J-J-J-J-yashica

My friend Carol gave me this beautiful J series Yashica for christmas/solstice/etc and I took it home and BROKE IT! (not on purpose, but it didn't work anymore) So after getting it back from repair, I finally got to shoot with it! BOY HOWDY do I like this thing. It's taking me a while to get the hang of the focus, and to adjust to the fact that I can only focus like three feet away from things (Because i'm used to getting my nose into everything) BUT it is THE PERFECT carry-around camera. Carol knew The Jessica (yep, named the camera) and I would be fast friends AND SHE IS CORRECT!

So far i've run through 2 expired rolls of color film (one test, one fun) and some slide film (one is getting processed tomorrow, the other one was too old and broke in the camera ON THE LAST FRAME! It was the trashcan for that one because I was a goof and opened the back to see what was going on.) So here's what I got:

I'M STILL ALIVE, HONESTLY!

Egad, its been a while since my last post. Here's what you've missed:
Firstly, Holidays in retail..as I'm sure you already know from shopping in the middle of it or possibly working through it yourself are a HOTT MESS. They left me utterly and completely exhausted, not to mention gaining responsibility at work, so I have more job in my job which sometimes leaks into my personal time COMBINED with the realization that I must somehow become adult-like and actually strive toward my career...meaning that a website, not just a blog is in order. However, I forgot how much work it is building a website. Friends, take advantage of your graphic designers and their skill...you'll come out with something nicer with much less frustration.

Anyway, I did have a chance to swing down to southern California to visit with my family for a hot minute. I took some film and a camera with me, but didn't get a chance to shoot much...also one of the two rolls I shot came out blank for whatever reason (the photo gods weren't with me on that one) But I did manage to get some okay shots of surfers.

That one roll....

I had to take a little break after my shooting spree (I'm talking cameras, not guns here) after I spent $30 on processing and $70 on film IN ONE DAY back in August. I'm waiting for my funds to catch up to me. In the mean time, I did some fun toy camera photos at my friend Danielle's wedding and decided to shoot a little expired black and white film.

Here are some photos from the wedding. Shot with my lovely seafoam Savoy (which many people mistake for a purse..therefor the perfect accessory to have on my wrist at a wedding). I prepared reels ahead of time with Ektar100, e100g (which I had cross processed), and portra400.

Danielle's wedding was way back in September, so I didn't shoot anything from that point until about a week ago when I got a little stir crazy and decided I needed to wake up early and go for a walk. I already had some expired black and white film loaded into my trusty Pentax ME Super...which I had initially intended to develop myself at work, when I realized that I had another roll of exposed black and white film in my bag  from a year ago that I still had not developed...So I sent both of them to the lab.

 I like how abstract this one turned out. I hope I was going for some abstract reflective portrait, but I was probably just trying to take a picture of a squirrel.

This one reminds me of my grandpa. He always liked still lives.

Looking at this roll completely removed by time and comparing it to the roll I shot a week ago, I'd say I'm a little less moody...but then again maybe its time for another photo excursion to the cemetery!

Here are the photographs from last week:

 The moral of my story is...1. shoot your friends (with a camera) even if it's their wedding. 2. get that roll that's been hanging out at the bottom of your messenger bag developed. Like yesterday.

Consumed

More photos of women! In the last month and a half or so I have shot somewhere near 12 rolls of film. This is pretty spectacular for me since I think about film like I think about gold. I probably shot this much while I was in school, but maybe not with this much enthusiasm. I'm caught between the need to slow down because of money (the cost of film + processing), and my desire to keep going everyday because the amount of available light I have is dwindling. This is a new concept for me...sort of. While in school financial constraints were always present in terms of making things but time was always more of an issue. Now the issue becomes less about time (I only have personal deadlines) and more about losing light in the winter (but I know once spring comes I can continue on).. In the meantime though, life is still happening. This weekend I took a break from working on my projects to take toy camera photos at a wedding and to get my cat spayed (I feel too guilty leaving her alone to go shoot.)

at any rate, this is what I have been working on..

 To follow: There may be toy camera wedding photos to follow (it depends on how well they turn out... I know, I live dangerously) But to protect the dignity of my cat, there will be zero photos of her bald spots.

I just can't stop shooting awesome women

....with my camera. AND I WON'T STOP!

Enjoy these new photos!

Women!

Recently, I have decided to photograph every woman I know who inspires me, who works in fields previously dominated by men, who fearlessly goes after what she wants because she knows she can. This project is very near to my heart because I know too many women who feel trapped, who feel like they have no choices, who feel like they can't be anything. One woman who lives in fear is one too many. We live in a wealthy country with plenty to eat, with fresh water, full of so many opportunities-- all you have to do is to go out and work for what you want. However, there are so many of us who feel so crippled by fear or politics or opinions. So many women are afraid to walk in their neighborhoods after dark, to drive alone, to meet their neighbors, to quit their job in favor of something better. I'll even mention politics here: The conversations in the news regarding women and their choices about reproduction is making me absolutely sick to my stomach. The only person who gets to make the choices about my body are me. End of discussion.

I want to celebrate women. We are fantastic, brave, strong, artistic, athletic, loving, intelligent, passionate, ambitious, we can be anything and everything as long as we realize it and then go do it.

BRRRRONICA

I'll admit that I'm not the biggest fan of Hasselblads... from poor experiences (It's pretty silly, I know) But I have nothing against Bronicas, so I figured I'd give this one a shot. The guts of this camera are pretty cool. The mirror runs on a track inside the camera and slides down and out of the way rather than flipping up to reveal the shutter. The resulting sound is something that I found deeply satisfying but which startled the wholy bajeesus out of my cat. I just got my hands on it last week, so there will be more photos to come, but for now, enjoy these abstractish pictures of my cat!

Isn't she a beaut?

New friends, old friends, and sunflair.

A bunch of fantastic things happened this week. I finally had my mamiya c220 fixed (It has been out of commission all summer due to finding some mold in the foam lining on the interior of my camera. I know, right? gasp.) We also had some out of town visitors (awesome!)... So of course out of sheer excitement in all directions, photography happened. I've been interested in trying to get some sun flair images for a while (ever since I read this article about it and was sort of like, oh yeah that sounds like fun..why haven't I done that yet??).

Some of the sun flair photographs were pretty cool, but I ended up getting a few shots without it that I liked as well.