5 Frames with a Yashica A and expired Porta 160

Sometime around 2023 I simply lost interest in it all. Cameras. Photography. Work. Doing much at all. Just a bit of a slump in general. Call it middle age, call it reality, call it whatever you want, but it took a while to un-slump. Pointing a light box at things didn’t seem to matter. It felt like I wasn’t able to “make” the images I wanted. So, step back a few steps, dig around in the box you got from your grandfather all those years back, see what lurks within.

A medium format TLR… ok, you’ve never used one of these. Let us see what happens.

Walks in nature are easy living in the West Yorkshire. It felt like a logical start. We’re lucky to have some stunning ground under our feet and most of it untracked by the tourists who stick to the pretty/quaint/quirky village I live in. We pick our times and we go to the places they go outside of their time. It’s perfect. We get a thriving village which we can enjoy outside the busy times.

Walks sometimes happen for work. A day at the beach teaching about biotic and abiotic factors. Looking at the effect of tides. Looking at ecosystems. One hour free. Go see what you can find.

Looking in and looking out. Staying away from the hordes of primary school children in their brightly coloured tabards running around like rats on the beachfront. 6th formers are easier. Less colour. More like sloths than rats. But either way, a break from them is always appreciated.

Finding the end of where the pier once stood. This was what I took the light box with me for. Pause. Measure. Look. Repeat. Breath in. Cock shutter. Breath out. Hold. Press and capture.

Notes call this roll 41.

I’ve just scanned roll 62.

Something clicked again.

All photos taken with an expired roll of Portra 160 (dated 2021, so not that far out, and kept in a fridge all that time).
Shot at box speed with a lovely Yashica A TLR, a fantastic little thing. Limited with its selection of shutter speeds, but who cares!
All images metered with a mixture of sunny 16 rule, or LightMe app on my aging iPhone SE (an original one…you can get the batteries replaced you know, unlike me).

Share this post: