As planned, we did
find a really nice camping spot in Caribou National Forest, Wyoming. Waking up next to a beautiful
little brook babbling through a grove of aspens, I got inspired to make an 8x10 tintype. Then, not satisfied, fired up daguerreotype equipment and made a little 1/6th plate (sorry for the copy quality below on that one).
To give some context to the travels, here’s not only the
plates made there, but also some photos of our camping spot. We were thinking of setting up a tent a
little into the forest, 5ft in from the meadow.
We looked around pretty carefully at the flat spot there, but then decided to
be closer to the fire pit and Gilli. Well, to our
surprise, in the morning, right where we wanted to set up at first and maybe 15ft from were we slept, there was a very
sizable freshly dug borough, which some animal, judging by the size probably
badger, decided to make into their home in the middle of the night.
Then we continued our northward progression toward Grand
Teton National Park. We stopped at Bridger Teton National Forest, at a high
overlook by Snake River. It was too
nice, so I took out the banquet B&J camera and made a 7x17in plate and
Jozlynn also made a 4x5. After not
pouring for a while she did great.
While driving Gilli-the-bus, every once in a while, it’s a
good thing to pull over and stretch, which is perfect for hopping from one
photographic location to another. Western
Wyoming is beautiful country and next quick stop was at National Elk Refuge to
shoot two 4x5s at Green River Basin.
From there it wasn’t far to the foothills of Grand Tetons. Pulling into a campground, I noticed that the
light was getting toward dusk and the scene right behind our parking spot was
nice, so it didn’t take long to make this view.
In fading twilight, my exposure was around 2min f22.
Next morning was spent shooting Tetons from a couple
locations. First 8x10 was challenging
because I decided to shoot it from Gillis roof.
After not having climbed onto the roof in years, it took a bit to find
the easiest way up and down, but I think the view was worth it; there were
small trees along the road, which would have greatly changed the frame.
After a quick stop at Jenny Lake I went looking for a good
spot to set up for a while and make a daguerreotype. It was early afternoon and all parking was
taken, especially if one is looking for a spot for a 35ft bus. Finally, I spotted a tiny lot with 10min
parking spots by a campground entrance.
There was a guard ranger, watchfully relaxing in the shade inside his
ATV at the entrance to the lot. As I rolled
by him into the lot, he came alive and gave me a mellow turn-around signal, to
which I gave an uncertain nod of agreement. Behind him though, I turned
around in just such a manner that I was lined up perfectly in a thick shade of some
tall pines, while not blocking any of the parking spots, being clear of the
gate leading to camp sites, and away from the cabin, where the actual
campground attendant lady held her post, so basically an ideal parking spot. Leaving the bus running, I walked up to the
ranger and gave him my best sales pitch for why he should let me remain parked
in what basically amounted to being part of the middle of the road. There were
a few moments where I thought I might lose him, but in the end art prevailed
and he admitted that it’s not often that he’d be able to allow for a creation
of a daguerreotype. As I pulled out the
long cord for the generator (dreading firing it up amid such natural splendor),
I heard a friendly voice of the campground lady asking me if I’d like to plug
straight into the outlet in her mini-cabin.
Score! I stayed there for a bit,
polishing some extra plates for the future and making the following dag. The
air was hazy from all the summer wildfires burning in neighboring areas, so
afternoon light created a glow that I wanted to capture as best as possible. Again, dags are super hard to photograph with an iPhone, so I'll have to copy it well when I get back...
In the morning, we were in Yellowstone already and wow, what
a place. We didn’t have a lot of time to
spend there as we had to be on the way to Bismarck, but we did see the Old
Faithful go off at about noon and then just drove about a bit and headed out
the eastern side. We both agreed that
we’ll have to come back for a bit longer. On the way out, I did pull over a few times
for some plates and here are some of them.
One of the stops included three attempts at imaging a beautiful large
elk, lounging in tree-scattered sun about 20 yards from the road. Exposures were perfect, but it was super late
in the evening and they had to be 8 sec each – during the one exposure when the
animal was actually at its stillest, a ranger came by behind me to tell me to
move back a bit and the elk moved because of that – darn… I didn’t copy those plates at the time, so
you’ll probably see them in the trip recap post in a few weeks.
Road leading east
from Yellowstone leads along the windy North Fork of Shoshone River and the
cliffs around it are truly unique. Even
though it was getting late, I couldn’t help but to stop and go for another
8x10. For some reason, I decided to go
with black glass this time and when I was taking it out of the silver bath it
slipped from my hand and was about to land face down into the sink. In the slit-second decision I grabbed it by
the corner with a very contaminated glove, scraping off some collodion in the
process and adding god knows how many of what type of chemicals to the
surface. At that point, I assigned that
plate to be my exposure test, thinking I’ll wipe it later, so after making the
exposure I wasn’t as attentive to details as usual while developing it,
creating yet more artifacts. From the
fixer though emerged a rather interesting image, but I didn’t have time to
decide whether or not it’s a keeper, so I did a cleaner tintype of same
composition. When looking at them next
to each other I thought that the ambrotype and all its collodion markings had
its charm, so I decided to varnish them both.
We made it all the way to Billings by the night. When checking into the hotel room there was a
small bizarre incident. During the long
drive, we made reservations in a chain hotel we know all too well and got there
pretty late. Well, to begin with,
there’s two of those hotels in Billings - one directly across the dug-up road,
with potholes the size of a county fair watermelon, from the other. Of course, we tried checking into the wrong
one first, but that’s beside the point.
Upon arrival to the correct one, we were checked in as usual, and given
two electronic key cards to the room. As
I slid the key in and out of the lock I saw a yellow light flash; not the happy
accepting green or the flat-out rejecting red.
Door wouldn’t open though. Try
again, again yellow. Darn, let’s go
back to the front desk. Attendant was
very apologetic and programmed a new set of keys. With those though - same yellow light! In frustration and after a long drive I tried
sliding the card in and out and jiggling the door handle a few times in a row
expecting a different result I guess (I think heard that’s a sign for
something…). Right as I gave up and
rather suddenly, the door opens from the inside and a sleepily suspicious man
in bed-wear appears though a crack.
Shocked, I mumbled a quick sorry and backed down, forgetting to find out
why he is in a room we were hoping to soon be resting in. The hotel lady seemed surprised, but somehow
not exactly shocked as she checked and saw that the room is indeed listed as
vacant in the system. While being very
courteous, she actually offered to comp us a room for the night, which I
quickly accepted; hey, you can’t argue with a free room. She went to refund me the charges, and in the
course of short time-passing conversation mentioned that this was the second such
incident that night, meaning there’s at least two rooms in that hotel occupied
by nobody knows who. What’s going on,
Billings?
A few days prior, I
noticed I was running low on acetic acid – integral part of wet plate
developer. I have about two gallons of
it back in San Diego, but it appears that with me I only brought the small
bottle of 100ml, nowhere near enough… In
Billings, I went to mix up whatever I could with the 6-7ml I had left, hoping
to find a place to buy more in the morning.
As I went to turn on the scale to measure out iron sulfate, the scale
display flickered in an unusual manner and the apparatus bit the dust. Great, now I have no wet plate developer and
can’t mix gilding solution for dags either.
Now there were two missions to complete – scale and acetic… I turned to social media for advice and was
directed to a camera shop. Along with
that, someone suggested a place that supplied hobby chemists, which is where I
did in the morning procure both items needed (and the scale is best I’ve worked
with so far). A camera shop though is
something I can never stay away from, so before moving east a stop there was a
must. Camera Cottage is what it’s called
and it’s a great place to stop by if you’re in the area. There’s a ton of film-related stuff with
some excellently eccentric items, including, according to the owner, the one
and only prototype 5x7 Burke and James made for a photo fair of 1897! The thing sure did look real and really cool
too. I have been loving my 8x20 of
course and have always admired their field cameras. Even though they aren’t most compact or
finely-finished, they offer the most movements of any camera I know and are
extremely sturdy. Well, one of the
things that caught the corner of my eye as I came into the shop was a
collapsible negative retouching table.
It was the kind which were made from all the way back in 1870s and I’ve
had a number of them, and kept one good one for use, so I didn’t pay particular
attention to it until making a full circle around the counter and back to the
table it was on. After it was in my
direct line of sight though, I noticed something was different. As I closed in, I noticed hardware I’ve never
seen before, certain features that were greatly improved or strengthened, and
even true opal glass instead of ordinary clear or matte. Also, the thing looked brand new! Sure enough – it was a brand new old stock
example by our favorite Burke and James!
I never even knew they made them and I have browsed many B&J
catalogs (that’s my idea of fun, don’t judge me). And next to it on the table is an instruction
and maintenance manual! The mirror is
still protected my three layers of original packing tape, but to my dismay the
owner admitted to throwing away the original box. He said it crumbled to dust every time one
touched it and he’s an old-school shooter who knows his stuff, so I have no
reason to doubt that the box was unsalvageable.
In either case – here is my new Burke and James Heavy Duty Retouching
Desk Model 11. Made for US Air Force in
January 1959, this one is serial number 110 and has Spec MIL-E-4743 (USAF). Contract number was AF33 (600)-38272 and I
would love to know how many units that contract for calling for and also if B&J
made Model 11 outside of special contracts…
Any help is appreciated!
It’s a long drive from Billings to Bismarck, and in a 40-year
old bus it’s even longer, so the rest of that day was spent driving. I did want to break up the haul and make a
plate or two. I picked out a town on the
map by the name of Forsyth since it was about as far as I can drive in one
shot. Looking at the layout of town one
can see a promising little park by a river – potentially a promising
photographic location. As it turns out
the park is mainly wild growth and the road cutting through it all is basically
two tire tracks through grass. I drove
all the way to the river, saw there was nothing there, made a 5-point u-turn,
and started heading back. The sun was
going down and the road just looked too idyllic, so I stopped and made two
plates literally looking forward and back down the road. Here’s the one looking forward.
In Bismarck, we were
visiting Shane Balkowitsch – wet plate photographer whom I visited on my 2013
trip. Back then we were both rather new
to the process and so we kept in touch and formed a comradery on the basis of
that and our mutual love for silver. Since our first encounter Shane has really
took off in terms of his productivity and quality and has gotten so deep into
it that he built himself a beautiful large north light studio right in his back
yard. That is where I parked. In the morning, I made a daguerreotype of
Shane in front of his studio and then we shot a couple of quick portrait of
each other in wet plate. Shane had a
full schedule and this all had to be accomplished while he was being
interviewed for a documentary and having his image taken by a local photography
for a kallotype print, plus he had to leave on family-related matters by
3pm. In the rush of things, I totally
forgot to make my usual phone copies of the plates, but here’s one of the
portraits I did of Shane that he has scanned and one of his plates of yours
truly.
Bismarck was the
farthest northeast point of the trip, so from there we headed back southwest. Jozlynn wanted to see Mt. Rushmore and, as an
American citizen, I could not in all consciousness deny such a request, so we went
for a drive to see big heads on rock. On
the way, we stopped for a night in some unmemorable town (though the lighting
show of a quick passing by thunderstorm will I hope remain vivid in my
mind).
Next day the photo
gods smiled upon me a bit. There was an
antique shop in one of the tiny towns we passed through on the way south, and something
compelled me to go in. The place, as
most small town antique shops, was stuffed to the ceiling with junk of no
particular interest. There was a display
case with cameras, but all were worth about $20 for the lot. Behind the display case with cameras though,
there was a tall cabinet with a myriad bottes and I’m always on a lookout for
certain old photography-related bottles (no luck so yet on those…). Among those I started noticing old chemistry
bottles, still partly filled with original contents. To my delight, I soon spotted a half-way full
1lb jar of potassium ferricyanide – a chemical used in Farmer’s Reducer, which in
turn is helpful in correcting certain mishaps with collodion in terms of
exposure and such. I try to use it as
rarely as I can, but it’s good to know it’s there and I discovered not too long
ago that I forgot my crystals in San Diego, only brining a small premixed
bottle that was running out. The
contents of this ancient bottle I found may be a bit rocky, but it’s working
just fine.
Mt. Rushmore is a pretty neat work of art, but
really needs to be photographed in late morning, and we were there in late
afternoon so the light was all but gone from the faces. Still, I now feel a tinge more patriotic than
ever before.
Big Heads happen to
be located in the Black Hills of South Dakota, which, incidentally, is where
the hero of a song by the name of Rocky Raccoon supposedly lived and died for
his love. I’ve fancied finding his home
since I was a kid in Russia, learning English by translating Beatles
lyrics. Black Hills are amazing and,
even though after driving around for a day and shooting 10 plates we I didn’t
find Rocky’s home or the local saloon he had a room in, it was a great
experience and I really can’t wait to properly copy those plates.
From there we headed
west on I-90 toward Yellowstone. At a
stop in a small town, I was messaging with someone and said that I was bummed to
not have visited Devils Tower. It’s one
of the rock formations that have always looked very intriguing to me in
pictures. For some reason, I thought it was
farther to the east, but imagine my joy when I saw signs for Devils Tower exit
not long after getting on the freeway!
Next stop was decided that second.
The site is not far off I-90, and we actually made it there just as the
sun disappeared behind the horizon. I
tried making a dusk plate, but basically ended up with almost a night-time
representation of it with silhouetted trees and didn’t go for the second one
because the mosquitoes were out in droves, plus the light was gone
altogether. Not far back we saw an
outcropping of teepees on a barren hillside with a ‘camp in a teepee’ sign by
the driveway. That notion seemed novel,
so we found our way back and were greeted at the gate by a very friendly owner,
Juliana, who spends her summers there and winters in Sonoma County, California. Her rates are rather reasonable and the
teepees are great and very comfy, if you’re passing through there I’d recommend
the experience, the place is maybe 5-10 miles south of Devils Tower Park
entrance. We got to talking with the
owner and she was very excited about tintypes, so in the morning I made a
tintype for her and asked for her assistance in making the plate below, which
Jozlynn recommended we do.
Devils Tower in the
morning turned out to be pretty much what I expected – really spectacular and
odd and also overran with tourists. What
I didn’t expect though is how hard it would be to shoot it and have the image
translate the geology of it, while also retaining some level of detail in the
foreground. This thing is tall and so
hazy blue and all the greenery around it is super dark, so translates really
dark in collodion… To top it off, after
about 11pm a whole bunch of large fluffy clouds came by, so direct sunlight
became very sporadic, and when there’s no sun the Tower looks totally
lifeless. I did shoot a few plates that
were to my liking in 3 locations and here’s a couple of them.
The fields of southwestern corner of Montana are relatively monotonous and seem to go forever and a half, but at sunset, about 5mi south of a small town by the name of Broadus, right off a two-lane rural highway 212, a tree, which stretched proudly from a tiny mirror-like pond, strongly called my attention, causing me to turn around and make this 8x10, which was copied in very late sunset light, thus the orange cast.
Next day was
Gilli-the-Bus day – she’s been due for a tuneup for a while now and I decided
to do it back in Billings, MT and take a day off from picture-making. Gilli turned 40 earlier this year and yeah,
she needs attention, which translates into extra expenses that come in
unexpected chunks of amounts, varying from somewhat painful to outright astronomical. This time it wasn’t as bad as it could have
been, but a transmission switch wiring was playing tricks with me recently, and
diagnostics of that plus other minor things pushed sting from the bill into a
solidly ouch territory. Gilli needs it
though, she’s a real trooper. Oh, Gilli
is also apparently carnivorous – I was standing next to the mechanic who worked
on her when he opened a large drum containing a huge circular air filter for
the beastly engine next to it. To our
surprise, we saw a dried up remains of a small bird that must have been sucked
up, into there through the upward-facing intake somewhere along the way. I don’t even know how long it’s been there – the
air filer looked like it was neglected by the few previous waves of mechanics
going through the motions of oil changes.
Back to Yellowstone
in a freshly-lubed bus we went. When I
pulled off the freeway to get onto a local two-lane and saw a huge refinery,
glistening with steel in the last rays of a setting sun behind us, I couldn’t resist
trying to make one tintype for the day.
I had to act quick as the light was fading like someone was operating a
dimmer switch. As I ran out to the
tripod with a plate in hand, the railyard guys decided to start switching the
barrels on tracks and set in motion a train of oil barrels that was crucial to
my composition. Not only that, but two
agonizing minutes later they stopped it smack in front of my camera, blocking
half of the refinery. Ok I though, I’ll
just make this plate to say it was done.
At that moment a truck pulls up and a security guard starts informing me
that my photographic efforts are not exactly welcomed at this location. The conversation started polite and friendly,
so I felt I could prolong it for the duration needed for an exposure. While amid a detailed explanation of what
photography as an art form is all about and how Gilli fits into that in
particular, I pulled out the dark slide and pulled opened the lens. The light was gone and I was at f14 (old wide
angle lens – that’s as wide as it goes…, really wish I would have brought the
90mm 4.5 Nikkor-SW…). After a
two-minute monologue (timed roughly in my mind by how many times I can mention
silver in my lecture), I replaced the cap and wrapped up by apologizing and promising
to be off their property as soon as chemistry is put away, which was the honest
truth. Here’s that plate, should have
extended the lecture by another minute for an extra ½ stop exposure, maybe he
would have liked to know about the efforts of certain people to revive autochrome…
We stayed in
Yellowstone for two days this time – still nowhere near enough, but there were
some neat plates made and we also saw a bison.
One of the enormous and shaggy creatures was exactly as you always hear
about of them – in the middle of the road at night, trying to cause a crash…). After
narrowly avoiding a head-on collision, I woke up Jozlynn and we turned around
to drive alongside the trotting beast for a bit.
We then headed to Glacier National Park, but it’s quite a
drive, so it took us better part of next day to get close to it. Along the way, I did see a river to pull over
by and make some plates. It was hotter
than usual, and I didn’t feel like going all the way to 8x10, so here's of the 5x7s from there. The air was incredibly
still, which is bad for staying cool, but great for exposures – the blades of
grass held perfectly still during the 10 second exposure.
After spending the night nearby Glacier National Park, Saturday morning we headed in. It’s truly a beautiful place, but with Gilli there’s restrictions. From the southern entrance, with a vehicle 21ft or over, one can only go 16 miles into the park, plus the road is very narrow and runs along a steep mountain, so pullouts are scarce, and more than half of those that seemed to have been there were under construction. Still, I drove a few miles to turn around, when I spotted a patch of dirt just wide enough to where right tires were about a centimeter over the edge of a steep river bank and my left ones were just touching the pavement. Gilli ended up leaning about 10 degreed starboard, and the first step was 4ft down from the stairs, leading directly into thicket. In that precariously perched position I proceeded to produce five 8x10s. Here’s one of the plates and the Zone VI 8x10 with Schneider Symmar 360 5.6 during exposure.
I think I made a few
5x7s later as well, but I’ll have to see when I do the final count. What I recall now, is that we spent the night
at a very nice nearby RV park (those are nice because they are perfect for
Gilli and to varnish in peace), where I was informed by a friendly Romanian truck
driver neighbor that one of my break lights was out, so I better get it fixed
asap. Two days prior to this, I took
what the maps app promised to be a score of a little shortcut. That 3.5-mile road ended up being the
bumpiest surface I’ve ever seen. From
about 300 yards away from the highway, to within the same distance from the
other it joined, the road felt like a rough Halloween amusement park ride. That ride shook Gilli up pretty good. Break light went out, the examination light
above my sink in the darkroom (very important!) went out and another thing was
getting ready to go out, but more of that soon.
Sunday, we were back
in Glacier, but a fire has sprung up overnight on one of the mountains, so
visibility was even worse than it already has been the whole trip. To top it off, it got really windy, so the
plate I was really excited about turned out only marginally sharp even after
three attempts; the subjects were just too animated by the airflow… The clouds turned out great, but even in them
you can see movement during 4sec exposure.
After that I did make a decent 5x7, so that made up for the initial
frustration with the 8x10. Here they
both are.
On our way back from
Glacier National Park, we stopped by Photographer’s Formulary, in a tiny town
of Condon. They have been a chemical supply
staple in the world of analog photography for 40 years now and you can read
about my first visit there on this 2013 entry. They are great folks and lead many amazing workshops, with a bed and
breakfast located on an idyllic farm. I
recommend them not only for photo stuff, but even if you’re just going up to
that part of the country for skiing or fly fishing. I wanted to say hi, plus I needed some more
acetic acid. It just so happened that
Monday they had a workshop running and there were 12 students along with the teacher
there. Imagine my surprise when 3 of
them turned out to be people from San Diego and Los Angeles whom I knew personal. One of them I helped build a wet plate
darkroom and one I went to school with in the 90s and a year or two back made a
daguerreotype of. What a small world. For a second there it was a like a little
reunion and I made a 5x7 group portrait for the good folks at Photo Formulary. Then, amid relentless heat, Jozlynn had an idea of making a portrait of her with one of the horses. It took two tries and a lot of running from the parking spot to the stables, but here's the resulting 5x7 - poured and developed by Jozlynn, camera operation by yours truly.
…
Not too long of a
wait, eh? Gilli started up like a champ,
pumping air at record speed, so I think that valve must have been unscrewed too
far from the very start since he’s definitely building pressure faster now The motel we were staying in apparently didn’t
have wifi and neither did the entire town of St. Regis (at least not one I
could get into to upload this), so I’m continuing for just a bit.
The town of St.
Regis was really kind to me though this time around. While I was sitting outside my motel room, a
full size converted school bus pulled up and the driver struck up conversation
with me based on our shared bus-ownership.
Upon finding out that I do old photography and use old equipment, he
asked me if I have use for an old wooden tripod. I can’t say no to offers like that, so he
proceeded to go into the back of his rig and dug out what turned out to be a
1940s Otto Engineering tripod, a lightweight model that is almost exactly like
the early Model A Reis tripods, but with a much more user-friendly leg locking
system. No head, but who cares – they are
great legs and I’ll put something on there.
Next though we went
to the post office right across the street from the motel, and next door to the
antique shop where years ago I bought a tintype (those are the only two
buildings on that side of the street). I
mailed off a few things to happy buyers, but for some reason something kept
pulling me over to the antique shop the whole time I was at the counter and I
even darted over there without waiting for Jozlynn to finish her mailing
business. The antique shop is
medium-sized, with 3 good size rooms, but as I entered my eye immediately
shifted right, toward a china cabinet on along the wall on a semi-dim side of
the shop. In there, behind glass I saw
three cameras – some random later plastic-body Canon 35mm and next to it a
Yashicamat 124G and Rolleiflex! I’ve
been a Rollei fan for about 20 years now and at some point had an healthy
collection of them going, so I didn’t need to look too close to see that it’s
their latest all-mechanical F model and, even though the lens cap was on, I
knew by the size of the cap that the taking lens was f2.8. When I saw the price tag I really felt my
heart skip a beat (very strange feeling actually, don’t know how to describe it…). Upon examination, both cameras were working
flawlessly (controls on Rollei are a bit stiff, but they’ll work out) and
lenses were super clear (though the Rollei has a few tiny scratches from
careless storage or cleaning, but they are super small and won’t affect the
image in any way). The sum for both
cameras tabulated and then I asked if there’s any break she could give me – the
number I had in mind was actually higher than the discount she offered, so I
didn’t continue negotiations and happily pulled the plastic. I now am once
again a proud owner of a 2.8F Planar Rollei – I think it was universe’s way of
saying I shouldn’t have sold the one I had before. I’ll probably pass on the Yashicamat to
someone else, since I’m a Rollei man through and through.
I felt an urge to explore
the surrounding areas a bit more, so out of St. Regis I decided to take a small
local highway going west, rather than getting back onto I-90. The highway was boring, so I jumped left onto
an even smaller local road that cuts over the mountains and there, while
cruising at Gilli’s usual mountain speed of a turtle, I spotted a small creek
that really called for a plate. It was
hot…. Darkroom was 95°F and I didn’t
have time to cool it down as the light was fading fast. The first horizontal wide angle plate turned
out just how I wanted it, but I did struggle with the second one – the fog was
relentless and I had to bleach it later to make it looks like it does now,
which I think is rather acceptable and even neat.
We spent the night
in a sweet little mountain-top forest spot in Idaho and now I’m really going to
upload all of this from a coffee shop in Spokane, Washington.
Anton
Anton
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