Brighton montage – a one shot story

February 2014 at a conference in Brighton. I took my recently acquired Rollei B35 along with some Kodak Gold. In the less interesting intervals of the conference I sneaked out to take some pictures, as the conference centre was just opposite the East Pier.

After a couple of shots, the camera made a crunching sound when I wound it on. Ouch. I ignored it and hoped things would be OK. The winding was smooth after that, so happy days, I told myself. After about 10 more shots though, I allowed my mind to align with my instincts, and realised that something inside wasn’t right, as the winding was a bit too easy. Despondent, I wound the film back to its canister (which happened far too quickly for my liking), and sulkily made my way back to the hotel. (Luckily, I had brought another camera with me, so all was not lost.)

I sent the film off to be developed, knowing it was probably mostly ruined, but dev&scan was only £5 at the time, so it was no great loss.

The results came in a few days later, and along with some great b/w shots from my Lomo LC-a & Fuji Neopan 400CN, there were two images from my Rollei and Kodak Gold, one rubbish shot of the pier from a distance, and this wild montage of various installations that decorated the Brighton seafront, all bathed in warm golden afternoon light and a high-key atmospheric effect resulting from the ten or more stops of overexposure of the one frame.

The camera wasn’t kept long after that, as aside from its tendency to chew up film, the shutter adjustment wheel was stubbornly resisting the twist. It got so bad I had to resort to using pliers to change the shutter speed, and just change the aperture when out shooting. Unfortunate, as it could make some nice images and some are still some favourites of mine.

I put some pictures on flickr occasionally, here

Thanks for reading.

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