Sunflower bud

[Terri]

I had to climb a ladder to reach the top of this sunflower! I was about 10 feet away from it and used a portrait lens, B&W film, which I hand developed then made this silver gelatin print using 8x10" Ilford glossy paper. We had a big crop of giant sunflowers that year. My favorite flower. Thanks for looking!

 

[Enyaw]

Beauty.

 

[Lazarus]

Beautiful.

 

[Triduana]

Gorgeous!

 

[Artyczar]

Love love love!!!

 

[Terri]

Thank you all so much!! ❤ ❤

 

[Queen Bee]

Stunning.

 

[ams]

Beautiful Terri. Your black and white photo brings back memories for me. My father was an avid photographer and I used to "help" in the darkroom sometimes when he was developing B&W film. I'm afraid his work wasn't anywhere near the quality of yours though.

 

[Terri]

Thank you so much, Deborah!

 

[Terri]

Beautiful Terri. Your black and white photo brings back memories for me. My father was an avid photographer and I used to "help" in the darkroom sometimes when he was developing B&W film. I'm afraid his work wasn't anywhere near the quality of yours though.

Aw, that's so nice of you to say, Anne. What terrific memories your father gave you, though - and an appreciation for film developing, getting results in that tactile way. What a nice thing to be able to recall.

Thank you!

 

[classic]

Can I ask the type of the original film and developer used? It looks very fine grained.

 

[Terri]

Sure, Classic! I would have to literally find that negative to tell you exactly what film. I shot this with my Mamiya 1000s 645, so it's a 120 negative. Likely Ilford FP4, but it could be HP5, since I tend to gravitate to faster film.

Likely developed in D76. Whatever we had made up at the time; my husband shoots film, too, and we tend to mix stuff up that's decent for each of us may be using at the moment.

I tend towards a relatively gentle agitation when I want to keep the grain down.

 

[classic]

6X4.5cm is much better than 24X36mm of the 135 format. No problem with excessive grain. And Mamiya lens are just professional ones. You are blessed with that camera!
Nevertheless, film grain isn't necessarily bad. It can be exciting. Digital grain is boring.

 

[Terri]

Nevertheless, film grain isn't necessarily bad. It can be exciting. Digital grain is boring.

I totally agree. I love grain, and consider it an element in certain shots.

Digital grain is boring because it isn't grain. Grain is in fact an element, since it's metallic (silver) pieces embedded into the emulsion. With digital, what you can get is pixels that are enhanced to look like grain. What a lot of photographers like about digital is that it's so easy to remove pixels and get total smoothness.