Kodak film grant, too much chocolate and Lithgow.

too much chocolate has teamed up with Kodak to offer a film grant for ten lucky, previously undiscovered, photographers. So where does Lithgow fit in?

Some of you may know that I’ve been posting a selection of shots based around the redevelopment of Lithgow into a more tourist friendly location.

Initially I was drawn in by the magnificent Blast Furnace, which was the main steel production location for NSW in the early days. (Explained better here). On first impressions, you could be forgiven for thinking the site doesn’t have much photographic potential. A few visits at night convinced me otherwise.

In fact, it was the visit above that convinced me of the potential of this location as a long term project. Yet despite my initial enthusiasm, I found it hard to keep motivated. When this happened I started to move away from conventional photographic wisdom and tried experimenting. My favourite of these experiments would have to be the shots from a $1 panorama fixed-everything camera, with a no name brand IR filter taped with gaffa tape to the front.

Yet even with such interesting results, I craved more…well, subjects of interest. Using the idea of Lithgow as a tourist destination as my basis, I’ve started moving around a little. So far I’ve started work on the Hoskins Uniting Church, starting again at night.

But then I started to think about its potential during the day, not to mention the prospect of avoiding the long exposures needed at night in sub-zero temperatures!

But I’m not finished yet.

So far only 3 shots in my project have been taken on digital. Having sold my digital camera some time ago to buy a Jupiter-9 85/2, digital is no longer an option. I wanted (and still want) to shoot the entire project on film so that it becomes so much more of a complete process, rather than digital output that has no concrete origin. And I guess that’s why I’m pretty excited about this offering.

4×5 E6 film is pretty expensive, and it would be great to have availability to that. I’ve yet to experiment with 4×5 up at Lithgow – I’m waiting on the cash for a better and more solid tripod, and of course the cost is prohibitive too!

I also want to expand my project to incorporate some of the street life – shopfronts, general life and some of the less imposing buildings. I’m hoping to pick a rangefinder for that side of things, and the Kodak Double X movie stock would be amazing for that side of things. Or even some Tri-X. Both of these I haven’t been able to afford on my student budget, yet I truly believe that access to these stocks would really open up the nature of the project.

I don’t know yet how the juding works (click the original link for more info), but I figured a post on my (near) stagnant blog would help me consolidate my intentions in preperation for the upcoming opening of submissions on September 1st.