Fuji Neopan 1600 BW. Nikon F2. 50mm 1.4 prime

Shutter Speeds: 1/500- 1/1000

Aperture: 1.4

This set is basically a dream come true. I really wanted to also try shooting sports (on film format). I just didn’t have the chance to grab hold of a film that really fits the situation, until a few months ago! I used a Neopan 1600 iso high speed black and white film. Thanks to my good friend Eugene for developing this roll, and of course the scanner goes to Canoscan 4400F.  The Fuji Neopan 1600 iso film has been discontinued for practical reasons today. This is my fitting goodbye to the grainy high speed film. What better way than to test it in action inside the Hevtek United-Ancheta Jiu JItsu grind house. Due to the uneven lighting inside the gym, I used bracketing to get the right exposure.

The Fuji Neopan 1600 was discontinued because of the presence of its 400iso counterpart. According to the rules that they give when you are trying to push or pull the film during developing process, you could actually hike it or decrease it by two stops and the results will remain the same. In terms of economic practicality, it really makes a lot of sense. The price of 1600 Neopan is a bit more expensive than the 400 iso Neopan. Why have a 1600 if you could push the 400?

These are some of the outtakes and I’ll be posting more on Flickr in the coming days!

OSS!

1. On and off functionality of F stops 8-16.

I had the difficulty shooting outdoors because the shutter curtain won’t allow the light to get through UNLESS you press the depth of field preview button. I do not know if it is the 50 mm NIkkor lens to blame or it is the F2. If anyone knows what could be the cause of this ruckus, drop me a line.

1. Faulty back cover lock.

It was quite frustrating to have some of your shots wiped off with the lock failing to keep the back cover tightly closed. Though the lock at the bottom of the camera was secured to “C”, it kept on opening ajar resulting to some frames being destroyed. Fortunately it didn’t damage a whole roll.

1. The head definitely gives the F2 a trashy look

If you will read about the F2 it has several heads from the viewfinders that allow you to shoot from the waist to the typical eye level view finders. Mine has a wrecked front removing the “Nikon” logo upfront. It was mentioned that it is really common to cannibalize viewfinders or heads in order to fix other Nikon cameras. It is likely that my F2 was a victim of this probable theory.

Of course, you really don’t want to have all problems and no solutions. I finally narrowed three problems to one pressing problem, scratching the two others (as a non-issue for me). Since I really don’t want to destroy rolls of hard work and joy, I am going to reinforce the camera with electrical tape from this day on whenever I am shooting. It doesn’t matter if it is indoor or outdoor.

For more information on how the Nikon F2 works check this out!

The next installation   of the Backpacking Ilcoos series is from Vigan headed ultimately to Pagudpod. We started from Vigan and headed to Pagudpod via Laoag by 9am. But in reality, if you want to go directly to the finest sands of Pagudpod, you can do so using GMT bus lines from Vigan, this way you skip the Laoag stop over. But for our part, we ended up going to Partas bus lines since we missed the GMT bus from the gas station.

Going to Laoag from Vigan typically goes from 2.5-3 hours. From Laoag, you can take the bus further up north to Pagudpod for another 2 hours. There are many sites you can see surrounding Pagudpod. You can in fact opt to see these places before you head directly to Pagudpod riding tricycles from one town to the other. The other option is to have a guide from the tricycle drivers of Pagudpod.

There are those tricycle drivers who are accredited by the Department of Tourism. Their rate would typically be 1,200 for both the Southward and Northward tours. The trusted driver who accompanied us was Marlito. You can contact him through his cell phone number (+63 9286618304) to get an easy accommodation especially during summer.

One of the best highlights of the trip is the Kabigan Falls. It will be a thirty minute walk back and forth to reach the falls but it is all worth it. Aside from the falls, you can also look forward to Bangui where you get to see 20 giant windmills that power two towns of Ilocos Norte.

Here are the complete list of itineraries broken down between the one headed north of Pagudpod and the ones headed south both being P600 respectively (good for 2-3pax).

Northbound Tour

1. Kabigan Falls
2. Patapat Viaduct
3. Agua Grande
4. Paraiso ni Anton
5. Timmangtang Rock
6. Blue Lagoon
7. Dos Hermanos

Southbound Tour

1. Bangui Windmills
2. Bangui View Deck
3. Bojeador Lighthouse

We had our accommodation at Polaris beach resort in barangay Saud. If you are looking for a quiet place to stay in, this is the best spot out there. It is near the town proper so if anything goes wrong, you could simply get to the hospital or go and get some food. Comparing Blue Lagoon and Barangay Saud, the downside to the latter would have to be the waves. They have stronger waves than the one in Blue Lagoon (which is one of the reasons why it is sought after).

If you are on a budget, you could simply go and find a homestay within barangay Saud and Blue Lagoon. You could always ask Marlito to bring you to the best places within your budget. There are rooms that would cost P800 per night while there are also those resorts that would charge 2 grand a night.

To have a smoother transaction, it is highly suggested you contact Marlito: (+63 9286618304) or Polaris Beach Resort (+63-077-6760198)

We basically started in Manila. We chose to go for Dominion Bus Lines and left for the 8:30pm ride. Manila to Vigan is around 8-9 hours so I’d rather sleep it off. You could in fact make use of different bus lines if you want to go to Vigan but Dominion Bus Lines is quite cheaper than what Viron Bus Lines is offering.

We arrived in Vigan at around 5am and went to El Juliana Hotel. I have to admit that the hotel 4 years ago was way better than what it is now. The place is literally falling apart not to mention the unmaintained pool that could already be a breeding ground of mosquitoes. They charged P900 for a room good for two. If you are on a tight budget, you could try the different homestays in the area. You could opt to have the one beside El Juliana hotel, or you could simply ask the tricycle drivers to bring you to one affordable homestay. I saw one sign that says P280/night, I don’t know if it goes per person or it is already good for one room.

Getting around Vigan is a great experience. The picturesque heritage village simply says it all. Plus the fact that you could get around the different sites of Vigan for P150/hour tour with the calesas. The tour typically covers the bell tower where the Panday fight scene was made, then the Hidden Garden, Burnay workshop, weaver’s workshop, Chavit Singson’s Baluarte and other museums that you could opt to skip or explore on your own. We covered the different areas   except the museums and we were done after 3 hours.

Aside from the trips and the sites to see, you should try the delicacies sold in the plaza. Though the Mc Donald’s is so tempting, try the Ilocano foods for a different experience.

So far, I love the way it shoots. The thing that I would like to change however is the fact that I need a different head for the Nikon F2. It would’ve been nice to have a TLR type of head. I think they call it waist level viewfinder which costs a solid $99-$125!

Jeez. Give me a break Nikon could really bust your pocket. Maybe I’ll just do some hunting again in the streets of Manila to find any remnants of the elusive “heads”. As you can see, my viewfinder really sucks from the outside. You can definitely call it a terminator. And for the record this is by far the ugliest yet most functionally sound camera I used.

(Overlapping shots scanned as one)

I still haven’t used it during the day with the sun as the natural light. I will have time for that in the next few days.

If you notice the cold feel for the Fuji films, it’s the trademark blue color that you get when you use Fuji films. Compared to the warmer taste of Kodak, I usually prefer a Fuji film than a Kodak whether it is black and white or colored negative.

My Canon Ae1-Program already gave up. This is the reason I used the Canon QL19 for the past days. I recently bought a Nikon F2 that reminded me of T-800 in The Terminator. Barely having a decent face, it works good with a 1.4 50mm lens. I hope that I could use it in the coming days. For now, I will be planning to take a trip headed North and maybe rejuvenate the film stash that has been drained by the last months.

It was really a long way since I decided not to sell the Canon AE-1 Program from the usual line up of then functional Hidalgo Online. But now it has a new owner and I was informed that it was fixed in Quiapo by our most trusted Oca. Come to think of it, it was the same Canon AE-1 Program that started our business and even up to an extent, a photographer’s friendship with Oca . I usually have Dong to fix my camera in Quiapo in the past. But knowing how Oca can give you a good run for your money when it comes to repair, I need not to find another technician. My and my University buddies are now heading straight to him.

Oca fixed the Canon AE-1 Program’s   light meter roughly two months before heading to Pulag. It was more than a year since we had that trip and the Canon AE-1 Program didn’t fail me in the meter department at all since then. But this time around it was the gear that was involved. The part that gave up was the one that cranks the roll into the next frame. Living up to it’s repair shop’s name Shurdun! You can really be sure with your camera with this guy.

I no longer wanted to have it repaired for an P800 price considering the battery is now becoming steep! So I had no choice but to bid it goodbye. I sold it to Clark together with the multiplier, battery pack and the 1.4 50mm lens. Though I really remember him getting trouble with its focus after having the gear replaced; this camera is such a treat. It’s history runs from an old photographer who finally decided to sell some of his stuffs to a hustling hobbyist (which is me).

For now, it’s going to be the Nikon F2 aka T-800 Terminator or the 40 year old but still dependable Canon QL 19. As a memento, the photos are some of the Canon Ae-1 Program’s  last roll in my hands.

To my surprise, some of the last shots of the camera came from my grand father’s tool shed. It was where some of the most basic and complex repairs needed in our household was done. It also involved some repairs done for the past and present car. The irony that it is complete with a collection of tools amounting to 50 years, no one inside the house has any knowledge to crack the Canon Ae-1 Program puzzle and fix it.

Everyone is heading straight to what the digital world could offer them. This is part of the reason why I really won’t jump towards digital photography and sell my gears. Though there are threats of discontinuing some of my favorite films, but as long as the third world is using them; film photography will still breathe.

We are planning to make things more affordable for people who love film photography. We all know how difficult it is today to really have someone get your black and white film developed with D76 developing. And the story really doesn’t end there. We are also aware how scanning could really cost you. What we are trying to do is to test whether it is feasible to scan and to develop on our very own. Well, we already did it on our films. It is just time for us to apply them to other people’s work. If all goes well, we might be launching it in the next few weeks.

Here are a few outtakes from the Tmax 100 using the Canon AE-1 Program, developed by Eugene’s D76 developer, scanned by the Canoscan 4400F.

I remember shooting the Holga for the very first time in Vigan. I was really amazed how medium format film worked and how they managed to turn into stunningly beautiful photographs with just a plastic lens. Lomo cameras were supposed to be cheap. It was a poor man’s camera until the online fad came along with the now barely breathing Multiply site. I remember Hidalgo stores selling a Holga FN for P1,800 but with the tendency of online stores to rip off “cheap cameras”, they priced it as high as P5,000 a pop.

Some really made a fortune of the film camera resurgence plus the Lomo fad coming into bourgeoisie consciousness. At that time, I was just starting with photography as a hobby. Until I accidentally discovered a sweet spot where people pawn their old stuff to get instant moolah. This was when I decided to open up the now forgotten Hidalgo Online. The very first camera I bought from them was an AE-1 Program. If you are going to buy the camera from Hidalgo, they usually charge you by as much as P6,000 for it. But with the site I opened, I sold it for more than half the price but still keeping a good deal of mark up. It became an instant hit, selling two to three cameras a week. Considering I spent most of my time in school, my cameras were everywhere. I delivered cameras to Bicol, to Cebu, to Davao and to different parts of Manila. It was my very first taste of “commercial success”, or how else you might want to call it.

I established friends over time within the pawn areas. I forged deals and good buys from the different pawn dealers within the area. As the site grew in popularity for around a year, getting my own juice on a regular basis, then Facebook came. That’s when I realized how the Video killed the Radio Star. But this time around, Facebook committed genocide over Multiply businesses and the sad part was Hidalgo Online was one of them. This is probably the requiem for the Hidalgo Online, which I never officially declared dead but was long gone. It’s always hard to say goodbyes but really we could learn a lot from the changing times and how fast internet propensities change over the past years.

We tried to order a bulk of old cameras from Japan just to get Hidalgo Online back on track. But with tax ruckus that everyone is afraid of, this idea didn’t remained just as an idea. We were supposed to be shipping EF mount lenses for cheaper prices but we were too afraid to be ripped of by the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

Though Hidalgo Online is active no more, I could really say to myself that I tried my best to keep the prices lower for everybody to have a chance to shoot some analog film cameras. For all those who supported the analog scene and to all those who are still continuing to shoot film and buying from the remaining survivors of Multiply to Facebook diaspora; I salute you!

Let’s just say I had the experience of working with Shakespeare the web copy writer. I hate being the grammar police because I am also a fugitive myself hiding behind the comfort of the internet and the desktop, but this case is just so hard to let it slide. If you are applying for a writer position, at least make things cohesive on what you are saying. I could forgive the tons of subject verb agreement violations, and the misused articles you precede almost every noun in each of the sentences; but writing wordy sentences that lack the direction and sense is already something atrocious that I could never pardon.

I played grammar police with one of the new writers in the office today. I know that there is a drought of writing machines recently in the office and we badly need some hands. But if you are mixing old English with a conversational tone written mostly on “American” English, you just can’t help but to scratch your head with all the “ought” and the incoherent sentences that came after.

I never had the fervor of writing Pulitzer worthy prose materials. What I do is what any other sensible copy writer does and that is to produce a copy that is capable of transcending to the readers despite the unavoidable grammar mishaps here and there.

I do not believe that we Filipinos in general could master the use of English in a proficient manner mainly because our first language has been bastardized. Socialites love to use the mix of Filipino and English on a regular manner that you are definitely not making positive strides for both. According to linguistics experts, mastery of the first language is a must in order to be proficient for both written and verbal to the second language.

When writing or speaking the target language (L2), second language learners tend to rely on their native language (L1) structures to produce a response. (Dechert, 1983 and Ellis, 1997).

The text means that second language speakers tend to still rely on their primary language in order to compose a thought, thus; if you do not have the mastery of your primary language, how do you even expect to rely from it? I remember the time when I first had my taste of cash from writing, one of the very first things I bought was the Cultural Revolution propaganda material from eBay for the sake of having a memorabilia. According to the guy who sold it to me, it says “ China Down to Countryside Movement Periodicals Magazine”. By looking at it, it seems to me that the periodical was published during height of reeducation campaigns for the Chinese middle class. Not only did it bring the Chinese kids of that time closer to the harsh realities of post civil war China, they were also made to teach the illiterates how to both read and write.

If we could only teach the basics the right way, we could’ve been doing complex things the right way too. Though it is bullshit to say that you need a second language in order to be an industrialized country, in my opinion, I just find it a crime to make use of secondary language as your source of bread and butter if you are already being blatantly atrocious on using it.

The hybrid Shakespearean/American conversational tone turned into text was probably one of the worst copies I ever read. I really do not know if it’s the effect of the late night shift plus the shitty computers in the office but come to think of it, what do we really expect if we couldn’t even converse on our own language?