DIY: Enlarger lens on SLR - part 2

After the Kodak Helios lens, I've built now a new combination out of an enlarging lens and an old M42 lens.
The enlarging lens is the Schneider Kreuznach Componon 5.6/80mm and the M42 lens is the Exaktar SFX 35.

Once again I slaughtered one of mine M42 lens, but the Exaktar SFX 35 was really very difficult to use. It was very easy to combine the two lenses.








Here're some pictures made with the lens!

Here is a good DIY-instruction to adapt an enlarging lens on a SLR.

"Sou fascinada pelos momentos de transição,...

...em que as pessoas ficam paralisadas, sem saber o que querem fazer, e precisam escolher o caminho, um rumo que pode redefinir tudo."

Sofia Coppola










"momentos de transição 01-10", brasil, 2011

"If you're not interested in life,...

...then photography has no meaning."

Ruth Bernhard

"scrape the sky", germany/brasil, 2005/2011

"The hardest thing about being a photographer is,...

...you have to take pictures."

Doug Bartlow

"two angry dogs", brasil, 2010

"For me, photography has become a way...

...of attempting to make sense of the very strange world that I see around me. I don't ever expect to achieve that understanding, but the fact that I am trying comforts me."

Mikhael Subotzky

"bull dozer", brasil, 2010

Pictorialism for idiots - part 2

Yes, I know you're a little disappointed about the first part of Pictorialism for idiots!
Because actually that wasn't very necessarily correct and the photos didn't look like the Pictorialism style.
But give me one more chance, please.

Okay, thanks!
I had already edited one of the photos with Photoshop, the colors and the curves, but just a little bit:

Now I'll create a sandwich with this photo and a layer, which I've just used to edit these pictures. The layer is actually an old blotting paper, which I scanned:

You can use many things as layer, for example photos of structures, different types of paper, etc., follow your creativity, but please NOT USE MY LAYER! ;)
Of course you must try as it works best, for example modify the opacity, change the layer settings (normal, multiply, overlay, etc.), color or b/w etc.

At the end it could look like this:

Still not really the Pictorialism style?

DIY: Flash Bouncer / Diffusor

The light of a flash is very hard, therefore many firms make wonderful flash-equipment like bouncer, diffusor, etc. for their flashes. But it's going to cost whatever it costs.


For everything there is a DIY-instruction, like these for a bouncer and for a diffusor.
So why should we spend money for it?

1. just paper (and scotch tape to fix the paper):



2. 2-in-1 bounce card (one side: white paper / other side: kitchenfoil):



3. transparent plastic (from a Fuji-35mm-filmbox):

Pictorialism for idiots!

"ins unscharfe", brasil, 2011

Pictorialism was a movement in the history of photography with great photographers like Stieglitz, Steichen, Coburn, Käsebier, Kühn, Eugene, the Brothers Hofmeister, Demachy and many others.
Many of the pictures have got a smooth effect like from the soft focus lenses, actually the lenses in this time weren't very sharp:

"Kühn geht es um die optischen und chemischen Mittel, die ihm ermöglichen, seinen subjektiven Augeneindruck treffend wiederzugeben. Aus Experimenten mit der Monokellinse erwächst die spätere Konstruktion des Weichzeichners 'Imagon'; ein Objektiv, das sich heute wieder großer Beliebtheit erfreut. Der Soft-Focus-Effekt, von Kühn zur Erlangung des idealen Negativs benutzt, führt zur 'unscharfen Richtung' in der Kunstphotographie."

- from "Kunstfotografie um 1900 in Deutschland und ihre Beziehungen zum Ausland" by Fritz Kempe in "Kunstfotografie um 1900 in Deutschland", p.4, exhibition catalog, Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen and author, Stuttgart and Hamburg 1982.

But the avant-garde movement in the 1920s didn't like the old-school Pictorialism, which this harsh criticism of Sasha Stone illustrates:

"In den letzten Jahren hat sich ein Stil entwickelt, hervorgerufen durch verschiedene Mängel der Objektive. Es hat sich herausgestellt, dass bei einer gewissen Entfernung manche Gegenstände unscharf, gewissermaßen verschleiert werden und dadurch ihre präzise Form verlieren. Es wird somit der Phantasie des Beschauers anheim gestellt, die Form zu erraten. Dieses Rätselhafte wurde als ein gewisser künstlerischer Stil aufgefasst und von vielen Photographen aufgenommen und entwickelt. So wurde ein weicher, sanfter, liebenswürdiger Stil kreiert, der die Mittel vergewaltigt hat. Sehr bald wurde jedoch erkannt, dass dieser Weg falsch ist, und ein anderer Weg, ein geistigerer, wenn man so sagen darf, eingeschlagen."

- from "Photo-Kunstgewerbereien" by Sasha Stone in "Das Kunstblatt", Heft 3, p.86, 1928 and in Eckhardt Köhn (Ed.): "Sasha Stone - Fotografien 1925 - 39", p.95, Serie Folkwang, Verlag Dirk Nishen, Berlin 1990.

Today you can photograph like them (if you have the equipment) or create a similar look with Photoshop.

But hey, we want an easier way. And this way is really the simplest one. Or am I being simplistic?

Like Robert Demachy said:
"Wer sich nur auf das Objektiv verlässt, der kehrt der Kunst den Rücken."

- from "Kunstfotografie um 1900 in Deutschland und ihre Beziehungen zum Ausland" by Fritz Kempe in "Kunstfotografie um 1900 in Deutschland", p.8, exhibition catalog, Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen and author, Stuttgart and Hamburg 1982.

You just need a DSLR or an EVIL camera and a 10x15cm (or smaller / or bigger) c-print or b/w-print.
Certainly you scan your analog prints with a normal scanner, but there the prints are flat.
But we don't want flat pictures, we want tension!
You have to band the print, this is all, 'cause thereby the flat print gets a three-dimensionality.
That's awesome, 'cause the camera cannot lie, but in fact the contrary is the case.

1. vertical curved:



two versions after Photoshop:


2. horizontal curved:




3. photographed at an angle from above:





There are of course many different angles from which you can photograph the print. Just try!

see part 2