The Deacon

[alfredo]

late 1969, early 1970 Louisville Ky Cherokee Park.
Pentex Spotmatic with 55mm lens. TriX film.

[JeffR]

1. Ah, the Spotmatic!

This photo really captures an era. And a pretty good texture shot, too!

[alfredo]

4. Thanks

That guy looks rather evil.

Here's the one I am thinking about using for texture

[JeffR]

5. Wow

Not sure what I'm looking at, but I like it. It's Giger-esque.

[alfredo]

7. A few weeks before I took this picture I had pasted

an anti bush poster on that aluminum electronics box outside city hall. They took it off using a grinder. That is what you see, the markings from the grinder.

I believe this was the poster.

[priller]

10. Can't remove all the evil

You can grind it off, but the evil still lingers. You can almost make out a ghostly image in it. Definitely use that one for texture.

[alfredo]

11. I've been using it as my desktop image.

It kind of harks back to some of the old patterns you would get with your linux distro.

[JeffR]

13. alfredo, if you'll pardon the expression, you're a god

Though I can't imagine finding myself in Kentucky with nothing I wanted to shoot. I've loved every minute I've spent in Kentucky, and I've always found the landscape just inspirational. Then again, compared to Africa, maybe it doesn't seem quite so intriguing.:shrug:

[alfredo]

14. I didn't want to come back, but I had signed a contract

saying I had travel restrictions, and was barred from immigrating. The travel restriction has been lifted and I don't think the immigration ban is enforced because some of my comrades have immigrated. So maybe I was dissatisfied with having my freedom restricted. I was having culture shock. Things changed radically in the time I was gone. 66-69.

The towns people weren't as friendly as the Africans. There was still a frontier spirit there, on my street people were peeking from behind drawn blinds and locking car doors as I walked by. In Africa there were children everywhere, at home they were nowhere. People smiled and talked with you. At home the only ones that showed any openess were the hippies. They were wonderful, sweet people, but they were tough. They had to contend with the hostility of the police and the "silent majority." It gave them strong survival instincts.

[NV Whino]

2. The pyramid cape

with the pyramid stones--wonderful.

[alfredo]

3. He could carry several pounds of weed under that.

Not saying that's what he did, but I did know a woman that used her cape to hide her "wares."

[Blue_In_AK]

6. I love this guy...

He reminds of flamboyant characters I've known in my life.

[alfredo]

8. He was one of the more laid back characters there.

[hvn_nbr_2]

9. TriX film?

Help my failing memory here. I haven't used film for quite awhile. Was (Is?) TriX that really, really sharp fine grain B&W film that you could make huge enlargements from without showing any grain? I used to hate the developer for it--I'd stir and stir and stir and stir and it still wouldn't all dissolve. Finally I'd just give up and use it as it was. I once made an 8x10 print from a section of a 35mm negative about as big as that guy's head and hat, and it looked clear, sharp, and no grain. Amazing film, if it's the one I'm thinking of. Do they still make it?

[alfredo]

12. It had a large grain, but it was sharp. It handled contrast well.

It was also fairly fast at 400. I used to push it to 800 for sporting events. I used to push Extachrome to 1600 for night time work. I eventually moved over to Agfa because it was so good with the browns and golds of the Sub Sahara.

There was also Kodak Pan (Panchromatic) film that was a much slower speed, but was good for portrait work.

Now it is Illford for black and white.

It was a short time after this roll of film that I stopped taking photos. Africa jaded me. I found little of interest to photograph in Kentucky. It wasn't until the internet, my mail route, and a pocket 35 mm that I decided to get back to work with my camera.