St Clair Photography Blog | New Zealand Wedding and Portrait Photographer » Film is not dead

Russell, Beach, Rain, Skinny Dipping

admin — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 09:23:02 +0000

Here’s a summary of Scott and Kate’s amazing getaway wedding in Russell, Bay of Islands. Thanks guys for having us out to photograph it, we had a blast!

Off to Christchurch

admin — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 06:35:01 +0000

We’re off to Christchurch for another rad wedding. Here’s a couple of photos of Christ Church… New Zealand’s oldest church complete with cemetery, in Russell.

6×6

admin — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 05:36:36 +0000

I’ve really missed shooting 6×6 film, and this lens will make sure I don’t stray again. I’m going to have to remind myself constantly not to just shoot at f/2 all of the time.

admin — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 21:53:57 +0000

The second frame, off to a good start.

admin — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 07:57:24 +0000

The first frame I shot with the Norita 66 I picked up recently. LOVE this camera!

Norita 66 ノリタ66

admin — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 06:08:49 +0000

Finally I’ve managed to lay my hands on one of these beasts. I first noticed the Norita 66 when my friend ARI started showing some amazing work photographed with his. The Norita 66 is a medium format SLR film camera with a Noritar 80mm f/2 lens and shoots 6×6 format on 120 or 220 film. This lens is rumored to be the fastest lens ever made for the 6×6 film format. Norita Kōgaku ノリタ光学 was a Japanese binocular lens manufacturer that was founded in 1951. They started making the Norita 66 during the 1960′s and the version I have was a collaboration between Singer the owner of Graflex sold in the US as “Graflex Norita”. I’m currently shooting my first roll now so look out for some scans coming soon.

Monochromatic Monday

admin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 03:05:25 +0000

Thought I would kick off a little series of monochromatic Monday’s where I’ll post a black and white image at the start of every week. Here’s a cool black and white of the other half of St Clair Photography, enjoy. Hasselblad 500 CM, Zeiss Planar T* 80mm f/2.8, Ilford Delta 3200 film.

Featured on Lucy Dylan Weddings

admin — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 22:40:30 +0000

I was fortunate enough to be featured on Lucy Dylan Weddings today. Pop over and have a look as she has some other great photography and wedding ideas over there! LUCY DYLAN WEDDINGS

Summer in the middle of winter

admin — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 23:23:41 +0000

I thought I would break up the wedding photography with a quick post from Tokyo. I shot this for Viviane three days before leaving Tokyo in Daikanyama. I love the feeling I get when looking at this photograph, it feels really warm although it was shot in the middle of winter. I’ll post some more up from this shoot this week. I hope you all had a great weekend, great enough to get you through this working week. Hasselblad 500 CM, Fuji Pro 400H, Fuji Frontier scan.

Hasselblad 500 CM

admin — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 05:24:38 +0000

So, a couple of weeks ago I finally got my own Hasselblad. I ended up getting a Hasselblad 500 CM in black, Zeiss 80mm Planar T* f/2.8, 120 and 220 film backs, and polaroid 100 back. So far it has been a lot of fun using it, and a lot different to the medium format Contax 645 I have. I will be getting the first rolls of film back tonight taken with the Hasselblad. I never use any of my cameras with tripods, everything is hand held so I have free movement when I work.

Compared to the Contax the Hasselblad’s construction is of a lot higher standard and made in Sweden. The body is all metal and the smaller dimensions make it a bit lighter to use also. Most of the body is covered in a leatherette covering compared to the Contax’s plastic / rubber combination. I do however find the Contax a lot easier to shoot and get critical focus due to the auto focus and prism finder. The Hasselblad definitely wins in the handling and shooting experience. Taking a photo with it is a completely different feeling to any other camera I have and the sound of the shutter is very unique, kind of a ” KA CHUNK” sound. It’s definitely louder compared to my other cameras, especially the Leica M7′s whisper quiet shutter.

For those of you are thinking “How much, how much?” I picked it up on ebay for $750 US, then bought an original lens cap and 220 back which gives me 24 photos per roll at 6×6 (the famous square format). If you’re interested to see what this combo produces then check back here over the next week or so.

Photo taken with a Leica M8 and Voigtlander Nokton 50mm f/1.1 @ f/1.8