Pushing Through VIII

A drainage ditch is something I had never see until I moved to San Diego. I lived in Pacific Beach for the first year and there is a large drainage ditch running through that neighborhood. In fact I drove over it every time I went to or from work. It was like a bog with very tall grasses growing there. The problem with that is that it also smells like a bog and in the summer I would drive through there with my windows open and I would pass through this massive stinking cloud of choking sulfurous stench. It was (and probably still is) a nasty little feature of the city landscape. Once we moved 5 miles east to Mira Mesa, it was quite a bit dryer. The drainage ditches here are much smaller, but they do collect debris which eventually makes a deep enough bed of substrate for something to grow it. It is another example of nature finding a way around man's design. In this case a big clump of grass has found a home.
Check out the rest of the series if you have a minute.

Pushing Through VII

See Pushing Through for an explanation of the series.

Pushing Through VI

See Pushing Through for an explanation of the series.

Pushing Through V

See Pushing Through for an explanation of the series.

Pushing Through IV

See Pushing Through for an explanation of the series.

Pushing Through III

At first glance, this looks pretty common. It's just a plant growing up through a gap in the sidewalk. But if you look a little closer, you'll see what attracted me to this particular one. First, behind the plant you can see that "they" have tried to seal up the gap with asphalt. This plant is growing in defiance of not only the sidewalk itself, but the added effort to keep nature at bay. The next thing to notice is that in fact the entire section of the concrete sidewalk is being pushed up from beneath. This is probably caused by a tree root. The roots push up and crack the concrete, then seeds get blown in and there they start to grow. I often try to imagine what things will look like in 200 years. Will man have truly mastered his environment so that his walkways are no longer damaged and 'littered' with these interlopers? Or will the plants continue to struggle and push through the concrete, reminding us that we are the intruders here? We are the ones struggling against nature. We are fighting on the side destined for failure. I want to think that we can come to some form of a 'truce' where man can allow more nature into his urban environment.


I took this photo with my Yashica Mat 124G, using Kodak T-Max 100 film. Development was in Caffenol-CL with 70min stand development. Scanned with an Epson Perfection V600. See Pushing Through for an explanation of the series.

Fern Leaves II - Errata

In my post Fern Leaves, I said, "I exposed for 1/10th of a second as metered (no compensation for filter or bellows extension)". And that is true, but that is not the meter reading for the photo I showed in that post. I took two exposures that day. One was as metered f/5.6 x 1/50th and the other one included 2.5 stops for the filter and 1/2 stop for the bellows (that was just a guess, I didn't calculate it). It came out to f/5.6 (to keep the same DOF) and 1/10th. I know that's not exactly 3 stops, but I knew the film would have enough latitude to tolerate 1/3 stop either way. I remember thinking at the time "Three stops seems like a huge difference for one little filter and a bit of bellows extension.", but I went ahead and made the exposure, just in case the experts really do know what they are talking about. I developed both negatives together using recommended times and agitation. When I took the negs out of the tank, one was 'normal' looking and the other was very very 'thin'. That is to say, it was mostly clear with just a hint of an image on it. I said to myself with a feeling of satisfaction, "See? That filter and bellows compensation is all a bunch of nonsense!" and didn't give it another thought. I didn't think it through until I went to scan the thin negative last night. Then I thought about it. A thin negative is either under exposed or under developed. I know the development was fine since all of the other negatives came out perfectly. So that must mean that the thin one was under exposed. That must have been my 1/50th exposure. The experts were right!! I really do need to add stops for the filter and the bellows extension. So, lesson learned, and it only took me one sheet of film to learn it. Even then, it's not a total waste. I threw the negative on the scanner and figured I would get something... maybe even something interesting.

What I got was what you would expect from a severely underexposed negative... grain and contrast. It is still a decent image. It just has a little more 'edge' to it than the other exposure. I thought it was an interesting 'experiment'. Go see the Filter Factor article on Wikipedia for an explanation of how it works and a good chart of different filter factors for different brands of filters.

Which version do you like better?