43/52 British Invasion in Ektar / Portra-Ektar Color Compare….

Portra rendered red as red. Ektar rendered it more “orangey”.

Again red is red with Portra.

From Portra the yellow is more true to life than renderings from Ektar.

 

 

As a study of color matching there are three images are from Kodak Portra 160 in harsh light.  Same camera, also used polarizer as with Ektar.

This weekend the “British Invasion” occurred in Bristol.  Beautiful English cars paraded through town on Friday night and exhibited for a judged show on Saturday.   This invasion is irony since our history is black-smithed from repelling the British.  The Revolutionary War’s Battle of Rhode Island occurred about 5 miles from my home.  My dad was in the first faculty of Portsmouth High School, hired while the school was being built.  Many artifacts from the battle were unearthed from the school’s excavation including several molten metal cannonballs that my dad took home.  They sat in a bucket beneath the kitchen sink for years.  I don’t think they were filled with any explosives and I have no idea where they are now.   The British were backed into Newport and the French fleet was offshore blocking escape.  But a severe storm hit and the French fled for open water fearing the ships’ safety and the British were thus able to escape encirclement on Aquidneck Island.  Many of the streets and schools in my town are named for the King’s grantees, Bradford, Reynolds, etc.  It was fun to experience the weekend of “Britishness”.  I for one admire the UK’s people very much and from having my DNA analyzed, I learned my lineage is mostly from UK.  The UK is strong and resolute in the face of unfathomable violence.  God Save the Queen!

On to the photography.   These images were shot with my wonderful Rolleiflex 2.8F.  It is a camera to last a life-time.  I used Kodak Ektar.  There are actually 2 rolls of Ektar but I will count it as “one” so I don’t finish this project early!  Half of the shots were taken in harsh late morning light so I used the Rollei polarizing filter.  It’s a great tool.  Screw it on the viewing lens, rotate until the desired effect is obtained.  Note the number corresponding to the red dot and then transfer that to the taking lens.  I messed it up a few times but overall am happy with those results.   I am happy to have gotten so many decent exposures.  I attribute this largely from the effort expended to get to week 43 of 52 Rolls.  There is no better way to learn than from using the camera.  From this week I learned that harsh light will impair contrast slightly and white balance is different.  I don’t yet know how to use color film filters but hope to soon.  Hope you enjoy the images of these classic cars, there certainly are enough of them!

Oh, I must add the image most precious to me is the one of my beautiful and loving wife, Catherine.