Cibachrome - A II "vintage" prints

..

Leica M3+Visoflex III+280mm Telyt - Escalhão, Portugal, 1983

This is my first ever atempt at Cibachrome - A II!

The first, and I might as well say, almost the only one! Back in 1985, I decided to give it a try. So I choosed a couple of 35mm slides, got the developing tank and the necessary chemistry (process P-30) , and made a couple of prints. As I didn't have yet a Jobo processor, or any other processor, I rolled the tank on the bath-room floor back and forth, what quickly proved to be rather tedious. Worse still, it was very hard to keep temperature constant. As a consequence, results were rather erroneous and inaccurate. I quickly decided to give up, and never tried it again. Somehow the process later on changed to Ilfochrome, but I don't really know what that change means...

Please take a look at these images as a kind of curiosity, more a kind of memory. I found them, and I thought it might be funny to post them. The years gone by, kind of excuse my inaptitude...

Leica M4-2+Visoflex III+280mm Telyt. Azoren, Pico, 1982

Leica M4+Visoflex III+280mm. Azoren, Angra do Heroísmo, 1982

Leica M4-2+Visoflex III+280mm. Azoren: sunrise behind S. Jorge, seen from Pico, 1982

Minolta XM+80-200mm Rokkor. Lagos, Portugal, 1979

Minolta XM+135mm Rokkor. Mira, Portugal, 1977

Minolta XM+135mm Rokkor. Monsanto, Portugal, 1977

These photographs are getting kind of "historic", and they remind me that the years keep on going by. I no longer own any Minolta cameras or lenses (only keep my Minolta Spotmeter), but I must say that I to these days regret that I sold the XM. A rather nice camera, that tried to compete with the F models from Nikon.
I can't talk bad about Minolta. I started with a 303b and soon added a 101b. Fine cameras with fine lenses. I was satisfied! That is, until one day I picked up a Leica in a shop, and from that moment on I knew a change had to take place! In that moment I did understand that Leica was not only a mythus, but rather another league. I soon substituted all my Minolta equipment for Leicas! So I am using Leicas for thirty years now, and I have never looked back.

My oldest model, a double-stroke M3 (took the first picture above!) is fifty-three years old, looking beatiful and going strong. Wish I could also keep forever young... I bought my "youngest" M Leica, (I first had a CL for a short time), in 1979!!! Keeps on working like in the first day! Every now and then (maybe every ten years or so) they get a CLA and keep on moving... Really great stuff!!!


It is a pity and a shame that Leica is becoming more and more a kind of status symbol, a kind of fashion accessory, mostly treasured and inflaccionated by collectors than actually used by photographers. Worse still, it seems Leica (the company) likes to play the game, what I can in a way understand because of the big bucks involved. Sad... sad...


The Visoflex mentioned above was a device, long gone from Leica's catalogue, that turned the M model (a so called rangefinder camera), into a single lens reflex. It is too late and I am too tired now, for to dive deep in the subject, but basically it allowed the use of long lenses and macro equipment with the M cameras. I imagine that some of you (I mean, IF there is somebody out there reading this!) don't know much about those kind of odditys, as they belong to a already gone age... Yes, there once was a time, when photographers didn't have auto-everything, super-fast and super-easy photography-producing machines, backed up by everything-correcting computers.

Once upon a time photographers did have to know their trade...

Good night, sleep tight.

(P.S.: Please excuse me, if some of you are Leica experts. Maybe you know a lot more about Leicas, and equipment in general, than I do, but I must assume that not everyone who might read these posts is a leicaphile...)

...

Guillermo Vázquez Consuegra - Pabellon de la Navegación en Sevilla

...

I had the chance of photographing three of the public buildings built in Sevilla, when the town prepared for celebrating Expo'92. Rafael Moneo's new airport, Cruz y Ortiz new railway station, and the Spanish Pavilion by the sevillian architect Guillermo Vázquez Consuegra, which I take the opportunity to show. I shot the three buildings on assignment from the architectural portuguese magazine "Architécti". In those times, the magazine was still run by the architect Luiz Trigueiros, and I think it's quality level could well qualify as international. We used to cover buildings in depth, usually not less than thirty photographs each work. I used to shoot them all in large format. So, we had dozens of sheet-films to develop when I got back home. Hours and hours of hard work on the Jobo processor, timing the process with a stopwatch!

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

In those times, besides carrying a Sinar f2 and all it's paraphernalia, I used to bring along a really heavy Linhof tripod, one of those kind that lasts forever, built like a german panzer. Also a case full of large-format lenses, plus another case full of sheet-film holders, plus loads of 120 Ektachrome for the roll-film holder... plus light-meters and color-meter, plus cc and various other filters... plus... plus... plus...
Carrying all that through and around those BIG buildings, sometimes having to step away, so that it all fits in those tiny 4x5's...
If you add a minute to think that in Sevilla the temperature often rises well above 40 degrees Celsius, you quickly conclude that I must have been in good shape!

I wish I could sing like The Byrds: "But I was much older then, I'm younger than that now!"...

Have fun!

..

Álvaro Siza - look inside my book

...

..

..

..

..

..

..

..

..

..

..

Scanned directly from the book. Dimensions: 24x24 cm (9,4x9,4 inches).

Bilingual: portuguese / english.

Texts by Paulo Martins Barata, Raquel Henriques da Silva and Bernardo Pinto de Almeida.

Design by José Antunes Barata.

Price: 20 euros + p&p (list price: 31 euros).

..

Alexandre M. Pereira - Look inside my book

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

Scanned directly from the book. Dimensions: 24x24 cm (9,4x9,4 inches).

Bilingual: portuguese / english.

Texts by Manuel Tainha, Nuno Grande and Paulo Martins Barata.

Design by Francisco Vaz da Silva.

Price: 20 euros + p&p (list price: 31 euros).

...

Photo gear

...

Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM

Every now and then, I will post some thoughts about photo gear. Nothing fancy or too much technical, I am not that kind of guy, just feelings about old and new equipment. Maybe even only some photographs of cameras and lenses. I might sometimes write from a professional point-of-view, other times just about the pleasure of creating images.

We, photographers, tend to be very gear-oriented people, we have a very physical relationship with our cameras, we touch them, we carry them, we smell them, we put them to our faces and noses.
I dare to say, that very often I find myself caressing my Leicas for instance, for I do love to grip that round shape with my fingers. It senses a little bit like "home". Am I silly? Well, I guess... But if you imagine that I am already doing it for over thirty years now... Kind of good old friends, me and my Leicas...


I start by posting my three last acquisitions (I choose to leave my Leicas for a later date).

The lens depicted above, I bought used in Leica Shop in Wien, Austria. They have a phantastic catalogue on line, and I was very pleased with their service. If I had some more money, I would certainly order a couple of things more from them. If you also love or need photo gear, take a look a their site. I think that you won't find it a waste of time.
I haven't tried yet this lens very seriously, but it surely focus fast, at least for a 5.6! It is relatively compact and light (for a 400mm, that is...), and is, in terms of L optics, still affordable. If you should need a long lens, and like me, don't need or can't afford f/2.8, take this one in consideration. Very good optical quality!

(By the way: the images of the two other cameras, were shot with the 400mm and a 30D).

Yashica IC Lynx 5000E

This camera actually belonged to my father. A couple of months ago, my mother asked me if I wanted to keep it. At first I showed no interest, but then I thought that it might be a good souvenir.
I must admit that I was wrong: the camera seems to be better than I thought. The lens is a six-element (Planar type?), and the Copal leaf-shutter is very quiet. Furthermore, it is mechanical, the batteries are only needed for the light-meter. No Leica, but solidly built anyway!
I think that I will keep it behind the seat of my Land Rover pick-up. Just need to find a lens-shade and a yellow-filter...

(IC should mean Integrated Circuit. Must have been the world's first camera to use such a thing. So he says: I mean the Yashica Guy! He surely knows better than me!).

Carl Zeiss Flektogon 2.8 / 35mm

I think that I am giving up beeing a snob... I started to enjoy using my Varex IIb!
After many years of staying in the cupboard, I decided to give it a try. I must say that it keeps me awaken, it makes me think even more than shooting a 4x5 inches... The finder is dark, the shape is certainly odd to say the least, the slow shutter-speeds are hard to set, the shutter-release is maybe good for left-handers...
But where else do you get a twelve-second mechanicaly-timed exposure? So cheap?

So I decided that I should start looking for a nice selection of lenses for this "freak"...

I already had a 2.8/35mm Schneider Curtagon from the sixties, but I wanted to compare it with a 2.8/35mm Flektogon (Zeiss east german equivalent to Zeiss west german Distagon).
Outstanding in this optic, is the short-focusing distance of only 18cm (less than 8 inches!), for sure unusual for this focal length. Some people call it the Macro-Flektogon!

I haven't tried the beast yet, the postman brought it a couple of days ago, but I bet that I won't have the need to use a post-processing program to correct the optical quality...

(I ordered this specimen from Foto Krüger in Dresden, Germany. Looks nice and feels nice, with a nice leather case. It left the VEB Carl Zeiss Jena in 1976. I love classic stuff!).

Nice close-focusing distance, but not that small...

(If you like Exaktas, or got interested, take a look here on Captain Jack's. You won't regrett it!).

...

Black and white portraiture

.

I always had a special pleasure on doing black and white portraiture of the informal type. So some friends and relatives, or just people I met, often came in for a sitting in my living-room or in the studio.
Only the last shot was made while on assignment. The man is a worker in a large quarry in the mountain of Monchique, south of Portugal, where I improvised a small studio in the dining-hall. I just loved the way he came and sat there, full of dignity. Sadly, I don't know his name.

Ana

Barbara

Florian

Filipa

Francisco

Irina

Luis (my son)

José (my father)

Sara (my daughter)

Stephen

Worker

All photographs on this post were made using a camera by Hasselblad (either a 500 C/M or a 500 EL/M), and a Sonnar 150mm, made by Carl Zeiss. Phantastic gear, designed for hard-work of the highest quality.
Light was sometimes made by a single portable flash by Metz, aimed at an umbrella, or using Hensel Studiotechnik equipment, built in the nice german town of Würzburg. I usually prefer to keep my portrait lightning simple, using very often a single light source.

The photographs were scanned directly from black and white prints, produced on the traditional wet-darkroom. Somehow, they lack some detail and get too much contrast for my taste. I really need to do some home-work on scanning!
I apologize...

.