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FINALLY !
Myself again. The Ralf-kind of look. I have no idea why I was so hooked onto the idea of growing long hair. It seems like an interesting idea (because I never had long hair), and started to keep it since summer 2020... But with a "helicopter platform", where the hair only grows little, it looked pretty stupid when i let my hair out. In the beginning it was ok - but as it grew longer and longer (and thinner)... it looked stupid. My hair also got pretty destroyed when binding it together many times. And boy, you could find my hair just everywhere in the bathroom and apartment.... Not fun, really.
So, no more of that.
BASTA !
I have not fine cut my hair yet. Just cut it off without any fine cleaning, or so. That's me, almost 57. It think it is OK for pushing 60. (Gosh that sounds so WEIRD !!). There is absolutely nothing 60 about me as a person. The only thing maybe, would be my belly - which is still in my way *LOL*
Dreary Sunday Weather
Man, the weather is absolutely dull. Dark. Wet. Mild. Booooring. And the lack of sun does penetrate the minds of men and women up here... Like a wet layer of dullness starting to take out energy, rendering you a bit lower than normal. We actually had real winter weather again the past days - but this changed only a day ago or so - into suddenly very mild, now even foggy weather.
More photography 2023 ?
2022 has been my weakest photographic year ever since the start year of 2000 using digital cameras. Never have i taken images that little like in year 2022. And not a single analog roll of film, nor have i even touched the rolls that need to get developed.
Well, I hope this will change. Therefore I started to use the little Sony A7s camera together with the old Leica Summicron-M 35/2 "IV" lens and make mainly black & white images. And strangely, the combination feels "Leica" like". Not in the handling, but the way the images are rendered, feel like it. As well the smallness of the camera.
These images are from 5 January 2023 at the Train depot in Högdalen.
The Combo of Camera + Lens
With the Sony A7s and Summicron-M 35/2 lens, everything is manual... A bit fiddly sometimes when you eyes are not on top - but it works. It is slower than normal - kind of like with analog film. On top, the Sony A7s is still my most sensitive camera of all cameras I ever owned. There is nothing like the Sony A7s in terms of sensor sensitivity (that hold up at very high ISO, especially in black & white !!). Even the later Sony A7s II and Sony A7s III are strangely a notch noisier.
Therefore - the original Sony A7s, "the Dark Knight", practically beats them all.
This camera i bought in 2015, I felt would be the extension of my Leica M9 - the latter only goes up to a mere ISO 2500. The Sony however can pull off an image with ISO 250.000 - looking like an image taken with a pushed Kodak T-MAX 3200 film.
The Sony A7s does a good job with the old Summicron-M 35/2 "IV" lens. It is not sharp in the borders, only in the center. But this behavior that lens has on all types of cameras. Modern Leica M lenses on the Sony A7s however get severely degraded in optical quality - and I don't really use them often. The Summilux-M 50/1.4 ASPH can still be used, thought. And the older Noctilux 50/1 works very well.
Continuing
So, I intend to continue with the Sony A7s + Leica Summicron lens even if it isn't always so fast for me to work with - i like the style very, very much. It gives me suddenly this "retro" feeling, even when i shoot. I "see" in a different way... like I used to with analog film !
And I like that very much.
Major cleaning in the Bed & Photo darkroom
A day ago, Sal and I made major cleaning in the bed room which serves also as a Photo Darkroom. It looks simply spotless now, plus all the stuff that piled up during the last 2-3 years, are gone. It looks so inviting now. Perfect for scanning negatives with the digital camera again. Really...
It's like order pulls less strings on the psyche. It feels inspiring to have things in order. (Oh, I know so well - and I know even better the lack of order in my apartments in the past... mama mia... there have been times, with absolute, total chaos. Ask my former boyfriends... they will confirm that by 500%).
*LOL*
It may still look "chaotic" below ...
- but is in fact tidy for the amount of stuff that our bedroom is housing. Before this photo, it look absolutely CHOATIC and CRAMMED. Oh, and it was dusty, too. And when the girls came to Stockholm, we had even more stuff stuffed here, so you could barely walk to the bed... The big heavy table, was used as a dining table in the main room. It is the only table which sustains the heavy weight of my 4x5 enlarger which has a weight of 50 kilo (!)
To protect the two enlarger and surfaces from dust - there is a layer of bubble wrap plastic. Dust is an enemy of anything that has with reproduction to do. The boxes house photo equipment (mostly analog) and the things I don't use every day. Instead of all that being in closets - i chose to house it all in plastic boxes since one year. Even the sutdio cameras and lenses, are in such boxes, albeit in the main room. No dust to speak of. Very handy !
This (bed & dark) room is almost never really illuminated like you see in the photo below. The light you see is a german designed photo darkroom lamp; it can use white light or red light and in various strengths. It is absolutely pure spectral red when used for developing Black & White prints in the darkroom.
In daily life, we don't use this light source. I only used it for this photo.
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