film

Trashed Art - Project Updates

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Please check here form now on for updates of my work. Project status reports for my subscribers are important so that you know how I’m using your money. The latest one is available in the following link and I will update it monthly.

My usual Instagram account will disappear tonight midnight. My commercial presence will remain as @mikestaceycommercial and there is also my arts account: @avisuallife

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vQvSBmz12Lf4RY1ENUacGk4J4_8lG5hzqCirhtBJgAwnRYy8sijadd_uH5dVYpljk1mhLRfUyA9y6ah/pubhtml

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Elements - Sarah →

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Members only content: http://mikestacey.com/members-area/elements - 44 high resolution image with photographic notes including workflow explaining how shots were achieved.

Featuring touring art model Sarah.

This shoot was down at my favourite coastal Sydney location. I know the light here well and it’s varied from soft reflective through to strong backlight and low angled sunset lighting. Sarah had expressed a desire to concentrate on her portrait modelling and these images show her versatility and skill with expressive portraiture. We only shot from 3pm to 5pm and that included half an hour or more of walking so I’m amazed at how many great images there are. Always a sign of a great model…

Read and see more in the members area: http://mikestacey.com/members-area/elements

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Simple, Uncomplicated & Impromptu

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This would be one of the simplest, most uncomplicated and impromptu shoots I’ve done. There were 4 rolls of TRI-X shot with Sass-kia during a one-one-one workshop for another photographer back in March. I’ve posted one of the rolls on Alt. Social previously but every one of those 4 rolls is quite amazing. This doesn’t happen very often. Thanks Sass-Kia.

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Vanity Fair

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This shoot with Meluxine was years ago now and was shot mainly for the ADORNED series that was exhibited at GalleyOne88 in Katoomba during August 2016. The large format portrait work followed up on initial shoot with early collaborator and dear friend Bianca Wolff. I had seen a few shots Meluxine had done with a tin plate enthusiast and given her long modelling career and vast experience I knew she'd be familiar with the large format workflow. I’d also worked with her before was confident she could hold a pose for the required length of time.

During the week GIAN Styling and I got hold of some jewellery which would fit the film portrait theme and it looked fantastic hanging off Meluxine's neck. She also had her own things from Mexico that she brought along and added to the mix. True to form Meluxine's look and gaze, not to mention hair, were perfect for these shots and I loved shooting with her again. 

We shot in Vanity Fair Studios in Sydney, run by Christine Dengate, and with Christine and Gina's help, managed to arrange the lighting to be something similar to what I had worked out with Bianca last week. 

After spending only an hour snapping off about 15 sheets of 4x5, we headed out into the courtyard outside the studio to shoot some fashion/nude stuff. Hope you enjoy all these free images.

4x5’s for ‘ADORNED’

Digitals

6x7

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XPRO

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XPRO - most people think that’s some kind of camera, actually it’s a chemical film development process - short for Cross Process. It means taking colour negative film and processing it in E6 chemicals or vice versa.

I’ve done this plenty of times before, but usually it was developing C41 in E6 chemicals. The feature image below was part of two rolls of E6 (slide) film that were processed in colour negative chemistry (Tetenal). Typically going from E6 to C41 its trickier.

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I like colour, but only a selective palette. I’m not keen on ‘real’ colour. Much of my work is black and white, which immediately provides an abstracted view of the subject - obviously because there’s no colour. This abstraction can be used to great advantage as part of an artistic process or concept. So, how to abstract the subject in colour? And, how to do it ‘tastefully’? I know, it’s subjective, and a ‘matter of taste’ anyway.

The film I experimented with was Astia 100F (RAP100) and Velvia RVP50 (kindly donated by Brad Page who slipped me two boxes of it - 10 rolls, 100 shots).

Model

The model was Poetic Minx. These were shot just the other day.

The magenta based film is the RVP50, the cyan one is the RAP100F

The magenta based film is the RVP50, the cyan one is the RAP100F

Camera

Two Pentax 67 bodies were used, one loaded with Astia, the other Velvia.

Lens

The renowned Pentax 67, 105mm F2.4 - one on each body.

Scanner

Epson V800. I always scan straight onto the glass for most purposes - have never had problems with Newton rings. Although, the final scan for the featured image below was scanned as a single frame using an old Epson 4990 film holder.

Exposure

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Was calculated with a Sekonic spot meter, spotted off the skin - not the brightest patches but more mid tone values. Using the Astia 100, I set ISO to 200 to overexpose by one stop. Exposure was 1/125 second at F2.4 The Velvia, being a stop darker, required 1/60 second at F2.4.

Lighting

A single fresnel 300W positioned behind an upright in the house so as to cast a shadow. Even studio light is generally boring to me. Light was set at about 45 degrees to the model and positioned about 3 - 4 metres away.

Extra Effects

I opened the back of the camera in indoor ambient light just after the film was wound free of the spool (about three cranks to go). This produced the light leaks you see across the roll of film ( not so visible on the contact sheet due to black point being set).

Backdrop

Home made painter’s canvas.

Development

I use a Jobo TBE2 tempering unit to to accurately get the 38 degrees C required for the C41 process. Chemicals are Tetenal. Development time was 4 minutes and then standard times for Blix, Wash and Stabiliser.

Post

The first thing I always do with film scans is set the black point using the black eyedropper of the levels control in PS on the black film edge. This time I didn’t do that, preferring the higher key look. The contact sheet does have the black point set, and you can see the general effect on the palette from doing that. It tends to bring the colours ‘into line’.

Some dust spotting and voila.

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A Cup of Tea, an Apple, a Shower and a Lie Down

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An second erotic e-Zine, shot as a mix of MF film and digital, and featuring Nakita Fox will be in the shop soon. Remember, 15% discount to all Alt. Social subscibers. The images will also feature on Nakita’s own platform.

So named because Nakita said it was the easiest shoot she’d ever done and only required her to make a cup of tea, eat an apple, take a shower and have a nice lie down.

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#powertothepeople

Waiting

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I shot this concept of ‘Waiting’ with Anoush back in February this year. The images depict different aspects of ‘waiting’. I should put them all together at some point. Think I wrote something about it too somewhere.

Waiting can include many emotions: hope, anticipation, trust, despair, comfort, anxiety…