Frank Lloyd Wright’s last prairie style house, or at least that’s what the tour guide said.

After the essay on choosing a B&W film, I decided that I had perhaps been unfair towards slow films, and that I should give them another shot. Working from the premise that more - in this case more slow- is always better, I decided to try Delta 100 pulled back to 50. I’ve not been disappointed.

Finding a time and temp for Delta 100 @ 50 in Tmax Developer was fairly simple; the instructions were right on the Delta box. Working with my normal extra diluted Tmax solution (1+5), I developed for 5.5 minutes at 68 degrees, with 10 seconds agitation for every minute. Halfway through I’ve been giving the film a couple of inversions in an attempt to combat what appears to be occasional uneven development. Five and half minutes turned out to be just right, yielding good shadow detail and easily handled highlights.

The overall look for this combo is a little more Tgrainy than Delta 400. There’s something about the shadows that reminds me of Tmax or Fuji Acros. Both are fine films, so that’s no bad thing. There’s also a hint of that slow film shot through Rolleiflex look, whatever that means. Although there isn’t much more detail than Delta 400, the tonality seems a lot smoother, much more like medium format. I’m intrigued by this. Shooting such a slow film has many of the same limitations as shooting medium format, so perhaps shooting some will be a good way for me to get into the medium format frame of mind without investing too much capital.

I’ve been doing a lot of experimenting with different films lately, but Delta 100 @ 50 is the only experiment that seems to offer something definitively new for me. Because of the limitations of such a slow film, I’m finding that I’m choosing my shots more carefully, and I’m consequently looking at different things. For what it’s worth, I’ve already ordered more.

Harry Callahan, writing in a grant application after World War II, asked for money in order to “photograph . . .to regulate a pleasant form of living.” This seems to me to be the best reason to pursue any craft. Whether it be photography, writing or beer brewing, the regular rhythm of craft, the slow, steady build up of skills and self-confidence, does indeed regulate life. It evens out the low points by providing successes to look forward to or back on. And, if pursued with any degree of honesty, every craft regularly knocks you back to earth when hubris has taken you too high.

I wonder if the new Luminous Landscape Endowment would buy me an M8 to help me “regulate a pleasant form of living?” A boy can dream . . .

If this was Colin’s blog, I’d file this under Words Not Lose.

and sometimes the children themselves need carrying . . .

My sister always seems to be carrying something that her sons have dropped.

The last few beachy shots have all been from a couple of rolls of Delta 100 pulled to 50 that I almost ruined by over developing. I was a sleep at the switch when I was mixing the developer. Instead of hitting the mark for Tmax dilution, I hit the mark for fixer dilution. Although the dilution actually ended up at the box recommendation for this film speed, I’ve found that a weaker, off-label dilution of 1+5 works a lot better. These shots were a pain to scan, and the highlights tend to be kind of blocky. But this one works well.

This looked a little too light the first time around . . .