Burton Prong in Fog

[scott]

We were in Delaware last week for a change of venue. Had some crazy foggy mornings and evenings, combination of strangely warm days and massive snow melt (there was a storm in our are a week or so before that dumped over 20" of snow in less than a day). Took the dogs out for a walk one morning with my wife down to a local stream (Burton Prong). Had brought my Super Fujica Six, saying, Boy - should have dragged my 4x5 down with us. Walked the dogs back, kinda fast, grabbed my bag, and hot-footed it back.

Had just a glorious time setting up composing, shooting. Burned three sheets; this was the first.



Burton Prong is the headwater of a creek that runs to Rehoboth Bay, and while freshwater, is subject to tidal levels. At times, this little island is completely revealed; at others, completely submerged.

Robert's posts of his dry plate journey has (finally) tempted me into the abyss. He's going to talk me through this first on 4x5 for ease of process, so I brought the 4x5 on this trip. I'd like to say that, after 20+ years, I'm a pro and muscle memory runs the show. Nope. Dropped and lost the branded Rodenstock lens cap for my Sironar 210/5.6. Stepped on some "soil" that wasn't and sank ankle deep in some very cold muck. Best though: This was, apparently, the first time I'd used this holder. Bought in 2020, several came loaded. Thought I'd emptied them all. Guess not. Shot them as Arista.EDU. When I was unloading the film, thought "Feels different than Arista." Developed as always (7:12 at 20C in HC-110 dilution H), pulled the film from the tank and - nothing. Really heavy base. Hmm - looks like color film. Checked the notch code - RDP III, Provia 100. Dammit. Almost tossed it, but hung it anyway. Developed another sheet that I knew was Arista, moved on. But when I went to scan, looked closely at the Provia, and there was an image there. Scanned with a very dense base, but my entire image was there. Took some tweaking, but got just the image I wanted. From 7 year old, abused positive film cross-processed poorly in B&W chemistry. Duh.

The other sheet is still in the holder, in a bag in the freezer. Have about 6 other sheets to process from the week, then will try to do a better job cross processing that one. So, after all these years, still making rookie mistakes.

(BTW, wife and I were walking by a few days later and I was able to locate my lens cap. Clean livin'.)

[Brazile]

Awesome!

And I have found that there's no such frickin thing as muscle memory with this stuff. You have to check down the list *every* ********* *time*. Or else. I've experienced all the mistakes at this point and any time I have the hubris to think I can just motor through I get bit again. Argh.

[Julio1fer]

After looking for a minute or two, I understood why you wanted to get this image, those branches and reflections in the very still water, through the fog, and the distant island (?) to the left are a beautiful subject. It may be worth exploring digital effects to enhance your cross-processed Provia.

I admire those of you that do LF more or less reliably, in the cold and mud, being myself hardly capable of doing rollfilm and 35mm without botching something, after more than 60 years of trying.

As for muscle memory, we have a saying here: Overconfidence kills men and gets women pregnant. . And I think that it was Mark Twain that wrote that “what gets you is what you did not know it was there”.