As I’ve mentioned before, I spent February with the Nikon F3. Our local national trust property is Kingston Lacy. It always has a great showing of snowdrops, and early spring flowers, so I headed there with the F3 with the 55mm Micro attached!
The last time I visited Kingston Lacy I used a roll of Cinestill b/w and wrote more about the property, you can read about that here. This time I was using some out of date colour. The first was finishing off a roll of Kodak Color Plus (expiry 2006) and used up a Fuji Superia 400 (expiry 2002!) I was told the Kodak was fridge stored and is 4 years younger – certainly the negs are better. The Fuji is older and storage un-known, even exposing the film at 200asa instead of the box speed of 400 the negs are thin. In both cases a bit of levels, and slight colour “warming” has happened in photoshop. I will use the Kodak, but I think the Fuji will be reserved for experimentation, and testing for light leaks and wind on etc.
The lens behaved fine, giving good sharpness. My technique was the problem. The trouble with snowdrops is that they are small, white, and strangely grow on the ground. The natural environment for my head is some 5 foot higher! Despite film variables, my exposure for a white flower against dark foliage was off. The light level was low, so most shots were with the lens nearly wide open, so no depth of focus at all. This combined with a slight breeze meant that I was lucky to get a couple of passable images of them. Other images, at eye level, out of the breeze or in more open environment were better!
S.H.O.U.T. 