I have purchased a used Contax G2.  It is an automatic rangefinder form the mid-1990s and has been given good marks.  For me it is almost too complicated without being a digital.  The focusing is awkward, I think, but we shall see…The plus side is that it comes with a Carl Zeiss 28mm lens.  Very nice.  It’s all about the glass.  I’ll shoot on automatic exposure for a while and try it out.

Once this paper is finished, I can really get down and finish the darkroom work.  I have to go through negatives and contact sheets and find 24 images that support a consistent vision and then print them all on paper.  Damn…the phone just rang and now I have lost my train of thought after a short conversation…Oh, yes…FA-1027.

I ordered some new chemistry from Fine Arts Supply in Montana.  It is a concentrate called FA-1027 and supposedly takes care of all the problems associated with Ilford film and Ilford liquid developers, i.e. foggy negatives and so forth.  When will it arrive?  I don’t know but it has been 2 weeks since I ordered it and it is still not here…

More will be revealed.

JDCM

Roma boy from an encampment in Belgrade, Serbia 2009

I have been home for over a week.  My trip back to the Balkans seemed quick.  I was there for a month-and-a-half but it felt like two weeks.  I was able to improve some great friendships and build some new ones, especially in Austria, where I connected with some musicians and graphic artists.

I used up 14 rolls of b/w film and am now in the developing process in a darkroom across the river.  I am there this morning and most of the day.  We shall see.  I have been slowly looking through the digital stuff.  Although I have combed through the Roma images, I still have the Breast Cancer shoot to address as well as my “tourist” images, mostly train stations, bus stations and transport of different varieties.

I am also writing my thesis on possible unification in the Balkan Peninsula.  Laugh if you will, but I think there could be a solution.  I also hope to be able to do a shoot next week with a professional model for some figure studies before I head to Woodstock for the weekend workshop on the same subject.  I have the images in my head that I want, I just need to make them happen.  I think I am using a male model, so I am going for a sense of heroism, almost like propaganda images from the Cold War, but I will also look for the vulnerability of the human spirit as well.

Here ‘s a small b/w image of a Roma boy from Belgrade.

John D.C. Masters

They were all pretty drunk, and invited me to join them..Orange juice for me, thanks. In this town of Muslim practices drinking juice is not seen as an oddity.  There were 8 or 9 of them, all about 50-60 years old.  One had an old guitar and he was playing furiously while they all sang gypsy songs as if their lives depended on it.  I was able to get some images and they were open with conversation.  They all spoke good English.  One explained that they had all been friends since childhood and that they all came from different backgrounds. ‘In the past,’ he said, ‘to ask someone what they were was considered rude.’  ‘Like where I live’, I said.   This meant that I was in an enclave of peace where Muslim, Catholic, Christian and Atheist alike all came together to pray to the God of Song – perhaps the only God they needed. Myths have been shattered.  These were Yugoslavians.

I have been sparing with my cameras.  The GIII Q17 rangefinder is fun and small, and I am anticipating the black and white prints more so than the immediacy of the digital.  I am shooting mostly 200 speed due to the bright glare of the Balkan sun, but I have been lucky so far with the times I been using 400…mostly cloudy. There have been some good moments in markets and on the street, I think, in both formats.  In Belgrade next week I will be focusing more on the Invisible People–those living on the street, Roma encampments, etc…

It feels good to unwind my eye from the American landscape.

John Masters