josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Share Posted February 27, 2006 I spent this past weekend visiting my parents down in southwest Texas, and I decided to bring my vintage cameras along for the ride since they have been somewhat neglected recently. My Yashica LM's shutter has stopped functioning (for about the 5th time), so I brought my Kodak Monitor 616 and Balda Six. My brother had recently purchased some land on the aptly named Turkey Creek, so I spent some time wandering around there. There is a little rock cabin on the property...<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 The area around the cabin is pretty typical of this part of Texas -- scrubby mesquite trees and prickly pear cactus.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 Landowners in this area have to be strike a balance when it comes to giving access to their property to the electric company to install and maintain the power lines, etc. -- they will sometimes come in with heavy machinery and make a mess and not pick up after themselves. A little further from that cactus is a sign of times when people didn't need to worry about electricity. An old well which my father says was originally dug by hand...<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 I assume my father knows what he's talking about, and to support his assertion, I found an old bucket nearby that looks like it could have been used to draw water. I placed it against the well for my record shot.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 Not far from the well are some more signs of life...<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 Even though much of the area is as I describe above -- cactus and mequite -- the area along the creek itself is pretty lush (although not so much at this time of year) w/ lots of oak trees which are home to turkeys and pecan trees, not to mention waist-high grass full of ticks.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 I couldn't spend all of my time down by the creek, so I went in to the nearest town (Uvalde, TX, named for a Mexican general I think) to check out the cemetery. Lots of interesting stones there, and I shot a lot in infrared with my "modern" cameras, but I snagged a couple of shots w/ my classics. By the way, all of the B&W shots in this presentation are taken with J&C Classic Pan 200 in Diafine except for the two color shots which are on crossprocessed Provia 100 (just because I was too lazy to take it to the place that does E6 processing in-house).<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 Some of the grave markers are home-made jobs...<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 I guess I should get a Monitor 620 considering how often I crop the 616 to 6x9 format, but I like having tons of negative to crop if I want. One final shot (my apologies to anyone w/ slow internet connections, but it's been a while since I really posted anything and wanted to share some of my favorite shots from the weekend)...<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephen hazelton Posted February 27, 2006 Share Posted February 27, 2006 Nice presentation! On the bands around the barrel...maybe that was so you could roll it without denting it up? Just a thought.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zane1664879013 Posted February 27, 2006 Share Posted February 27, 2006 > On the bands around the barrel... Just there to add strength. Without them the wood slats tend to come unattached when the barrel is full. Some/most barrels have flat bands, rather than these stoutish ones. Nice pics, nice narrative. Makes me miss Tejas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alex_lofquist Posted February 28, 2006 Share Posted February 28, 2006 It looks like something that I might expect in Texas: a combination well and outhouse! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CosteaM Posted February 28, 2006 Share Posted February 28, 2006 Joseph, nice job, thanks for sharing. would you post pictures of the cameras as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephen hazelton Posted February 28, 2006 Share Posted February 28, 2006 That looks like a steel barrel, actually. Sure don't see any wood slats in it. And the hoops on a barrel would be flat against the barrel, not projecting out like these do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jim_mcbride Posted February 28, 2006 Share Posted February 28, 2006 Texas: a beautiful state full of wonderful people. Too bad it sends all its garbage to Washington, D.C. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 28, 2006 Author Share Posted February 28, 2006 Here's a pic of my Monitor 616. You can also check out the page I made when I originally got it @ http://www.geocities.com/josphy There are some photos there and then another page w/ my how-to on using 120 film in it. When I originally got it off Ebay, the bellows were totally crapped out so I painted the hell out of them with "liquid electrical tape" which you can get at the hardware store. I had to really lay it on thick to seal up all the light leaks and as a consequence, it's fixed in the open position now. I guess at some point I will look into getting the bellows repaired, but haven't really had the extra money laying around to worry about it.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted February 28, 2006 Author Share Posted February 28, 2006 Here's a picture of my little Balda Six -- it's totally dwarfed by the Monitor. Sorry for the lousy picture -- it's one of the pics from the original auction, and I don't have a digital camera and have never taken any other pics of it since. By the way, don't judge Texans by some of the bad examples. My Mom's family (Kuykendall) has been here since the original Stephen F. Austin colony, so we have strong roots here and it's a pretty good place although to be honest I prefer the east coast.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jack_lo_..._t_o Posted February 28, 2006 Share Posted February 28, 2006 Nice pix, nice cameras, nice pix of cameras. Your state produced Willie and Waylon (sniff) among many others (Bob Wills), and I'll always be grateful to it for that. Anyway if Tom DeLay hadn't been so "creative" with his electoral partitioning, Boy George might be taking early retirement right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
david_m Posted February 28, 2006 Share Posted February 28, 2006 Very nice shots, also liked the commentary. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gib Posted March 1, 2006 Share Posted March 1, 2006 thanks for posting, the two cross photos in particular are very, very well done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
micah_henry Posted March 1, 2006 Share Posted March 1, 2006 Joseph, Hey, very nice work. I especially like the Monitor 616 shots. I think (I spoke to you before on Monitor 616 in email or some other bulletin board. I have one and am contemplating a 50' roll of 70mm film from J&C Photo to reload my own 616 film.) Nice website, too! I like the semi-panoramic infrared work. --Micah in NC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jd_rose Posted March 1, 2006 Share Posted March 1, 2006 Mr. McBride Nicely said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josphy Posted March 1, 2006 Author Share Posted March 1, 2006 Thanks again to everyone for your comments. I think my favorite from the set is the shot of the wood stove. Micah, I have thought about getting some 70mm film too, but I only have one 616 spool and you'd have to find backing paper somewhere too, so it didn't seem really practical for me. At one time I think there was an announcement on the J&C website that they were going to start offering 616 film but apparently that fell through (I bet the backing paper or lack thereof was an issue for them too). In the meantime I use my one 616 spool and then unload the camera in darkness and wind the film back onto a regular 120 spool. And I also have a spool that I modified with some "adapters" off Ebay which are really just some washers that I glued onto regular 120 spools. I need to get some more of those or make my own since I have lost a couple of the ones I had, so basically I'm limited to a max of 2 rolls of film (12 shots total) through the beast in any given outing -- one using the adapted 120 spool and 1 using the actual 616 spool. Incidently, you could probably get away with running one roll of 616 through it without backing paper because it does a frame counter, but you'd have to load and unload the camera in darkness. I don't worry about the frame counter although I received an email from someone once who described a way he got it to work using 120 film. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
micah_henry Posted March 2, 2006 Share Posted March 2, 2006 Joseph, You might be able to get an new old stock roll of 616 film from eBay or a place like Pacific Rim http://www.pacificrimcamera.com/ which would provide you another spool and backing paper intact. That's what I did. Now I have two 616 spools and one piece of backing paper, which I treat with kid gloves. I hope to get some J&C 70mm film soon. --Micah in NC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
discpad Posted March 2, 2006 Share Posted March 2, 2006 Joseph, I really like the cross-processed shot of Turkey Creek! Did you scan it yourself, or have the lab scan it for you? Also, I noticed the waterfall is blurred: Did you use a neutral density filter to get that effect? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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