kodak 250D daylight film indoors and outside during the daytime. The film was selected to capture the shadow details in the buildings and the actors' expressions under the brims of their hats in the hard, noon-day sunlight of New Mexico. The single night shot was done with Kodak 500T. The goal of using 35mm film was to create a gritty, Western-style look with the texture of film grain. The panaromas of the desert were best captured with the latitude of film and the actors and crew were on the top of their game to capture the scenes right. One of the stars of the motion picture, John Travolta, fist-bumped the director/writer, Ti West, on learning that silver halide film was being used to make the movie.

Released October 21 in theaters, on demand and digital HD. Happy Halloween, partners.

Lomography October 2016 Magazine

Lomography, the company that brings us excellent remakes of lens designs, such as the Petzval and Daguerrotype Achromat, also has an online magazine. The latest edition has this interesting article on why film is making a comeback.

From the article:

With perfectly-and-digitally-shot photographs, many are beginning to get sick of the norm; and how true it is that when perfection becomes easily reproduced, it begins to lose its appeal and value.

How do humans counter this? General history has gone over this many times: they break the trends by starting a new one.

The Emphemeris App

If you want to take full advantage of the sun and moon, in particular sunrise and sunset and similarly moonrise and moonset, The Ephemeris App may be for you. Available on devices and the Web, this app not only tells you the time of these events, but also the direction on the compass of the events and even the path of the sun or the moon, respectively.

Lately, the time of sunset and moonrise have been close. This gives an eerie, large moon on the horizon with a blue background and sun dappled landscape. well worth seeing, if not capturing on film. Use the Ephemeris App to find the direction and location to best observe this phenomenon.

Check out the moon exposure calculator to get an exposure for the moon.

Newsletter: Tim Rudman

Tim Rudman's newsletter made its way out Friday. With lith and film news from Photokina and packed with more photography goodness. A quick review of the main points here: Tim's photobook, An Uneasy Calm, has received rave reviews so far. He also points out that since the book is being sold from the UK, the recent effect of Brexit on the UK pound sterling now makes the book more affordable elsewhere in the world. Photokina and film Renaissance media articles.

Tim was also selected to judge the weather photographer of the year competition. Jointly convened by the Royal Photographic Society and Royal Meterological Society, the competition is hoped to be even more successful next year, with the involvement of the BBC, the reknowned British broadcaster.

At Photokina, Tim noticed the lack of Adox' Polywarmtone Project, the replacement for Forte Polywarmtone. The project may be well underway with much investment in its future, but so far has not made a splash yet. For lith printers, he has heard of problems with some batches of Slavich Unibrom. This paper is not made for lith, so results are not guaranteed. Meanwhile Bergger introduced a new B&W film, Pancro400 (thanks for the illustrated photos, Phoblographer!). The RPS also has forums in their new Analogue special interest group with more articles.

The newsletter also includes tantalizing articles on the resurgence of film. Out of Australia, tales of a resurgence of film, including wet collodion and darkrooms. An editorial proclaims film is back, and some photographers never left it. Fashion photography and authenticity drive the desire for film for some.

Sign up for Tim Rudman's newsletter for the full newsletter packed with info for lith and film photographers.

* Tim Rudman, Photo Book
* Lith News, Spring 2015

Film Ferrania: At the Bases

Film Ferrania has taken another step on the journey to producing colour slide film. In case you have forgotten, Film Ferrania completed a successful Kickstarter back in 2014. With many setbacks, adventures and challenges, they have announced the third step - preparing the base material for the coating machine.

This is a significant step, because once completed, they will have material to coat with emulsion to make film. They are using existing polyester film base stock that they already have, rather than preparing from scratch. The problem is that the base they have is spooled for larger machines than the Little Boy coater. So, they will be slitting the material using a slitting machine from 1917! They have a modern slitter, but is much larger and more difficult to setup at this time.

The process will involve cutting down a single 113cm wide, 3,000m long (3 kilometers!) jumbo roll into 50 23cm wide, 300m long mini-jumbo rolls. Each mini-jumbo can be used to coat up to 930 spools of 135/36 exposure rolls of film. The slitting can be done in daylight, since there are no light sensitive components in the base (it is just plastic).

Don't miss the posting on F.I.L.M., the early name for Film Ferrania.

We will continue to follow this story until film is produced. Stay with us!

How to Clean a Lens

From a company that rents lenses, Borrow Lenses gives a guide to safely cleaning one of the most precious components in image capture. Tips include starting from the least invasive steps, using a lens blower, but not your breath, to the various cleaning tools and techniques to conquer serious lens smudges. Best bet is to go easy, because contaminating the inside of the lens can lead to costly repairs requiring the disassembly of the lens.

The Intrepid Camera

The Intrepid Camera Co. successfully completed a Kickstarter campaign to create the affordable Intrepid 4x5 camera. This camera is handmade in England, but using time saving techniques to bring a large format camera to you at only £200.00 assembled, if they were not sold out. As usual, large format cameras do not come with film holders or a lens, so those are extra.

The camera takes a Linhof/Technika lens board and will accept lenses from 90mm to 300mm. A pinhole board is available for low cost, if you want to get started while searching out a lens and shutter. The rotating back accepts all standard film holders as well as Graflok compatible backs. The camera weighs 1.2kg and comes with a choice of bellows colour. The bellows extends up to 310mm and has front movements (no back movements).