analog photography – Page 3

I had a road trip from LA to north California last month, stayed in Lake Tahoe for 3 days and San Jose for 1 day. I took this trip as a photography opportunity more than just a vacation time. I always love nature, especially forest, there’s something in the forest and trees that I feel like I belong to. I still remember the feeling of being alone in middle of the woods with just grass, woods, leaves, water flowing in the creek and birds on the branches, I felt a sweet lonely happiness there. And photograph forest on film was a thing I wanted for so long. If you like forest as me, I hope this post and photos from here will inspire you and warm you.

Back to the technical side, I knew I must prepare the equipment for the trip, because I wanted to make some long exposure of the waterfalls and the lake Tahoe in sunrise or sunset (I know this sound cliche but I haven’t do this before so worth trying). I bought a 10 stop ND filter for my Bronica ETRSi 75mm lens. I thought about other ND filters with less stops than the 10 stop but since I just can buy one, I decided to buy the 10 stop because it’s better to have longer exposure than don’t have enough time to make the water look silky. I also bought a polarizer filter for taking photos of the water, of course. I already have a cable release. I brought a bunch of batteries for my Bronica, Nikon F2, and my digital camera (I used digital camera for long exposure test shot). And a steady tripod is crucial! I also want to have a wide angle lens on my Bronica but when I decided to buy it, there’s nowhere can ship it to me before the trip, so I tried to make the best out of the 75mm lens. For film, I used Fuji 400H, Portra 400 and Fuji 160 NPS expired (which is not so good) for 120, and Fuji 400H and Kodak ProImage for 35mm.

massive cloud lit by setting sun. Nikon F2

Here’re some photos on the first hike day.

Next is some scenes near my Airbnb, beautiful sunset light on these houses, I was walking to the lake to take my long exposure on the water at sunset but couldn’t help myself not to stop by these scenes. These were shot on tripod at 1/30-2s.

Of course next thing is sunset shots on the lake. Nothing so fancy here but I like the long exposure that give the water a nice texture to it, it’s not totally flat but still blurry and has dimension for light to fall on.

And 3 night photos that I like a lot. I had to wait in front of the liquor store for 15′ to get the shot when no car or people get in between my camera and the store, but I think the one with 2 cars parked in front is quite nice. I like the suburban vibe here pretty much.

More photos from the neighborhood in the morning.

Next day, I woke up at 4:30am to walk to the lake with my Bronica, digital camera and tripod for the shot I came here for, long exposure at sunrise. These photos turn out not bad but I honestly not a big fan of long exposure water, it’s just look so flat and lack of dynamic to me.

i wonder if the 10 stop ND filter make the photo less saturated. exposured for 15s

Last is series of photos took on the last hike in lake Tahoe. On this day, I hike to a waterfall with a plan for a nice silky waterfall photo but when I got there, the sun is so high right behind the waterfall. The sun shine direct to my lens made it really hard to look into the viewfinder to compose. First time working with 10 stop ND filter in backlit situation and million droplet falling to the camera made me did a very rush job and honestly I didn’t have high hope for these photos at all. But these came out quite nice.