Episode 55 • Vienna Calling

What this episode covers

Hello, oh-oh, Vienna calling! Jeff’s in the City of Dreams for Episode № 55 of I Dream of Cameras, featuring talk of travel, model shoots and being trailed by paparazzi. Do they swoon for the XPan? Find out in this globe-spanning dispatch! * Jeff’s in Vienna, Austria for this one! * Cameras of 1968: * Petri Color 35 * Fed Mikron * Konica Autoreflex T * Praktica Super TL * Gabe’s been going to a lot of camera meetups ‘cause Jeff has abandoned him * Jeff talks about the nature of his globetrotting adventure: Bratislava, Brno, Vienna, Prague, Karlovy Vary… * Photographing picturesque cities, being trailed by paparazzi * The cameras he brought: the Hasselblad XPan and the Olympus XA4 Macro * The XPan opens doors! photographers notice it — it’s not a dilettante’s camera — and this has led to some fascinating conversations * Gabe’s had a similar experience with Rollei TLRs * The XPan is a surprisingly great travel camera — between behind-the-scenes stuff and exotic Central European cities, Jeff’s burning through two or three rolls of Kodak Portra 400 a day * Kodak Ultramax 400 was cheaper but a bit disappointing * also in the queue: Portra 160 and FPP Color 125 (a.k.a. Svema) * Jeff’s getting an extraordinary insight into the collaboration between model and photographer on a fashion shoot * yesterday’s photo shoot was with Leica Ambassador Pat Domingo, who used a Leica SL2 Reporter and a custom black chrome Hermes edition Leica M10-D with red leather and a 35mm Summicron that belonged to his father * Gabe had some struggles to get back in sync with his black-paint Leica M4 * Jeff’s pretty good at judging exposure — are you? * Gabe’s also been out shooting with the Mamiya RZ67, the Hasselblad 501cm and the Rolleiflex 2.8E2 * And he’s fascinated by the work of Saul Leiter * And he’s still enjoying the black Canonflex RM and Pentacon Six TL * Jeff’s favorite black-and-white film is Double-X 250, a GREAT stock which for some reason isn’t commercially available (except through Cinestill) — buy a 100-foot roll from Ultrafine Online and start bulk-loading! * Jeff’s East Coast lab of choice: picturehouse + smalldarkroom in Chelsea, NYC * and finally, a dip into Das Prodigious Mailbag!