Remembered Photographs

As the afternoon faded away, a large herd of sheep, returning from their daily pastures, slowly moved in and covered the slope visible in the picture. This is a small seasonal settlement in the mountains of Turkey, where shepherds keep their herds until fierce winter sets in. We had set up our tents for some semi-wild camping and had already acquainted ourselves with the four or five shepherd dogs. In another moment the peaceful atmosphere turned into commotion. A pack of wolves - I counted four -  dashed out of the woods in front of us, at most 100 meters away, and dived into the herd. As we froze, eyes wide open, everything around us seemed to accelerate. All dogs charged upwards instantly. The shepherd hurried towards the action. The shepherd's daughter appeared from one of the shacks and sprinted, rifle in hand. In a matter of seconds they were chasing the wolves through the woods; we heard shouts and incessant barking; shots fell. A couple of minutes later all was silent again. The wolves hadn't been able to grab a lamb, but they had a scuffle with one of the juvenile dogs, which eventually managed to escape unscathed. The shepherd's daughter was carrying back the small dog, covered in wolves' saliva and still shaking from the ordeal. After the excitement had died down we made ourselves comfortable in an abandoned hut, cooked chestnuts over a fire and sang songs...

...wondering whether the night would be safe, especially because we had our kids with us. The vigilance of the dogs gave us some comfort.

Missed photographs can be particularly painful. I wince when I think back to the shepherd's daughter, that courageous young woman, so obviously used to taking matters into her own hands. Clearly, she loved that dog dearly, the way she was holding and caressing the small, black, shaking creature in her arms. What a beautiful portrait that would've been! I believe she would have given me the permission for a picture if I had asked; sadly, I didn't have the presence of mind.

In all the years of hiking and camping in the mountains, I've had quite a few surprise face-to-faces: bulls, wolves, wild boars...even a bear, which to my relief took flight. In my minds eye I can still see it's wonderful shiny fur as it looked back at me one last time before disappearing in the forest. I was so lucky it didn't have cubs. No photograph exists of any of these encounters, only memories.

Tuff Triangle

There is this enchanting piece of nature called Cappadoccia in Turkey. An amazing history of thousands of years. Stunning churches carved into volcanic tuff. Fairy chimneys, each one a marvel of its own.  But when I returned to Cappadoccia last summer after a gap of 9 years I found that much had deteriorated. On top of other concerns, now the ATV business was thriving,  creating such a roar and churning up so much dust from sunrise till sunset...

...but hey, if it helps one to show off their great adventures on insta reels...and it fills some pockets...then what's the problem, right?

Anyway, here I was again, walking from one valley into the next, stuffing my backpack with discarded plastic bottles all along. It was getting hot, sweat was flowing profusely, I had a hat and sunglasses and my Rollei T...

...and plenty film. Tmax100 this time. Not my first choice, but I'd had so much frustration with other roll film over the last few years that I was happy to have anything that was simply trouble free. The problem I'm talking about are the well documented "white spots" on Ilford film, which came about by the backing paper interacting with the emulsion*. And with Kodak Tmax400 I had the backing paper imprint issue, where the writing on the backing paper would transfer over to the emulsion, so that your prints had "Kodak" written somewhere in them.

So, Tmax100 it was, and back at home I developed it in Tmax 1+9 at 24 degrees C. The negs are quite beautiful!

This print - a photo from that day - is on 24x30 cm Ilford Classic FB paper. My go-to paper & size for what I consider "finished" work.

Last weekend, whilst lost in daydreaming, I thought what if I make a big print by patching up four sheets of 24x30 cm paper, in effect giving me a surface area of 48x60 cm. Of course, I could've bought 50x60 cm paper, but that's beside the point, because I was simply curious about how a patched up photo would look (also, 50x60 cm paper is hard to find and very expensive, considering the rare occasion I use it; and another, although minor point: requires a significantly larger volume of chemicals).

I thought this picture would be a good candidate for this size, so I set to work. I used Ilford RC Satin because it lies flat and racked up the head of my Focomat 2c enlarger for a print size of 45x45 cm. After arranging the sheets on the baseboard and exposing them, I developed them individually. Here is the print (or should I say prints?), held together with magnets on my pin-up board next to a random, regular sized work print:

I quite like the not-so-precious DIY look. After taping the four sheets together on the back one could even get it framed.

By the way, most of the other clutter on the board is songs, exercises, strings etc. for the guitar. I've been a guitar learner for a few years now - still very much at beginner level and thoroughly enjoying it  - and I practice sitting on the couch opposite this board.

So, that's that. Summer in the northern hemisphere and its myriad challenges for the B&W film photographer is upon us. For those of you in the hotter regions, good luck trying to stay calm whilst spooling your film onto reels with sweaty hands in pitch black darkness; I feel your pain!

Take care and maybe I'll see you at another "agitation" 😎

* Ilford say they have solved the problem and indeed my latest rolls of HP5 have been spotless. And also, to Ilford's credit, they sent me replacement film after I contacted them. Of course I've lost some precious pictures, but still I appreciate their customer support.