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One of the first shots from a roll of Ilford XP2 super, developed in Rodinal – my first foray in to the world of home developing.

Film: Ilford XP2 Super, ISO400
Camera: Yashica Electro 35GT set with the ISO as-rated for the film

Development: Since XP2 is designed for a C-41 process (colour processed, but resulting in B&W negs, apparently to make it cheaper/easier to get processed on the high street) I thought I’d made a mistake in loading this in to the Yashica if I wanted to home develop.  A bit of Googling turned up some excellent articles (references below) about processing XP2 in a B&W developer called ‘Rodinal’, or ‘R09′, so I decided to give it a try.

The process is a bit different to a normal B&W method and opinions vary on best way, so I thought it was worth putting what I did out there as it may help someone get a second opinion.  This is a brief overview of what I did, if you want more info on any point, let me know!

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Tynemouth Market is held every weekend in the wonderful Tynemouth Metro station, its a fantastic place to wander around even without a camera and there is always an interesting stall with some oddity or knick-knack to take your interest.  It’s a great place to hone your street photography skills too since its packed with character, both the surroundings and the visitors!

I took along my Yashica Electro 35, loaded up with a roll of Ilford XP2 Super and tried to be as inconspicuous as possible.

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I’ve begun dabbling a little more seriously with staged shots after my better-half asked me to take some promotional photos for the cake business she’s started.

I’ve not done much, if any, food photography before and the first attempts taught me a great deal about getting the lights too close to the food (butter-cream icing does *not* like heat!) along with little things like the importance of props and setting up the lamps so that the light catches things in the background for a bit of interest in the bokeh.

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I found myself with a rare ‘free’ night last month and, as the weather was superb, I decided to take myself out for a wander with a couple of cameras tucked under my arm.  I was bought a classic Kodak box brownie for Christmas and hadn’t yet had the chance to try it out, so I loaded it up with some film (120 re-spooled on to a 620 reel, detail fans!) and headed out.

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I took part in my first Flickr Newcastle Photowalk after a Supermondays event in April, we had a wander down through Newcastle University campus as the light was starting to fade and the sharp lines of the new Northern Stage building caught my eye.