This roll is almost entirely from a walk up to Soldiers Monument on the Otago Peninsula. Overall, I was reasonably happy with the shots on the day, although I think the red-filter-technique for high contrast skies really showed its weakness here. Some exposures were simply too contrasty, which I think a yellow filter would have avoided. I probably should not have pushed the roll one stop, either, as this likely contributed to a little too much contrast. Oh well, live and learn!

Camera: Ricoh KR-10 Super

Lens:

Film: Ilford FP4+

Post Processing: GIMP

Starting off with a nice shot of First Church. This was taken at 28mm to get as much of the spire in frame as possible. Maybe I could have angled slightly further up to capture the very top of the spire. I like the framing of the trees here.
Still at 28mm but not looking at the base of the church. It’s simply such a pretty building! I tried to extract some features on the tree, but have made the church bricks blown out in the process.
Here’s the start of the walk up to Soldiers Monument. This is the Tomahawk lagoon, starting the 41 Peg track. Plenty of excellent wildlife shots to take here, but the swans looked the nicest to me.
Not super happy with this photograph. I think there’s too much going on, it’s simply too busy! Plus, I think this was taken with a fairly wide aperture, so the near plants are not in focus…
Ah, this tree really captured my focus (no pun intended). A single, lone, dead, towering tree in a paddock? Name a better subject!
Wielding the zoom lens to full effect, I am quite happy with this exposure. The trees in the background still have plenty of detail, but don’t detract from the main subject.
Walking slightly further up the hill and looking back, some sheep now wandered past the tree. I thought the composition was nice, so took a couple of frames (varying the zoom).
A little blown out on the sheep, but oh well.
A view of what’s to come. This was taken without the red filter, and I think the clouds were contrasted enough. The focus really is on the fence line, anyway.
More sheep, now up close and personal! We will see more of these fellows on the way back down.
Looking back down the hill gave a nice view over the Pacific Ocean and the coast.
Stepping off the path a little (shh, don’t tell) gave a nice view over the city. I’m quite partial to this shot, even if it’s a little muddy.
Drats, a macro a shot in which I messed up the focal plane! The leaves are in brilliant focus, but the flower was just a little out…
Coming to the summit now. I think the extreme contrast from pushing the roll really shined here. There’s just barely some detail on the monument itself, and the sky really pops. The grass in the foreground shows you how windy it is up here.
Getting closer now, like a previous frame on this roll I like the way a pair of fences draw the eye towards a vanishing point. I like the increased detail on the monument here, especially when paired with the previous frame.
The view from the top really was breathtaking. This is out towards Port Chalmers and the harbor mouth.
And another shot back towards the city.
Here’s the same shots, but now at 28mm. It’s a completely different look, but I think I prefer it!
A little too much contrast here, but that’s because the 28mm bought much more light from the sun overhead. There’s next to no detail in the city anymore, but the clouds and excellent, and the harbor reflects its ripples something wicked.
Back to 50mm, but now looking at Ravensdown. You can see the very same bridge that disappointed me on the walk out to Port Chalmers.
Descending the hill now, this view still captured me, so I captured it again.
Ah, macro… thistle?
A curious fellow, and a few friends.
The inverse of the shot taken on the way up. I think I prefer the previous, but this is nice too.
Bidding farewell to the swans. They didn’t reply.
Stopping by Tomahawk beach before heading back home.
The same photo but now with the red filter. I thought plants and leaves were too heavily affected — water is absolutely decimated by the red filter! Good to keep in mind…

And, to round out the last two shots, some night-time photography to experiment with exposures in low-light! Here, we’re capturing Orion’s belt again (but at 200mm instead of 50mm as in a previous roll). The aperture is also open as wide as possible to push the shutter time lower (only 20s here). The star trials are mostly removed, but we still see jitter. I assume this is from slight vibrations through the tripod… will ponder how to remove these in future shots.
A night shot of a cityscape. I manually timed this exposure to 20s to try and get some details from the scene. Clearly, it worked, but I think the frame is a little over exposed. Maybe 16s would have been fine.