I purchase a lot of my film from Analogue Wonderland. In February 2021 they hosted a competition called “Tri-X Factor”. Obviously, the point of the competition was to encourage customers to purchase some Kodak Tri-X 400 film. I had wanted to try out some Tri-X for a while so I fell for this trick and entered the competition. The story of the mini-project behind my competition entry is set out below. All the images were taken on one afternoon using my Bronica SQ-A with the 80mm and the 150mm lenses. In addition all were, of course, taken on Kodak Tri-X 400 purchased from Analogue Wonderland.
In three villages in north Worcestershire near where I live an iconic red telephone box near the centre of the village has been repurposed as a community library. These are not what you would traditional think of as libraries, but more of a way to swap secondhand books. It’s great to be able to stop and browse the selection of books while on a walk or a bicycle ride, but it’s also great to be able to take a box of books and set them up on the shelves ready for a new reader to take and enjoy for themselves.
According to this article on nothingintherulebook.com, the first such library was set up by residents of Westbury-Sub-Mendip, Somerset in 2009 after funding was cut to the rural mobile library service. The local parish council purchased the telephone box, set up wooden shelves and donated the first books. There are now many of these tiny community libraries all over the country. If you’re interested in finding out more, a simple Google search will open a wormhole of articles, photographs and stories which could keep you occupied for hours.
The three examples near me are all within an easy cycle ride from my home, but as it was February I drove to each. The plan was simple. I took one roll of Kodak Tri-X 400 120 film and my Bronica SQ-A. This meant I had a total of twelve photographs. This allowed me to take four photographs of each telephone box library. The weather was dry, but overcast, so I knew I would have consistent, soft light at each location and no harsh dramatic shadows. It was also cold (for the United Kingdom anyway): just above freezing. This added an unexpected challenge: working without gloves meant that I could barely feel my fingers by the time I was finished.
Behind the Scenes
Here are some photographs giving a glimpse behind the scenes as I set up to take photographs of the telephone box library in Broome, Worcestershire.
These all show the set up for the first shot of the day, using the Bronica PS f4 150mm lens without a filter. You can see the spirit level I used to set the camera up, then ignored so I could align the photograph with the frame of the telephone box.
You can also see from my shooting notes that the first shot was also taken on Ilford HP5 Plus pushed to ISO 1600. This was to provide a back-to-back comparison between the two film stocks. After all this was my first time using Kodak Tri-X and I thought a direct comparison would be interesting.
I did try an orange filter for two of the day’s photographs. This was probably the least successful part of the project as it lightened the tone of the red telephone box. C’est la vie. You live and learn.
