off to see the wizard

a touch of winter flu has tossed a slight shadow over my first few days off, but hopefully i'll be fit enough tomorrow to (gently!) throw a couple of cameras onto the back seat of
the car and join my patient partner on a little, not-too-far-afield, road trip.
we're thinking northern france by way of bruges, but i'm fine with anywhere, really,
as long as it's picturesque, and photogenic.
and as long as it doesn't pour.

to kingdom come

he was a prince of stances, effect above essence: she knows this now.
but it takes little - a posture, a profile, a pair of pigeoned toes - to remind her poignantly of something she no longer truly remembers.

hasta la vista

an autumn day can be an imagemaker's dream in the netherlands, with a pure, crisp, glorious light, and colours that - joni mitchell says it perfectly - stick to all your senses.
it can also (think wet, grey, relentlessly matte) be an imagemaker's nightmare.
i'd like tomorrow to lean the first way.
please.

be my, be my

tsk. i know:
the "sweet spot" on the top image is mi-ni-scule and hovers awkwardly somewhere in the corner of a shutter, but the lensbaby - mounted as it is on a lovely old nikon - has been an exercise in coordination, faith and patience.
an analog camera means no preview, no review, no tossing away; it also means
finishing the roll and waiting for processing and then discovering that i need a lot more practise before i am rewarded with wonderfulness like this.
and this.

holding the roses

"almost all words do have colour, and nothing is more pleasant than to utter a pink word
and see someone's eyes light up and know it is a pink word for him or her too."
- gladys taber

my fascination with colour has not diminished, but my fascination with film has flourished, and i find that my older cameras tend to render what i see in a subtle and subdued - but infinitely true and beautiful - palette.
i do wonder, though, if my using long-expired film could have anything to do with it?
i am a late and plodding learner, but i am a learner nonetheless.

a latte to go

wim, and his beautiful etchings, can be found sundays at the weekly art market on the spui; if i happen to be in amsterdam i always drop by to say hello, and to watch his stall while he stretches his legs and goes for coffee.
i was grateful, on this particular day, for the shelter of his canopy: the heavens
suddenly opened and even the next doorway would have been a leap too far. there is a special calm, truly, in a steaming latte sipped surrounded by a storm.
the top image? i forgot - not once, but twice - to forward the film. it's because i'm three times older than i feel.