The Many Faces of Les

Les Gediman and myself did some cross border commerce a while back

including a lens and camera, and he sent me a care package including

some of his unprocessed films.

 

The film was in pretty rough shape. I interpreted the shots with a

high contrast look which I like in this series. Hope you enjoy Les.

 

Camera unknown, film marked Neopan 400 on cannister (only numbers on

strip), date about 2002 from another shot on the roll.<div></div>

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Love the detail... Les, what did you shoot these with?

Nice work by both of you. I've got a roll of Neopan 400 on my desk right now that I'm not quite sure what to do with. I'd be interested in a few more details too.

I like the way you've processed these, Mike, along with Les' personal sense of "himself". Also, these are really quite sharp for self portraits. A tech aspect I find difficult, personally.

Great cross border collaboration !

 

"The profile" is far the best of the three photos IMHO.

 

The other are a bit to grainy/noisy, purely technically speaking, and as for the first (the hands) the photographer had not made a clear choice between the hands and the face (seeing half that beardy face is quite disturbing to the eye).

 

Better like this I think :<div></div>

Nicolas, it was "found" film, in pretty rough shape for only 3 years old.

Mike Kovacs:

Thanks for processing the mystery film, and in the way you scanned the far from perfect negatives. I like the chiaroscuro effect very much especially in last image "The profile."

 

However, now the family secret is out; yes, my head does come to a point. The Cone Head skit in SNL was based on my deformity. The egg shaped lobe, that differentiates homo sapiens from lower members of the biped mammals, is missing. That's where higher calculations and skills in digital printing are normally stored. My phrenologist describes my head's shape this way: From its peak to the brow is a beginner skier's slope, but from the apex to the back of the neck, it's an extreme skier's nightmare. A downhill run that is death defying, a near free fall schuss that approaches 90 degree. Just ask any of the DESD members, aka Dandruff Extreme Ski Divers.

 

Did I ever mention my father's older brother was a comedian in burlesque and vaudeville circuits. In France, during the WW1 truces, he performed standing above the trenches doing his "shtick" for the allies and the Germans, as he was fluent in French and German. Ironically, he was gassed during that war, and suffered for the rest of his life from lung and stomach problems caused by one gas attack . Uncle Sam lived with us and as a kid he let me use his make- up kit with false mustaches and beards, wigs and putty to make a Cyrano shaped nose. In that department, I didn't need much putty. What my gene's supplied abundantly, Claudia's cheated her by giving her a tiny nose. Fortunately, our sons got most of her genes. OK basta! back to 2005 and photographic topics.

 

CE and Mike Connealy: In late summer of 2001, Freestyle had a bargain on outdated, but stored in freezer, Neopan 400. I bought a couple of cans of 100 feet of it. I'll have to check on the margin of the negatives of the rolls I souped in Florence when we went over there to celebrate our 50th anniversary. I only used Neopan 400 in the two cameras I relegated to b&w: Olympus XA2 and Oly 35SP. I processed over a dozen rolls of N400 in either Rodinal or Ornono Gradual ST 20. The latter is an Italian liquid developer with phenidone. If they only have numbers, I'll post a few of those shots, but as I recall the name Fuji and N400 were printed on the margin.

 

If not Neopan 400, it could have been another bargain film from Freestyle. It was May 1st 2001 that I turned 75 and my sons gave me my web-site that they secretly organized, and also a Visioneer flat- bed scanner. Those two gifts re-sparked the fire-in-the-belly photo drive I needed. There was an urgency to change our then current extra storage space back to the b&w darkroom it was designed to be in 1961.

 

I built most of it, but it was Claudia who surprised me after returning from a business trip with the initial darkroom design she layed out and started to build. That was shortly after our 6 room ranch, on 1/2 acre, was built and sold to us for $16,500 with $100 as down payment; it's currently evaluated at $320K.

 

Seeing my old work in a website in 2001, especially from my richest and most productive photo era-- the 2 years I worked for a Florentine radar company-- gave me the creative impetus to re-acquaint myself with an art form I had abandoned, more or less, for several decades. By then a whole new technique was evolving, one I was totally ignorant of, i.e. photo digital processing; the same one I'm still battling with and trying to master.

 

After this endless preface-- that by now has caused viewers to switch threads, as one switches channels with a TV channel sector aka, the clicker-- I'll answer the original question from CE. It was probably one of the Olympus cameras: XA, XA2 or 35SP that I had at the time. All have sharp E. Zuiko lenses XA2 (3.5) XA and 35SP (2.8) All have self timers and tripod fittings. I'm sure they were self- portraits, not taken by anyone else, because they have that posed look about them. Let's leave a little mystery in that roll of film and call the film and camera brand X.

 

Mike Connealy: I'll post some photos that were taken with Neopan 400 in Oly cameras I took to Florence in 2001 (about 3 weeks after 9/11) for our 50th anniversary. It was the last time we were there. For those, I can give Rodinal time and dilution. BTW I rated film at 400 ISO

 

I'm embarassed to say how many self portraits I've made. I have the notion to do a portfolio of straight, humorous and/or dress-up in crazy costumes, self portraits. The one in my Photo.net biography is a Rembrandt inspired dress-up s/portrait. Some of my best portraitas are of Claudia and sons Dan and Marc.

 

I'll report on Neopan 400 negative margin research this AM. Have first bocci match of the season at 9AM. Our 4-man team were champs of local senior bocci league last year. Will show pics of ancient bowlers, Italian style.

 

As to cameras, in 2002, it was before I got the Russian camera bug or knew about Photonet. I was into packing an Olympus XA and an XA2 in soft leather, belt-looped pouches, one on each side of my low slung belt worn Western cowboy film style. Sometimes one with b&w the other color, but mostly b&w with slow and fast film

 

Nicolas, I could have accidently moved the camera or kicked the tripod running back to my chair/stool. I wouldn't have puposely chosen to cut off the top of heads. Not that it hasn't happened, but never intentionally. Maybe there was flare or a fogged area that forced Mike K. to do a deeper than usual frontal lobotomy.

 

Come to think of it, Dr. K. never quite said exactly what kind of nuclear research he's doing in his laboratory, but speaking of genes, his military officer grandfather was stationed in Hungary in WW1, which wasn't too far from Transylvania where Dr. Frankenstein did his early experiments. Maybe his secret was divulged and now a new breed of experiments are being done by digital processing-- first on images, then the spider invites the fly(fits with legend) into its web (also fits). Low Beam: Mind your head! or Watch out for your head!take on a new meaning.

 

Enough of these fantasy. Time to get ready for the big bocci match.

 

 

The "Hands" was full frame. The others were cropped about 10%.

 

Great-grandfather was WWI, an officer in the Austro-Hungarian calvary.

My kingdom for the cavalry, without suffering a calvary ;-)

Excellent thread, guys. And I like the original crop of Hands, it's more

arresting. <p>

Mike Kovacs and Mike Connealy:

 

Sorry to be so slow in responding. The Neopan 400 film I got at Freestyle has the following markings "FUJI FILM" and two frames later "400PR-241" both on the film's top margin. It also one number per 24 x36 frame. However, on the bottom margin, it has a half-frame numbering system. On left bottom, there is an arrow then a number followed by an A. e.g. "--> 22A" On the right bottom it has just the number "22."

 

That nails it down, Mike Kovacs, despite what was written outside the cassette, the film you souped was not Fuji Neopan 400. I've found in protective plastic file sheets, negatives with only numbers in top and bottom margins. There are notes with dates of 2001 & 20002 written at the top of these 10x10 inch 35mm negative strip files (6 frame x 7 rows.) I'm not sure what film it is, but I'd guess it came from Freestyle.

 

Mike Connealy: Regardless what film my head and hand shots were on, I'll post some photos taken with NP400 souped in Edwal FG-7 and Rodinal, the latter in Florence during 50th anniversary trip. No point showing any photos of NP400 in Gradual ST 20, as it's unavailable in USA.

Mike Kovacs and CE Nelson:

 

I'm nearly sure I figured out what film my head and hands are on. If the numbers are only on the bottom and are spaced 3 perforation apart and have both the frame number and same number plus A under each frame and it's written in bold typeface, it's DMAX 400-- Freestyle's repackaged Ilford Delta 400.

 

One roll with good negs that I shot in St. Augustine has a note saying I rated it at 320 and souped it in D76 1:1 for 14 min and temp went from 70 -72 deg F. I'll post one of the frames shortly.

Numbers top and bottom. I feel dumb now because one of the clipped sets of 3 frames says "Fuji Film" and "400PR.241" so I think this is Neopan 400.

 

Strange, there were only about 10 of 36 frames exposed on this roll. Only a couple on the Verichrome Pan 127 (still too curled) too. Les, I think you waste more film ;)

Mike Connealy:

 

Here is an example of NP400 taken with Olympus XA souped in FG-7.

It's in front of Wellesly College Art Museum. I'll look for one devved in Rodinal taken in Florence.<div></div>

Les, you really have some nice shots ... and some great stories too.

Thanks for the notes and examples of the Neopan. I've been trying out a number of the inexpensive b&w films with different developers lately. Many of the results I'd rather not talk about, but there are also some nice surprises including a recent combination of APX 400 and HC-110. I generally like Fuji films, so feel it is a worthwhile thing to look at.