Italia! - May-June 2012

Olive grove on the cliffs above Sorrento -  Rolleiflex 6x6, Agfa Ultra 50 (expired 2002)

View from the Boboli Gardens, Florence - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektar 100, cropped slightly at top and sides

Tree on the Palatine Hill, Rome - Rolleiflex 6x6, Fuji Reala 100

Left: Fontana, dei Dioscuri, Piazza del Quirinale, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Right: Obelisk, Rome - Nikon FE, Ilford HP5 Plus 400, cropped slightly at top and left

Left: Rooftops in Florence - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400, cropped slightly at top and left

Right: Trajan's column, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

View of Vesuviana from Pompeii - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed), cropped slightly

Foto, Florence - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400

Left: Wall of Hotel Alberto Albruzzi, near the Pantheon, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Right: Doorway, Rome - Nikon FE, Ilford HP5 Plus 400

Homeless woman, Colosseo, Rome - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektar 100, major crop

Left: Columns in Pompeii - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed), straightened and cropped

Right: Brick wall in Pompeii - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Colosseo, Rome - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektar 100

Pantheon, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Outdoor market, Florence - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400

Aron River, Florence - Rolleiflex 6x6, Fuji Reala 100

Street in Florence - Rolleiflex 6x6, Fuji Reala 100

Window Display, Florence - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400

Paul at the Lay Center, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400, cropped slightly at top and leftLauren and Megan with a cat at the Boboli Gardens, Florence - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektar 100

Alison at lunch in Florence - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektachrome EPP100 Plus (expired 2001, cross processed)

Left: Mother with children, Rome - Nikon FE, Ilford HP5 Plus 400, major crop (shot horizontally)

Right: Galleria nazionale d'arte moderna e contemporanea, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400

The Forum, Rome - Rolleiflex 6x6, Fuji Reala 100, cropped slightly at top and right

Butcher shop at the indoor market in Florence - Nikon FE, Kodak Tri-X 400

Manuscript reading room at the Vatican Library, Vatican City - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Columns, Rome - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Vespas, Rome - Nikon FE, Ilford HP5 Plus 400

Colosseo, Rome - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektar 100

Lauren and Alison in Pompeii - Nikon FE, Kodak Ektachrome E100VS (cross processed)

Fresco, Sorrento - Rolleiflex 6x6, Kodak Ektar 100, straightened and cropped

Subway entrance, Rome - Nikon FE, Ilford HP5 Plus 400, cropped slightly at top and right

i recently spent two weeks in Italy to take a course for my MLS degree (last one!). it was a great experience, and i met some wonderful people. we visited museums, archives, libraries, churches, and archaeological sites, spending most of our time in Rome but also hitting up Vatican City and Florence. plus lauren, alison and i went on a little adventure to Pompeii and Sorrento on the weekend. we saw presentations by Italian cultural heritage professionals, and got some amazing behind the scenes tours where we were allowed to see some really cool stuff - seriously, wandering through the stacks at the Vatican Archives and the Laurenziana? does it get any better for a bibliophile like me?

but one of the most interesting parts of the trip for me was just wandering around and observing this entirely new world - seeing the way history exists in layers in a place like this, and watching people and how they interact with the history that surrounds them was an almost indescribable experience. it's something we just don't have here in the US. i managed to snap a few photographs along the way and these were my favorites. rather than presenting them chronologically or thematically in a narrative, i tried to paint my impressions of the country (or what i saw of it anyway) and the experience as a whole.

i took only two cameras and a variety of film:
- Rolleiflex 6x6 with 2 rolls Fuji Reala 100, 1 roll Agfa Ultra 50 (expired 2002), 4 rolls Kodak Ektar 100, and 2 rolls Kodak Ektachrome 100 Plus (expired 2001, cross processed)
- Nikon FE 35mm SLR with 1 roll Kodak Tri-X 400, 1 roll Ilford HP5 Plus 400, and 1 roll Kodak E100VS (cross processed).

forgot my light meter so with the Rollei i was guessing on the exposures using the sunny 16 rule which is not something i'm used to doing, but it was incredibly sunny most of the time so it wasn't too hard. the Rollei's fastest shutter speed is only 1/250 which didn't give a lot of room to open up the aperture as much as i normally might, and my settings hung out around 1/100sec @ f/8-16. the Nikon gave me a lot more flexibility, and its meter is actually incredibly good - i almost always nail the exposure with that camera...provided i remember to set the ISO dial properly.

all film processed and scanned by Richard Photo Lab. very little Photoshop/Lightroom here except for using photomerge to create the panorama at the bottom from 4 separate shots, crops on a handful of the images, some brightness/contrast adjustments here and there, and of course making the diptychs (which i find tedious and annoying - there's got to be a better way!)

overall 174 of the 214 frames were well exposed and in focus, over 80%, but that doesn't mean they were all good photographs - far from it! my film work is far superior to digital as far as being technically correct, but i'm still getting less than 20% of my images at what i consider to be an acceptable level of quality. full selection and some additional groupings can be seen on Flickr.

Panoramic view of Rome - Nikon FE, Ilford HP5 Plus 400, four shots combined using Photomerge in Adobe Photoshop