All posts by Alan D

THE READING ROOM – NEWS & THINGS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED (WEEK 11: 5TH-11TH OCT)

So this week I’ve selected a great eclectic bag of stuff. We’ll find long overlooked classics, kill it disposable style and shoot the ghosts of the past. There’s an open letter to Kodak too, plus a mysterious emulsion, a compact trip up river and do we really need to post that !! Continue reading THE READING ROOM – NEWS & THINGS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED (WEEK 11: 5TH-11TH OCT)

Kosmic Clean up – A one roll review of Kosmo Foto Mono

You might remember those nice folk at Analogue Wonderland sent me a box of 3 very different rolls of films recently. Amongst these is Kosmo Foto’s B&W film launched last year a 100 ISO Panchromatic number. So I loaded up into my trusty Nikon F55 and headed to the Solway coast with the weans to do our bit for the environment and to test out this film. Continue reading Kosmic Clean up – A one roll review of Kosmo Foto Mono

A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHOTOGRAPHY BY OBJECTS – 4 – Fujica Camera ~1958

We leap forward by over a century and half.  Our subject is a lowly simple viewfinder from Japan. But this is one of  a new wave of innovative cameras in the late 1950’s offering automatic exposure.  It also represents an early hint of the shifting dominance of the camera market in the coming decade. Continue reading A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHOTOGRAPHY BY OBJECTS – 4 – Fujica Camera ~1958

Retro Medium Format Lo-Fi- The Samtoy – an original Diana Clone

Lomography’s launch of the Diana F+  in 2007 wasn’t a step forward in lo-fi photography. It represented a hommage to the medium format camera that would lead to the development of that movement – the original Diana camera  and its numerous clones. So how does one of these stack up to the 21st century. Continue reading Retro Medium Format Lo-Fi- The Samtoy – an original Diana Clone

A Brief History Of Photography By Objects – 3 – Chalk Drawing Circa 1800

It’s not the drawing or  artist who created it that we’re after here.  our subject is the man pictured. He is arguably the first person to create a photograph as we’d understand almost a quarter of century before the oldest surviving examples. Sadly like his photographs, he has faded into relative obscurity. Continue reading A Brief History Of Photography By Objects – 3 – Chalk Drawing Circa 1800

Nikon Budget Face off – Does the F75 make the F55 pointless ?

So I’d discussed the weakness of the F55 in the comparison review with the D50 dSLR. The F55 is arguably the cheapest Nikon film bodies you can buy but does spending a bit more snag you  a better camera in the guise of the F75. The reality is it a bit more nuanced. Continue reading Nikon Budget Face off – Does the F75 make the F55 pointless ?