 Today's episode is sponsored by Squarespace, New York. The city of pizza and sewer rats the size of horses that never sleep or whatever. Caleb and I went there because we have a couple of friends in New York and figured we might as well pop over and do what we do best, capture photons, and also record a couple of podcasts. I don't know if you've heard as well, but there's also an Edward Hopper exhibit at the Whitney and Edward Hopper, kind of my guy. It's all anyone ever wants to talk to me about and sometimes I kind of just want to talk about other stuff because at the end of the day, I'm a multi-faceted guy who, yeah, occasionally makes diarrhea jokes on the internet. Anyway, back to the good stuff. Eventually we made it to our cute little Airbnb that we'd be staying in for about a week or so. Look, it's a Mami Amigo. New York was a bit of a different place the last time I visited about five years ago. A simpler time for Jason Mahogany, Cumberfelt, Lycalis, Mamialis, and male pattern baldness, Lis. I do feel like my photographic niche has been carved out a bit more since back then. Back then I was dumb and shot anything that I thought looked cool, whereas nowadays I'm only slightly less dumb and actually kind of sometimes have a clear picture in mind when I go shoot. Back then was sort of the start of my YouTube career, if you want to call it that. Honestly, on my business card, it just says YouTube bulls***, so you can also call it that if you want. I very distinctly remember going to K&M camera, crouching down, rubbing my hands together, licking my chops, and telling that sweet, sweet Mamiya 7 in that glass window that one day it'd be mine. Anyway, I never bought that one, but I did eventually get one and it has become one of my favorite cameras of all time. So it's kind of full circle for me to bring it to New York this time around. It's not too bad. Yeah, it works, doesn't it? Let's go get food. Anyway, we are craving some New York pizza, which rumor has it supposedly tastes better because of New York water. So I put that theory to the test and stopped by the only place open in our area at that hour where the pizza was so bad it killed someone. Yeah, theoretically we could move this couch and push it back a little bit here. The camera's like right here. Yeah, it might work. What did I bring as a backup weapon to my Mamiya 7? As you may know from our brief, yet intoxicating parasocial relationship, I have several cameras. Several cameras, too many if you ask my girlfriend. This time I actually brought along a relative newcomer to the collection, the Agfa 1535, a point and shoot slash rangefinder that has won the hearts of millions or at least my heart right now. Anyway, the next morning we were certainly not jet lagged and woke up at a reasonable time like responsible adults. After all, today was gonna be one of our only free days this week. I mean, technically we're always free because America or whatever. But what I mean is we didn't have plans this day so it's time to head out and explore the big crapple itself. I decided to load up my second baby, the Mamiya 7. If I have to tell you what my first baby is then we're gonna have big problems. So I slammed some Ilford XB2 into the Mamiya 7. XB2 is an interesting film stock. It's really not for everyone, I would say. It's a C41 black and white film that has a single defining characteristic of a literal metric ton of grain. I mean, take a look at this shot. This was taken on six by seven in medium format which is a physically huge negative and yet the grain on this thing is visible from space. Shooting this stock on 35 millimeter would probably just feel like winding a roll of photosensitive sandpaper through your camera. Anyway, in the Agfa, the choice was obvious. And it's still 800T. Quickly moving up the ranks into my top three favorite film stocks to shoot right next to Aerocrome. You know what, let's just get this over with. So with that, we headed out into the cold, unforgiving streets of Yonkers to shoot some heat, potentially. Okay, so you remember how earlier I said the Mamiya 7 was one of my favorite cameras? Well, not anymore. Okay, fine, yeah, it still is. Did it take a photo? It didn't sound like it. But this roll of XB2 did not turn out whatsoever, literally not a single drop of information on the negative. So I guess all that time I spent earlier complaining about XB2 is just me being an asshole. I don't know exactly what the issue was. I do remember the shutter being kind of delayed that day for some reason. Luckily we were on our way to B&H that day anyway, so just pick up a new battery and try that out. You know what, New York definitely has a distinct smell as I soon realized when venturing down into the subway. It's a unique smell, the combination of piss, pepperoni pizza and more piss. After our awesome B&H tour, which I didn't get any footage of because I suck at my job, we headed down towards the Leica store. Speaking of Leica, I decided to bust out my tiny cheap ass Agfa and shoot some random scenes here and there as some light snow began to fall. It was truly magical. Honestly, most of these shots are kind of predictable and I definitely could have done them better. Though I do think I was getting something right overall and that was using humans in frame to not only show scale, but also maybe just give the viewer something to latch on to. Eventually we made it to a coffee shop that was pure aesthetic. I don't really drink coffee, so I just sat there and watched people like creep, but otherwise it was cool. I took this shot there and it's one of my best from the trip. I do wish I framed out the sign here a little bit, but regardless, try to remember this image because we will definitely revisit it later on. Anyway, eventually we made it to the Leica store where they could immediately tell that we weren't gonna buy anything as soon as we walked in. It did however warm my heart to see someone in there buying a brand new Leica MP. So maybe there is hope for this whole film thing after all. This shot is fan four stick like the movie. It's just a pigeon, but it's got good deep layering and wonderful colors. So it's a winner in my book. Anyway, after securing that quality footage of Cale's ass, we headed to a nearby hotel that came as a recommendation from our inside man at B&H. All right, let's talk about this image. It's really good in my opinion. The colors, the framing, the lighting and the mood all come together very well, although it is slightly out of focus or just soft. One thing that the Agfa definitely does not have going for it is that the fixed lens on it is a tight ass 40 millimeters. When I got all my film back and processed it, I do remember wishing that I was using a wider lens to give the images more context and show the setting a little bit more. This is quite a cozy elevator. Now blacked out off one drink because I'm constantly dehydrated. We headed out to meet up with Cale's brother from the same mother. This photo is great, well-framed and the colors are nice overall. I love the halation of the hanging light making it look like some kind of fiery jewel overhead. This tiny little unheard of train station out in the boonies was actually pretty cool. Hard to get a good photo here, I think though. Last but not least for the evening, we headed over to that crazy big Pepsi advertisement in the pouring rain because I had 800D in my camera and the neon just calls to it sometimes. I mean, not this time, this shot sucks but most other times for sure. Yeah, this is also something. Absolutely have no idea what happened here or how I even got this but it's chaotic in a good way, I guess. Whilst calling our own asses to the nearest train station in the pouring rain, I stopped for two seconds and took this. This photo is everything I strive for in a mood. It feels like you're standing outside some small town bar on New Year's Eve just soaking it all in or throwing up because yeah, that happens on New Year's Eve sometimes too. You sure? Yeah, it sucks. Oh, it says B&H creators. It's just a B&H. All right, bitch. The next day was pretty slow going. We had our first podcast interview lined up that evening with Birgit, the general manager of Lomography North America. She said, just Googled for logo. Is that the FP100C of energy drinks? We should get one and make her drink it on the podcast. I don't think they exist, that's the thing. No, they do, I'm pretty sure. For logo of course is still available but the original formula lovingly dubbed blackout in a can and frankly, a menace to society has been off shells for 10 years now. There's alcohol in it. Yeah. I thought it was just an energy drink. No, I think they were just- How is that illegal? Jason, stop looking porn. What's a better angle? That's the best angle right there, yeah. That's the end. With the CineStil 800T and the Agfa all done, it was time to load a new stock. Out of the 36 exposures on the 800T, I got about 24 shots that I would call keepers and then also three potential portfolio shots. So, not bad. I have elite chrome. What's elite chrome? It's like old direct across. They're gonna do gold. Yeah. No, you should do something higher than gold. I have elite chrome 400. I feel like you're gonna want 400. This elite chrome was sent to me by a viewer named Sergio. Sergio. As part of my Ectochrome Christmas series but because I'm irresponsible, I was unable to shoot it until now. It was expired and I definitely didn't know what I was gonna get but spoiler alert, it was the right choice. Anyway, we headed over to the Lomo headquarters and recorded an awesome podcast with BeerGit and then went out and partied afterwards. Like, that's fantastic. A lot of places don't have that. They don't have the- Yeah, my boss is a dick. Yeah. Yeah, I'm my boss. I'm my own boss. Yeah, he's a terrible dude. Speaking of, you guys had some coffee earlier. Yeah, we did. A latte of coffee. A latte of coffee. Lomography even gifted us some new limited edition Lomo apparatus which are basically reusable point shoot cameras with a fixed focus. So, we just got back from interviewing BeerGit at Lomography. You know what? Let's just unbox it. It's like 1 a.m., anything goes. We're wasted. Maybe you are. Maybe I'm- I'm- Tired, wasted. Whatever that's called. Exhausted, wasted. I decided to lean in hard on Lomo for this one and absolutely just ruthlessly slam some powerful Lomo 800 into the apparatus. The next morning we awoke ready for the next pod interview. I was talking about four loco earlier. Yeah, and we know what four loco is. Very much these things are formative. Have you had a four loco? I have. What does it taste like? It tastes like the color red. I associate the color red with rage. It's similar. Yeah, you get a lot of rage from it. Yeah, that makes sense. You must have had the original recipe. Yes, I had OG for a loco. The OG foe. I'm surprised you survived, man. Oh, well, I mean, of course, several surgeries later, I'm here today. Wow. Yeah. We did some research on it last night and it was giving people like heart attacks in traffic. Yeah. There was like- On our lunch break for the day, I decided to load up my sweet baby Mamiya 7 again after it totally betrayed me, but I'm actually used to betrayal. My real son Baxter steals my seat on the couch constantly. Okay, an image of this time. That's a good start. But uh-oh, what exactly happened here? Is my lens absolutely riddled with fungus? No. Well, maybe, but probably not. Let's talk about something that you're probably not ready to talk about. Lens netting. Lens netting is a popular diffusion technique for cinematographers. It's where you take some sort of fabric, like nylon or stocking, and apply it to the lens glass. Typically, the lens net is actually applied to the rear element of the lens, but you can get somewhat similar results if you apply it to the front of the lens as well. The Mamiya 7 lenses are just so damn sharp that I wanted to try knocking it down a little and get kind of a dreamy look for some of that pushed HP5. Textural dreamy, if you know what I mean. Tiff and promise are just too clean and glowy. And I wanted something that would deliver some dirt. If you want to have a go at this technique, I would say totally go for it. I will say that the worst part of it as a man is the weird feeling you're gonna get buying women's stockings off the internet. I wouldn't say that I really nailed the composition on any of them, but this one is definitely my favorite. I wish I would have tilted up a bit, but hey, that's life. I'm also not super sure why I've been taking so many photos of garbage lately. Of the 10 shots of pushed HP5 and the Mamiya 7, I think nine of them were keepers and of those keepers one was a potential portfolio shot. Anyway, now back from some cute ass brunch. We set up for the next potty that evening where the lighting was getting so nice. I shot some aparat goodness and it's very moody. This one is the best for sure. It looks like a painting to me and it's absolutely going into the portfolio. I think it's entirely possible that we're a little bit delirious. Two podcasts in one day is a lot of content. Just wrapped up our podcast with Casey and David, which went really well, two of our favorite people. Oh no, this isn't gonna work. Now we're pretty exhausted. Probably won't try into two podcasts in the same day ever again. The ass, just finished our podcast with Sissy, Sissy Lou. Getting ready to go to beers and cameras. Today is Saturday. There's a beers and cameras event near Times Square, I think. So just taking it easy. We're gonna go get some lunch and then head over and say hi. Maybe I'll even shoot something. We'll see. On our way to beers and cameras that evening, I decided to pound out some elite chrome in the Agfa. The good news is, if you like the cold, crushing blight of these shots, you can just shoot ectochrome. It's basically the same thing. This shot actually turned out far, far better than it had any right to be. The lighting, the angle, how the cars are framing the subject and the colors just took control and nailed the emergency landing completely. The beers and cameras was cool as per usual. And the guy standing next to me even won some 120 air chrome in the raffle that they were doing. Anyway, after following the guy who won, beating him up and robbing him, we made our way home ourselves. If somehow you missed this beers and cameras because you didn't wanna travel hundreds of miles by horse-drawn covered wagon, the film photographer's choice of travel, then worry not, there will likely be another one in April in Chicago. Anyway, thoroughly exhausted from being jam-packed with stuff to do every day and four out of our five podcasts completed, I realized it was time to be absolutely fearless and load up some Lomo Red Scale. After all, today was the day we'd finally be heading out to see the Edward Hopper exhibit at the Whitney. And I was thinking, why not make it look like a radioactive wasteland akin to that one scene in Blade Runner 2049. Time to go to the Happen Museum. We're still like extremely tired from a week. That's like a pro. But first, elite chrome. I do like the shot of the train station entrance. The colors are nice the subject is silhouetted in a very pleasant way. I do wish maybe there was a tiny bit more shadow detail but it do be like that sometimes with slide film. Anyway, in true Lomography fashion, the first shot of my Red Scale was somehow double exposed. I am not sure how that happened but hey, I'm kind of in new territory here. I exposed the Red Scale at 160 ISO but generally the lighting that I was in was too dim for the stock. But I gave it the old dumb ass try anyway. Ah yeah, you remember that image I was telling you we might revisit later on? Well, now is that time and you can't run away from it. So don't even try, you coward. At the Edward Hopper exhibit, there were a lot of interesting reads and fascinating breakdowns of his work. Including some previously unreleased deep dark hidden secrets as to how he got his signature style. One tip that particularly stuck with me was that he rarely ever painted in reflections because he thought it helped the viewer be drawn into the painting a bit more. If it looked like there was no barrier between you and the subject whenever you were looking through a window which was often in Hopper's work. So that leads us back to this shot. That's kind of what I did here. It's not like there were a ton of reflections to begin with but what was there, I did paint out to see if it draws the viewer in a bit more. And I think maybe there is something to it. I don't know though, it's kind of cheating for sure but I do think it's something to consider especially if you're like me and you're trying to recreate Edward Hopper's work through photography. Alternatively, you could just use a polarizer filter to help eliminate reflections but me personally, I like going the hard route because I have no other way to suffer from my art. The Edward Hopper exhibit was awesome. I really enjoyed seeing all those works in person. It truly added a new dimension to his style at least for me. I even picked up this Edward Hopper New York book for further reading because I'm a nerd. Anyway, back to photography. This shot on red scale looks cool. I guess it was some sort of conference that was taking place in the middle of the museum floor with see-through glass but whatever. It looks like some hellscape backroom type stuff. And yeah, I mean, we've all had jobs like that, right? I would say of the 10 shots of red scale in the Mamiya 7 about only five workkeepers and one was a potential portfolio shot. Look at that dude with a tow bag. He's so New York now. Anyway, eventually the group decided to check out Leica Square Park where everyone there had Washington's. I was wielding the Agfa with a leak drum loaded up and I think it being a dismal day more or less kind of made it look good. These shots really aren't anything to ride home about. I mean, I don't even own a horse, but this one is good. No, it's great. I don't know what possessed me to think of adding more headroom like that, but I'm glad I did. It almost looks kind of Orwellian. Anyway, that night we met up with Jason Roman to prepare a little bit for our final podcast the following day and then headed home. On the route home, I shot a little bit more with the Lomo Aperat that still had the Lomo 800 inside of it. The Aperat has a native shutter of one 100th, I believe, and the lens is fixed at F10. So low light is a bit out of the question unless you have balls of steel, which I don't but I can pretend. There is a bulb function on the Aperat and since the 21 millimeter lens is super wide you can almost almost get away with long exposures hand held like this one. The Lomo Aperat is an interesting camera. The lens itself is decently sharp and altogether it's super basic and easy to use especially because you don't need to focus. No camera is without its faults though and the Aperat definitely has some limitations like paint cushion distortion in the lens. No worries though, it is easily fixable or you can just leave it as is because you understand the fact that you're using a plastic camera with a dead format inside on a doomed planet in a universe that doesn't particularly care about you. It was finally our last day in New York and we had one more podcast to do and many more shots to take. Photography shots, not like Yeager. Since the Elikrom was spent in the Agfa I figured I might as well gently punch out those remaining Aperat shots of the 36 exposure Elikrom. I got 26 keepers and two potential portfolio shots. Pretty good. After lunch we headed over to Jason Roman's studio once again which he kindly opened up to us to record our podcast in which was super fun. Jason is such an influential voice in photography and every time I talk to him I leave feeling inspired which may have been the driving force as to why I was able to get my act together just barely enough for one final shot that slaps harder than a check engine light. Yep, you already know this was handheld. Anyway, that was that for the Aperat. Of the 36 shots I got about 13 keepers and of those I got two portfolio shots. This doesn't sound right. I'm actually gonna check this in the bathroom. Yeah, it worked. It sounded like you're strangling a cat or something with it. Anyway, as I sat there and supervised Caleb while I cleaned up the Airbnb for us I couldn't help but think of all the fun times I've had with today's sponsor, Squarespace. Yep, you guessed it. Squarespace is an all-in-one website building platform that allows you to customize and grow your website as creatively as you possibly can. Let's face it, it's 2023. 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And if you use the code grainydays at checkout you can get 10% off your first purchase. Well, that's a wrap on New York. It was a good ass time for sure, but also exhausting. I did have a lot of fun experimenting with several different looks. Some of which worked and some of which did not. I think I will keep the lens netting on the Mamiya 7 for the time being. It just cuts down the lens sharpness quite a bit in a really nice way. I do love New York. It's somewhere I'd wanna live someday. It's much more of a live city to me than LA. There's just something new to be shot around every corner there. Contrary to LA where around every corner there's someone taking a dump. New York is much more of a people city. People walking to work, people taking the subway, whatever. LA is just people in their cars or people crashing limescooters into your car. There's not very many people on the street and I think photography kind of suffers because of that. Anyway, I did love my time there and it certainly will not be my last. I mean, hopefully it's not my last. Buses are still the thing that run people over, so.