The other day, I went out for a little walk by the lake Mjøsa, biggest lake in Norway. Along me I brought the Canon T70 and a roll of Ilford FP4 Plus. It was a rather windy day and the weather was dull and overcast and with some threatening skies promising some downfall in some form. Whether it would come as snow or as rain was anyone’s guess at this point. Since the weather was rather unpredictable, I chose to not bring any video-equipment, so this is a blog-only post. For readers only.
At this time of year the lake is still low and one can walk on what most of the year is submerged by the lake. Once the snow-melting in the mountains picks up some time in the middle of may the water level in the lake will rise and the are I photographed this time will noe be accessible.
I snapped some shots on my way along the lake towards a little woodland area not far from the main path along the lake. I noticed a lot of motion in the water, and I tried to freeze it in action with the higher shutter speeds on the Canon, and even though some of the ended up slightly under-exposed I also got a few decent exposures.
Once again I chose to develop this film with Adox Atomal 49, a developer I know gives me very fine grain and is very good at keeping shadow-details without blowing out the whites. Whether this is considered a compensating developer or not, I am uncertain, but I find it to give me relatively flat negatives that are easy to scan and work with in post-processing. After using 10 liters of this developer I have found that the dilution 1+1 is the right one for my taste. I also like the way you get Perceptol-grain without having to sacrifice film speed. In these times when Kodak Xtol seems to be in shot supply, I have used Atomal instead. However, for my next big-batch I am mixing Ilford ID-11 instead of Adox Atomal 49.
After a while I approached the trees and the little woodland-area which sadly has shrunk quite a bit over the last years due to construction of new residential areas closer to the lake, but some interesting trees are still left, and with the snow disappearing, it is once again accessible.
I find woodland-photography the most pleasant challenge for me as a photographer. Shooting a decent woodland composition can be very difficult, but at the same time, working in such an environment has a certain peace to it. The feeling you get from being in the woods is unlike anything else.
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