Self publishing services

I was searching for a self-publishing, print on demand service in order to realise my wall calendar ideas.

There is a variety of print on demand services available offering calendar layouts but I could find only one self-publishing service which is www.lulu.com theat offers calendar layouts.

Unfortunately Lulu does not give you full control over the layout of your calendar.
My current calendar project is around landscape images all shot on medium format film using a Hasselblad 500 c/m camera producing square images. What I wanted to do was a calendar with black background image pages and one square photograph in the middle. But the Lulu layout would not allow me doing that in an easy way.

What service could do my job (custom calendar layout and self-publishing service)? - Any suggestions?

Street photography in interesting cities

"Street photography is photography that features the chance encounters and random accidents within public places."

"Street photography is disinterested in its nature, allowing it to deliver a true depiction of the world. Street photographs are mirror images of society, displaying unmanipulated scenes, with usually unaware subjects."




Here a documentary on street photography in Marrakech, Marocco by Zack Arias. Lots of good hints on technique. I especially like the explanations of magician techniques at (0:47 ff) where Zack pretends taking pictures of roof tops while taking pictures of a man sitting on a chair smoking his cigarette totally unaware of what is happening.
Or the scene using WiFi remote control to take close up pictures of cobra snakes on the market.


And a second movie from the streets of Mumbai, India. Lots of very impressive images of Mumbai city life. Zack elaborates on the advantage of using a compact mirrorless camera with high quality lenses.


Zack Arias is using Fujifilm X-series cameras in both documentaries.

See some of my own street photography from Shanghai, China using the Sony RX-100 Mark III camera:

Shanghai - Images by Andreas Mueller

Photography reading list

For anybody who wants to start film photography. - Here a reading list from the #istillshootfilm blog with very valuable recommendations.

http://istillshootfilm.org/post/534856924/the-essential-reading-list-for-film-photography

A modern camera

How does this look for a modern digital camera? - Is there somebody who can share a similar explosion chart for today's state of the art digital cameras?

Nikon SLR camera

Printing in the darkroom

25 years ago I used to do my own black and white prints in the darkroom. It was a good time having full control over the entire photographic process. - Playing around with old cameras and film recently made me think of restarting the darkroom handcraft. - I am still not sure if I should setup a darkroom lab, get some used equipment and start developing my own artistic process end to end.

Here an article I came across on photographic enlargers, the hart of darkroom equipment:

http://istillshootfilm.org/post/130262852345/photographic-enlargers-101

12 Reasons Photographers Still Choose to Shoot Film over Digital

12 Reasons Photographers Still Choose to Shoot Film over Digital

Experimental film

This is another post on analog photography using non standard film. Some creative experiment playing with the imaging media.

Randomly I ordered some special film through the internet. Now I am trying to figure out what to shoot with it. As described in an earlier post when using different color film to capture the colors of our fall landscapes understanding something about the technical, or chemical background of the film is needed in order to make the right choice.

Rollei INFRARED 120: an ISO 400 black and white film:
This is a special infrared film with spectral sensitivity up to 820 nm. This is more than 100 nm further towards the longer wavelength compared to the spectral sensitivity of the human eye which goes to 700 nm.
Images of a landscape setting with deep blue sky should result in a very dark, almost black sky since infrared is absorbed by the water in the atmosphere and not reflected back into the camera. Same applies for water. Foliage of trees becomes very bright since the leaves of plants reflect a lot of the infrared light.

Rollei Infrared ISO 400

There is no big IR effect when not applying an IR filter - meaning, a filter blocking all colors in the visible range of the spectrum an letting pass the infrared contribution only. If no filter is being used, the absorption in the visible range of the light spectrum is predominant.





Rollei Crossbird Creative Edition: an ISO 200 color film:
Crossbird can be processed as standard E-6 slide film or it can be cross processed in C-41 process producing interesting altered, retro color shifts.

Rollei Crossbird ISO 200

This film in general exhibits coarse grain and a rather greenish color spectrum.








Lomography Color Negative: an ISO 100 color filme:
This is a color negative film for bright sunlight conditions giving results with vivid colors.

Lomography Color Negative ISO 100

Example images show a rather cold color temperature, meaning a strong blue contribution.

The Lomography films are also referred to as "toy films". However, Lomography films are just rebranded films in earlier times produced and supplied by Kodak, Fuji, Agfa, ...




Lomography Black and White Earl Grey: an ISO 100 black and white film:
The Lomography Earl Gray Black&White film seems to be a rebranding of the Foma Fomapan 100 Classic. This film shows low granularity, high resolving power and contour sharpness, and displays a wide range of halftones.

Lomography Black&White Earl Grey ISO 100

This seems like a very performant black and white film when detail, contrast and sharpness is required.












For reference please refer to the websites of respective film suppliers:
- Rollei film
- Lomography