Urban Texture

Back in the beginning of photography, film and plates were orthochromatic. Orthochromatic means the material isn't sensitive to red light. That makes processing easier, since then it's possible to navigate a darkroom, load film, and even develop "by inspection".  But since any subject with the color red in it became darker with Ortho film, certain scenes became problematic. Blue skies were rendered white, skin color with more red pigment went dark, freckles and zits were emphasized.   In the early part of the 20th Century, panchromatic films became the norm. Ortho film was still the norm for many technical uses of photography. For example copywork, typesetting, etc. But with panchromatic film, tonalities of the world around us were more accurately mapped to their associated gray tones. Today, when film photography itself is already a rarity, I've opted to play with the unusual characteristics of film including the color sensitivity. What happens to a red rose on a

In my free time, I like to use the darkroom at Mills College. I've been experimenting with X-ray film just because it's so cheap and there's plenty available. Recently it occurred to me that some areas I have access to aren't in use. So for a long weekend, I co-opted a little gallery space " Slide Space 123 " to do some shooting.  The natural light in Slide Space is nice. There are white walls, and plenty of room to navigate. At one point I had a 4x5 (an old Toyo my high school teacher Mr Bernucci gave me,) My Linhof 5x7 and my red bellows 8x10 that my grandfather gave me all setup swapping cameras for similar scenes. So far I've only developed the 8x10 xray films. I had trays setup in a darkroom and would shoot a sheet and walk it over and develop it immediately afterwards.    See more here

 I've been working on another way to digitize my old negatives. 20 years ago, I was using a Nikon Coolscan. Looking at those files now, they're ok I guess. Better than nothing. I have an Epson V750, but especially for 35mm, those scans suck. I have access to a drum scanner, but those scans take so much time and work. In any case, I've come up with a method that I'm happy with. This isn't my technical blog, so I'm just gonna show you a few images from Czechoslovakia. Now that country was separated in the "velvet divorce," one of the few country split ups that was peaceful and civil. Back in 1991 when I first visited, Czechoslovakia had recently moved from a planned "socialist" economy towards a western style more capitalist democracy. Prague was a gritty, gray, yet beautiful city mostly visited only by foreigners from the East Block.  Czech out the gallery (isn't that punny?!) here . As always, words and pictures are copyright ©Michael Hal

 Yesterday, I was itching to get out and do something interesting. For one I wanted to shoot large format and test out some techniques and ideas (more to come, perhaps?)  I went out with my 8x10" Toyo monorail, all my film holders loaded with very outdated film and headed out. But I also brought my Sony kit for digitals.  Right now I have some digital files to share. I developed four sheets of 8x10 yesterday and may go in and scan those and develop another four. For those not familiar with large format photography, it takes alot of time, money and patience. And I'm limited in all those areas.  In any case, if you are into this kind of thing, check out the gallery here . As always, all words and images are copyright ©Michael Halberstadt

For the last four years or so, I've been working in the Photo/Art department at Mills College in Oakland, California. Mills has been in the news due to financial problems and ultimately due to being purchased by Northeastern University. I have no idea how much longer I have a job there. So I thought it might be good to start documenting the beautiful campus while I am there.  So sometimes on breaks or my days off, I'll photograph around campus. Also, it's a good place to test certain gear. Prior to taking the job, I'd done a lot of stitched panoramas. I stopped, in part just because I ran out of bandwith. My job was supposed to be half time, but in reality it took more, which left little time for my other endeavors.  At some point in a discussion I ended up suggesting somebody try stitched panos to increase resolution. And I figured it was time to pull out my trusty old Gigapan. But not to make things too mundane, I thought why not try and combine stitched panos and my

  snapshot of 8x10 negative  At my school darkroom where I work I came in on my day off to play. I've had an idea of something I've wanted to try for a long time. The idea would take a few things I can't easily put together. Patience, time, room to photograph, and room to develop right next door. Yesterday the stars aligned. Here's the deal. Xray film is cheap. It has a unique look due to it's orthochromatic character. Ortho films aren't sensitive to red light. So two factors should be clear: you can develop under a red safelight, kinda like paper. And that any red in your motiv will be rendered dark. I recently bought a beautiful Componon-S factory mounted in a shutter from a friend. Normally lenses of this sort are used for enlarging. But such lenses are also well suited for closeups. This lens has a 49mm filter thread, and I have the adapter to my cheap Vivitar ring flash.  What I ended up doing was setting up two large format cameras: a 4x5 and