Googie Café

I last blogged about this sign a couple of years ago...

I still can't get enough of this great Googie café sign in front of Bill Smith's Cafe on Hwy 380 in McKinney, TX. The building itself doesn't stand out as a great example of mid 20th century architecture, but the sign makes this 50+ year old restaurant impossible to miss. I remember discovering this place right after I moved to McKinney and it was because of their sign.

 
I've been meaning to get a Polaroid of the sign and finally had an opportunity. It was late in the day, so I photographed facing the west side of the sign.

There was no way to choose the color of the frame. Impossible PX-70 Color Shade by Nigo gives you a different colored border picked at random. Taken with Polaroid SX-70. 

Atomic Wedding

A few shots from a wedding I attended last weekend. Some of these I posted on Twitter. All done with the X-100 (edited in Lightroom 4).

Lot's of photogs also in attendance and even some Polaroid shooters! I decided last minute NOT to bring my SX-70 because I wanted to get more X-100 practice and not carry around more than one camera. As usual, I regret not having what I didn't bring. 

Ornamental

Finished my first film cartridge in my newly acquired SX-70 using Impossible PX-70 film by Nigo which includes random colors. Two in the cartridge were lost because of my home made light shade that kept getting in the way of the print as it ejects (I've since ordered a proper shade from Impossible).

My daughter used to collect colored stones but when they failed to sell in our last garage sale, I put them in with the other rocks in one of the gardens out back. I had her hold a few of them for the last pic in the SX-70.

Polamatic

There's a new iPhone app called Polamatic that can reproduce the look of old Polaroid pics, complete with actual worn frames. The frames are cool, and that's about it.

The effects are pretty uninspiring and they are pretty much what everyone else offers for free..Polamatic costs .99 cents and there are three upgrades available at .99 cents each. But never mind the cost, the effects don't look much like actual Polaroids...just the same vintage-y effects like in Instagram only not as good.  I ended up taking the above pic in Hipstamatic, and then added the Polamatic frame.

The frames are scans of actual Polaroid frames with names like "cumpled" and "I sat on it." This is by far the app's best feature. Additional frames can be purchased with an upgrade.

You can also add text to the bottom of each frame and images are easy to upload to all of the popular social networks.

By far the most annoying thing for me was the fact that the files are not saved as JPEG, but as low res PNG. This means I can't easily upload them into Lightroom from my iPhone. To most people this isn't a big deal, but to me it was HUGE. Enough to make me just delete it from my phone. Too much work

Since I've been working a lot with Polaroids lately I REALLY wanted to like this app. Too bad it just doesn't cut it.

 

Update on Thursday, May 17, 2012 at 3:30PM by Haberkern Photo

Email from the company that makes the app:

Hello,

We have an update on the way shortly. Go easy on the review, we want to create the most realistic Polaroid experience. I know you have some concerns, but this is a version 1.0 release. I will let you know when the update is ready.

Thank you for the review

Becoming a Polaroid Junkie

You'll have to excuse my recent flurry of posts and tweets having to do with little else besides Polaroid. Since I've gotten my hands on a few cameras I've begun to really nerd-out on the different cameras and films available.

I realize many folks don't see the point of paying for film (let alone instant film) when we all have access to digital photography. Polaroid photography is fun and that's how I justify it. It's not economical and it won't get me any new work, but it's fun. As I've mentioned in previous posts, you can make just about any pic look like a Polaroid using digital editing, but getting that effect to happen before your eyes is pretty satisfying...especially when you acheive a certain look without digital editing.

Polaroid cameras are fairly cheap and fairly easy to find. Finding one that actually works has been an issue for me however. I brought home 4 Polaroid cameras recently from my FL trip and unfortunately all but one are not in working order. The one that does work is the Polaroid Reporter which uses Fujifilm pack camera film (the kind you peel apart). The others, a 600, a OneStep and a Pronto, all have problems that pretty much render them unusable.

I did, however, finally get my hands on an SX-70, the first Polaroid instant camera that ejects a photo that develops while you watch. That's been my toy of choice recently.

So again, apologies for going on and on and on about Polaroid. It'll pass...maybe.

Update on Tuesday, May 15, 2012 at 7:06PM by Haberkern Photo

...and then I got a Spectra...

Hipstamatic, Pentax, Portra & Trattoria

One of my favorites from the FL trip is an iPhone/Hipstamtic shot I took of my Dad at Trattoria Romanza, an Italian restaurant in Miami.

The portrait of the toddler dressed like Chef Boy-Ar-Dee above his head was there by chance and I decided to use it in the shot. Got a good expression from Dad who wasn't really paying attention to me.

I also got to test out my new Pentax K1000 I found at the big community garage sale in downtown McKinney last month. It was fun to use being all manual...aperture and shutter speed have to be set manually.  I also decided to use the opportunity to try out some Kodak Portra 400 film which I had never used. Results were definitely favorable, however some of the negs came out with faint streaks. I seriously doubt it was the film and likely that I got it developed at Walgreens to save time and money. Probably won't do that again.

Pinecrest Gardens

Even shots you may think are unusable can turn into somethng interesting.

This one had some motion blur, so I added more motion blur and made it b&w. In it's current state it gives the impression of being taken with a home-made pinhole camera. It defintely wasn't and most of the curent look was done digitally. I only tried to accentuate what was already there. 

The palm leaf over his shoulder suggests some place warm even though he doesn't appear to be dressed for a tropical getaway. You might interpret this in a completely different way.

Dad and I were shooting at Pinecrest Gardens in South FL in the rain. I took a really quick shot of him in the shade that ended up underexposed and was somewhat blurry. 

This one was also taken at Pinecrest. I edited this on the iPad with Snapseed.

Gators

While visiting South Florida I had the chance to visit Everglades National Park. I've been to FL many times but this was my first visit to the park. 

Many of the public areas had an abundance of wildlife, especially alligators who were quite easy to spot since there were so many of them. I have to admit, I was surprised how close you can get to them (or them to you).

To folks who visit the park regularly, I'm certain that this is really nothing new, but it's certainly a far cry from anything I see in McKinney, TX. 

The Laziness of Digital

Although I've recently handed over a chunk of change to buy a Fujifilm X100 (my reasoning explained here), I still have certain reservations about what digital photography is contributing. Mainly that it contributes to a certain laziness when it comes to taking and sharing a good shot.

Based on the images all over the various social networks, the days when pictures were taken sparingly are long over...we no longer need to worry about the cost of film purchasing and processing. As a result of living in the digital age, we're constantly bombarded with photos...many of which are uninspired and many are quite remarkable. If not used sparingly, smartphone apps do a good job of muddling their intent and purpose and too often there really is none.  It's fun to share photos but, as a person who looks at a lot of posted photos, they get dull after a while and they start to all look the same.

A picture might look cool because it looks vintage, but Instagram (and other apps) doesn't make everyone an artist. Clicking on an app doesn't require much thought and makes it almost too easy to share too many images. I suppose my main complaint is that there are too many images to go through to find the good ones. No one really needs to see 30 shots of the same penguin at the zoo and few really have the time. I think digital photogs would be more appreciated by picking just their best and sharing that.

If you REALLY like that vintage look, try shooting with an old film camera that smartphone apps try to mimic. Of course, film and processing cost money so you may be forced to actually think about your shot before you snap it.

They Still Make Film For That?

I recently purchased a Polaroid 104 camera from the good folks at the Film Photography Project. This is my first ever pack film camera...and yes, you can still get film for it. Polaroid doesn't make it, but Fujifilm does, in color and black and white. I've only shot with b&w so far and below is a recent result.

This is not a camera you can pick up and get great results without first learning how to use it properly. Being about 45 years old (the camera), it does take a little getting used to. My first results were not great, but with experience the results improve.

This is the old "peel-apart" film that some of us may remember from childhood. One cool thing about this type of film type film is that it produces a scanable negative:

 

I've also started posting again to my long neglected Flickr account. Only film so far.

Update on Monday, April 23, 2012 at 4:27PM by Haberkern Photo

Polaroid Cold Clip & instruction book