Contact sheet: the harbour
I like shadows that shows the marks of how it was made. Good grain is for the most part a series of little, unglamorous decisions. I shot most of this series on a single roll, half of it in fading light.
What I kept
Overcast days are underrated; the light wraps around everything. The best frame on the sheet was the one I almost did not take. I print little first, then decide what deserves to be larger.
For a long time I treated the darkroom as an afterthought. I like long exposures that shows the marks of how it was made. Scanning is tedious, but it is where the series takes shape. I would rather do one thing deliberately than five things quickly. Film forces a pause between seeing and pressing the shutter.
Closing thoughts
The trick, if there is one, is to leave sufficient room for missteps. It took me nine attempts to see the pattern. It is simple to overthink scanning negatives. It is harder to just start. Most problems with shadows turn out to be problems with time.
Lessons
If something here is unclear, that is on me, not you. Some of this will be self-evident; some of it took me years. This began as a quick note and gradually turned into something longer. Most of what I know about grain came from getting it wrong first.
- Start with grain and nothing else
- Keep a 50mm lens within reach
- Give shooting film a full spring
- Give scanning negatives a full spring
In practice
You can get surprisingly far with a film scanner and some patience. Most of the editing happens weeks later, when the memory has faded. The specifics matter less than the practice of paying attention. Every autumn I revisit the same questions about grain.
A film scanner helps, but it is not the point. There is a version of this that is much more complicated. This is not that version. I like overcast days that shows the marks of how it was made.
Every spring I revisit the same questions about light.