Photography by Naomi Drew
Another instant photo taken with the Instax Wide 300. More monochrome film (why don’t they just say “black and white”?). No flash, and no flash cover. Instead I judiciously placed the center of the lens – there is a circle you can use to set up your image – on the bright left corner of the couch. Here it is, straight from the camera’s whatever. This one I like.
If you use the Instax Wide 300 by Fuji, you know that it has a flash that won’t be turned off. As a result, flash goes off when you don’t want it and can over expose your picture and waste film. Instax film doesn’t cost an arm and a leg like the Polaroid film does, but it still is annoying to not have control over that darned flash.
Enter Thingiverse, the world of free patterns for 3D printers. My husband has one and makes some really cool things. I looked, sought, and found a cover for the 300 Wide’s flash. You can find it here: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2788611 – and it works really well! From the site, this is what things look like – screen dump of the cover. Notice it has sticky foam tape or something to help keep it on the camera itself. It helps to keep the cover from sliding away from the flash as you move the camera. I don’t have any foam tape, but made sure the flash was covered, and it worked out nicely, as you will see below.
This is how it looks on the camera itself – again, pictures are from the Thingiverse site – click on the picture to enlarge it.
Notes from the Thingiverse site for the flash cover mention that if you make one in black, it shuts out a lot of light; a white one works more as a diffuser. My husband had hot pink set up on his printer, I had black and white film in the Instax, and I think the pink could have acted as a sort of red filter. Dunno. As we have a lot of different colors for the 3D printer, guess who is going to try them all out once they are printed?
Here are the two pictures taken a couple of minutes apart to check out the flash cover. The first one is without the flash cover. I shot this out the studio window around 8:30 this morning, facing east, where the sun comes up. (I always have to say to myself, “And the sun sank slowly in the west” to remember which direction it rises – oh, well!) Pow! The flash went off.
And now, with my hot pink, newly printed flash cover, here is approximately the same image with the diffuser on.
Once more, the flash flashed, but was not flashing all over things. And it produced a rather pleasantly darker picture. Because the film is black and white, I expect the picture is not picking up the finer gradations of color it could. The window is blown out. But does it matter? I don’t think so. I am curious to see what will happen with color film, which I will load up when I finish this black and white.
I cannot say enough good things about Thingiverse. If you have a 3D printer or know someone who will print for you, not only can you find this flash cover, but also other cool photography stuff, like film uptake spools, pinhole cameras for 35mm and 120 (I have one yet to be tested out), 35-to-120 adapters, and who knows what else. Totally cool stuff if you like to play around, which I do, and certainly does Mr. D.
Toys! Toys! Toys!
It has been absolutely perfect weather around here – 72F, clear skies, and just spring-moving-into-summer!
On a day like this, it is silly not to pick up your butt, pick up your camera, and get out of the house. Today I loaded up the Instax Wide 300, and meandered through the neighboring college campus.
It is deserted. Consequently, as with elsewhere, wildlife is taking over.
Birds, squirrels, crows, rattle snakes, bunnies, and even coyotes. Crows were everywhere.
The wilder parts of the campus are overgrown with mustard and fennel.
It was great to feel a bit lost in the wild, but I also kept a sharp eye out for rattlers – not something you want to run into.
Tomorrow I think I’ll head out to the local creek.
I have been craving a film fix. Yeah, I can go out with a film camera loaded with film – but nowhere nearby is currently processing film! I’ve determined the next Big Project is to master black and white processing at home – really getting it down – and then perhaps some color. Maybe even slide. So, to fill that craving, I dug out my box of Instax cameras (Mini 90 and Wide 300). The Mini was loaded, so I took a few using it.
Just outside the door to the Dog Free Zone – wine red dahlias and some bulb I cannot remember …
Shadows of the picnic table in the late afternoon.
Vining petunias in a lovely pink.
And finally, as the daylight fades, the banana and lemons on the granite countertop.
Oh, yeah!
Always lovely to see in blom!
Our local botanical gardens is open again! I took one of the dogs, Smudge, my X100V, and off we went, following the trails up and down. We have missed a lot of the early spring blooms, such as the narcissus and daffodils, but the trees are beginning to blossom. At the top of the hill is the cactus garden, filled with a variety of desert plants. There are barrel cactus, crowns of thorns, cholla, saguaro. Other drought-tolerant plants are there, too. The best of the day, though, was the Palo Verde tree, fully dressed in its light yellow-green leaves.
I keep thinking about Monet’s Woman with a Parasol when I look at this photo. Sadly, his photo is nothing like his painting . . .
Fire season has begun! Up the coast, along Highway 101, the first fire has broken out near Gaviota. The land is hilly and grassy, and rugged in areas. This makes stopping the fire more challenging, and when the winds pick up, it can travel so fast. We have been having a heat wave in the 90s F for the past few days – today is supposedly the last one like that in our area. Then, down into the 70s F, which is much nicer. I used to love the hot winds, but they have become more fierce and destructive over the last few years that they are more frightening than ever.
This photo shows what we can be up against. The new spring growth, becoming lush in our seasonal rains, changes to dry, dead tinder for a wildfire. The swath of grey is last season’s new growth.
Today promises to be frying hot – 91F or more. The house is already closed up to keep it cool – thank goodness for modern insulation! – so we don’t have to use the air conditioning. I took this image not too long ago on a considerably cooler day, and that is what I want to think about rather than suffocating heat! The plus side of the heat is flowers love it and as it is too hot and bright to go outside for strenuous activities, it is a perfect day to do things around the house, like sewing and such. Domestic life suffers in the summer around here.
My box of knitting – a sweater in the round, to be steeked into a cardigan. The whole process of steeking entails sewing down a bead on either side of where you CUT THE SWEATER. From there, well, let’s wait until then! Too scary to contemplate for a first-time activity.
Oh, how Covid-19 makes you bored and brave (or foolish) at the same time!
