Ravilious was the local photographer in North Devon for many years (he's dead now). Most of his work is in black & white. It is a nostalgic portrait of a remote, rural community.
Over the years he honed his technique to produce a soft, old-fashioned look. He had started with modern Leitz lenses, and Tri-X. At the end he was using uncoated Elmars and Hektors from the 1920s and 30s on an M3. These lenses are said to have good 'drawing' qualities, giving a 'rounded' feel to the image, whatever that means. A strong 3-dimensionality, I think, with a lot of shadow detail even when shooting against the sun. He used the Zone system, overexposing by 1 stop, then compensating in the development using a very dilute soft-working solution. He used a very light yellow filter over the lens. This combination of factors is said to have produced the very long tonal range in the neg., and a slightly soft feel to the image. It seems he rarely needed to burn in the sky more than about 10-30%. He even made his own lens hood to cope with the fact that he shot so much against the light. The book doesn't seem to mention what b&w film he was using at the end, although for colour he used K25. I would guess he was using a fairly slow b&w film too. This may be old-hat to you - I'm not into the fineries of processing. But it gives his photographs a very distinctive look, which is well-suited to his subject matter, and a welcome change from the high-contrast which predominates nowadays. -- Cheers, Bob > -----Original Message----- > From: Shel Belinkoff [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Link doesn't work ;-(( I'll check Ravilious thru Google and > see what comes up. Thanks for the pointer ;-)) > > Shel > > > > [Original Message] > > From: Bob W <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > > Hi, > > > > I'm not sure if we're thinking of the same kind of glow, but I was > > going > to > > post some information about James Ravilious, an English > photographer > > I've raved about before, who has a certain glow in his work when he > > shoots against the light. > > > > Then I remembered I've probably done this before, so I found this > > reply, > to > > one of your questions: > > http://tinyurl.com/9sew5 > > > > If you haven't tried it already, it might be worth it. Even if it > > doesn't produce that glow you might find an interesting > technique in > > its own > right. > > > > -- > > Cheers, > > Bob > > > > > -----Original Message----- > > > From: Shel Belinkoff [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > Sent: 29 May 2005 18:35 > > > To: pentax-discuss@pdml.net > > > Subject: Getting That Old fashioned Glow > > > > > > Before anti-halation backing, it was easy to get a nice > glow around > > > white or bright objects in a scene. I've not had any > luck recently > > > when trying that with the contemporary B&W films. Any > suggestions > > > on how to do this (outside of Photoshop and Digital Trickery)? > > > > > > > > > Shel > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >
