Summer | Fotoeins Fotografie

Posts from the ‘Summer’ category

My Fuji X70: Ektachrome 100SW (XTrans2 recipe)

Above/featured:False Creek east, from Cambie Bridge – 12 Jul 2021.

A variety of film simulations in the form of recipes with different settings are applicable to Fujifilm cameras to create uniquely historical and/or vintage look to images. Fortunately, a number of recipes are available to apply onto Fuji cameras with X-Trans II sensors.

That’s where my Fuji X70 has entered the fun fray. Previously, I showed examples of images made with the Kodachrome 64 recipe, simulating images made with the Kodak analog colour film produced from the mid-1970s to its final run in 2009.

I wanted to try another film-simulation recipe: the Ektachrome 100SW (SW for ‘saturated warm’) described by Ritchie Roesch in Fuji X Weekly. Historically, the Kodak company produced the ‘Ektachrome’ line of colour transparency or slide films. From its introduction in 1996 to its termination in 2002, the ‘Ektachrome 100SW’ film with increased ISO sensitivity produced images with deeper colours and warmer colour balance.

At locations throughout metropolitan Vancouver over a period of four weeks in July and August 2021, here are images below straight-out-of-the-camera (SOOC) with the following settings:

‘Velvia’ built-in film-sim
Dynamic Range: DR200
Highlight: +2 (High)
Shadow: +1 (Medium-High)
Color: -1 (Medium-Low)
Sharpness: 0 (Medium)
Noise Reduction: -2 (Low)
White Balance: Auto; +1 Red, -2 Blue
ISO: Auto up to 3200 (or fixed to 1000)

All recipes sorted by specific sensor are found here.

( Click here for images )

My Fuji X70: Kodachrome64 (XTrans2 recipe)

Above/featured: South portal, Lions Gate Bridge – 25 Jun 2021.

I wrote about how the Fujifilm X70 fixed-lens prime has been great for my photography. Fujifim prides itself on good to faithful reproductions of film simulations (film-sims). For the most part, I’ve used the default or “Standard” setting, equivalent to the “Provia” film-sim which is one of 11 film-sims built into the X70.

I learned about other film-sims, particularly those applicable to the older X-Trans II sensor that’s in my X70 camera. I’ve been interested in digital reproductions of “old” colour slide film, and seeing how images over a variety of subject matter appear with a film-sim that looks a little more like “old school film”. Ritchie Roesch describes in Fuji X Weekly the differences between the Kodachrome II and Kodachrome 64 film-sims; the former resembling the look of Kodak film from the 1960s to the mid-1970s and the latter echoing the final version of the film-type from the mid-1970s to 2009. Roesch provides additional historical context to the development of Kodachrome film here.

Here I’ve used the Kodachrome 64 film-sim recipe with the following settings:

‘Classic Chrome’ built-in film-sim
Dynamic Range: DR400
Highlight: +2 (High)
Shadow: +1 (Medium-High)
Color: 0 (Medium)
Sharpness: 0 (Medium)
Noise Reduction: -2 (Low)
White Balance: Daylight; 0 Red, -3 Blue
ISO: Auto up to 3200 (or fixed to 1000)

All recipes sorted by specific sensor are found here.

( Click here for images )

Vancouver: summer cricket at Stanley Park

Above/featured: Grouse Mountain looms over a cricket match at Upper Brockton, with the bowler delivering from the mountain end to the pavilion end.

It’s not typical 21st-century sport in North America, but it is Canada’s first summer sport. Many of cricket’s practitioners in Vancouver’s picturesque Stanley Park have roots from India and Pakistan; among them the shouts of “shabash” are heard often during play.

In childhood, I was enamored with baseball. With its similar origins, I discovered cricket with time spent in Australia, New Zealand, the Bahamas, and South Africa. The natural connection is the former British Empire. I began with T20, the shortest format of the game; with curiosity and time, my hunger encompassed the 50-over one-day format (ODI). It’s my start with the short white-ball format that I’ve developed an appreciation for the long format of the game with red-ball Test cricket.

But is the cricket ground at Vancouver’s Stanley Park “the most beautiful cricket ground in the world”? (With Table Mountain as the backdrop, some might proclaim Newlands Cricket Ground in Cape Town, South Africa as the most beautiful/scenic.)

( Click here for images and more )

Two vs. two volleyball, Spanish Banks East, Spanish Banks, English Bay, Salish Sea, Vancouver, BC, Canada, fotoeins.com

Seasons: summer

Above/featured: Beach volleyball at Spanish Banks: Vancouver, Canada – 18 Jul 2013.

So then, July 2020 is the month of “seasons” for LAPC, and the theme begins in current (northern) summer.

For me, summer largely represents deep blues and greens, a time of year with long hot days and short comfortable nights. It’s an opportunity to observe early sunrises to the northeast, and relatively late sunsets to the northwest. In languages with which I’m most familiar, the word “summer” also appears as:

Chinese: 夏季
French: l’été
German: der Sommer
Spanish: el verano

( Click here for images and more )

U Kasaren, Hradcany, Prag, Prague, Praha, Czech Republic, fotoeins.com

My Prague: a favourite place to return

Above/featured: U Kasáren from Loretánská, Hradčany – 30 July 2016 (HL).

On a personal level, the impact of this city can’t be gauged, measured, or quantified. What I know is I’ve roamed this place over countless little cobblestones. The sum of all strides led me to jumping continents and traversing nations with steps as large as my imagination could entertain and overcome.

And so, after the twelfth, fifteenth, or twentieth visit (I’ve lost count), I look at these images and ask why I surrender to the pull, why I return, and why the Czech capital city feels familiar. It’s about the old and the new, a colourful combination replacing what I’ve lost and amplifying what I’ve gained.

Prague is one of my favourite places to return.

summer sunrise, sunrise, summer, Karluv most, Charles Bridge, Prag, Prague, Praha, Czech Republic, fotoeins.com

Daybreak and a halo for St. John of Nepomuk, Charles Bridge (Karlův most) – 28 July 2013 (HL).

National Monument, Vítkov, Zizkov, Prag, Prague, Praha, Czech Republic, fotoeins.com

Over the city to the west from the National Monument on Vítkov (Národní památník na Vítkově), Žižkov – 2 August 2013 (HL).

Muzeum, stanice metra, metro station, DPP, Prag, Prague, Praha, Czech Republic, fotoeins.com

Metro line C commuters at Muzeum station – 8 November 2016 (HL)

Ginger and Fred, Fred and Ginger, Dancing House, Tančící dům, Prag, Prague, Praha, Czech Republic, fotoeins.com

Dancing House (Tančící dům) with streaking northbound streetcar, Nové Město – 6 November 2016 (HL)

I wrote a “love letter” to Prague, which as many have discovered also includes “the night watch.”

I made all of the above images in 2013 and 2016. This post appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins.com as https://wp.me/p1BIdT-bCs.