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Roraback’s Windmill

The gradient of sky; the distinctive rural structure on a summer roadside. The black and white pictures from these moments form a brotherhood of sorts; found on the hard drive and in the boxes of negatives, slides and prints.

This picture was from a recent bike ride (with camera) in Harwinton CT. The windmill was built 90 years ago and sits next to the former home of its namesake.

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River North From Riverton

Pausing on the bridge in Riverton CT, the Farmington River is seen curving into the woods to the north. These buildings are evidence of a long history of mills, beginning with Hitchcock chairs and a fabric printing operation in the 19th century. A short walk north along the river leads to an interpretive trail and abandoned cellars and mill walls dating to the 1840’s. Before the arrival of Europeans in the 1700’s, the river was a trade route and fishing area for Native Americans.

What interests me with the photograph is how rivers can convey a sense of place and adventure much like roads. But their stories are richer; and they span millenia, not just a few decades.

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Matthies Grove

This was taken in a grove of a well-loved white pines in the picnic area of People’s State Forest in Barkhamsted CT. The West Branch of the Farmington River divides this section of woods from American Legion State Forest on the other side. The woods are home to bears and bobcats and moose are occasionally spotted as well. This stretch of river is wild and scenic; a destination for catch-and-release fly fishing. On my bike ride around both sides of the river a few days ago, I spotted many waist-deep fishermen quietly casting into the flow.

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Lead Mine Brook

This is the first of a group of pictures from this morning: a lifting late-spring fog in an area of wetlands in Harwinton CT. All around this spot were the songs of Blue-winged Warblers. This creek is the East Branch of Lead Mine Brook.

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Vernal Surface

This photograph was taken taken two weeks ago in a secluded swampy area in Great Mountain Forest, Norfolk CT. The preserve is one of the few places in the state where there are breeding pairs of moose. Those shades of blue found in this image are favorites of mine.

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Desert Grassland

This is a recent scan of a 35mm transparency taken about twenty years ago. I was using a Contax G2 and Fuji Provia F. We’re looking at central Utah here, just northeast of Hanksville. That camera was a rangefinder; no mirrors involved. And it does appear it found a range in this instance.

Butter Knife Variations

Having not added a lens or camera to the arsenal in almost a decade, that changed yesterday with the arrival of a 25mm Panasonic Leica f1.4 lens. In the language of photography gear, that’s known as a fast normal.

I had a nice walk with it; first around the house and then in a local park. The extra stop beyond my old reliable just-shy-of-normal 20mm was a delight. So far, I’m enjoying the out of focus experience as much as the in.

Sadly, my Olympus Pen F is no longer serviced here, so a new camera may join the bag as well.

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Mojave Dusk

Joshua Tree National Park, 1994

This picture was taken on a trip to California in 1994. As was the case with the others, a square format image captured on film with a Hasselblad fixed-lens wide angle camera. What has pleased me most about these medium format resurrections is the smooth mid-range grayscale I’m finding when converting 30 year old color negatives; a result of that camera’s legendary optic.

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Needles District Landscape

Canyonlands National Park, 1993

The three districts of Canyonlands National Park protect over 330,000 acres of the Colorado Plateau; much of it designated as wilderness. I first visited this place with two companions in the summer of 1978. Memories of that remote backcountry and its extraordinary isolation have stayed with me all these years. This photo was from a later trip in ’93. Full frame image with film border to the left.

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Saguaros ii

Saguaro National Park, c 1991

This photo was taken the same day as the picture from my previous post; a warm March sunset six weeks before these cactuses typically bloom. In those days, I’d have to pick up a cooler and bags of ice to keep the film from getting ruined on hot days. And there was a second ritual of asking to have my film passed around the x-ray machine at the airport. When 120 film cameras became scarce in the 2000’s, the airport ordeal moved up to a higher level of complexity.

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Saguaros

Sagauro National Park c. 1991

The well-loved Saguaro cactus occupies a relatively small range in the Sonoran Desert (in southwest Arizona and also in Mexico along the east side of the Gulf of California). On this trip, we took a train from NYC to Albuquerque and drove into Arizona where this shot was taken. (I’m pretty sure this was also the trip when we saw a Gila Monster.) The image was captured with the Hasselblad “superwide” aka 903 SWC. Full-frame image with film border to the left.

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Cathedral Valley

Grand County UT c. 1994

This is the first of a group of scans I’m working on from unpublished film images taken around thirty years ago. This scene was just outside Capitol Reef National Park. I’ve included a file here to show the original border of the film, and on the left hand side you can make out the code notches from the Hasselblad film holder. The image was captured with a 903 SWC on 120 color negative film, and converted to black and white.

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