Best Foot Upward

I don’t like to edit photos.

I’m kind of bad at it, probably because I don’t like to do it, and have avoided developing the skill. One of the things I like about film photography is I don’t have to—the basic corrections done by the lab during the scanning process are all I need, and it’s rare for me to make any addition adjustments.

But I do like a specialty film, stocks that are pre-exposed or otherwise tweaked prior to shooting them for the purpose of achieving some sort of color-shift or effect in the photos. I recently bought a roll of Amber D400, a color negative stock reformatted from movie film to be used in still cameras. The antihalation layer is removed from the original movie format, allowing the film to be developed in traditional C-41 chemicals (what is used to develop most color negative film stocks for still cameras), and from what I can tell from a couple Google searches, has something to do with the amber hue found in the processed images.

The result feels like a lower contrast version of Dubblefilm’s Pacific, which casts a similar (but maybe more saturated) hue. Both stocks give me 1970s Cali vibes, perfect for shooting skate or surf.

I love catching skaters flying through in close focus, sometimes capturing only their dangling feet and board in frame. I shot this roll on a late afternoon at Texas Beach skate park, shortly before rain clouds rolled through. The amber hue of the film stock seems (so far) to give a favorable effect in both sunny and overcast conditions, but I’ll definitely be shooting more to further test it out.

Image of Amber D400 film found via Google

The best price I’ve found for Amber D400 is at B&H, $15.99 for 27 exposures at time of this posting.

I normally post collections of work primarily here with one or two images on Instagram as a teaser, but typically do share all skate photography on IG as well so the homies can tag themselves. So if you landed here via Google, check out my profile here for more!

Thanks for reading, you’re beautiful.

Howdy-Ho

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve made a blog post. Since then, spring has officially hit and with it, a busier time of year for me. Since beginning this blog a few months ago, I’ve mostly used it when I have a larger collection of photos to share, some sort of cohesive set. As I type this, my “unposted” folder is a menagerie of one-offs, snapshots of friends, shots that didn’t make it into sets I’ve already posted—things I would typically post on Instagram but not make a full blog post with.

Also as I type this, eight rolls of undeveloped film are enroute to the lab to be processed, brimming with blog posts. I can’t even remember what’s on all of that film, as is usually the case, but I know there is more macro moss, skate, and tattoo series work to come.

Last year I shot 95 rolls of film. That’s almost a roll of film every four days. I entered 2022 feeling like I wanted to shoot less film—I sent a lengthy voice memo to my friend Amy that February rambling about how I wanted to take fewer frames and make more intentional work, and limit the projects I invested time into. At the time I was feeling a bit directionless in photography, and I didn’t want to waste film on things that didn’t mean anything to me.

Then, really, the opposite happened. I photographed everything. I photographed usual suspects like skating; I began photographing surfing and rodeos for the first time; I took self-portraits and portraits of friends; I documented my days and took lots of snapshots; I launched my tattoo stories series; I photographed my cats and plants and buildings and flowers and beaches and mountains and family. And all of it meant something to me.

I don’t know what to expect this year, even as we’re a quarter in. I’ve developed some solid projects I’ll continue working on; I’ll go where the lens takes me. I think this current batch of film I just sent out is probably the beginning of the year’s onslaught—from here the days will just get longer, the sun will shine later, daytrip roads will be calling, skate parks, surf breaks, bull pens, secret wooded enclaves with just me and a tripod. In the meantime, here are a few random shots from that unposted pile of detritus, just little moments my lens found her way to. Thanks for reading, you’re beautiful.

Nevermind

I’ve posted recently about expired film, and also about skate photography, and today’s post combines the two. The following photos were shot on Kodak Max 400 (expired in 2008) at a small DIY in Richmond. I already had this film loaded in my camera (Minolta X-700) and killed off the last few frames, realizing I haven’t shot much skate on expired film before, if at all.

One of the things I love about photographing skate is the nineties nostalgia. Visit any skate spot and find skaters in wide-leg jeans and oversized t-shirts reminiscent of mid-nineties fashion. I was fourteen years old in 1995, and my brother and I were the first kids at our high school to rock the massively-legged JNCOs that soon overtook the denim zeitgeist. We paired them with boxy band tees, Hawaiian shirts, and pierced eyebrows.

Last spring I was standing along the perimeter at Texas Beach skate park, camera in hand, waiting for the right shot to come whizzing into frame, when I found myself transported back to my adolescence—all around me, boys in baggy jeans, and blaring tinnily from a portable speaker connected to someone’s iPhone, a playlist of Rage Against the Machine and Nirvana.

I like the worn quality of expired film, the softness of the images similar to the faded graphic on a thrifted tee, how it makes you think of the year it was meant to be used. There’s a timelessness to film photographs, and to culture that pervades multiple decades, a sense that no matter where you are in time and space, you can show up and see that you have a place there.

Thanks for reading, you’re beautiful.