The Monochrome Set Pt.2 - FED-1

So the second, possibly final Black & White film for me. A freebie from a mate though quite expensive to develop of course, although my preferred developer has a slightly cheaper option for processing now so maybe not the 'final' final film in fact...

I've heard people expressing the opinion that B&W is the best medium for photography, the serious medium for serious photographers, and of course this may well be true if you're a really good photographer, which of course I’m not. Yes B&W can deliver eye-poppingly 'graphic' images, closer to the realms of art than photorealism, but then so can colour film in the right hands. One thing is certainly true, with B&W photography you have to think much harder about the light in your composition, which perhaps makes it more a medium for the experienced photographer. Loading my camera with monochrome film didn't in fact turn me into Henri Cartier-Bresson, you'll be entirely unsurprised to learn...

So for us less experienced Camera Operatives, and where most of us are working with scans rather than prints, all the fun and creativity of monochrome photography can just as easily be achieved with decent editing software... yes?

As I say, I’m hardly qualified to express an opinion, I just know that my eye is more drawn to colour images, whether accurate, creative, or with more of the ‘vintage’ look that seems to be so popular now. If I think the shapes will look better in B&W then I’m not so puritanical that I won't tweak things that way, but the fact is I’m never going to be able to tweak these monochrome images to colour, and if I'm honest there isn't one of them that I wouldn't prefer in colour.

These images were shot on a day out in Peterborough, and at the Riverside Festival in Leicester, on Ilford HP5 Plus 400, kindly donated by a friend who's now reverted to old-fangled digital. In the absence of any other film stock in the house this became the test roll for the recently CLA'd FED camera, perhaps not the wisest choice but with the things I was looking to test, Curtain Shutter accuracy, Focus, dirt in the camera etc. it made little difference what film was in the camera.

I'm guessing this film sits at the budget end of B&W, and whilst it's sharp and not too grainy I do feel it lacks a bit of contrast, or is that the limitations of the Soviet Industar 10 Lens coming through... or indeed my lack of attention to the light. Probably a bit of both...