Before School

Instant Noodle

The last time I used a Tri-X was probably a thousand years ago.  This was taken when Alex first cooked: 2 packs of instant noodle, for himself and me.  The scan was exceptionally poor.  But who cares.

Midtown Oasis

Take Stock

Incidentally, the upside down Chinese character rightly describes what I have been going through for the last two months.

Snowstorm In NYC

Yellow Cab
My Canon P proves to be weatherproof.

Bill Cunningham of The New York Times

© 2010 laichungleung.

Canon P, Canon RF 35mm with optional viewfinder. Kodak 400NC.
Shot outside the two tents in Bryant Park where Fashion Week 2010 was taking place.  It's an orchestrated mess.

UPDATE:
I like the picture.  It works on some level because Mr. Cunningham is the only one who is looking at the camera and all others are either on their backs or look elsewhere.  He looks in focus and I think I must have set the lens at hyper focal point at f8 and 1/125 of a second and composed through the optional viewfinder.  Mr. Cunningham seemed ill at ease being taken the picture and out of respect I did not come close to him.  The man was at work.

Sean Lennon

©2010 laichungleung. If you were to use it for editorial purpose, please feel free and give attribution. Thank you.

Me the paparazzi ... Sean Lennon photographed using a 1959 Canon P, 1951 Canon RF 35mm f2.8 with optional viewfinder.  Film was Kodak NC400.

UPDATE:
I took a few pictures of him and I like this one the most.  The partially obscured face on the right doesn't bother me.  I like it as a candid.  The focusing, exposure, expression seem pretty spot on no matter none of them is automatic.  I like the fact that my estimate is on the ball park and somehow captured the moment.  The 35mm lens doesn't prevent me from getting a close up picture.  Really getting close on foot is important.  Yes, I am touting my own horn.

Picture taken outside the two tents in Bryant Park where Fashion Week 2010 was taking place.

The Lonely Branches

The world just needs another picture of snow covered tree branches because I say so.  The last picture I took before I headed back home.  That's all there is, folks.  For more pretentious black and white pictures, check back soon.

The Canon P, made in 1959 together with the 35 RF f2.8 proved blizzard worthy.  Thumbs up.

Park Bench In The Snow

I am telling you, the world just needs one more picture of a park bench.  One more, that's it.

I was thinking to crop the picture in post production--I just like this big word, POST PRODUCTION, WOW.  But I decided to leave it as it is.  I remember it was just so cold and after this I just didn't bother to take another frame.  My fingers were frozen stiff.  Actually I did take one more now that I confirm by looking at the negative strip.

The Sartorialist At Work

© 2010 All rights reserved.

Fuji Neopan 400 shot as rated and developed using Kodak HC-110 at 1:63 for 10 minutes. This is the 37th frame of the roll.  The very last frame.

UPDATE:
This pictures grows on me.  I like it.

Best Subway Line In The World

The Price Is Right

Friendly Vendor

New Yorkers are incredibly friendly.  I feel enormously thankful to strangers.
Canon RF 35mm f2.8

Sometimes, I wonder I can probably put a coke glass in front of the camera and it's still be acceptably good.  Just kidding. I used to be very very anal about how clean the lens is.  I mean I still do.  But ever since shooting these two lenses from the 1950s I guess some scratches really don't mean anything.  Bottom line is the picture.  While scanning, I notice sometimes Dust Removal is just too smart for its own good.  Sometimes, some facial features are considered as dust and the result can be strangely appalling.  I can't do this to the nice people in my pictures.

Empire State Building

Neopan 400 shot as rated. Kodak HC-110 1:63 10 minutes at 68F.

Me And My P

Me and my P. Canon RF 35mm f2.8 with 35mm optical viewfinder. The optical viewfinder is nifty. It has a focusing scale to compensate the optical discrepancy between the lens and the viewfinder. I honestly don't think it's called parallax correction. Anyway, the distance adjustment tilts the viewfinder down if focus is close and flat focus to infinity. I know some other Canon rangefinders, there's a pin on the cold shoe connected to the focusing mechanism to do just that--moving the shoe mounted optical viewfinder up and down. I mean how cool is that?

When accurate framing is not critical. When accurate focusing is replaced by hyperfocusing. Rangefinder is the way to go. I talk like as if I know what I am doing, I don't really. I just enjoy what I am doing.

Mom, Look, There Is No Lens Cap

The lens has scratches and marks and it doesn't come with a lens cap. So it's naked. The upside is I never miss a picture because I forgot to take the lens cap off.

One good thing about the P is you can easily leave the film leader out without much guessing. Once the little red eye stop spinning when you are rewinding, you know the film is out of the take up spool on the right and not yet back in the cassette cartridge. Of course, if you want to micro adjust the the length of the lead sticking out, like getting 39 or 40 exposures out of a 36 roll, then you need to be more careful. But it's really great if you process your 135 roll film. I never needed to use a can opener because I always leave the film lead out.

Pedestrians

Merry-Go-Round

Canon P Rangefinder.  Canon RF 50mm f1.8.  HC-110 diluted at 1:49 for 8 minutes.

First Roll of Black and White from P Almost Ready

My first roll coming from the P is processed and is hung up in the bathroom to air dry. I shall scan once the negative is ready. I think this time I beat my record in loading up the steel reel, it took me probably 2 minutes to load the film. I did it in one go and there was no crinkles, a very clean load. The exposure doesn't look bad either considering I was just guestimating the exposures as I shot along. The accessory meter doesn't work.

That was the good news.

Here comes the not so great news. Well it wasn't exactly bad. I found out I left the FE film advance lever open and the battery was duly drained. This had never ever happened to me in the 20 plus years that I own the camera. The battery has been in the chamber forever and it had been good for years. I remember I only changed it once all these years. And I thought it has auto power off even if I leave the lever in the open position. Oh well, you live and learn. Without battery the FE only operates at M90 and B unless I use it with my MD-12 motor drive.

Well I can always shoot my Hasselblad 500C/M and my Canon P sans battery and sans meter.

I Got My P

Canon P, probably manufactured in 1959 and the lens in 1951, finally I found some camera gears that are even older than me. Woo hoo.