Moody Lake ShoreLake Erie It was a cold early winter's day and I was hoping for some winter-in-your-face photographs on the shore of Lake Erie. Upon arrival, I was greeted with a beach windswept clean of any snow and it was too early for ice. The winter look wasn't going to be but the lake was still there and so were the beautiful rocks.

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For this expedition, I was lugging my Mamiya 645 medium format film camera loaded with Ilford Pan F Plus black and white film. It's low ISO of 50 combined with a 6-stop ND filter was going to work great for the intended long exposure photographs.

I goofed up though! I composed my shot, carefully metered the scene, increased exposure by 6 stops to account for the filter factor of the neutral density filter I intended to use, put the filter on, and took the shot. And another, and another. With the 6 by 4.5 cm format one can fit 15 exposures on a roll of 120 film. Only for the 2nd last shot I noticed something was off. After placing the filter on the lens I actually looked through the viewfinder. I am not sure why but I did. And the strange thing was I could see the scene in front of me. Dim, but still there. That was not supposed to be! This late in the day with daylight quickly fading the viewfinder was supposed to be pretty much pitch black.

It turned out I reached for the wrong filter and kept using that instead of the ND filter. For all the photos, I used my HRT polarizing filter, which has a filter factor of only about 1.5 stops. Thus, I was overexposing all shots by about 4.5 stops! I finished the last two shots much the same way to allow for a consistent development of the whole role.

Having realized my mistake before developing the film I shortened the development and pulled the film by 1.5 stops, hoping to counteract the overexposure a little bit, bringing it down to about 3 stops. I was hoping the wide latitude of the black and white film would help with the rest. Another fact playing to my advantage was the low contrast of the scenes. There really were no hotspots and the range of tonality was limited. All of this combined and I pulled a well looking negative out of the tank!

Triple Dome RockLake Erie

Triple Dome Rock Long Exposure, Lake Erie Shoreline near Buffalo, NY

Film photography: Mamiya 645, Ilford Pan F Plus

It was a good learning experience to pay attention every step of the way and I am glad I was able to mostly recover and not pay the full pice and lose a roll. I hope you'll enjoy these moody photographs from our Great Lake.

Enjoy The Beauty That Surrounds You! #etbtsy

Do you enjoy reading my photography blog? Would you like to see more photographs from Buffalo and Western New York? Visit my Buffalo Cityscapes and Buffalo & Western New York Landscapes and enjoy! For more black and white photographs click to the World without Color photo collection. Please, let me know if you have any questions about any photo products offered, or not offered, I will be happy to help! For a quick reference to all photo galleries and collections as well as all photo products currently offered through my site, please, visit the Products page.

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Previously captured on film: Analog (Film) Photography - Film Pinhole Photography - Winter Jinx - Seaside Pinhole Photography - Theatre District at Sunrise, Buffalo, NY - On Main Street, Buffalo, NY - On the Road around Buffalo - Lake Erie Lakeshore on Pinhole - Erie Basin Marina on Pinhole - From Ohio Street - As the Names Change - Buffalo Classic on Classic Medium - One More White while Appropriate - More Winter in Hamburg, NY - Palace in Winter - A Shed - The Chimney - Road Trip 2018 on a Page - Road Trip 2018: The First Few Darkroom Prints - First Roll of Infrared Film - Road Trip 2018: A New Darkroom Print - Analog Colors - Cheap Shots of Sunny 16 - Darkroom: A Split Grade Print - A Drive-Through Nation - A Quiet Moment - Lighthouse Beach - Nostalgic Colors - The 70s Look? - Lakeshore Mood

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