I have been wanting to build my own camera for a long time. Not a pinhole camera, but a large wet plate camera. I don't want to make it in the old style and follow the beautifully designed cameras of yesteryear. I want to make my wet plate camera out of garbage.
Trash.
Detritus.
Scraps of junk.

I found a Czech photographer who has been doing this since the late 50's. Miroslav Tichy's cameras are made of cardboard tubes, wire and wooden spools. They are working works of art and look like something from Mad Max.
Somehow I don't think he has used any of the complicated mathematical equations to determine focal length, image coverage circle and f-stops...which makes for a totally un-nerdy nerd camera, just what I am wanting to build.
Now all I have to do is collect doodads, cardboard, wire, leather and go at 'er.

I also LOVE pinhole cameras made from old books.
I made one for pinhole camera day in 2007. It needed a little work as the film got all bunched up but it would work perfect for dry plate tintypes as the thin metal would be so much easier to secure than a roll of film.
Erin Paysse, a Seattle based artist makes some very stylish objects d'art that she sells on her Etsy page.

Tintypes in Gastown

We have just moved back to Vancouver, to Vancouver's famous Gastown area. Gastown is famous for its cobblestone streets, its galleries of First Nations Art, its stylish boutiques and restaurants and obtrusive film crews. One street over from the shi-shi shops is another famous part of Vancouver, also known as Canada's poorest postal code -Vancouver's Down Town East Side, or DTES. The DTES is everything you see on the news, the frequency of police activity is a combination of street monitoring and movie set security. Rich and poor side by side, makes for a very vibrant neighbourhood. I am very happy to be back in the bustle of the city and am inspired by the richness of my neighbours.

I am currently searching for studio space! If anyone knows of something coming up please let me know.
I need loads of light! I am shooting at ISO 3 after all!

the Tintype Lady strikes again

The opening for my show at the Waterfront Theatre was yesterday and I was happy to see familiar faces as well as strangers. I got to talk about my work with people, which is really nerdy and fun. I get all animated and excited. I incorporated braille into my work for the first time. It is a strange thing for people but it is fascinating to me to combine a non visual language in a visual way with a visual yet very tactile form of photography. People tend to want to touch tintypes, so I gave them something else to touch. It was a lovely evening and I want to thank everyone who was there for their interest and support.

Ok, now suck it in

I am busy packing for my upcoming trip to India and Pakistan and of course I have to decide what I want to bring for cameras...
Looks like the winners are:

Lumix digital and 3 film cameras:

Diana +f- because of its truely crappy quality and plastic-ness, and the fact that a Diana has this nack of making images look like real memories, hazy, blurry, distorted and dreamy...and I can do pinhole with it.

Olympus trip 35 - 1974 auto and manual 35mm cult camera, tested and ready to go..

Speed Graphic. ok, it is a bit overkill for a backpack, but I just can't pass up the opportunity to shoot wet plate while I am there.

So that means I have 3 sizes of film, 35mm, 120 and 4x5 sheet film, plus glass and metal plates AND a portable darkroom that I am lugging as carry on baggage. Ambitious? Uh, yah....

I hope to post photos of my darkroom in action doing tintypes and ambrotypes on the streets of Lahore, Rawalpindi and Islamabad, as well as the beaches and backwaters of western India. I am not taking any chemistry with me since it is somewhat problematic to take flammable, explosive, and poisonous things on airplanes and through customs.
So my first task when getting to Pakistan will be to find chemistry. Oy vey!

My urdu consists of "excuse me, I'm sorry" (how Canadian), "please", "thank you","good morning" and a bit of hindi for "don't move for 3 seconds" .
I figure if you don't know what is going on, at least be polite.

I needed to test my Olympus trip 35, that was birthday gift from daughter and had yet to be used.
I live in a small place, isolated by a ferry ride from the big city. Well, you'd think it wouldn't be so terribly difficult to get a roll of film developed...2 weeks later, an additional sample roll shot, that I requested be developed gratis and asap (sorry 'bout that) since my order was taking soooo long...and it came out monochrome...
hmm....not right...so I asked them to do it again.
The little trip works splendidly in automatic, which means I can hang it out the window of moving trains!

I much prefer square fomat however...If only I could somehow cram my hasselblad 500c into my carry on bags...I don't really need to pack clothes do I?
I guess I will have to repack.

So that is 5 cameras and a portable darkroom.

west coast winter wet plate portraits

Leah
4x5 ambrotype

So after fall's home renovations and then the holiday season, I now get to spend some time in the dark...ahhh...the darkness. I was unsure whether I would have any satisfaction from my old reddened collodion or my wayyy too old developer, but even with the dark rainy Canadian west coast day, I managed to make some shoe portraits. Since no one was home and the dog can't manage to sit still for a whole 90 seconds, it had to be shoes...

taken with a 4x5 speed graphic with a petzval type lens, for 90 seconds, on a very dark and rainy day.

pour le moment

au revoir Ottawa and all my fab SPAO people. I had a fantastic workshop, lots of great creative folks and now I am off to the west coast to get mucky. Merci ms. Aviva Cohen for snapping a photo of me as I prepared for my departure.

Aching for the Ether

Image by Ed Ross

































Image by Kristen Hatgi

It has been 4 months since I made my first wet plate image, and it feels like an eternity. I had to return to the west coast from Ottawa to take care of my home and ended up in renovations. So on the eve of my return to Ottawa to teach another Modern Tintype workshop at the School of Photographic Arts Ottawa. I am truly ACHING to get out my wet plate gear.

I have found some lovely wet plate folks out there scattered across the world like Ed Ross from San Francisco and Kirsten Hatgi from Denver.

So upon my return I will endure the cold rainy days and attempt to shoot in the rain with my new (old) brass lens.

Goodbye Ottawa- you were good to us!!!!

Favorite Ottawa Places
the Shanghai
RawSugar
Bridgehead at Elgin & Maclaren
Adorit - the best of vintage and fairly traded goods at awesomely fair prices
Galerie La Petite Mort Gallery
School of Photographic Arts Ottawa
Cube Gallery
the Carleton Tavern

The hunt for the holy grail

Who loves you?? Thats right...




















yes, it was arduous, it was hot, very hot, we could not find bubble tea, but we hunted with earnest - for an insert for my daughter's 45rpm record We were told it was an impossible task, it could not be done...we met with much head shaking. But we persevered and yes, we found one. I can't tell you where. But for all of you who are also hunting for the illusive 45 inserts, think, independent, that is where you will find one.

Extreme Analog on Elgin St

I'm meltiiiiinnnngg......no, I am not made of sugar, but, oh my! heat and humidity are not friends of liquid emulsion. We had a full day of shooting and as the day heated up so did my metal plates which resulted in images dripping right off the plates! Luckily the morning was cool enough that I was able to get some interesting shots of Dave the butcher on the street at our local Bridgehead. I suppose it is a curious site to see me load up my speed graphic and put that dark cloth over my head. Extreme Analog

Dances with rats

My sister was recently traveling in Europe and knowing how much I love taxidermy snapped me some shots of stuffed critters. Since I now have a rat residing with us and sharing food and leather accessories she sent me this image. Why don't we have this kind of shop in Canada? Waltzing rats, most awesome.

Church of Tintype

I just spent 5 glorious days in upstate NY with tintype master, John Coffer. I am now an initiate of the Church of Tintype where collodion is holy, and chickens run free. We managed to sneak in some time to get to a garage sale where we picked up some dresses and bonnets worn by the Mennonite women. In the Mennonite community, once you are of age to enter the church, you cannot pose for photos, nor take photos. The image is me in my newly acquired dress and bonnet using a reproduction wetplate camera to set up a shot with John's assistant Nick. The countryside was breathtaking. I fall asleep with collodion visions.

Summer in the city

Summer is here... the smell of rain on the pavement, the sticky hot air, the sound of red winged blackbirds, ahhhh summer in the city.

A fair is a veritable smorgasbord...orgasbord...orgasbord

I love the smell of the fair, sugared donuts, fried everythings, spun sugar and sweet dayglo fruity shaved ice. I was surprised to find a very old fashioned fair right here in Ottawa as part of the world famous Tulip Fest. Down near Dows Lake on a lovely patch of grass was a small fair just right for folks with small children. We sat on the grass and listened to the live band and ate poutine and of course, I took photos. I pulled out my DIY kit and made myself another TTV contraption. TTV stands for "through the viewfinder". I use my digital SLR to photograph through the viewfinder of an old brownie camera to get a fabulously distorted refracted image that gives a lovely nostalgic feeling image.

If I could bend time

I would go back to when my nana was still alive and sit with her and look at old photos. If I could bend time I would go back to when my daughter was little and spend more time pushing her on the swings, and laying in the grass and making up stories.

The photobooth Tour finally arrives

Ok, so we did take a detour from our original plan to stay in Canada the WHOLE way. We decided it would be fabulous to go through a Chicago snow storm, and ice storm in Michigan, and crazy traffic jams and endless toll booths, all so we wouldn't hit a moose on the road driving through the Great Northern Shield. We loved Minneapolis and Chicago and wished we could have stayed longer but there was a turkey dinner calling us in Toronto. We did manage to get some photobooth action, which most often accompanied coffee in a mall, the ONLY time I have ever been happy to go into a mall. First one thanks to Rita for the tip was Chinook Mall in Calgary, Alberta

Bears ate our garbage

X-processed Homage to the Sunshine Coast

Photobooth pre-tour action

Ok, so it's really happening, after setting up my studio and doing a few studio sessions we are now off to Ottawa! Hooray! That means... ROADTRIP across Canada in the snow. Insane, possibly, but very truly Canadian. So I had this idea. I wonder if we could find photobooths along the way? That would be fun, we could stop, grab a coffee and hunt down booths in malls, bus depots, carnivals...ok, maybe there are no carnivals but there are bars and bowling alleys across Canada that still have old school photobooths.
I have found websites with locations that people send in the info for like
this one here.
I have made a google map that can be added to as more booths are sleuthed out. The map is public so all you folks who are also crazy to cross this snowy land can also enjoy some photoboothing and be sure to add what you find. If anyone has a favorite photobooth, please post it on my blog, and help spread the photobooth love around the world.
Thank you to Robert Eaton from Photo Booth Rentals of Winnipeg for the extensive list of all the photobooths publicly available in Winnipeg. Winnipeg just may be the photo booth capital of Canada. More to come...
The accompanying pre-tour photo was taken at Pacific Centre in Vancouver, it is located in the hallway between Fairweather and the Satchel shop. Zoe looked dashing, and I had a feral animal on my head the whole rainy day.

MusicBox website

...and there was a website too...what seemed like an epic journey was just the beginning of yet another journey. Not only am I building my website I am also rediscovering the joys of my new larger format press camera. My sweet 1940's Anniversary edition Speed Graphic arrived last week and I am reminded of how sweet it is to focus images on the ground glass, upside down, with depth of field and light fall off.....oh it is lovely. Now to take some photos with it!

And thus was created the photo salon

I am finally settling in to my studio on the Sunshine Coast. I have created a cozy space that is unlike other photo studios, it is not a stark space filled with cords and light boxes and gadgets and emptiness. This is a space where, if you wish, you can lounge on the setee and put your feet up, it is Roberts Creek after all. My inspiration comes from the salons of yesteryear and the artistry of the past. I am inspired by classic beauty, shadow, light, curves and form with a bent for the nostalgic. I welcome you to MusicBox.