This entry is more than a little late, but I feel like I’ve been non-stop lately and also the weather is so good right now which makes me want to be outside, and things are picking up in the lab so much that when I get home the last thing I want to do is look at a screen.

Alas, today I have a day off, and while I would ordinarily like to be away somewhere in the car with Robyn and the dogs, I have a carton that needs pissing in for the next 24 hours. Doctors orders. Something to do with my blood pressure… heart… kidneys… whatever. Heart scan on the NHS is 16 months away yet, so I’m just gonna piss for now, and share some photos.

*Leica M6 + 35 1.4 Nokton + HP5 pushed one stop*

My parents visited us early in the month. We met them at Loch Ard, which is a go to for me and Robyn on a nice day. The forest walks are lovely, and there’s also a perfect spot to sit by the waters edge.

We just shared a pin with my parents and they eventually showed up in their van, which they kinda just live in now given how little time they spend at home.

Robyn puts in some shifts in helping toads, frogs, and newts cross a road in Milngavie on warm and wet Spring evenings with a few other volunteers. So naturally she was keeping an eye out here, too, with some help from Marshall.

Harman released a redscale film. It’s called RED. Naturally I wanted a shot of it because a) I’d never shot redscale before, and b) knowing how the photos were exposed it would be easier for me to figure out how to scan it at work. The films box speed is 125, and shooting at 200/250 the photos will be a richer orange/red with crushed blacks, and shooting at 100 will make it more yellow/washed out with more obvious shadow detail. Judging from photos I’ve seen taken elsewhere, I’d say 125 is probably the best option, and just tweak the intensity of the colours in post to taste.

In hindsight, I wish I’d loaded it into the Xpan. I feel like this photo of our car in the dense fog as we drove through the countryside would have slapped in 65:24.

Anyway, my experiment is over, and I will probably never shoot it again. Shite.

A pancake day surprise for when I returned home!

I’m pretty capable in the kitchen, but pancakes and baked goods are entirely not my domain. Despite Robyn’s instructions, I still managed to entirely fuck it up. I maybe salvaged about 1.25 pancakes out of 3. And that’s being generous.

We travel a lot with the dogs. Instead of just a local ‘walk around the block’ we actively take them places and try and keep it as varied as possible for them, it’s also nice just to see new shit. We recently found a new place to go called Knapps Loch. There’s a 2km loop around the Loch, and it’s just stunning to look at. There was a whippet meet up here, so Marshall got to run freely with a few new friends.

*Leica M6 + 35 1.4 Nokton + Double X pushed to 1600*

We had another visit to Scarborough to see our families. I’m still ploughing through rolls of film whenever I visit, with the hopes of making a zine/book of my home town somewhere down the line. I’m not sure when it will be done, but I’ve been chipping away at it for a few years now.

Axl and Pete had their birthday’s this month.

Axl is now 2, and he fit in to our lives so effortlessly. Hands down the best depression fueled impulse buy I’ve ever done.

Pete’s our eldest hot mess, and he’s somehow 15 years old. About a couple of years ago he stopped playing like he used to do, and just slowly walks everywhere. But whenever we take him to Oliver’s Mount in Scarborough it’s like his brain fog resets and he runs off to chase a ball.

I didn’t really take the Xpan out with me all that much on account of me feeling pretty done in with my photos, and only got one roll through it. Look at that coat, and the SUN. This was the moment I swore off wearing the coat again until winter comes along again.

It was also just after I almost broke my foot running upto and kicking what I believed to be a football for Marshall to chase.

It wasn’t.

It was a fucking buoy.

*Hasselblad Xpan + 45mm + unreleased BW film*

Made my way through a few rolls of Portra 160 this month. Not a stock I’ve really shot before, and until recently it would be rare for me to shoot something slower than 400, but I’ve been changing up how I shoot and I’m doing much less street stuff at the moment too.

Here’s a few from the Three Loch’s Forest Drive near Aberfoyle. It’s a 7-mile one way drive along quiet forest roads with plenty of spots to stop en route. If driving, it’s only open to vehicles between March and October, but can be accessed on foot/bike all year round.

Oh yeah, my old flat got blown to pieces.

This was a weird one to watch. Genuinely saddened seeing it. I actually almost didn’t go out that morning, I refused at the last minute until Robyn basically forced me to. We arrived just after nine, and the demoliton happened unprompted a couple hours or so later. The sound of the explosion was unlike anything I’ve experienced. Terrifying. And seeing three huge towers fall to the ground in seconds was surreal. The shockwave damaged nearby flats too, cracking the foundations and raising them out of the ground. Insane.

Our first family home, destroyed. Asbestos clouds and other shite filling the air.

The fourth tower is being taken down piece by piece.

I should probably have wrapped this up long ago, so just gonna wind this post down with a few lab photos and general work commute nonsense. I’ll get April’s post done soon(ish).