Dreaming Spires

I'm en route to the city of Dreaming Spires (as Matthew Arnold called Oxford in his poem Thyrsis) today, assuming the Belfast-Liverpool ferry did it's thing correctly.  Actually although they call it the Belfast-Liverpool ferry it doesn't actually port in Liverpool, but across the Mersey in Birkenhead.  Maybe that's splitting hairs (probably not to the locals, though).  Anyway, it's a daughter-dad only week, which will be a bit special.  It's her last week as a teenager and Missy is none too happy about that - she's not relishing the whole 'adult' thing at all, she says.  Responsibility, having to deal with 'stuff', sign official documents and so on.  I get it.  These days it seems there's more officialdom that ever to deal with.  I don't remember it being like that when I was 20, but perhaps it was and I just blocked it out, ignored it.   

This is a shot from a while back, when I was wandering around Derry.  It's not a great print at all, but I liked the wording on the election poster and the people underneath give it some interest, even if they are somewhat lost in the shadows of the murky winter light:

Aontú, (Unity) party poster in Derry, 2023.

Aontú are a small party across the whole island, but they must be well-funded, given the size (and number) of their election posters.  A quick online search indicates they stand for rather an odd mix of idealogy: anti-abortion, Irish republicanism, social conservatism and soft Euroscepticism.  They lost my vote on that first one alone.

Liberation Day

The Piazza del Carmine in Cagliari seemed to be the main place for holding events.  The 25th April is Liberation Day - the anniversary of the liberation of Italy rom the fascist regime and Nazi occupation in 1945.  From what I read, it marks the start of Spring holiday weekends and is a big public holiday.  As usual, by the time we realised there was something going on most of the crowd had dispersed from the Piazza, to go get coffee and cake or whatever.  But there were still a few people milling around - some with coats and some in t-shirts (the latter for us):

The usual: FP4 on Foma 133, toned.

In other news, I've acquired a new camera.  To be fair, it's been a while and this was one I couldn't refuse: a Pentax Spotmatic SP.  There's a story behind it, as I really need fewer cameras, not more.  A few months ago I was contacted by a friend in our Club to see if I could help a neighbour of theirs.  His father had recently passed away - he had been an avid (film) photographer and here was a ton of stuff to sift through. So I spent an interesting afternoon poking through a mountain of stuff, trying to separate the wheat from the chaff.  A lot of stuff was for recycling, or dumping but there were a few items of interest.  The pick of the bunch was a Rolleiflex, but there was a Mamiya 645, various older folders and quite a few 35mm SLRs.  Some were seized solid and were for parts only, others 'had potential'.  The Pentax had a 50mm f/1.4 and a 28mm f/3.5 with it but it wasn't a show camera - there was a sizeable dent in the pentaprism and although it seemed to wind on and fire OK I couldn't get the back open.   I though about making him an offer but decided not to...and regretted it as soon as I got home, of course. 

Fast forward to last week and the gentleman's son got back in touch.  I'd suggested he send the better stuff to ffordes in Inverness, who checked the gear over, if necessary got repairs done and then sold on commission.  The Rolleiflex and Mamiya both got good ££.  The report on the Pentax was less favourable - "mirror locked up, scratch on rear element of 50mm, can't open back, new seals required: value £0".  The 28mm they were going to advertise at £29.  He said if I wanted the camera&50mm I could have them, no charge.  Of course I was going to say Yes to that, and I offered to buy the 28mm for the valuation ffordes had put on it.  So this week I've been playing with the Spotmatic, trying to breathe some life into the old lady.  

You might recall I got lucky with an Olympus OM-10 a while back but that's about the sum of my experience of trying to get broken cameras to work.  Anyway, I got to work on the Pentax and yes, the mirror was locking up, but only at the slower speeds, 1/60th and below, and only intermittently.  So I fired the shutter through the range of shutter speeds one by one, up and down, and after a few minutes there was no more locking up - I think it just needed exercising.  As for the back not opening, I managed to get the rewind spool up a few mm, using a little more force than I was comfortable with, but enough to get a drop of light oil on the spindle.  That did the trick - the back popped opened and inside everything looked clean as a whistle.  I'm sure it probably does need new seals but I've a short test film in it now to see what gives.  The meter is activated by a switch on the left of the lens mount but unfortunately that appears to be broken - it does move, but even with a new 394 battery installed the needle in the viewfinder doesn't react to light as it should, so I may have to forget about the built in meter.  I can live with that.  Oh, and that scratch on the rear element of the 50mm?  I can't seen anything of note - there may be a hairline mark but I doubt its going to have a major effect unless I'm shooting directly into the sun.  We'll see. 

It's the first Spotmatic I've had (my brother had one briefly when he was at Uni) and it's a lovely thing to hold - quite compact (compared to, say, a Nikon F2 from the same era - late '60s/early '70s) but very solid, much heavier than an OM-1.  And those Super-Takumar lenses - oh boy, they are things of beauty.  They are quite small, but perfectly made and the focus mechanism is unlike any other camera system I know - beautifully damped, very smooth and with a lovely solid feel to it.  I think I'm hooked.   

La Vecchia Trattoria

Down Via Domenico Alberto Azuni, next door to the Chiesa San Michele lies this restaurant, although it didn't look like it was open when we passed.  The outside rendering reminded me of Venice - a beautiful faded burnt red colour.  

It's lacking something, this print.  Perhaps the sunlight was too harsh at the time of day the shot was taken, or just my printing skills aren't up to it.  FP4+ on Foma 133, toned.

PDA

I'm sure it comes as no surprise to learn that Sardinians are generally more demonstrative than the Northern Irish.   (I was going to write, Sardinians, being Italian but I thought I'd just check and lo and behold that's not something that would go down to well.  Sardinians consider themselves as an independent ethinic group and apparently it is not uncommon to see graffiti that says Sardigna no est Italia). 

Back to Public Displays of Affection, I snapped this lady up as she was about to greet her friend with a warm embrace:

OM4ti/85mm; FP4 on Foma 133, thiourea toned.

Lamped

Lamped has many meanings...including one that always made me smile: being hit very hard.  Perhaps that's a nod to having your lights punched out.  But here I'm taking a more literal meaning:

Ornate lamps outside the Chiesa Collegiata di Sant'Anna in Cagliari. 
OM4ti/85mm/FP4/Foma 133; toned in home-brew thiourea.

I was looking forward to being able to show something of the inside of these beautiful churches, but I had a moment of madness.  I'd loaded HP5+ and was rating it at 1600iso, as obviously things were a little dark inside.  I think it was while I was in the third church of the day that I noticed the rewind spool wasn't turning as I wound on.  I re-tensioned it, took another shot and as I wound on the tension seem to unwind on the spool.  Heck, I thought - have I not loaded the film correctly?  And not noticed all day?  Ach...

So then I did a stupid thing.  By then I had convinced myself I'd not loaded the film correctly.  Frustration took over and I opened the back of the camera...and...wouldn't you know, everything looked OK.  Except of course I'd opened the back.  I know - I'm an eejit.

Anyway, I'm away now to develop said film and see if anything is salvageable.  I'll let you know shortly.  Go make a cup of tea in the meantime.

(Insert your favourite elevator music here)

Apologies - that took a bit longer than anticipated.  HP5+ at 1600 in Ilfotec 1:31 needed 14 minutes, according to the Massive Dev App.  OK so obviously the part of the film that was exposed to light is ruined, but at first I thought the start of the film looked OK, no obvious signs of fogging on the frames themselves, although the top and bottom edges were black.  However, once dry a closer inspection showed it's all a bit veiled and murky, very low contrast so I doubt there's anything salvageable in the darkroom.  I did go back and re-shoot the interior of two of the Churches we'd visited that day - the Chiesa Collegiata di Sant'Anna you see above and the Chiesa di San Michele, which has a stunning Baroque and Rococo styled interior, so once I get that film finished hopefully there will be something to share.  

Bastioni di Saint Remy

This was one of those 'difficult to print' shots...there was a wide dynamic range, from the shaded stall in the foreground to the light stonework of the impressive entrance to the Bastion of St Remy in the background.  Some fill-in flash would have helped (perhaps!) but all I could do was hold the lower half of the print back a bit under the enlarger in order to try to keep some detail in the stall:

Bastion of St Remy, Cagliari.  OM4ti/24mm Zuiko; FP4+ on Foma 133.

The Bastion is hard to miss, since it dominates the whole city.  Alas I was unable to scale the steps - well, I think I could have got up OK, but it was the coming back down that worried me.  There were no handrails, so one trip and there would have been bits of an Ulsterman all over the pavement below and that would not have been a pretty sight, believe me.  There was supposed to be a lift/elevator and we did actually find it up the road a bit but it was all locked up, which was disappointing.

The Bastion as it stands today isn't that old - it was built in a classic style around 1900, although it occupies the site of much older bastions that were built by the Spanish (What were they doing here, I wonder?) in the 16th Century.  It took a bit of a battering during the second world war from the Allies (as did much of Cagliari, apparently) but it has since been rebuilt.  

The street that I was standing in when I took the shot marks the start of the main drag in the city.  It houses most of the main shops/boutiques and is the place to be seen for the daily promenade, which seemed to start about 7pm.  So after the Sardinian afternoon siesta, it's get your glad-rags on, head up to the Via Giuseppe Manno to see and be seen, dander up and down for an hour and then sit at your chosen restaurant for the evening meal.  Sounds good to me!

Al fresco

This is certainly one thing we miss over here in Ulster - the ability to sit out and eat in the evenings.  In Cagliari everyone did it, every night from what we could see:

OM4ti, possibly 85mm; FP4+ on Foma 133
There are some weird artefacts on the lower left of this print and I'm not quite sure what's going on there.  I don't think it's lens flare, more likely it's something not quite pukka in the darkroom.

Italy is an hour ahead of us, so when we were getting hungry (after tramping the streets all day) at 6pm, it was 7pm there.  Most restaurants were just opening then and usually we were first to sit down at a table - the locals started arriving an hour later, 8pm their time.  A few times the waiter even apologised to us, saying the kitchen staff were eating and wouldn't be ready to serve food for a little while.  That was fine, we were happy to sit, enjoy a glass of wine and engage in the serious business of people watching.   A 500ml carafe of vino della casa came in at 5 euros, and very drinkable it was too.   At home the price of wine in a restaurant is becoming a bit of a joke - at a minimum it's £20 a bottle and usually more.  We rarely go out to eat, since both my wife and I enjoy cooking at home, so it was a pleasant diversion to eat out on holiday.  Having said that, a couple of nights we did cook in our apartment - old habits die hard.

The light

I've been finding it tricky to print some of the shots from Sardinia.  I think this is due to a number of factors but the main one is the fact that strong Italian sunlight makes for harsh shadows.  Sometimes that's OK, but it makes it difficult to get the exposure right for both elements; and then also when printing - it's not easy to keep detail in the shadows without losing the highlights completely (and vice-versa).  I've had to resort to a bit more dodging that I would normally do - here in Ireland we get soft, even light a lot of the time due to copious amounts of cloud cover.  I don't think Foma 133 is dealing too well with these negatives, so I tried Kentmere fixed grade paper for this one.  At grade 3 it was a bit too contrasty for the negative and as you can see, the highlight in the middle distance (where the sun is illuminating part of the scene) is pretty much lost:

I'd like to say I saw and waited for the perfect moment but in truth I didn't notice the lady turning her head until I printed this.  It's a pity its not a little more obvious.
OM4ti/85mm/FP4+

I think I will try to make a better print of this one - it has potential, as they say.  If I'm successful, I'll let you know.

Shutters

Back home now after a week away.  Got two films developed yesterday and a very quick darkroom session this morning to get something printed.  I seem to have taken a lot of photographs of shutters.  Here's the first offering:

Cagliari shutters; OM4ti, 85mm Zuiko.  FP4+ in Ilfotec HC for 8minutes (1:31).
Foma 133 paper, mild thiourea tone, which didn't take as well as I would have liked.

Cagliari was superb - beat my expectations by a long chalk.  Plenty big enough with lots of interesting streets to explore on foot and enough variety to keep it interesting.  It was quite hilly, so challenging in the heat at times.  Most days we just ambled around the different districts, stopping for tea and cake and wandering in and out of any church that happened to be open...and there were a lot of churches.  For a bloke familiar with austere Northern Irish Presbyterian Buildings the Cagliari Roman Catholic churches were on the other end of the spectrum - filled with statues, art works, marble and gold.  I did what I could to capture them on HP5+, not developed yet so I can't promise anything.