Vicksburg with a Hasselblad 100mm ƒ/3.5 CSi Lens and Fuji Pro 160 NS Film (Abandoned Films 10)

After successfully completing some medical treatments, I was overcome with a serious bout of GAS. That is Gear Acquisition Syndrome, although the other gas was also present. 

Hasselblad 501CM with 100mm ƒ/3.5 Planar CSi lens and correct hood

For over five years, I used an 80mm Planar lens on my Hasselblad. But sometimes, I wanted just a bit more reach. With 35mm cameras, I liked the 55mm ƒ/1.8 Super-Takumar lens on the Pentax Spotmatic. This was just marginally longer than the more common 50mm. Hasselblad's 100mm Planar lens would provide a diagonal coverage on 6×6 approximately equal to 55mm on 35mm, so I started looking at online vendors in USA. Soon, this gorgeous 100mm ƒ/3.5 Planar CSi lens came in a big padded box from Camera West. This is a 6-element Planar design and is reputed to be the highest resolution Hasselblad lens for distant subjects.

On a foggy and drizzly January day (my favorite light), I loaded a roll of Fuji Pro 160 NS film in the holder and headed out. This is a neutral color balanced film designed for wedding, fashion, and commercial product photography. Fuji did not distribute 160NS in the USA and discontinued it in the Japan market in October 2021.  

I posted these frames at 2400 pixels wide, so click any picture to see the details. Most were tripod-mounted.

Polk Street view east, January 7, 2023, 1/15 ƒ/11

Monroe Street looking south from China Street. The former Junius Ward YMCA is to the right.

Pearl Street near Fairground Street, 1/15 ƒ/16

2521 Pearl Street, still occupied (taken from railroad tracks)

501-509 Fairground Street (taken from railroad bridge), 1/15 ƒ/16

Floodwall and Bunge Corporation, Levee Street, view south (hand-held)

1109 Mulberry Street, view east, 1/30 ƒ/11

LD's Restaurant is in a building that formerly housed a club/bar (closed several times because of shootings) and a liquor store.

Railroad yard from Levee Street - 250mm ƒ/5.6 Sonnar lens, 1/4 ƒ/22

2427 Washington Street - 80mm ƒ/2.8 Planar-CB lens

I added two frames that I took with my 80mm and 250mm lenses. Hasselblad's 100mm lens is considered to be their "sharpest" (whatever that means in internet fantasy-land), but all the Zeiss lenses are superb performers. My Planar-CB is a 6-element design, in contrast to the more common 7-element models. My 250mm Sonnar is a 1960s silver barrel model with single coating, but it is just fine.

I found a very handy padded bag to hold my camera on the car seat next to me or on the floor. The rest of the kit stays in a larger camera bag. This is a Ruggard Onyx 35, only $17.95 from B&H. $17.95? That is the cost of a roll of film now. The original idea came from a WalMart lunch box that my wife suggested, but this Onyx is well-sewn and protective. Highly recommended.

Thank you all for joining me on this semi-random tour of Vicksburg.

Levee Street Railroad Yard, Vicksburg, Mississippi

The Kansas City Southern rail yard on Levee Street usually has interesting patterns, shapes, and textures to photograph. Long-term readers know that I have photographed here many times before, but I usually find new material when I explore. Nowadays, it is a rare treat to walk next to or within a rail yard that is not fenced off with security razor wire. The two big rail yards in Jackson are off-limits. 

Fairground Street Bridge, closed since the early 1990s

The rail yard is much quieter than it was before the 2011 Mississippi River flood. I do not know where all the rolling stock went. For older articles on Levee Street:

• Historic Cotton Compress
• 1800 railroad warehouse/shop
• Tank farm

These photographs are from Kodak Ektar 100 film. I used a venerable Honeywell Pentax Spotmatic camera. Most of the rail yard photos are with my 135mm ƒ/3.5 lens, an inexpensive optic in its day but excellent mechanical and optical quality. Northeast Photographic in Maine developed the film and scanned the negatives with a Noritsu system. I reduced the saturation with Photoshop CS6 software.

Snow in Vicksburg, Mississippi (B&W film)

Dear readers, the heat is here, and the winter of 2018-2019 is fading away into memory. Other than a minor dusting of snow sometime in January, we did not see any of the white stuff. But the winter of 2017-2018 was much more interesting, with three real snowfalls. Because this is a rare phenomenon here in central Mississippi, it is worth recording on film. I bopped out with the Hasselblad and tripod as soon as I could while the white stuff was still falling or just afterwards. Here are a few examples (click any photograph to expand to 1600 pixels wide).

Beulah Cemetery, MLK Jr. Blvd., Vicksburg (50mm Distagon lens, Kodak Panatomic-X film)

Zollinger's Hill Road, Vicksburg (50mm Distagon lens, Fomapan 100 classic film)

Zollingers Hill Road drops steeply down from MLK Jr. Blvd. In the snow, it looks like a country lane. In one of the snowfalls, the city closed it because of the slick surface.

Sycamore Avenue, Vicksburg (80mm Planar lens, Panatomic-X film)

Sycamore Avenue is another small road that drops down into a valley from MLK Jr. Blvd. Once there were small homes along Sycamore, but most have been demolished. When I took this picture on December 8, 2017, the snow was melting quickly, and I wanted to capture the scene in soft light.

West Pine and KCS railroad cut from Belmont Street (80mm Planar lens, Panatomic-X film)

This is the railroad cut between West Pine and Belmont Streets. This has carried the railroad between Vicksburg and Jackson since before the Civil War. Once, there were many more cottages on the opposite slope.

Washington Street, view north (80mm Planar lens, Fomapan 100 film)

Vans, 2640 Washington Street (80mm Planar lens, Fomapan 100 film)

Heading west, we reach Washington Street, unusually quiet on a snowy morning. I have been unable to do much photographically with Washington Street, but the snow added contrast and eye interest.

Fairground Street (80mm Planar lens, Fomapan 100 film, yellow filter)

Fairground Street drops down to the west from Washington Street. These little cottages at the west end of Fairground Street have been here for decades. I have photographed them before. Most appear to be occupied.

2521 Pearl Street (80mm Planar lens, Fomapan 100 film, yellow filter)

This duplex on Pearl Street is on the east side of the street and faces the railroad tracks. All the cottages on the west side of the tracks have been demolished as have many on the east side, but I photographed them years ago.

Fairground Street Bridge (80mm Planar lens, Fomapan 100 film)

The Fairground Street Bridge is a Keystone bridge from the late-1800s. It is in poor condition and may be demolished despite its historical significance as being one of the only bridges of its type in Mississippi. I wrote about it in 2017. According to the Vicksburg Post,

"Nancy Bell, executive director of the Vicksburg Foundation for Historic Preservation, said the bridge is listed as the oldest in the state, is on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Mississippi landmark. 

The bridge was closed to traffic in 1995 as unsafe. Its approach at the intersection of Pearl and Fairground streets is overgrown with trees and other vegetation, and the crumbling structure crosses over the Kansas City Southern Railroad yard."

Way to go, Vicksburg, make us proud! Demolish a historic engineering landmark, while meanwhile trying to promote the city as a tourist destination.

Durden Creek, Waterways Experiment Station (February 2010 snowfall, Sony DSC-R1 digital file) 

3000 block of Drummond Street, view south (February 2010 snowfall, Sony DSC-R1 digital file)

I found some snow files from the winter of 2010.

KCS tracks, Warrior's Trail, Bovina (80mm Planar lens, polarizing filter, Fomapan 100 film)

These are the Kansas City Southern tracks next to Warrior's Trail near the town of Bovina. The sun was just coming out and the light was magical briefly.

Highway US 80 over the Big Black River, Bovina (50mm Distagon lens, polarizer filter, Fomapan 100 film)

 Finally, this is the US 80 bridge over the Big Black River a short distance east of Bovina.

KCS railroad bridge, Big Black River, Bovina (50mm Distagon lens, yellow filter, Fomapan 100 film)

A short distance south of the US 80 bridge is this concrete arch bridge, which carries the Kansas City Southern railroad tracks over the Big Black. I am not sure when it was built, but an arch bridge this high  is unusual for Mississippi. The dark stain on the concrete shows how high the Big Black can rise after heavy rains in west central Mississippi.

This ends out short snow tour of Vicksburg and immediate area. Come back to this article when it is 100° F during some scorcher of a muggy summer day.

All square photographs are from my Hasselblad 501CM camera. I scanned the negatives with a Minolta Scan Multi medium format film scanner controlled by SilverFast Ai software, running on an old Windows 7 computer.

Vicksburg with Color Film 2017 (test of a Hasselblad)

Clay Street, Vicksburg (also known as the ugliest street in America), 150mm Sonnar lens.

My friend generously loaned me his Hasselblad camera and gave me some Fuji NHG400 color film to try. The Hasselblad is a 6×6 film camera, like my older Rolleiflex, but instead has a modular design. The reflex mirror is in a rectangular box. A lens mounts on one side, a film-holder on the opposite, and a viewfinder on top. You can switch and swap components as needed, and all these parts click together with remarkable tolerances (similar to how 50-year-old Leica lenses work perfectly on a new body).

Hasselblad 501CM, A12 film back, and Zeiss 80mm f/2.8 CB lens (all 1999 production).

Kansas City Southern railroad line from the Confederate Avenue bridge, Vicksburg Military Park, 150mm lens.

The Hasselblad has a big advantage over the Rolleiflex: you can change lenses. My friend's 150mm Sonnar lens, although about 40 years old, has beautiful color fidelity. It gave a field of view approximately equivalent to an 80 mm lens in 35mm terms.

501 Fairground Street, 150mm lens.

503 Fairground Street.

The five matching houses on Fairground street are typical 1920s cottages. They are wider than shotgun houses but similarly intended as inexpensive housing for urban working families. I have photographed them before many times.

Fairground Street bridge, 150mm lens (flare is from a  light leak in the film back).

The Fairground street bridge is now closed to car or foot traffic and is deteriorating. One span was built by the Keystone Bridge Company and was erected here in 1895. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.

KCS railroad cut from Washington Street, 150mm lens.

Gent with his bicycle, 150mm lens.

I often like to photograph the Kansas City Southern railroad line where it passes under Washington Street and runs through a deep valley between Belmont and Pine Streets. The gent on the bicycle was coming down the sidewalk and we chatted. He graciously let me take his portrait.

Tri-State Tire, 2209 Washington Street, Vicksburg.

This building with its Spanish motif was once an ice cream shop but has been a tire store since the 1970s.

Stairs on the east side of the unused Mercy Hospital, Grove Street, 80mm Planar lens.

The former Mercy Hospital is closed and locked, but must have a lot of photographic potential. Some background on the hospital is in this Preservation Mississippi post.

2314 Grove Street, Vicksburg, Mississippi, 80mm lens. (Update Dec. 2019: the house is empty but still standing)

This is a typical early 20th century cottage. This was once been a duplex, but one door has been removed.

Thank you, Bob, for letting me use your camera and lenses. But now that I have sampled a Hasselblad, I want to buy one (Hmmm, an element of Gear Acquisition Syndrome (GAS) at play here.....).