The Holga rides again

  

Double exposure - Expired Kodak 400VC. Wide angle attachment giving an almost fisheye effect

I've not used a Holga since 2011 when I had some bad experiences with a mail order developing site and mourned the passing of Kodak 400VC, my favourite film. Most of my photography since then had been done using my mobile phone  - as Chase Jarvis says "the best camera is the one you have with you" - or with my Olympus DSLR

Anyway I recently discovered the Lomography brand of film and thought I'd try their 400 colour print film to see how it compared with the vibrant Kodak VC I used to use. I also bought a used Holga 120PC (6x6 pinhole camera) from Ebay and Holga 120 Pan (6x12 Panoramic camera). Hopefully I will have some interesting images from those cameras to post in a future blog. I will definitely go back to using my local photo processing shop, even if it is quite expensive, as they seem to know what they are doing (Express Imaging in Cardiff).

Roath Park, Cardiff - Expired Kodak 400VC

The images accompanying this blog came about because I was inspired by the images from one of the first rolls of film I shot with a Holga, so I returned to a local park this autumn (2015) armed with some expired Kodak 400VC in a Holga GTLR. The Kodak film was great for capturing the warm, rich colours of autumn. I hope the Lomography colour film will be as well, but the weather has been overcast and dull since the day I took these so I've only shot with black and white Ilford film this week. 

Acer from my garden. - Close up lens + flash on a Holga GTLR

I had not noticed light leaks with my Holga GTLR before, so either it has started leaking, or the age of the film produced the streaks on the right hand side of the frame on two of the shots from this roll.

Another double exposure. Distortion from wide angle attachment.

For the first time I tried the GTLR's colour flash. I wondered if the blue gel would correct the warm colour cast of interior lighting - nope - it just makes the pictures blue! Sorry Duke (my new Sheltie Puppy).

Still I'm blessed to live an a country with changeable seasons, this means the landscape is constantly offering something different to photograph. The warm light that bathes everything in a feel good glow all day at this time of the year (when the sun appears!) is something those who live near the equator never get to experience.

My final shot is another attempted double exposure. Only when I got it back did I remember the home made spliter attachment that I could have used to avoid this image looking washed out. 

Still I've really enjoyed getting the Holga out again and I will be shooting several rolls of film in the different Holga cameras I have over the next few weeks. If I can get 7 or 8 decent shots per roll of film I'll be happy. Getting the exposure right on the pinholga could prove a challenge - wish me luck.

Digital Holga

Long time since my last blog, got discouraged by the discontinuation of my favourite film and difficulty/expense of ongoing film development. I had given up on Holga photography  - but I've just bought a Holga plastic lens for my Olympus E-620. It arrived today although I haven't had time to take it outside to try it out yet (we don't get much daylight during a Welsh winter!) but I did take one multiple exposure with it through my lounge window.

Olympus double exposure setting plus home-made Holga Splitzer pictured at the bottom  of  my blog dated Sat 27th November 2010.

 

 

Okay so the subject may not be that interesting, but the Olympus multiple exposure setting looks like it will work well with the Holga lens. The built in art filters may also add some interesting possibilities. I know that analogue photo enthusiasts will be horrified that I've gone completely digital and given up on film, but with film companies giving up on us I decided it was time to try digital Holga.

Thanks for nothing Kodak

Great news Kodak announced they were producing a new colour film for 120 film cameras - hurray. No not really, because the end of the announcement says that their new Porta colour film replaces the existing Porta VC AND NC lines. So you used to have a choice of high saturation (VC my fav film) or natural colour (NC) film, now you just have one film that splits the difference. How can they have the cheek to announce this as good news???   Good news for whom?? - The customer who gets less choice, or for Kodak who cut their production costs?

Whilst I'm moaning - It must have been 25 years since I last posted films to a lab for development (I've been taking them to a lab near my home) My lastest two Holga films came back, only one of them wasn't the film I'd sent : ( It reminded me of the frustration I experinced many times in the 1980's shooting 35mm and getting someone else's holiday snaps back from the lab.

Even the film that was mine wasn't up to much. I've found that 400 ASA is not sensitive enough for the dark, dreary Welsh winter days. Three shots were ok.  Two taken in the snow when it was a bit brighter

This one was underexposed so I changed it to black and white and boosted contrast.

Taken using Holga close-up lens

I have ordered a Holga cable release that I will have to use with 400 ASA film on dull winter days in future. Either that or get some 800 ASA film. 

Well goodbye Kodak 400 VC - my fav colour film and hello Fuji, who will be supplying my colour film from now on!

You learn from your mistakes

So the forth film through a Holga turns out to be my least successful yet.

 

I don’t know if the fact that the film was expired made a difference but the contrast was really high and most shots were underexposed. Maybe I didn’t pay enough attention to the light on the day I took these

2 secs bulb exposure - camera propped on a bridge hence movement blur

I also managed to once again wind over one exposure, but out of the eleven I did take only four look like intentional photographs to me, and even then not that good.

First attempt at a Holga splitter - fail!

Still, hopefully I will learn from my mistakes. I hope the other two expired Tri-X films I used come out better. I also used my home made Holga Splitter for the first time (on the photo of the trees). But this didn’t work out too good. I’ll have to try it again in better light.

1 sec bulb exposure - camera on a rock

Not strictly Holga

I once emailed Lensbaby to see if they had thought of doing a “Toycamera” or Holga type optic for their Lensbaby composer system. They had not, mainly because they think their plastic optic already has it covered. These shots are taken with the plastic optic and an Olympus E-620. Not very Holga like to me, but a fun lens nevertheless. 

Crazy Daisy - home made shaped aperture disk

Starbucks picture

Chair in local library

River Taff - well I am a "Taffy" afterall!

My back door

Glass tile

Glass wing

Salad for tea - again!

Autumn colour

 

My third film through the Holga GTLR is more colour Kodak 400VC. The next film to get developed is the less saturated Kodak 400NC film, I’ll be interested to compare the results. The saturated colours of the VC film suited the late autumn hues of a tree in a park local to me – one of the few trees with some leaves left.

Memorial to Capt Scott (of the Antarctic) who sailed from Cardiff

Can’t quite believe I made the rookie mistake of including my shadow in a photo (non-intentionally), but of course there’s no live view with a Holga, you just point it at what you want to photograph and shoot. Still, I should have spotted it! The other rookie mistake I made was falling asleep whilst inserting the film and winding past the first exposure – duh!

Who's the muppet casting a shadow in my photo?

I seemed REALLY close to this tree when I took the photo?

Another dual exposure (deliberate, I haven’t done an accidental one YET). I thought I had tried my home made Splitzer, but that must have been on the B&W film in my Holga 120N, yet  to be developed.  Some of these shots also feature the (£8 on EBAY) Holga wide angled lens attachment. You can see the greater vignette and corner distortion on the shots using the wide attachment.

Double exposure

The final two images are of my parents dog, (Caesar)  they wanted some pictures of him, so he got Holgered.

Hail Caesar

Noble, if somewhat dim beast.

Which brings me to the main drawback in Holga photography, the expense of developing and printing/scanning 120 film. The cheapest I can find is £10 for developing and scans, or developing and prints. Still with a “prosumer” DSLR costing £1000, you can afford a fair few films for that price.

Digital Holga?

The Yashica EZ F521

Digital Holga – really? No, not really, but to be fair to the company that bought the Yashica name, they never claimed it was. It's just a cheap 5MP digital compact with a plastic lens (hence the Holga comparison by some). It has some fun built in digital filters that can be applied before or after shooting – in camera. You can even stack several on top of each other. It has a strangely powerful flash and video capability.

Flashlit Graffiti

Another neat trick it does is bend images. There is no shutter, the camera scans the sensor from top to bottom, if you move the camera horizontally while taking a shot, it gets confused and bends vertical objects.

Bendyness

 

 

Colour filters

Like a Holga there is only simply focussing ability (normal or macro) but there is some exposure control, you can apply flash and exposure compensation settings through the menu options. One thing it does that real Holga photographers can only dream of, it can see what you about to take. It has a Holga like useless viewfinder or an LCD screen to where you can actually preview the image!  

Some owners have inserted a washer behind the lens to give Holga like vignette. I don’t see the point as I can easily add this in photo-editing software if I want to. But I suppose that if you don’t have the software it’s an interesting mod.

Strange red colour cast

B&W filter

Some digital vignette

If you want a digital camera that gives Holga images, sorry, you’ll have to wait. But if you want a fun featured – take anywhere – cheap digital, the Yashica is worth a punt.