I dedicated 12/12/2009  to the Help Portrait movement.

-basically you take your camera and use it to put a smile on someones face. Take their picture, print it and deliver it. No strings attached.

Out of everybody Cosmin moved me the most.

• He`s a single child.
• He thinks he can play basketball.
• He said he played in his high-school`s team as a pivot.
• He said he had an accident and can`t play anymore.
• When the cellphone dropped from his jacket, he almost freaked out. I asked him why and he replayed “This phone was my mom`s and she game it to me as a present for my 18th birthday. I must not break it”
• He doesn`t really understand the concept of guarding an opponent or dribbling. He just likes to shoot hoops.
• His friends call him “Smecheru`” (I`m having a hard time translating this in English) or “Sageata” (as in Arrow).

These ar just quick facts. I played some basketball with him (mostly as his ball retriever). Stayed there on the court for about 1h. after 25min a kid came by with his grand`ma to play football at the other end of the playground. Boy, that kid missed the goal from 3ft away, but when he hit the ball in our direction, he struck Cosmin in the back of the head from more than 20ft. That very moment I wanted to be Kyle and score a home-run with that kid.

When I got there I just wanted to shoot some hoops. When I left, I had a story and a new friend.

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First roll – Kodak TRI-X

27th of September

Chez Marie

Oktoberfest

Second Roll – Rollei Retro 400s @ ASA3200

27-28th of September

El Comandante

The Studio

City Grill

5th of October

Back at the Crib

Rollei Retro
ASA 400
6 out of 36 frames
Processed in Rodinal 1:50 / 12min
Scan: Canon CanoScan 4400f

This is one of those films that stays in the camera for weeks and you can`t really make it a “one subject roll”. So I chose 6 pictures 5 of them taken in the studio where Alexandra Sandu is taking photos for the Daydreamers project and the first one is taken in the old part of Bucharest (on the way to the studio).

The guy in the 2nd and 5th picture is the photographer Alexandru Matusciac.

As I devoted more and more time to this hobby of mine I started to wonder “What advices do the best photographers in the world have for us … puny mortals?” and I came across many good ideas but only two of them stuck to me:

1. Wear good shoes!
2. Don`t process your pictures immediately after you shot your assignment.

I`ll will talk just a little bit about the 2nd one.

The whole idea is based on the fact that 2-3 days after the assignment you`re still attached emotionally of your pictures. Thus, the more you let them sit unattended, the more distant you become of them. And by the time you decide to work on them you`ll analyze them with more critique … as if they were not your pictures in the first place. So picking the favorites and processing only those should be an easier task to do and with better results. Some of the early photographers used to let the film rolls stay in the fridge up to 6 months before they got developed, but in this fast world we`re living in we`re lucky if we can let them sit over the weekend.

I tried the “process later” approach and everybody got mad at me because I wouldn`t give my friends the summer / party / night out pictures the next day so they can upload them on Hi5 / Facebook / personal shrine page somewhere on the Internet. Eventually they got used to it and now I don`t have to worry about that anymore.

The pictures I`m about to show you are shot this august in Paris (and in the future blog posts: Normandy and bits and pieces of Netherlands)

This year 15 days of summer found us in Paris, Normandy and the Netherlands (5 days each).

There`s a first time for everything … this was my first time in Paris. Beautiful city but it stinks (literally) and it`s expensive. Were not your average “must see everything” tourists.  We don`t step inside every stupid museum we see marked on the map. We`re the kind of travelers that get to know a city by keeping our asses outdoor and taking time just watching the ordinary people doing ordinary stuff.

No, we`re not the kind of “Me Want FOOD!” hill-billies but the “sitting and enjoying a glass of wine here and a glass of wine there” is what I like the most.

But enough about that.

This year Ioana`s parents (or for better understanding: my {somewhere in the future} parents-in-law) celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary. I know what you`re thinking: free booze! And you`re right! The ceremony took place at a Orthodox Church in the Latin part of town and it was simple and beautiful.

Mihai Eminescu - Leica 10 - Rollei Retro 400s

I will split the remaining 4 days into 4 groups: Museums, Defance, Street View and Eiffel Tower.

1. Museums

• Musee d`Orsay – Built in a old train station

Musee d`Orsay - Leica 13 - Rollei Retro 400s

2. Defance

Grande Arche de la Fraternité

Arc de Triomphe

9 Frames

10 Frames

11 Frames

360 of Defance Main Square - 25 Frames

3. Street View

1. Digital stuff that I need to get out of the way…

2. Leica in chronological order…

Leica – 10

Leica – 11

Leica – 12

The first of the following pictures is shot on film and the other seven were captured with the Nikon D90. This guy was awesome!

Aaaand back to Leica and film…

Leica – 13

4. Eiffel Tower

The tower in pictures…



And for the next part … we had to stay in line.

And after God knows how many steps …

And a few with the rangefinder…

Overall I liked Paris but I don`t consider it to be a place to move to. It`s not even close to my top three places to live in.

This entry took me 4h:56min to write from 0% to 100%, that means from RAW pictures and no idea about the entry to what you have before your eyes so don`t hate me if I don`t hurry up with the Normandy entry.

I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did traveling this summer. Comments are appreciated… this way I`ll know my work was not in vain.

More tk.

Rollei Retro 400s
ASA 400
8 out of 36 frames
Processed in Rodinal 1:100 / 1h stand
Scan: Canon CanoScan 4400f

This roll traveled with me to Bacau and to Bîrlad at my grandpartens.

First two frames, yours truly and Romeo Tomescu. This guy has so many blogs / portfolios that I had trouble finding one that suits him.

My gran`pa in probably the best pictures I`ve took of him ever since I took on this hobby.

And because new camera has to take pictures of cats … I`m letting her do her stuff.

Rollei R3
ASA 1600 @ 400
7 out of 36 frames
Processed in Rodinal 1:100 / 1h stand = underdeveloped by -2EV
Scan: Canon CanoScan 4400f

Catalina gave me this film. She said “have fun trying this one”. I had no clue about how it works. (The fun part about this type of film is that “it has no predetermined ASA”. Just select the ASA you want and be careful to develop accordingly when you get back home.)

I ran it through my Leica as a ASA1600 film but I forgot about that setting when developed it and I ran it allong with a TRI-X @ 400 @ ASA400 dev. time … so it messed it up a bit.

After so many crappy photos I decided not to bore you with even more crappy photos so from now on I`ll try to select a few frames specific for that roll of film. Not necessary the best but the ones I consider most valuable to me, or the story behind the whole roll or just a momentary feeling.

Therefore today I`ll lay out just 7 pictures.

Enjoy.

More tk.

P.S. Yes, that`s my mom and my dog in the 5th picture.

Rollei Retro
ASA 400
13 out of 36 frames
Processed in Rodinal 1:100 / 1h stand
Scan: Canon CanoScan 4400f

So, today I`ll show you only 13 images from the 6th roll, because only these are mine. The rest of 23 … let`s just say I don`t want to look good with other people`s photographs taken with my camera.   : )

Moreover … starting from now I`ll be using Lightbox as “gallery surrogate” so I bet you`ll like the new look. You can now use the keyboard arrow keys to scroll through the pictures. I have no idea if the plug-in can figure out how many pictures I have in one entry and show only those … but we will wait and see.

Enjoy the pics.

More tk.

Rollei Retro 400
ASA 400
36 frames
Processed in Rodinal 1:100 – 1h stand method
Scan: Canon CanoScan 4400f

It`s been a loooong time since I last wrote a few words. I`ve been doing something special these past 2 months : I took a break!

But now that BB gave me her film scanner I thought I should update the “Leica” chapter. Remember that it`s my second film with a rangefinder and I don`t really know how to scan film, thus the pictures are crappy. But being a part of my  “I`m taking a break” experience, they deserve a spot on my blog.

Enough blabber …

The first 21 pictures were taken on assignment at a cocktail party. The afternoon started pretty good but the clouds covered Bucharest in no time. (many of you were at Best Fest waiting for the “The Killers” concert). At around 7 PM it started to rain; but I`m not talking about your average summer rain. Oh boy! It got me soaked even under a tent. So we rushed everybody inside … including the string quartet and all their equipment and tried to continue the event there.

We had a D3, a D200, a D90 and my Leica. Out of those only the Leica didn`t bother with the shutter sound. So we snapped 20-30 pictures with the dSLRs to cover our asses and then enjoyed the rest of the evening snapping few frames on film.

The last frames were snapped on 4th of July before the Santana concert at BestFest.

Enjoy these pictures.

More tk.