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NOLAroids 2013

Travels in and around New Orleans with a Polaroid 195

By INSTANTgratis

April 27^th, 2014

REFLECTIONS

Starting our drive down. I took a similar review mirror shot with my Oly OMD and I could get the driver‘s eyes mostly in focus. However, the DOF is so shallow on the 195 that nothing but the mirror was in focus here. Additionally, rangefinder parallax issues precluded me from lining up the eyes properly. Ooops. The second shot is of our ride, as mirrored back by a tanker truck. It was taken from the back seat nearly hanging out the window going 70mph — the strong wind being the first of many abuses to my camera bellows during the trip.

QUICK PORTRAITS

Pit stop in Bay St. Louis, hometown of our traveling companion, artist and trip guide, Andrew Blanchard. We started out with a few shots to get a feel for the camera. First up is a shot of our other travel companion and pro photographer, Ian Curcio. Next is his shot of me. Ian commandeered the camera frequently throughout the trip — I’ll note his photos separately.

ThE GULF

Dead sea turtle washed up on the beach. Poor guy.

Backroads

Andrew was on the lookout for gators so we took the backroads from Bay St. Louis to the Louisiana border. First up is a shot of Ian — patiently waiting for Andrew to report back on any sightings. Sadly, there was nothing to report that day. The next shot was a happy accident. Despite my friend being a professional photographer, he has always shot D/SLRs and he missed a few times with the rangefinder. In his defense the 195 is definitely a fickle mistress. With this shot he peeled it, got pissed at himself for missing the focus, and then just slapped the neg back on top of it in disgust. It sat in the car all day like that before I peeled it again later. I actually love how it turned out.

NOLA

After another long day on the road, we arrived in NOLA and kicked back with a few cold ones. I think this was taken on Decatur St.

9th WARD

Taken the next morning on another excursion. This shot of the burnt out car was taken in the 9th Ward amongst a bunch of ultra-modern/solar powered Brad Pitt houses during a quick stop on our way out to the swamps. It was crazy, 7 years on and most of the area was still just a bunch of cement slab foundations overgrown with weeds. In this particular area probably only 1 in 20 houses had been rebuilt since Katrina.

THE SWAMP

Finally made it out to the swamps in the Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refuge to the north-east of the city. Trying to take wild life photos with a Polaroid is really not recommended ever, what with the wide-ish ~35mm equivalent field of view lens. However, in the swamps it is especially not recommended where the interesting critters are gators and snakes! This is a shot of a water moccasin sunning himself on some reeds. To get it I had to precariously hang half off the pier over the water, arms outstretched. In retrospect — WTF was I thinking?!?

I‘m not much of a street shooter — too modest to snap without approval. However, having a Polaroid with the possibility of instant results was an interesting experience. With the second shot I started a 1-for-1 series with strangers. I would ask if I could take their picture, and in return I would take a second for them to keep. This was a fisherman who was using his long net to find grass shrimp at the base of the reeds near shore. He would collect them for bait before going out on his boat.

SIDE NOTE: This second shot was also the inspiration for this site!

SHOOT THE SHOOT

And then in the middle of the swamp we saw the damnedest thing — a photo shoot with a couple of models. I was a little reluctant to approach. However, I was using the 195 to document my trip, right? And how could I not take this shot? I introduced myself, apologized for interrupting, asked if I could take a quick picture, and then took a second one for them to keep. On the way back to the car my friend commented that the photographer was using a DSLR with kit zoom, no reflectors, no flash, no assistant and shooting in full sun at noon. He was assuming the models would be asking why his shots didn‘t look as good as the Polaroid :)

FUJI COLORS

Both of these shots were taken by Ian after returning to the city. We met up with our friend Denise who used to live near us in South Carolina, but moved back to NOLA a few years ago. She is a rock star – in every sense but the literal one! Ian took this awesome shot of her standing in front of the guest house we stayed in. Notice how the floor of the patio, the railing and the yellow siding are all parallel to the street – now look at the door! NOLA is that kind of place…

INSTANT APPARITIONS

This shot is crazy. This anchor is the ‘Unknown Slave Memorial’ outside the St. Augustine Catholic Church in Treme. Just before this was taken we had been walking around the neighborhood and I (stupidly) had the bellows extended. Well, I turned and ever so slightly bumped the bellows into something (can’t remember what). This is where my faint light leak started. It was particularly noticeable after switching to the 3000 ISO B&W film (Fuji FP-3000b). Anyway, the leak manifested itself in quite a ghostly way given the context of the shot.

BAYOU ST. JOHN

Ian had commandeered the camera at this point and took these shots near Bayou St. John. We witnessed a beautiful sunset and took advantage of an epic rope swing (see below).

ROPE SWING PANS

What are these photos about?

DUSK

This was taken as the sun was almost set. Ian was wanting to experiment with flash, but he forgot the cable needed to remote trigger (which is possible on the Polaroid 195 and yields spectacular results). So began a 30 minute attempt at him shooting in bulb, while I held a soft box over my head and Andrew manually popped the flash by jabbing at the ‘test‘ button with the tip of his pocket knife. This photo was the worst of the bunch from a technical standpoint, but I ended up liking it best.

THE RELUCTANT BARTENDER

Another 1-for-1 shot after returning downtown. It took me 10 minutes of convincing and probably 10 more with her contemplating whether to “go through with it” or not. In retrospect I should have cut my losses and moved on – but I had a cold beer and was with friends so I wasn’t in a particular hurry…

BOURBON ST.

The first shot of the calvary keeping the peace is mine. Then Ian grabbed the second shot of the balcony across the street with people begging for beads in the foreground. He also took the last shot of me. Drinking. On the street. I love New Orleans! And hey look at that, he managed to hit the focus this time :)

The accordionist

Another 1-for-1 with a street musician at the end of the evening. Notice the light colored band about 1/3rd of the way up. It started showing up a few pictures back, but it was more noticeable in this shot. Hmmm…. probably old development goo building up on the rollers. It‘s hard to remember to clean those between each pack change when scrambling to reload.

HOMEWARD BOUND

This shot was taken on our way home the next day. Andrew was still intent on showing us a gator and we hadn’t come across one yet. So he took us to the spot where his dad used to take him as a kid – off Interstate 10 heading east out of NOLA (somewhere near here). Mind you, there was no off ramp. We just parked on the shoulder and walked out on a bridge overlooking an open area in the swamp. There were 18-wheelers whizzing by at 70mph 10 feet behind us while we were tossing Vienna sausages out of a can at two gators — a 3 footer and a 4 footer. Finally found them! Although they were babies so my friend was a bit disappointed. Anyway, while we were feeding the gators I had my 195 hanging around my neck, bellows extended. By the time I took the shot below 15 minutes later, the sun had more than overpowered the uber-sensitive B&W film. Still I loved the shot — seemed a fitting end to our travels.