Blog #183 Testing at home with 28mm + TMAX 400
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We were all born scientists, or was it artists? or both? As children we experiment, but somewhere along the line we lose some of that curiosity and “lemme try this…” instinct. In my previous blog post I wrote about some camera issues while out on a photo shoot far from home in the great outdoors. After my experience with PLAN A failure and having to implement the best (only) PLAN B for that event, I figured that I would try to do some testing.
The Minolta CLE shutter was acting up and sticking. Exposures were perfect on some frames and way off on others. Maybe 30/36 frames were correct and the others were faulty due to the camera’s shutter issue.
So thinking that the camera issue might have been due to the weather conditions (e.g. outdoors, hot, humid) I tried another scenario. After the camera body was home, cool, and dry for a few days I stuffed some TMAX inside and proceeded to shoot a whole roll in my flat.
This was a camera test. The subject wasn’t the point so I just shoot whatever seemed interesting. Most of the frames came out ok but there was the occasional sticky shutter issue. At this point, the camera is off to the shop for (hopefully) repair (fotopia.com). I developed the roll at home and made some scans. The images that came out ok were acceptable in terms of image quality and camera performance.
The point here is that you need to test, you need to experiment with your gear and ALWAYS HAVE A PLAN B especially while out at the shoot.
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The light is always right.
JHG
*Images: © Limelight Limited
Where: At Home, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Subject: Camera Test at Home
Gear: Minolta CLE 35 mm film rangefinder, Leica 28mm f/2.8 Elmarit, Kodak TMAX 400
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