Top tip for Monday

Like vignetting but don't want to fake it in PS?  Not confident enough in the darkroom? Fear not.  Simply use the wrong lens hood and get a lovely vignette effect for free!

The River Bush, at Bushmills, 2021.  HP5+ on MG Classic fibre paper.

I finally made it 'out' for a photowalk last week, with another film user from the Club.  We decided on Bushmills, home to the famous Whiskey.  The River Bush runs through the village and is really a lovely little river - at this point we are less than a mile away from where it empties into the Atlantic in Portballintrae.  I was a bit rusty with the 'Blad but I stuck the 60mm lens on it (slightly wide-angle) and out we went.  There happened to be a lens hood floating around in the bag...I didn't look too closely at it but just twisted it on and away we went.  The Zeiss lenses for the 'Blad all have a bespoke bayonet filter (and hood) ring - which is handy for a quick change of filter/hood.  Genuine Hasselblad filters don't come cheap, though.  The only alternative is a 67mm bayonet-screw step ring and then normal 67mm filters but even the Fotodiox adapter isn't a tight fit.  But I digress.  When the negatives popped out of the developing tank I noticed severe vignetting on all the shots on the 60mm lens.  Whoops.  Turned out I was using the hood for the 150mm lens.  Ah well, hopefully I won't make that mistake again.   The saving grace is the 6x6 negs are big enough to allow a bit of cropping in the darkroom.  Onwards and upwards...