Last snow pic (for now anyway)

Happy holidays all! Here is the last pic from my recent outing during the snow storm. This graveyard is right next to where I live and I have had an endless fascination with this angel. I have probably shot hundreds of images of her over the years. I have told myself over the years "yup that's the image, I never have to shoot her again" yet here I am pointing yet another camera at her. It is part convenience, part she is a good subject, and part the fact that because I have taken so many pictures of her that she is a good subject for me to test out new film and ideas. Any way enjoy your holidays.

Angel
Holga, Ilford HP5

all images are the copyright of GreenStPhotography

Another snowy pano

I have really been loving my holga panos lately. I rarely shot a roll through my holga without doing at least one pano. There is just something about overlapping images that just works with the Holga. Even with vintage manual film cameras it is rare to be able to advance the film only part way. All of the manual film advancing mechanisms are designed to prevent you from "accidentally" overlapping your images. Which makes sense for the general photographer I guess, but personally I would love to be able to overlap frames in all of my cameras.

Snow on the Potomac
Holga, Ilford HP5

All images are copyrighted to GreenStPhotography

I feel gray

Here is yet another image taken during the big snow storm. This is one of those images that I have had in my head for some time and it turns out the conditions I needed to make it a reality was a blinding snow storm...who knew. It is also an image that I am not sure anyone else but me will like. Right now I am really liking it, though knowing myself this will pass and all I am feeling is the happiness of having finally put on film an idea that has been brewing for some time. This image is about being solitary, that blah, isolated and incomplete feeling. At least for me it is. This could be aptly titled my 2009, but that may be a bit mellow dramatic. Anyway I am sure no one else will like it, but its my blog so suck it!

"I feel Gray"
Holga, Ilford HP5

all images copyrighted to GreenStPhotography

More Snow!

I don't have too much to say today. I got a few images from braving the blizzard Saturday. This one may not show well on this forum, just click on the image to see a larger version. For those of you unfamiliar with the Holga, one of the nice things about a manual camera is that you can choose to not advance the film all the way to the next frame. You can choose to advance the film say half way to the next frame and overlap images. In this example I overlapped 7 images to create a panoramic of an entire street block! It was freezing and by the end I could barley use my hands, alomst got hit by a few cars, but all worth it!

800 Block S. Washington St.
Holga, Ilford HP5

all images copy right of GreenStPhotography

Build your own Holgaroid and Holy Crap that's alot of SNOW!!

I'll start by giving you a look at a camera I just finished building. I'd like to tell you that I do this allot, but this is my first time. I'd also love to tell you this was all my idea but nope I just copied it from someone much smarter than me, check it out. About the only difference between his build and mine is I used black on black foam board for the adapter plate. For the Polaroid back I used a non working Polaroid 250 that I purchased from eBay. It wasn't advertised as broken, but for $15 it sure wasn't worth it try and get my money back.

Ready for paint!
Iphone, Helga style from Camera Bag App.

Racing Stripe!
Iphone, Helga style from Camera Bag App.

I used rubberized paint mean't for the undercarriage of cars. The paint does dry nice and hard, just make sure to give it a few days to dry then give it a light wash with a damp cloth. There is a sandy feel to the paint that the wash seems to get rid of. So here is the result. You do end up using a bit more of the image area than the manufactured Polaroid back for the Holga, but it still doesn't use the whole area. The result of this is you basically get a circular image. All in all I think it was worth the effort. I'll probably just do what I do with the manufactured Holgaroid images, crop them to make them look like square format Polaroids. I know many photogs don't like to use Photoshop in this way, but if it helps the final image I'm all for it.

Batman on Red
Home made Holgaroid w/ hand held flash
Fuji FP-100C

For those of you that have an iphone I recommend you get the Camera Bag App, it has a bunch of different "styles" that you can convert your images too. My favs are the Helga (which mimics the Holga) and magazine. I'll post a bunch in a future blog.

Finally it has been snowing all night and day here in Washington DC. As of a few hours ago I measured the accumulation at 18 inches and it is still coming down out there. This basically means that the area is shut down for days now. We just don't get storms like these very often and do not have the equipment to get the roads cleared in a timely manner. In a few days the sides of the roads will be littered with SUV's that spun out of control. The nice thing about this is that they act like railings and show you where the road is :) I spent much of the day shooting with my Holga's, I will develop the film later and will post if I like anything. I did take out the Digital (Canon 20D, as well as my Polaroid 180). Here is an image from the Polaroid.

Snow Angel
Polaroid 180, Sepia

All images on the Blog are the CopyRight of GreenStPhotography.

My name is Andrew Phillips and I finally decided it was time to start a photo blog for GreenStPhotography. GreenSt is the name of my "photography business", I put that in quotes mainly because while I do occasionally get paid to use my cameras I still don't actually make any money at it. At this stage in my life it is just a very serious hobby, I have a real job that pays well and allows me to persue my love of photography. This blog is one of many ways I am attempting to get my name (actually GreenSt's name) known so that if I ever do decide to turn my life upside down and see if I can be quarter back some day...(sorry, Strongbad reference) I mean try photography as a primary income source, well you get the idea.

To that end I figure that I can share love of photography and pass on any lessons learned and hopefully find new photographers to interact with and learn from.

As for where I fall in the cliques of the photography world, I am primarily a film photographer. My cameras tend to be "vintage" manual film cameras. Some examples of my current cameras are Hasselbald C500, Nikon FM2N, Graflex SpeedGraphic 4x5. I also shoot with toy cameras, actually the only camera you will always find in my bag is a Holga. For those that don't know the Holga is an all plastic medium format camera that is made in China. When I say all plastic I mean that even the lens is plastic. Is is cheaply made and cost about $25, can't really beat that price for a medium format camera! I have also recently been getting into Polaroids, yeah I know I am late to the game and Polaroid is no longer making instant film. Well I have a fridge full of film found on ebay and Fuji still makes some peel apart film, and the impossible project is getting ready to release its first integral films, so I should be good to go :).

So my primary job is Aerospace Engineer for the US Gov. I also teach intro to photography classes at The Art League in Old Town Alexandria in Virginia.

Ok, enough about me for now, on to the photography! Below is an image I created from the second roll of film I ever put through my Holga, it's called "National Cathedral 1-9". What you see is a digital representation of how I display the image, nine images with a small white border mounted on a black background. The reason I have the small white border on the nine images is I feel it allows the viewer to step back and view the image as a whole or to step closer and view each image individually.

"National Cathedral 1-9", Holga, Ilford HP5
copy right GreenStPhotography