The Swing

Having been a photographer for almost 45 years now, the vast majority of my images (to this point) were made on film.  Although I tried many different types of 35mm and 120mm roll film over the years, I shot almost exclusively with Tri-X (ASA 400) black & white film.  I preferred the grain patterns of the film and wanted the faster film speed for the type of shooting situations that I encountered.  In those days I bought Tri-X film in 100 foot rolls and rolled it myself into 36 exposure cartridges.

These photos were taken with a 35mm Bessler Topcon, Nikkormat FTN, a couple of Nikon F-2's, and a Nikon N8008 that were my main cameras in those days.  The lenses I used varied from wide angle, micro, fixed length, and telephoto lenses but I have to say one of my all time favorites was my 80-200mm f4.5 Nikon lens which I still have today.  The zoom is a little "loose" now from the sheer number of photos taken with it but it always produced sharp images and was a pleasure to use. 

As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I have been steadily scanning in my color slides and black & white negatives and have managed to scan in many of my favorite images.  In fact, many of the images in my "Vintage Images" gallery continue to hang on the walls of my home to this day.  I thought I would share these images with you at this point so that you might enjoy them also.  As you look at these images remember that the grain you might see is from the film itself and not some plug-in effect applied over a digital image.   I feel that the mood and textures of a black & white silver based image are not easily captured or duplicated in this age of sensors and pixels. 

Mark