 One Flaming Hot Mountain Dew a Day keeps the doctor away. Are you really still drinking those? I'm surprised you're not dead yet. Today's episode is sponsored by The Dark Room. So here's the deal. The other day my girlfriend Monica and I got in an argument about who's hotter, me or her. After not resolving anything, I needed some time away to cool off and contemplate my actual hotness versus my perceived hotness. So naturally I called up my barbecue slut brother Caleb to go on a road trip. After all we've been trying to go to this place called Bodie State Park for like the better half of an eternity at this point. Last time we were up there it was hella closed but now it should be open and we're gonna go shoot it on film because that's how gangsters do it. But since we ended up spending a couple days up in the area, this video will just have to be the long-awaited sequel to Shooting Film in the Sierra, a video that I made when this channel was still good. Of course who could forget on my first Sierra trip I took probably my most famous photo, the toilet. So this go around I was pretty determined to shoot a worthy follow-up. We had a bunch of abandoned and landscape locations on the map to hit and what better vehicle to get us there than the old 1990 blueberry. After a long drive we arrived at our first location, an abandoned farm. Since it was the middle of the day, hot as balls and the lighting was I decided to load up some T-Max 400, a very sharp and clean black and white film due to its tea-grain makeup. Speaking of cameras and my uncontrollable addictions, what cameras were I riding off into the midday sun with? As you may know I'm not very good at limiting myself to a minimal amount of gear. So I brought my Canon AE-1, my Leica M6, my Yashica T4, and my pink Polaroid 600. The AE-1 I basically didn't really end up using and the pink Polaroid might as well have been unused as well. I think I'm starting to realize that two cameras is really about all I need for stuff like this. Maybe I should get that tattooed on my neck as a reminder. Anyway I loaded up some film in the direct sunlight yet again and got to work producing some shots that I guess are fine. Look at this round as the warm-up. Not that my s*** is any better later but do it anyway. I do think these shots maybe would have been better suited for pushed HP5. Adding a rough and grainy texture to the images seems like it would have paired nicely with the subject matter. That. I'm going to take a picture of that. That was a nice catch too. But then again you try shooting 1600 ISO in the middle of the day. It's also worth mentioning I was shooting with a yellow filter as well because I don't even want the color blue in my black and white shots and it helps cut through the blue haze over the distant mountains in the background a bit more which is nice. After finally confirming that the premises were indeed abandoned besides the usual desert rabbits and souls of the damned with unfinished business trapped within the confines of the property we decided to ignore all warning signs and head inside and that ladies and gentlemen is where the real magic was you know aside from there being bird s*** everywhere. I soon threw my Voigtlander 12 millimeter lens onto the M6 for some true wide angle shots as I'm starting to grow more accustomed to shooting ultra wide on interiors. So here's the first toilet photo. It's good. It's not the best photo or place that I've shamefully taken a dump but it's not a bad start. Here's the same toilet on the Sumacron versus the Voigtlander ultra wide. Eventually we grew kind of tired of the farmhouse and decided to check out something we weren't entirely sure was even going to be there. A house tucked away next to some sand dunes. Luckily for us it was hotter than balls out so we definitely were super down to hike in blazing hot sand in search of this long lost gem. After first thinking it was simply a mirage we at last stumbled upon the ruins of a house buried away in the sand. You weren't wrong. You weren't wrong. It's actually really cool. The wind started to pick up a bit which was not good considering that we two shells of human beings were standing inside the shell of a building so we hiked it back now with sweaty backs and butt cracks. Speaking of things that make me sweaty this shot it's surprisingly great and candid if you can believe that but then again nothing is candid if you believe in destiny. Anyway the car was right where we left her blocking the road completely. Okay so the Canon AE1 thing I suppose I should come clean. I was actually using it for something. It had a roll of air chrome in it but the roll was quite old and it didn't turn out. Sometimes that just happens with expired film. The good news is I only cried for about 36 hours alone in my room about it. Anyway up the road was one of the best locations that we had stumbled upon and by best I mean a completely abandoned murder shack s*** bolt which is exactly what we were looking for. It feels rare to me to be able to find locations like this that aren't you know totally bombarded with spray painted dicks everywhere. Maybe just the occasional Lana Del Ray song or whatever. So when we do find good locations like this we take our time and we make sure we don't miss catching anything. Like as best as particles. I'm quite happy with these shots especially this one taken on gold on the T4. While I wish the lens was maybe a little bit wider I think the colors and story it tells are quite vivid. Here's the same angle on the 12 but I actually think this alternate worked better for black and white. I'm not too sure how this house got destroyed. It was certainly missing walls on the backside and since it was next to a river the ambiance was quite nice. It certainly beats the hell out of the occasional wood creek from the other room that makes you think someone is still living there and loves the taste of frightened little film photographers. It's kind of funny to me shooting abandoned interiors because I kind of take the same approach as if I was photographing interiors for a real estate listing like shooting with wide angle lenses to make the room seem more spacious. The only real difference being I'll never be able to afford a house and nobody respects me for doing this for a living. This shot is kind of deceiving because it makes me look like I'm packing a total juicy dump truck of an ass but trust me it's just because I have the sheikah and the sumacron in my back pocket. Anyway we couldn't find a toilet or bathroom at all on the premises so one can only imagine why the owner is moved. As the sun was hostile away going the f*** out we raced to a familiar location that we had previously shot on large format. Oh my god it smells like sh** over here. So last time I was here I took an 8x10 shot from right about here 8 pretty fast so I kind of had to set up in a hurry and now we've got plenty of time so I'm gonna shoot it in a bunch of different formats see what looks the best. There's a little bit of light hitting it right now and it's just perfect except for the fact someone took a dump over there. Thanks guy. With time to burn I decided to shoot some old Polaroid 600 film from the days when Polaroid was chill and gave you a full 10 shots so I loaded up the old Pepto Bismol 600. I had shot some of this 600 film last year and they looked super cool in their expired state. Very orange. Unfortunately the Polaroid did not turn out. The chemicals didn't spread at all. Here we go. But because I'm dumb and don't give up so easily I decided to try again later. If only Jason's windshield was not this dirty I could be able to focus past the windshield. Bro I cleaned it. I don't know what's going on there's just hella dead bugs. Hella dead bugs. Hella bugs that want to die. In Bishop we stopped at our usual hotel because without us visiting every year how could they possibly stay in business. After a quick toilet inspiration check that yielded nothing we headed out to get alcohol so that we could drink alone in our room like two grown men with nothing better to do. Check out this hot meme. Did you take a shower before you left? Oh you're just gonna go straight from the bottle eh? I gotta pour it in a glass maybe let me have some. You want some? Do you like um it tastes like sour blueberries. We also decided to do a totally unbiased drunk test of which Leica is heavier the standard m6 or the titanium m6. This one this one's heavier. This one's heavier? Yeah. This is mine. Okay hands out. We woke up at around noon with a hangover as big as my inferiority complex. Okay man you are up next. Shower is all yours. Uh huh. You need it. Thus we decided to heal ourselves with some all-natural barbecue at our favorite spot in the valley. After all today was the big day. The day that we finally get to see Bodie State Park in all of its ghost town glory. Haven't got mine yet. Would certainly be nice to have meat sweated out all the bourbon before we get there. Eventually we arrived at the place we'd call tight 340 consecutive times for the next four hours. Bodie State Park. I knew that I'd want to shoot the crap out of this place but the lighting wasn't really selling me just yet. I elected to shoot black and white with a yellow filter for the time being and I'm glad I did. The harsh contrasty look was well suited for the deteriorating setting. This is one of the first photos I took and I really like it even if you don't. I think the yellow filter on black and white really gives you the timeless look of darker sky and white puffy clouds. I think this is my favorite shot. It just feels really moody and ghost town-esque. Unlike these shots where there are clearly other visitors in frame. I don't know. I'll probably just tell my future children that they were ghosts that only appeared when the film was developed. I also had my Yashica T4 with me loaded with some Kodak gold but I'm not really doing backflips or anything over how cool these shots look. Mostly because I can't actually backflip. Eventually I grew tired of T-Max 400 and decided to risk it all and take a chance on me just as Abba always wanted. So I threw in some bougie industrial 100. You know that s*** you can't get anywhere anymore? Yeah that stuff. I did not have high expectations for this roll of industrial. I pretty much just slapped it in Leica because it was 20 shots per roll and I'd be done with it right around magic hour but damn did they blow my expectations out of the water. I love these shots. The colors are just so bougie for better or for worse. Insert another vague generalization here. The blues and the greens and the reds pretty much just turn the f*** up for these shots. Especially this beautiful vista that makes the sky and rolling green hills look like something from a Studio Ghibli movie. I also like this shot quite a bit. The colors are majestic and this guy awkwardly doesn't know what to do with the camera pointing at him. He must be a photographer himself. As we hit it up the hill I took these shots of Caleb and I think they're really good because I think they're more about the setting and not so much the subject and they display strong colors and yeah Caleb is just reloading his camera not playing with himself. I think this kind of reinvigorated my love for bougie stocks. There really is something about how the greens are rendered on bougie film. It's just really kind of too bad that bougie just doesn't give a s*** about film anymore. As we descended back down to the car I actually took this shot twice one with sunlight and one with cloud cover and I consider it one of my best from the day. The only problem is I can't decide which one I like more. The colors are just incredible but I struggle with indecision. Back at the car we decided our work was not quite done and we're going to do another pass of a different part of the town as the light started to get more swag-tastic. I knew in my plums that there was really only one film stock for the job and it was definitely Roly Bario Chrome. You may have never heard of Roly Bario Chrome before and I'm here to tell you it's basically just a real-life cheat code to make any of your photos look good. Bario Chrome is basically just expired ectochrome but in a very warm and comforting way if that makes sense which it doesn't. So apparently according to the information pamphlet only 5% of the original town's buildings are still standing which doesn't really explain why of all things this outhouse is still around unless the builder of it poured their heart and soul into building a s*** or so well engineered that it would withstand the test of time. Anyway these shots on Bario Chrome look incredible as per usual. I know it's not everyone's cup of afternoon yeager but I'm more of a bourbon man myself anyway. I really like the shot of the telephone pole leaning over the buildings. I think the lighting is very nice and the colors are very warm and golden. It feels like a very cool collaboration between a spaghetti western and Edward Hopper. This shot of Caleb deserves an honorable mention as well. I don't really remember taking it but it turned out quite moody and immersive as if Caleb's a predator staring down its prey which kind of made me feel like I played a barbecue for a second. That's a wrap on Bodi. Shot a lot of good stuff. Get the film back but hopefully shot a lot of good stuff. Eventually we left our favorite location and stumbled across a herd of sheep as well as a very good boy defending them. Something my dog Baxter could learn a thing or two about. Anyway I took this photo on gold but it's not really that good. We checked into our room for the night and immediately we're struck with inspiration. That's right folks. Lightning struck twice. It was beautiful and all of its porcelain pink grandeur. You literally couldn't ask for a more photogenic place to leave a meaty barbecue 12 pounder. I was literally afraid to use the damn thing out of fear I'd somehow ruin such a pristine temple. Slightly ahead of myself with the outing we had just had I decided to go against my own programming and load some Cinestill 800T with a chocolate 2 filter on the lens. We set forth on the town in search of dreamy lighting and Pulitzer Prize winning tones. Pretty happy with these shots. I think 800T needs even more light than what I was giving it though. The photos were pretty grainy but the colors were a different take than the usual warm tones baked into some photographic Kodak lines and that I appreciated. As we wandered through a playground with cameras which was probably not our best idea. The light was starting to transform nicely and we found an abandoned market. I actually really like this shot of the motel sign. The colors are skank-tastic in a way that I wouldn't normally go for. Especially the sunset light hitting the mountain in the background and Caleb thought so too. As nighttime dropped like testicles we decided to lean hard into the cliche of shooting neon signs and gas stations on Cinestill 800T. Unfortunately the inn that we were staying at only kept their sign on for like 30 seconds so we'd have to plan a little bit better next time if we wanted to catch it. It almost kind of felt like they were mocking us. Luckily some other places in the area had their lights on and it was time to slay some teas. 800 of them to be exact. The town we were in is actually quite small so night shooting only lasted maybe an hour or so. Thus when we got back to the room we decided to shoot a bourbon commercial. I figured now was as good a time as I need to try shooting some more of that expired Polaroid that came out like a sludgy mess. After all I have bad glam days too so I was willing to forgive. But anyway there was really nothing I could do to bring these expired Polaroids back from the grave. So instead of feeling my sad feelings about these Polaroids I decided to stuff my emotions deep down and bury them with my Yoshika T4 because materialism is real folks. You stink do you plan on taking a shower today? By that hesitation? I don't think you have. I mean do you plan on taking one? Why don't you take a shower? I already have taken a shower. I'm clean. Anyway it was another late night of two dudes taking pictures of a toilet which made for a slow morning. Luckily we got out somewhat early to check out some spots that looked interesting on Google Maps but in reality were total voids of good photography. Regardless I loaded up the M6 with T-Max 400 hoping for the best because you can probably tell I'm a huge optimist. Well what do you know? I took one photo there and it was an absolute banger for once. There was inside this weird army trailer thing that looked like someone had camped out inside of it for a second. The door blowing in the wind definitely added to the creepy ambiance. After that we said f*** it life is short and full of taxes. Let's head north and see what we find. Finally arrived at several abandoned buildings and decided to do our best impressions of a road worker via a trick that was picked up by the one and only Nick Carver. This place was cool and certainly abandoned but I don't really think I got anything good from my shots here except of course for the fact that we looked totally f***able in our high vis vests. Back at the hotel we decided to rest our weary souls after a good 10 hours of sleep and not really doing anything that morning. I took the shot of some evening light hitting the curtains behind Caleb and it's very moody. I can't complain. I need to throw this in my portfolio instantly. Whatcha doing over there? Whatever anybody tells you you are worth it okay? Thanks man. Thanks. I needed that. I also need barbecue. God damn it. It smells like you s*** yourself last Friday and I haven't cleaned up after yourself. My nose is burning. Go take a shower. I need you to take a shower. Take a shower. Fine. I'll do it. For you. I'll do it. I'll take a shower okay? A shower. A hot steamy soapy shower. Okay? A hot shower. You know what I'm talking about? You didn't take a shower. Go take a shower. You stink. I can smell you. From here. Stay hell. Eventually it was time to shoot. We felt it in our bowels but that might have been the barbecue making a break for it. I don't know. Our first stop was certainly off the beaten path. A couple of farmhouses that were stripped of their bare hardwood foundations. This shot is pretty nice. The lighting patterns and texture of the building make it quite moody but I don't know if I'd qualify it as a full shot in my own eyes. It's still missing something like a well-defined subject or a roof. You know against all odds this bathtub was not totally destroyed or gross. In my travels to many abandoned locale I've found that people enjoy blowing them up. Not like leaving the standard floater in a bathtub but like with dynamite. I mean look at the toilet next to it. It's definitely a trend. So imagine my surprise when I came across this beauty still in pristine condition ready for its next user. So naturally I stripped down and plopped my gaping wide 12 millimeter lens on my Leica M6 and shot it. But the photo was unmentionably bad so we can just forget this ever happened right. I think at this point in the day I was still in a bit of a funk from earlier and I wasn't producing the kind of work that I was hoping to. But hey we've all been there. So we moved on down the dirt road of life to a historical farmhouse that was going to deliver exactly what daddy needed. That sweet nectar of inspiration. Inside the building the lighting was crashing through the only window there casting this beautiful highlight across the floor on the wall and suddenly I realized I could finally get it up again. The camera to my face I mean. I shot on both the 12 and the 35 millimeter and the 12 millimeter is definitely better. I think if this one stud wasn't around I'd probably go with this one which is ironically exactly what the girl I asked to prom told me. We eventually moved on to a barn that we had shot before but not in these lighting conditions. In fact in literally sh** conditions because I still don't know what this brown sludge is and I'm starting to worry. This shot actually turned out really good my dudes. I don't think I consciously snapped the photo as the birds were crossing but I'm glad I did. It really turned an average photo into something that I consider quite good. The L filter and T-Max certainly did their part as well. In fact they did most of it. I'm loosely credited as the jackass that was barely strong enough to hold up his M6 and point it in the right direction. As we wrapped up there I loaded some Cynestal 800T once again with a chocolate 2 filter hoping that my photos would at least be creative. We eventually headed quite a bit up the mountain to a lakeside spot that was very peaceful. This shot on the Ishika T4 and Kodak Gold is everything to me. The image looks like an old faded painting from the 1800s that someone forgot about like in their attic because it's generally unremarkable and really not worth a second glance and that's the vibe that I really want for my work. In fact Kodak Gold really delivered here. This shot of the bench is also quite nice. Anyway after drinking some water from the lake I realized I don't know if 800T with a chocolate filter is really working for me. The colors are quite different but in some cases I think it looks cool. Like this shot. I think my main issue is that it seems to turn golden sunlight into possum piss yellow and I'm not 100% in love with it. At its core it's a tungsten balance film so maybe I'm just wrong to assume I can ever shoot it in true daylight. We eventually got back to the hotel room and the sign was on for a minute. This was our chance. Our final chance at a polter prize winning neon sign banger. We didn't know the necessary deeper symbolism behind the image yet so we'll just have to figure that out later. It's time to shoot some heat. This shot right here is totally it. It's the one. It may be because I shot it on the Voigtlander 12mm but the other shots didn't really tickle the taint in the same way. You know what I mean? After all was said and done we decided to break into the bourbon yet again. After all we accomplished something that day. I don't know what because we didn't do much but we left the hotel room so I guess that's worth celebrating. The next morning I made my peace with the fact that these polaroids were not going to do anything. After all life's a bitch and then you die. With that in mind we headed back to reality aka LA with a few more stops in mind as the clouds were rolling in. Further down the road we saw another abandoned farm from the highway and found a sketchy but I guess efficient route to get to it. It was certainly windy here and I don't really think I got anything good. I was definitely just in the grind mindset to finish my 800T. If I were to make an observation about this shot I'd say the shape of the building kind of reminds me of the Jawa Droid transport from Harry Potter. As the day moved forward I was happy knowing that I'd finished my last role and I could call this video a wrap but guess what mother f***er life had other plans. Caleb and I spotted a remote building from the road that definitely looked abandoned and so we decided to investigate knowing full well that if we encountered hostiles we could probably barter our cameras instead of you know favors in exchange for safe passage back to the highway. Luckily for us no one was home and it looks as if the place had long been abandoned so I loaded up an emergency roll of tmax 400 and got down to pimpin. After slamming some exterior shots on the sumacron and yellow filter I threw on the Voigtlander 12 and that's when things got really downright nasty. Unfortunately the 12 is only a five six speed lens so in low light situations like this it was definitely going to be a bit of a struggle but if photography isn't a struggle is it even worth it? Do you need to go open that? This shot is absolutely interior photography heaven at least for me. The 12 millimeter really shines here and the tmax 400 makes the scene look quite dramatic. Besides the ancient curse scribed on the walls condemning us to the deepest circle of hell we thought this place was possibly one of the best we had stumbled across in our years of shooting. There was barely enough light most of the time but it certainly made for a dramatic scene more often than not and there was even a toilet that clearly hadn't seen any ass hours in a few years. We entered the final building and it was certainly a gem to behold. At places like these I often wonder who was the last person to use the stove to make a quesadilla? Shooting everything at 115th that is not the way to live your life. Did they have internet and if so what was the last video that they watched and why is it a thousand percent likely that it's either a disastrous cave exploration video or Mr. Beast? This is what we enjoy doing with our time. I don't particularly remember what this was but it wasn't a body at least I'm pretty sure it's not like I was gonna check. After polishing off that bad boy tmax 400 I decided to call it quits. The lighting wasn't really gonna improve and I didn't think we would possibly be able to top this gem of a location so I chugged some water to fight off the hangover and we headed home with many rolls of film ready to be developed. And speaking of developing I'd like to thank today's sponsor the Dark Room. I've been using the Dark Room for the past four years or so and they've been an absolute gem of a company to make sure that all my work will come out on time and exactly how I want it. The Dark Room is a traditional dip and dunk lab that develops C41 E6 and black and white film all in-house. As well if you're looking for prints they also offer a wide variety of print options including true black and white prints on ilford silver gelatin paper. Best of all you can have those dreamy film tones scanned at three different resolutions for further image customization. Once scanned they are uploaded to your account on the darkroom.com and the film is of course mailed back to you. You can even access your uploaded scans on your phone via the darkroom app. It's quick and convenient. The darkroom's online ordering is fast simple and even provides prepaid shipping options for you to send your film in for development. Simply go to the darkroom.com or download the darkroom app to get started available on apple and android. In the end it was yet another solid road trip with the homie. Admittedly I don't think we'll be back out in the eastern seara anytime soon. We're growing kind of tired of doing it. The 395 highway not like doing it doing it. We're both just kind of feeling the urge to go somewhere outside of california for once. There's a lot to see here for sure but there's a lot of to see elsewhere too you know what I mean. I think I came home with some surefire hits that I'm definitely going to add to the portfolio and maybe even my book but that's all you're going to get from me on that topic right now. I think I accomplished my one main goal on this trip and that was to shoot a toilet that was pleasing. Until the next beautiful toilet I hope you all have a great rest of your day.