It has saved me a few times now. Plus it's where I load my 4x5 holders for now until I get a properly dark room set up.

It also helps when you finish a roll in the old Minolta 5000AF (which is practically a family heirloom on my wife's side) and discover the powered rewind doesn't work any more.

At first I thought "right". But looking at them larger, I'm finding my eye drawn toward the distant mountains by the "god beams" near the edge of frame in the right one, whereas the left version leads me strongly to the house and keeps me there.

And tomorrow I may change my mind. Both excellent.

The textures in this are really interesting, and that one little cloud! Love it.

Totally “Saturday Night Fever” 🕺

Liking how this place is shaping up for photography. Mostly film photographer, hopefully darkroom printer again soon, would love to be on this list!

Ah the car colors of my early childhood. So many oranges just like these cars (and browns, and weird hospital greens too)

This. Exactly this.

That’s one of the things that tended to drive me away from Twitter even before it went sideways. If I follow an artist I want mostly posts about art. Occasional pol stuff is one thing, we’re all affected by it one way or other. But everything? Nope.

That does remind me I need to clean the mirror on my Yashica A. And shoot it a bit more.

But, I can avoid doing business with companies and avoid giving my time to platforms which “normalize” them. I can protest in my own quiet way.

The decider though is that as a non-naturalized permanent resident, I don’t actually feel safe to speak up. Even if I am male, white, straight, lawful and middle aged, they cannot ever represent me in any way. But I’m for real concerned that speaking up too much is dangerous for now.

And partly I dislike the anxiety and rage I feel about the things that are happening and will happen. Expressing that out loud has changed exactly nothing which only serve to increase anxiety.

Partly I dislike the places my mind goes to (I grew up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, so have witnessed polarization and hate close up before; and have witnessed the violence and radicalization which so easily grows from it, on all sides).

Waist level finder is definitely a bit different to work with. Even more so than the 4x5 ground glass, oddly enough. Results are usually worth it though!

Definitely plan on leaning hard into these two things myself this year, esp. having seen the chaos in the wake of the whole TikTok thing. A reminder that the only way to guarantee continuity of what you post is to be in control of the platform it's hosted on (and for it to be seamless to relocate).