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| Kansas City Southern (KCS) rail yard, Levee Street, Vicksburg (Panatomic-X film, Spotmatic camera, 135mm ƒ/3.5 Super-Multi-Coated Takumar lens, ⅛ sec ƒ/11.5) |
Levee Street runs along the Yazoo Canal waterfront following the west edge of Vicksburg. Formerly, warehouses, silos, and machine shops of various types lined the road. Many have been demolished over the decades, but it still has an industrial look, especially with the presence of the Kansas City Southern railroad shunting and work yard right next door.
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Levee Street view north (28mm ƒ/3.5 Super-Multi-Coated Takumar lens)
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| Levee Street view south (28mm ƒ/3.5 Takumar lens) |
I have seen this old workshop since I moved to the area. It is clad with miscellaneous materials of interesting textures.
I see junk inside the shed but never any activity. I assume the railroad owns it.
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| South side of workshop with railroad track and parts (28mm ƒ/3.5 lens) |
The building was secure and I did not want to trespass. I do not know if railroad tracks ever went into the work area.
This brick shed is on the grounds of the KCS rail yard and may be decades old. The mid-century buildings are steel utility construction, so I assume this brick shed is early 20th century. Long-term readers may remember that I wrote about a handsome
1890 brick office/utility building that once stood in the rail yard. Sadly, the railroad
demolished it in 2011.
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Kodak 135-36 Panatomic-X film, expired 1991
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I took these photographs on 35mm Kodak
Panatomic-X film. Kodak discontinued this wonderful, fine-grained, black and white film around 1990, but an eBay seller offered a brick which he claimed had been frozen. My experience with cold-stored 120-size Panatomic-X is that it is almost perfect, with no fog or other deterioration. These frames are from the first roll of three that I bought from that vendor. I exposed the film at EI=25 in a
Pentax Spotmatic camera. I also tested my newly-acquired 28mm Super-Multi-Coated Takumar lens. Praus Productions in Rochester, New York, developed the film in Xtol developer. I will show more Panatomic-X examples in the future.
4 comments:
I'm appreciating the opportunity to finally develop some appreciation for the low-speed films. I only used them briefly a long time ago when you had to make prints with an enlarger and I found it hard to control contrast. What I am realizing now is that the real issue was my poorly developed printing skills rather than the qualities of the film. These days, with digital scanning and editing, it is a lot easier to get access to the real potential of films like Panatomic-X. Of course, proper processing also plays an important role in getting at the films' potential.
Mike, I always enjoy your comments regarding the technical aspect; even though I do not always understand the specifics, it helps me to see the photographs in a different perspective. Andrew, as always, I appreciate the interesting contrasts in your industrial photographs--and the old brick warehouse was indeed a striking building.
Thank you all (y'awl) for your support! Stand by for more industrial photography and more Panatomic-X in the months to come.
Yeah! Always checking daily for your posts!
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