Whether it be film, paper, chemistry...you name it - they have it. Not only do they have it, but the continue to launch new products all the time.

I'm in love with Freestyle as a company, seriously. They are just an amazing company to work with.Their privately labeled film stock is what I shoot exclusively now for Black and White (my favorites are Legacy Pro 400 and Arista Premium 400).

I actually just recently was able to visit their retail store in Hollywood. I live all the way on the other side of the country in Greensboro, NC but happened to be in LA shooting one of my best friend's weddings. I had just enough time to squeeze in a visit to the store and it made my day! What a wonderful and helpful staff!

Freestyle just announced today on Facebook that they are introducing a new magnetic 11x14 easel. How cool!

I've been looking for a new easel actually and I think I may just pick one of these up to try out, it seems like a great idea and a lot less clumsy than the typical adjustable easels.

Here is a link to the product:

http://www.freestylephoto.biz/13810

Freestyle Photo's new magnetic 11x14 easel

I wanted to let everyone know I've been working on some things for the photography business in the background:

- New website up! Check it out at www.aepearson.com - Still some work to do (well, a lot of work to do) but it's up!

- New Facebook Fan page! Check it out at www.facebook.com/aepearsonphoto - Be sure to "Like" it!

Bonnaroo, in a word, is HUGE. The last time I checked there were about 75,000 visitors this year. It's one of the largest music festivals worldwide, with an amazing lineup each year.

I took along my Nikon F5 and Nikon F3, a 35mm/f1.4 lens and a 50mm/f1.4 lens, and about 40 rolls of Freestyle's Legacy Pro 400 film (aka. Fuji Neopan 400). What more could you need to shoot such a fun event?!

I ended up shooting only 14 out of the 40 rolls, I've been trying to be a bit more conservative with my shooting lately. 14 rolls over 2 days of shooting isn't too bad I don't think, especially considering all that was going on.

Got home and processed the film right away, I had to stop by and visit Tim in Hillsborough, NC (the founder of Music Maker) at his home darkroom to pick up some reels I left there. Somehow I managed to misplace my fresh, unmixed, batch of Diafine so I turned to good old Kodak D-76 for my developer of choice.

I rated the film at 800ISO, so at 1:1 dilution developing time was 11minutes at 72deg F for D-76. Scanned the negatives after they dried on my new Epson V500. For such a cheap scanner ($150 shipped!) it does an amazing job.

I just put the photos up on my Flickr account, so please take a look!

Besides the killer access I got to the stage(s) and backstage, one of the highlights of my trip was watching Danny Clinch at work. For those of you who don't recognize the name I highly recommend you check out his website portfolio. He's by far one of the most amazing rock photographers out there, I truly admire a lot of the work he's done. As far as I'm concerned, he's got my dream job. One of these days....haha

Click here to check out the photos!

PS> I'll edit this post in a few minutes with some photos and more information.

The concept is very simple, all you need to make a pinhole camera is:

• A container of somesort that you can make light-tight, even if that means wrapping it in duct tape. Duct tape cures everything.
• Film or Photographic Paper, I recommend paper...some cheap 5x7 RC paper from Freestyle is perfect ($16 for 100 5x7's)
• A dark place to load the camera, using paper makes this a lot easier because you can work under a safelight...so if you have a goofy pinhole that is hard to load consider using paper!
• The actual pinhole, something sturdy with a hole in it.

And, yeah, you are going to need some B&W chemicals to process your paper or film pinhole photos. Again, I recommend using paper because it adds a lot of fun to the process. If you have never seen a print appear in the developer you are truly missing out! Working in total darkness with film can be very frustrating for first-timers, especially if they are kids.

So what chemicals do you need?

• Developer, pick up some Kodak Dektol. Enough to make 1 gal. will last you forever if you are making pinhole photos.
• Stop bath, get a little jug of Kodak Indicator Stop Bath. One little jug (16oz) will last you years. And you know its going bad when it turns purple.
• Fixer, I like regular old Kodak Rapid Fixer. The size to make 1gal. is actually enough to make 2gal. if you are using it for paper!

You can make trays out of anything, and just use the kitchen sink to wash your prints. By the time they are done in the fixer they are totally safe to bring out into the light.

You can find a wealth of information about making pinhole cameras on the web, it's merely a Google search away. If I remember some of my favorites I'll add them to this post at a later date.

Making a panoramic pinhole camera out of an empty 35mm film tin

If you have ever rolled your own 35mm film canisters from a 100' bulk roll, you have probably seen a tin like this many times. But for the uninitiated, the tin you see in the pics is what a 100' bulk roll of 35mm film comes in. You load the 100' roll into a device that is designed to help you roll your own film into re-loadable canisters.

If you don't have one handy, go buy a 100' roll and shoot it! Then, make a pinhole. Or, I bet you could find these all over ebay, just don't pay too much please. If it comes down to that, make it out of something else with a similar shape (if you want a panoramic pinhole).

An often overlooked, but really great improvement in image quality for a pinhole camera is having the correct diameter pinhole. I went out and got a variety pack of sewing needles and measured the smallest one with some calipers...worked out to be right about 0.017" in diameter. Using one of the pinhole camera calculators linked below, it turns out the ideal focal length is 4.1" for a pinhole of that diameter and an image height about what the height of our panoramic photo would be. Perfect! Why? Because that's the diameter of the film tin, meaning pinhole to paper distance is right about 4"....this is a happy coincidence.

Some useful online pinhole calculators:

http://www.mrpinhole.com/calcpinh.php

http://www.photostuff.co.uk/pinholec.htm

Step 1: Make the camera

How nice, a tin designed to hold film turns out to be perfect for making a camera.

• Drill a hole midway up the height of the tin (with the lid off), I used about a 3/8" drill bit
• Sand down the burrs created by the hold you drilled, and also scuff up the inside of the tin (lid and base) with the sandpaper. This will help the paint stick better inside.
• Paint the inside with flat black spraypaint. No need to break the bank, I got a can for $0.92 at WalMart. You'll barely use any of it, but now you'll have some on hand for "flocking" other pinhole cameras. We're using flat black because we want to reduce any light bouncing around inside off of a reflective surface.

Guess what? You just made a pinhole camera, now time to make the "lens".

The camera from the outside, notice the hole drilled on the left

Step 2: Making the "lens"

For this camera, it so happened that the smallest needle in a multi-pack of sewing needles was just the right diameter for good focus using this tin. Right about 0.017" in diameter.

For your first time, no need to get hung up on this. You'll still get an image, just maybe not as sharp.

• I used some brass sheet stock from the hobby store as a material to make my pinhole. It was about $5 for a roll with enough of this crap to make about a million pinholes. If you don't have that available, cut a piece out of an aluminum drink can.
• Slowly, and with a twisting motion, "drill" the metal with your sewing needle. Put something like thick cardboard under the metal, it helps to have that solid, yet poke-able surface when you are trying to be gentle.
• When you have it all the way through (the tip), use the same sandpaper to clean up the edges of the tiny hole. If you hold it up to a bright light and peek through it with one eye, you can see the imperfections pretty well.

Step 3: Mount the "lens"

This step is simple.

Tape the pinhole to the inside of the "camera" like you see in the photo. Try to center it in the hole you drilled in the camera.

Brass pinhole taped into position, you can also see a piece of photo paper taped inside

Step 4: Load the camera and apply the shutter and light sealing

So, now you'll need to go into your dark place with the safelight on.

• I cut the 5x7's into 3 strips I think, then just taped them inside the camera with some black tape. Try to center the tape based on the pinhole location
• Now, put the lid on and run a piece of tape around the lid. This will keep the lid from accidentally coming off in transit and help to eliminate light leaks.
• Last step, put a piece of thick black tape over the pinhole from the outside of the camera. This is your shutter, pull it back when you want to expose the paper.

Try to center the paper across from the pinhole like this

Now, go take some pictures!

Those links above can also be helpful in deciding how long to expose your photos. I would go in "stops" just like you would with a camera, and do it on a sunny day inside.

When I say go in "stops" I mean try: 1sec, 2sec, 4sec, 8sec, 16sec, etc... Move in stops, remember this is a camera!

All you do is pull back the tape over the pinhole and wait, that tape is your shutter.

From here I recommend you go back inside and process the paper (tutorial coming soon).

After it dries, you have two options:

• Make a contact print of your paper negative. The image your pinhole is going to make will be a negative on the paper when processed, so you need to turn it into a positive! A simple way to do this with light is to make a contact print. Sandwich your dried pinhole photo between a sheet of glass and an unexposed piece of photographic paper and shine some light on it. If you don't use an enlarger you'll have to experiment with times, but you can easily use a flashlight or table lamp.
• Scan the paper negative and invert digitally. This is what I did for this example. I dried my paper negative and threw it in a flatbed scanner I got at the Goodwill Store for $5. I opened the scanned image and inverted it in Photoshop.

An image of my backyard taken with the camera, scanned and inverted

So, that's all there is to it! Go make your own and see what you can come up with. This camera is very portable so get creative!

For a long time I saw different focal lengths only in relation to how much of a given scene they can capture. Wide angle lenses capture a lot, while Longer/Telephoto lenses capture less. That simple, right? Well, not really...

Here are some key things that the focal length of a lens affects:

• Compression in a scene
• Depth of field
• Photographer to Subject distance
• Angle of view

I'm sure there are several that I am leaving out, but these are the most important to me. Results may vary.

Compression in a scene

This is one of the more important of the four. The higher in focal length you get, the more compression you get in a scene. What do I mean by "compression"? My definition would be: The measure of perceived distance or depth in a scene. A wide angle lens tends to show a lot of depth and curvature where a longer lens tends to "flatten" the scene.

This is especially relevant when you are photographing people, people in a group, and people interacting with their environment. I really don't think there is a right or wrong way to use certain focal lengths, it's more a matter of what it is you are after.

Traditionally, portraits/people are supposed to be shot with a longer focal length lens: 50mm on the wide side, 85mm or 105mm is pretty much the standard for 35mm photography. I would tend to agree with this in a lot of ways. A lens like an 85mm lens is great for people photography, but again its all about what you are after. Think about facial features when you are doing a portrait, noses, cheekbones, lips, foreheads.... You can accentuate these features with a wider lens, or minimize them with a longer lens.

Shooting people in a group can be hard with a long lens, you have to have considerable subject to photographer distance to include more than 3 or more people (head+torso), but it can also look great....again, depending on what you are after.

People interacting in their environment should almost always be done with a wide lens in my opinion (24mm, 35mm, 50mm?), unless there is a good distance between key elements of their working environment. Say a person is playing a guitar...I say you go wide and get in tight, but that's just me. The area that their action is taking place in is rather small and you really have the chance to show a lot of depth, go wide and get close. But say a person is running a distance, like in football...well then you need a longer lens, not only because of the distance you are from the player, but because it would be impossible in most cases to get out on the field right next to the guy. A wide shot from a quarterback's shoulder during a blitz would be great, but you have to be realistic sometimes when you are picking a lens...chances are, you are gonna be on the sidelines with a 300mm/2.8 or a 80-200/2.8.

Hannah

Depth of field

Depth of field changes according to focal length. It's a fact, I swear. Take a look at Hannah ^ , this was shot with a 24mm/f2 Nikkor lens. Notice how just the one eye is in sharp focus? And look how quickly focus falls off. With a longer lens, its a little harder to this type of selective focus. Depth of field is not entirely dependent on aperture.

With a longer lens, you get less depth of field as your aperture size decreases than you would at the same aperture with a wider lens. This can lead to some great effects though, like shooting around f4-f5.6 and being able to get your complete subject in focus head to toe (standing), but background substantially blurred. An 85mm lens is perfect for that.

An important note for street photographers, or other from-the-hip types...wider lenses, like the 24mm and 35mm, have greater depth of field per aperture than longer lenses. What I mean is that you get greater depth of field as you stop down than you would on a longer lens. This is great for daylight street photography when the time you take to focus can quickly change the scene. Set your aperture to F/11, F/16 etc. and scale focus using hyperfocal distance can really speed things up. Because of the lens design you can shoot in daylight at a small aperture and not have to be dead on with focus, depth of field can be substantial with a wider lens. This can make or break a "decisive moment" type shot.

Photographer to Subject distance

This one is pretty obvious. To fill a persons head in the frame with something like a 24mm requires you be about a foot or so from their nose. Where with an 85mm lens you can be a few feet away. The basic concept is that wider lenses take in more at less distance, where a longer lens takes in a more narrow angle of the scene.

Think about your working distance. How much space do you have to work with and still make your subject the primary focus of the image? I encourage getting as close to your subject as you can, get right up in their business. But this is great for how I shoot, not necessarily you. Getting closer, to me, encourages more interaction with your subject. I think this is a great thing, interaction can lead to a level of comfort between you and the subject which can lead to better photographs. Sometimes however, interaction is not what you need...or not possible. Think about this when you are deciding what to put in your bag.

Angle of view

Without really meaning to, I've already kindof talked about this part of your lens choice. Less working distance generally means a wider lens, more working distance can allow the use of a longer lens.

**DISCLAIMER** When I'm referring to focal lengths and angle of view in this entry, I'm meaning relative to 35mm film or a "full frame" digital sensor.

I've always been in love with black and white film (well, shooting film in general really). There is something about the look, the contrast, the grain, the tonality...its very organic. The look is organic, made of grains of silver rather than pixels. The process is organic, from manufacture all the way until you pull the reel/print out of the final wash in the darkroom. The result is organic, you fumbled in the dark, got your hands wet...you worked for it and the process itself gives a deeper more tactile relationship the images. I just love it.

There is something deeply satisfying about smelling the fixer on your own hands as you hold the first contact sheet up to your eyes.

I get questions pretty often about why I shoot film. As in, why on earth would you shoot film? "Digital is so much easier", "Digital is so much cheaper", "Do they even make film anymore?", "How can you afford to have a darkroom?"

I'll admit, shooting digitally is really easy...but easier? I think that's a matter of opinion.

With very little money you can be shooting on an archival medium right now.

Let me explain:

• Film is cheap
• Processing film is cheap
• Film cameras are cheap
• Film is archival

Film is cheap

Don't believe me?

Check out Freestyle, their privately branded black and white films are very "similar" *cough* to the major brand name versions and a LOT cheaper.

I get their LegacyPro 400 film, it's $2 for a 36 exposure roll...and very "similar" to Fuji Neopan 400 ($4.40/roll). So similar in fact, if you were to buy a 100' roll of it, you would find it's even wound on a Fujifilm reel. Their Arista Premium 400 is very "similar" to Kodak Tri-X...and only $2.19 for a 36 exposure roll (35mm).

Processing film is cheap

Well, not if you pay someone to do it.

If you process your own you can do it for real cheap though.

You only need a few basic things:

• General: Water (a sink is ideal), A Dark Place (even if only temporarily dark), A Towel (to dry your hands and clean up spills), A Timer (with seconds)
• Chemicals : Developer (for paper and/or film), Stop bath, Fixer (separate batch for paper and film), PhotoFlo (to reduce water streaks on your negs)
• Film processing tools: Some reels (35mm, 120, etc), A Processing Tank, Thermometer
• Print making: Enlarger (with lens), Trays, Chemicals (same as film, but for paper), Grain Focuser, An Enlarger Timer is a nice optional item

All of that can be found for cheap, used, on craigslist or ebay with the exception of the chemicals.

I have tried a ton of different film developers at all sorts of different dilutions. I landed on Diafine as my developer of choice. It's easy, cheap, and delivers excellent results (for me). One $15 batch of developer processes at least 100 rolls of black and white film with no replenishment (works out to about $0.20 per roll). With Diafine you don't use a stop bath, this makes the fixer last a lot longer...again, saving you money. Sometime soon I'll do a more in depth writeup on Diafine, it deserves it's own blog entry haha.

Don't have a darkroom? Don't worry. Do you have a closet, or a room without windows? Does it get dark where you live? If you said "yes" to any of those, you officially have a darkroom. Of course setting up an enlarger and making "real" photographic prints will require a bit more space than a closet but a bathroom with the windows covered at night will work perfectly.

And, remember, you don't have to make prints. You can just process the film and scan it if you would like. I just recently purchased an Epson V500 film scanner for $150/shipped from B&H photo. It works GREAT, worth every penny.

Film cameras are cheap

Nobody wants them anymore. You can get an old manual Nikon, Minolta, Canon, etc. for dirt cheap. In most cases <$100 with a lens. Most any old manual camera in decent shape will work. If the meter doesn't work (which it may not ) brush up on the "sunny 16 rule" and you'll be fine haha. Remember, black and white film has serious exposure latitude...there is pretty significant room for error in exposure while you are learning.

Stick with a 50mm lens for now, every manufacturer has a cheap 50mm manual focus lens. The 50mm has been the "bread and butter" for most manufacturers for a long time. Regardless of manufacturer you can almost always assume that any 50mm lens you buy is going to be worth the $. Even the earliest 50mm lenses tend to be incredibly sharp lenses. They are abundant and cheap.

Film is archival

As long as you fix and wash your negatives/prints correctly they will last well over 100 years. Well over. As long as you can find light, you can view a negative or a print.

Where will your digital image files be in 100 years? Will you even be able to view them? And how long do you think that inkjet print is going to last? Better keep it out of the sun...

Great news too, image sensor technology is only getting better. What does this mean for film shooters? It means that your negative scans are only going to get better with time as technology advances.

In conclusion

I use my digital camera pretty frequently, but when it comes down to it I prefer film. I'm not trying to make the argument that it's the "superior" medium, I'm just saying that if you are interested - you can try it out for cheap, and I bet you'll enjoy it.

Go dust off that old camera and put some film through it. I dare ya.

I've been working on getting into the habit of updating my blog more often here lately and saw this as a chance to share something that really made an impact on me.

Me and Austin are always going back and forth, he's a Canon freak and I'm a Nikon freak...so naturally we are always poking fun at one another. When he sent me this link I was certain it had to be some "Nikon uses ground up unicorn horns to make their autofocus so deadly accurate" type of blog post.

Boy was I wrong. WAY off.

The link he sent was a link to the personal blog of Daniel Milnor.

The article Daniel wrote is one of the most inspiring articles I've ever read about wedding photography.

I can see why my friend Austin sent it to me, I really "get" Daniel Milnor's take on wedding photography. What he is doing in his wedding work is exactly where I see myself going, and I love that he's having such a great time and such success with it.

I've said it once, and I'll say it again...outstanding photography is timeless, it doesn't need anything to hold it up...it stands on it's own.

While the true documentary style wedding photography isn't for everyone, it's certainly where my heart lies...and it's uplifting to see a photographer like Milnor out there making it happen. Granted, he's working hard as hell to get his clients but I have to imagine they are the best clients to have. And more than likely, clients who are going to love his images for at least the next 50 years of their life...way after selective color and fake vignettes go out of style.

The link again, for those who may have missed it: http://smogranch.wordpress.com/2010/05/28/whats-old-is-new-return-to-weddings/

Self Portrait w/Leica M4-P (Bill Thompson) - July 16th, 2008 - RCC Photography Department (Pearson)

Home of Captain Luke - Winston Salem, NC - Summer 2009 (Pearson)

Captain Luke getting ready at his home in Winston Salem, NC - Summer 2009 (Pearson)

Captain Luke outside his home - Winston Salem, NC - Summer 2009 (Pearson)

Adolphus Bell in the living room of his home in Birmingham, AL. Summer 2009 (Pearson)

Me (fore) and Liz (back) on the front porch of the home of Adolphus Bell - Birmingham, AL - Summer, 2009 (Davis)