MUST WATCH: Nuclear Detonations, 1945 - 1998

if0x — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 09:16:51 GMT

This YouTube vid needs a post to itself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfpQNfcRE1o

Isao Hashimoto's Time-Lapse animation of nuclear explosions, 1945 - 1998.

Lomography

if0x — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 12:23:31 GMT

aome asked me what LOMO was, and what I liked about it.

So, when I say LOMO, I mean (one of) my (two) LOMO LC-A(s):

The LC-A was originally made, in the 1980s, by the Russian LOMO camera company, and was a shameless clone of a Japanese 35mm basic point and shoot compact, the Cosina CX-1. Because of poor quality control/finesse, results from these Russian beasts weren't always of startling high fidelity, but they had a sort of beguiling quality to them. Anyway, LOMO ceased production of the LC-A in the... 1990s?

Some time later (so the tale goes), a group of Marketing Students (the 'marketing' bit there is important) discovered the original LC-A whilst on holiday in Russia somewhere, and liked the results it produced, and eventually commissioned a Chinese manufacturer to clone the device. This is what I have: a Chinese reproduction of a Russian clone of a Japanese 35mm compact from the 1980s.

It's manual focus (that lever on the right switches the focus point from 0.8m to 1.5m, to 3m to infinity: those are the only options), and the lens is a fixed wide-angle, at 32mm.

As promised, here are some of the pics it takes; just to emphasise, there's absolutely NO photoshop in any of the following:

This is the counterweight to a footbridge near The Deep, in Hull. The yellow really 'pops' in this pic, and gives a hint of the other-worldliness that infects LOMO shots.

The LC-A does absolutely stunning things to skies, as demonstrated in this pic taken at Driffield Kite Festival. This is actually slide film, cross-processed (xpro) to pretend it was colour print film. This amps up the contrast, and accentuates the colours.

More xpro'd slide film, this a sign on one of the roads near The Farm. This land may indeed be green and pleasant, but it's not really that green.

This is the back of an absolutely beautiful VW Beetle, LOMO stylee.

A vintage tractor - note the red, red, red and the blue, blue, blue (I'm rather pleased with this one, even though it meant rolling around on the ground beneath it to get the angle!).

fastcub walking Mali; most of the time, I tend to try and accentuate the distortion that the 32mm lens gives when used close to subjects, but here's a more general landscapy shot.

A tunnel on the A55 near Bangor - the LOMO will keep the shutter open for as long as it feels necessary to get enough light. I had no idea how long it was going to expose this shot for, but I like the end result.

This was the flattest day imaginable on Bangor pier, but because I was, firstly, cross-processing again, and secondly, using a LOMO, events conspired to ramp everything to the max...

Focusing at short distances (read 0.8m) is hard (you have no guide/focussing screen or anything): eventually, I settled on stretching out my arm and pointing at the subject. If the subject was then about 2 inches beyond my index finger, it should be in focus. This is a beach groyne at Criccieth, in North Wales.

Different slide films give different results when cross-processed. Kodak Elitechrome gives those punchy colours and extreme contrast of the pics above. Fuji Sensia, on the other hand, red/purple/orange shifts, to give surreal shots like this one of the University library.

Reflections in a shop window's mirrored blind in Caernarfon.

Weird lighthouse thingy at Paull Nature Reserve, against a LOMO'd blue sky.

Again using Fuji Sensia, this time demonstrating red-shift, this is in the overgrown cemetery just around the corner from Castle Fox.

Albany Street, off Spring Bank in Hull, has these amazing wire-frame polar bear sculptures, in reference to the Zoological Gardens this city used to have back in Victorian times. I've shot this at a curious angle because the bears themselves are right against the houses, and you have to work a little to isolate them.

The dog. Red-shifted :)

So, even if I do say so myself, the LC-A is capable of producing some pretty good images. The downside is that you're not sure exactly how it's going to turn out until you've got the film processed and scanned - that first roll of Sensia, for example, was a bit of a shock.

If you want to see what really talented people can do with these cameras, check out my LC-A Brilliance Gallery over at flickr.