Flowers at the Refectory Table / June 12, 2016 by Jacqui Booth

Well, yesterday, my involvement with Little Bird SOS let me to hang out in Loughborough, Leicestershire, in a garden belonging to Janet Currie and Pete Mosley. Janet had very kindly invited us to display our handmade items for sale, and Pete has long been a supporter, dishing out carefully considered advice to Lisa and trusting me to review his book, The Art of Shouting Quietly.

Their expertly tended garden was open as part of the National Garden Society Open Gardens Scheme. I'd had the opportunity to see it a few days earlier when installing a yarn bomb, as you do, and knew I had to take my long neglected macro lens out to see them on the Saturday. So, after setting up stall and making sure we had enough help for the rest of the day, I headed out for what was actually a very happy and absorbing half an hour, before heading home to my abandoned children and the comparative wasteland of my own garden!

52 Rolls Week 7: Holga – Jack White (at the allotment) / June 11, 2016 by Jacqui Booth

Well, I had a week off work. You’d have thought that would make things easier, right? But no…I barely managed to get out to do this one. Due to my “start at the doorstep and work out” the allotment was next. It should be an idyllic place but sadly the local council’s contribution to an allotmenteers wellbeing is to come over all officious at every opportunity and after a good start I’ve very nearly lost all enthusiasm for it. Last year’s seed potatoes had shrivelled on the bench and yesterday I just glanced at the new stocks in the shop. I might just clear it up this year and give the hostility a miss.

BUT the Jack White Holga was primed and ready to go. I’d wanted this camera for years – since my eldest son was born – but couldn’t justify buying it. Last year I bought what turned out to be a really knackered 2nd hand one. The masks are missing too, but I’m only going to tape the thing up and ruin it further, so it doesn’t really matter. The tape fetches off the red on this and the Diana Meg – so there’s no point being too precious about it.

The day before my sister, knowing that we really needed to get out, drove us to Foxton Locks, a popular tourist ‘beauty spot’ in South Leicestershire. We got there late so there’s just one shot of the canal. Then we tried to save a lamb that had foolishly squeezed out through the fence and, to put not too fine a point on it, was shitting it. As we decided that giving up was the best bet (this creature could not fathom the concept of gates and she had her baby in a sling) the farmboy turned up…and the lamb bolted out of the field entirely and onto the towpath. He called it ‘mate’ a lot and eventually coaxed it back. We could all sleep well.

So then it was time to face the allotment. Not surprisingly, my neglected polytunnel was the worse for wear. The whole thing had shifted onto the herb patch but some kind soul had caught the torn cover and weighed it down with a bit of fence. I gratefully shoved the muddy cover into the shed and sat in the drizzle for a bit, looking around at the mainly vacant plots.

Time to wander…

I’ve photographed this place many times before – not with the Holga though and not with a fisheye lens (which is three times as heavy as the camera and dutifully plopped off into the mud after the first shot) so it was really quite a quick whizz round, especially considering the wintry conditions and the low light.

Seeing as the light was low, it seemed a good time to pop out a double exposure too.

The last shot is of the local primary school, which thankfully both my kids have left (we had the misfortuntune to attend under the management of the most bonkers head mistress ever experienced. I’m being kind here). It was a strange feeling looking out onto the scene of many nativities, though happily the memory of my naughty little donkey shaking his fist at the innocently singing robin character was the strongest…an improvised performance I’m told he repeated the next day too. Ahem.

I turned towards the exit and moved on.

Technical shit:

Film: Fomapan 100 B&W – not expired!

Pre soak 20 deg water 2-3 mins, with waggles. Water went crazily green. I was scared.
Developed in Ilfotech HC 1+22 @ 20deg – agitated for 1st min then for 5 seconds every 30 seconds
Water rinse 20 deg water 30 seconds, with waggles
Fix 10 minutes – agitated each minutes
Water rinse 20 deg water , changed frequently, just over 10 mins as I couldn’t be arsed to do it for 20 mins.

This blog was first published on 52rolls.net

52 Rolls Week 6: Polaroid. Various Failures / June 11, 2016 by Jacqui Booth

First of all it’s late. I bought the wrong Polaroid film from the Impossible Project people. They have very kindly offered me a refund so when I’m feeling a little more confident I’ll try to order the right film.

I also excitedly bought a Macro Polaroid off eBay…only to find that there’s a third format of Polaroid film I needed to know about and everyone knew this except me. Ah well. Learning is good, right?

So, then him indoors offered me one of his expired Impossible project films for the house Polaroid (donated some time ago by Jo and Richard – thanks!) and I accepted as they’re normally pretty much okay, handed over the cash, and here’s the results.

Good eh?

I finally got three shots out by figuring that they didn’t like one iota of light between their ejection into the atmosphere and them hastily being shoved into a dark box, so these last three were clamped to the bottom of the camera the moment they were spewed out.

Not a resounding success, but given the circumstances I think I’ll settle and go read a book.

This blog was first published on 52rolls.net

52 Rolls Week 5: Kodak Auto Colorsnap 35. Trainspotting / May 30, 2016 by Jacqui Booth

One of my favourite weeks so far from 52 rolls...

This week’s crop of photos is from the local heritage railway, the Great Central. I’ve just heard a steam train from my house, so this is still conforming to my doorstep rule, albeit a little bit cheaty as the dayticket for me and the smallster took us to Loughborough, but hey – it’s like entering a wormhole into another dimension so I’m going to let myself off. And I’ve come to love the railway, in my own way.

We hand over a considerable amount of cash and nestle into the vintage carriages and trundle away, past the badger holes, my first house, past the allotment and friends’ back gardens. The day is given over to a gentle trudge over familiar ground and I get to spend some time with my lad, who is transported in his own way. We both have our favourite things – he’s only just stopped being scared of the engine sheds in Loughborough, where I could always spend longer and he loves the trains themselves (you’ll notice I barely paid them any attention…ahem), running alongside them as they leave the platform. I love the way the powerful trains loom over me…he still seems a little unnerved. Neither of us quite know what to do with the more over-earnest trainspotters but we love it when they’re swallowed up by steam, big lensed SLR and all, and we always look out for welly man, our favourite local trainspotter.

But you’re not here for the trains, are you? We need to talk cameras and it was with a little leap of joy that I realised I’d overlooked a 35mm camera – a Kodak Auto Colorsnap 35 and, as I’d never used it before, it was duly googled and fitted with film. Its belly was full of expired Kodak Ultra Plus 200 which was to be exposed at 100 ISO as the camera dial only went to 160. The idea was to adjust for this when the film was processed but after a couple of rather tense discussions about whether it was to be pushed or pulled (pulled – I was right) and weighing up the expired film element I decided to just do it in exactly the same way as Week 3. Pictures happened.

Well, it wasn’t that simple. Some were the most woeful pieces of shit you ever did see. I don’t ever want to see them again and won’t be subjecting you to them. A lot of the time I simply forgot to set the distance meter thingy, or simply didn’t employ enough care, and they were just awful. The rest aren’t great but hopefully won’t be too offensive. There’s a bit of film slippage and double exposures but I can live with that. It’s as well as at some point I’m going to use my Bakelite Brownie again and that’s all that does sometimes.

I guess that the above area won’t be around for much longer in the way that it is now, as the track is going to be extended towards Nottingham, over the graffiti bridge and straight through the barbed wire topped fence in a year or two, which I imagine will mean that much of this must be swept away. Right now, it’s well off the tourist track and one of my favourite places at the railway. (There is a real ale shed but I saw them draw the last pint of bitter…for the man in front of me. I pulled up my big girl pants and survived. Just.)

And so another day out at the Great Central Railway was complete. We stopped off at Rothley to see the model railway but by then the light was fading and so you’ll just have to trust me that it’s one of the most bizarre set ups you’ll ever see.

And in case you’re worried, I did find a bottle of beer there which was sort of how we accidentally travelled back in First Class. It was very nice, thank you.

This blog was first published on 52rolls.net

52 Rolls - Week 4: Pinhole Photography: What can go wrong will go wrong / May 20, 2016 by Jacqui Booth

Well, this week was equisitely frustrating. Of course I haven’t done my tax return early again and I also had a child at the end of the tax year, so come the end of January I’m usually a smidge stressed to say the least. So I decided to do something simple this week. How wrong I was…in fact, even now I’m considering tidying a bit more of my filthy office instead of writing this up. Things are bad.

First of all I made a REALLY stupid mistake. ‘Use of one your ready made tin can thingies’, him indoors said. Turns out that I took this too literally and tried to expose a solargraph in waiting. Of course, I hadn’t loaded this in the darkroom and so the first attempt hit the chemicals and went BLACK.

So, back to plan A, except I couldn’t poke a hole in my coffee tin. A tiny drill has now been ordered and is in the post.

BUT I still have a bag of empty beer cans (who doesn’t?) so a couple were taken into the dark room where I spent ages trying to find the end of the black gaffer tape in the dark. By now, the daylight was already fading.

So – a couple of things were tried. Hilariously (in retrospect they will become so, surely?) I nearly knobbled one by throwing it in the stop before the dev. Next time, the first tray really needs to be white and not red which causes it to disappear in the dark of the garage floor. Then, my son – who ignores me normally – BURST into the garage through the fire door. Ace.

Still, a couple of pics did turn out.

The next day, despite having a billion other things to do, I tried again. As I knelt on the floor in the gloom once again, I realised that the house mamil would need his bike. I kept the cans upside down with the paper inside whilst I grappled with tape just in case. It wasn’t enough. The garage door opened and on development I found that another bit of paper was BLACK. One was okay…

Still, I found more ways to make things go wrong. The next bit of paper was hastily stuffed in glossy side out. Dammit.

Eventually, I got a couple of pictures I was happy with. During this I heard dogs barking and the inlaws had turned up to drop off gifts, then the phone went and a gentleman from a call centre far far away got a few words of…umm…advice.

Final negatives were enhanced by handling post greasy Chinese takeaway. My Dad asked me why I was doing this, and I really couldn’t give a good answer.