First post of 2025, welcome to the quarter century!
Sadly no update regarding Vol.2 appearing, other than it was reconfirmed the publishers will ask for it at some point so they can fit it in the schedule. Hopefully this time I get a photo on the front but to be honest, I just want the blessed thing done with and I’ll settle for mine on the back cover again if needs be.
With stony silence on finishing Vol.2, there’s been more prodding and poking by myself around how to approach what’s next. Reference material is still being amassed shall we say and the more digging I do, the longer I can see the project taking,. At the same time, the need to visit the National Archives at Kew for at least a couple of days grows, along with a few trips to odd parts of the British Isles for photos of related equipment or seemingly innocuous bits of concrete in some cases! Still, it keeps me quiet.
Christmas saw the first get together for more years than we thought of all my friends I made doing the photography course at Sheffield College, and who did a pair of Coast to Coast photo shoots with after that. We’ve all done bits and bats in between times, though our lecturer has now finally retired permanently and he’s now had one of his paintings permanently hung in a local gallery, which was great news.
Aside from trying to assemble material for another book, my journey back to film photography continues, with unexpected results in one instance, as can be seen if you look in Analog Days. The latest and probably last purchase on the 35mm compact front arrived this week and I’ve finally succumbed to bringing back an old friend for I think the third time! An Olympus XA rangefinder. The electronics can be a little wayward, hence a profusion of them listed as “spares or repair” on eBay, which usually means stripped for spares, as there’s a couple of components which, unsurprisingly after 40 years since they left production, are no longer available. There’s a few other quirks too and people try selling or at least listing XA2 or XA3 as XA, but for me the original rangefinder model with aperture control is the best. The big draw is the lens, it’s typical Olympus of the time, sharp, plus they’re so pocketable and better still in my case, you can’t lose the lens cap, the cover just slides across to shut down the camera and cover the lens. Sadly despite it coming with the matching A11 flash, that doesn’t appear to work, but it was the camera itself that matters to me. A dedicated pre-cut set of light seals are now winging their way from Japan, courtesy Aki-Ashai Camera Coverings my favourite source for seals and new skins for film and some digital bodies. Once fitted I’ll run a film through it and post the results on Analog Days.
