Alright, 2020, so I have to say that this blog, at least in its current iteration dates back ten years now, that’s right, ten. I had kept a blog here before then, however that go lost when a server hard drive failed. And while since then this blog and site have been hosted on at least two other servers and one move, I’m actually pleased I have been doing this blog thing for ten years now. Let’s just call it ten because it’s my blog and I can do as I please. But of course, I couldn’t have gotten to this point without you, myRead More →

When it comes to the specialised films out there, I’ll admit my knowledge is pretty grey. But there is also a particular challenge to making such a film work in general use photography. And having worked with various Eastman films from 5363, 2366, and 2238 I felt confident that I could make this Fuji film stock work. So what exactly is Fuji Recording Film Eterna-RDS Type 4791? According to Fuji’s website, Eterna-RDS 4791 is a black and white film intended for making archival black and white separations from colour digital masters for a digital separation workflow using a film recorder. The film is Fuji’s versionRead More →

Roxanne! You don’t have to put out a red light…but in the case of the darkroom, it might be a good idea. Yes, the gang spends an afternoon in the darkroom pumping out prints. Including for Bryan his first darkroom print ever! Darkroom Printing While we have talked about darkroom work in the past, we’ve never actually done an episode where we’ve printed then sat down around the table to talk about the successes, failures, papers, techniques. And more importantly, introducing Bryan to the wonderful albeit sometimes frustrating joy of seeing your print come up on paper for the first time. After this recording, BryanRead More →

When it comes to the names of the Fathers of Confederation, those men who attended the conferences at Charlottetown and Quebec, most Canadians can only list a handful, or just one. That name is Sir John A. MacDonald. And while MacDonald certainly made a name for himself in his roll in what could almost be seen as bullying the other Provinces into Confederation, we often will overshadow the man who could almost be considered the architect of Confederation, George Brown. The eldest son of six, born to Peter and Marianne Brown on the 29th of November 1819 in Clackmannan, Scotland. George grew up among theRead More →

When it comes to game-changing cameras there is nothing more iconic than the Olympus OM-1, it ushered in the small format for the SLR world, and not to be outdone by Olympus, Pentax released their versions of the small SLR, the first two being the MX and the ME. But the ME had a lot of limitations including the lack of a manual mode, enter the ME Super. I’ve had both a ME and ME Super come through my collection in the past, one went to a friend (not sure if she still uses or even has it) and the ME Super met its endRead More →

When it comes to Kodak’s film catalogue, there are many films in it that we have never seen much of in North America. Among those, the one that confused me the most was ProImage 100. Despite the name, Kodak documents in no way claim that ProImage 100 is a professional film, but then again what makes a professional film? Maybe because it does not come in sheet film format, like Ektar and Portra? That said, I feel ProImage 100 is a great film to shoot in a professional setting, the soft contrast, excellent colour rendition, and slow speed make it a fantastic hybrid of PortraRead More →

When it comes to political change in Canadian history, there has always been two behind any major change. Robert Baldwin and Louis La Fontaine for example, and while George Brown would play a major role it would be George-Étienne Cartier who would provide political support to John A MacDonald but ensure that French-Canadien culture would not be lost. Born the 6th of September 1814 in Sainte-Antonie-sur-Richelieu in Lower Canada. Baptised with the name George in honour of King George III. But George’s family already had a long history in the new world, even claiming relation to Jacques Cartier (although there is no evidence to supportRead More →

We here at the CCR have discussed the iconic Hasselblad camera system before and were to be rather honest rather critical on the system. But we didn’t dig too deeply into the camera’s history from it’s beginnings to where it has gone to date. That system is the V-System (formerly 500-Series), and today to help us dig into the camera’s history is two guests from Photoklassic International, Marwan Mozayen and Charys Schuler. As a company, Hasselblad was not always in the photographic industry. Started in 1841 the F.W. Hasselblad & Co. began as a trading company importing household goods into Sweeden which included sewing materialRead More →

It should come as no surprise that at the mention of Sir John A MacDonald, you get a lot of negative feedback. He managed to in his time attract a lot of controversies. Like his law career, he drew as much positive attention as he does negative today. Born the 11th of January 1815 in Glasgow, Scotland, the son of a somewhat successful business owner by age five he and his family had immigrated to Canada settling in Kingston, Upper Canada. While his father continued to see moderate success in running various mills and businesses, most of the family income would go towards John’s education.Read More →

If you think this Portra 800 is a new film, then you’d be wrong. There’s used to be a huge range of Portra films, but today there are only three films in the Portra range. Still, Portra 800 is overshadowed by Portra 160 and Portra 400. I mean, I had heard some talk about Portra 800, but always dismissed it as one of the older films and stuck with Portra 400 and pushing it to ASA-800 when I needed that extra boost. And I can honestly say I used to tell people to not bother with the film stock. But after shooting it, I’m gladRead More →