Weeks 47 and 48 – Poland (reprise)

I was in Poland for parts of weeks 47 and 48 and in the 5 days we were there, shot as many rolls of film. That takes me to an unexpected and unprecedented 95 rolls for the year (it was 10 rolls last year). I expect that as we get towards the end of the year, we’ll each be writing posts about our experiences of 52 Rolls and how it might have changed the way we do photography.

For now, I’ll bring you the highlights of those most recent 5 rolls. As usual, on this my third trip to Poland this year, I carried my Leica M6 and my ailing Yashica-Mat 124G (you’ll tell them apart below because the square ones are the medium format Yashica), but on this occasion, I took along a friend of mine from the UK (Radio4Percent) and met another from Poland (Wojtek). This meant that I got to revisit some familiar sites in the city of Wrocław with Iain, before discovering new ones with Wojtek in his home city of Katowice.

I’ve written before about my fascination with the country and what an interesting place it is to take pictures. For reasons that I don’t fully understand, I still find it far easier shoot in Poland than the UK with more interesting subject matter all around. Maybe it’s because I take holidays there and have time to ‘get into character’ rather than trying to fit photography into life at home.

Anyway, some pictures. As usual, these will be best viewed from the 52Roll site (rather that the WordPress reader view) by clicking on them and flicking through the ‘media files’.

First up, 35mm snaps from our walk around Wroclaw, including from the market that had spread into an old station. The juxtaposition of market stalls and steam engines was pretty interesting!

A few familiar locations that you may even recognise from previous posts here, but it was great to show someone else around.

We walked many miles in the three days in the city and spent our evenings exploring the excellent craft beer scene. So many bars selling local beers of great quality.

After 3 days in Wroclaw, we went to Katowice to meet Wojtek, but the theme continued (albeit with less beer).

Finally, it was back to my mother-in-law’s to enjoy her wonderful hospitality and the peace and quiet of her countryside home.

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Gubbins:

The colour pictures are Kodak Portra 400 in either 120 or 35mm format. They were shot on a Leica M6 with 35mm Summicron lens, or a Yashica 124G. They were processed and scanned by FilmDev. The black and white was Kodak Tri-X400, shot at 1600 and processed at home in Ilfotec HC.

My previous posts on 52 Rolls are here.