82/365: Oak pollen

So, I had my final project presentation in Advanced Traditional Photography yesterday. For the final, we had to pick some photographer or piece of art work that influenced us, and present no fewer than 15 prints demonstrating that influence. I've been on a bit of a Karl Blossfeldt kick of late, and since my macro photography work had been well-received in the class, I decided to run with it. Ironically, the first print I made turned out to be the most Blossfeldt-like image I produced, wholly by accident. I photographed this oak pollen cluster against a mottled grey background, and the contrast was horrible. The entire image was a dull grey with little detail. Hoping to save the shot, I printed multiple copies in the darkroom using progressively stronger contrast filters on the enlargers. This final image used a 4.5 filter with an exposure of 60 seconds or so. The coarse, contrasty look gives it an antique feeling and echoes some of the texture of Blossfeldt's masterful works, although his images were normally much darker than this.

Camera: Canon Elan 7ne
Film: Kodak T-Max 400
Lens: Canon 100mm 2.8 macro
Lisa On Location Photography

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