P-P-P-P-P-P-P

Construction debris , Albemarle County

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That is:

Previous Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance

It wasn't exactly the crack of dawn when I finally got out the door this morning, but it was still within the first hour and a half of early light. I'll admit it : I'm still a sucker for early and late light. I'm stuck in that aesthetic. Perhaps after another decade of working with it and around it, I'll figure out a way to expand my repertoire.

Nonetheless, I had fully intended to work with the Linhof and find a composition or two to put on sheet film. I was prepared with three cameras, six lenses, two tripod heads, a bag of film with three sheets of FP4 and half a box of Fuji quickloads. In actuality it doesn't appear as if I was unprepared. After finishing off, right beside the van, a roll of 220 that has been in the Mamiya for 5 or 6 weeks,  I headed off with the full pack and tripod. What I came back with were several point and shoot digital photos. After wandering around the new Earlysville Road/Dickerson Road intersection, a crowded black & white composition presented itself. Checked it with the cardboard viewer, set up the tripod and camera with the 210mm lens, went through my forward tilt focusing routine, calculated DOF, and headed back to the pack for a sheet of film. Wait a minute, I don't have any holders in the pack. Ooops...wait another minute, I don't have the quickloads either. All the film is still in the van, in the film bag, six or seven minutes away.

How long does it take to decide either to give up the image, or make the 15 minute round trip to fetch the film? It took me about five seconds. Not too wedded to that image, are we? This is what I got instead. And it gives me a clue as to what I should be putting together in this section of the site. I think it's going to be more immediate digital imagery that could logically be contained in a daily/occasional journal.

Really, this lesson says nothing about my preparedness, as much as it does about my poor memory. And being out of shape using the 4x5. As I learned long ago, when there are so many bits and pieces that make up the kit, most of them being required to make an image, it can be fatal to forget one piece. Several years ago I drove two hours east to Hanover County, unpacked the gear, chose my location, set up the tripod, and then realized that I didn't have the rail clamp for the Sinar. There was no point in jumping around or swearing or trying to improvise. I put everything back in the van and went looking around Richmond for a rail clamp. What a futile waste of time that was. But it taught me that I needed to create a packing list - and look at it prior to departure.

The point is that all pieces need their assigned place, and they need to be put back in that place each and every time so that they are routinely where one expects them to be when needed. At least I didn't drive away from the house without something necessary. But in this instance I had the film bag from the Sinar kit with the pack for the Linhof kit, so the film wasn't where it was supposed to be when I got on location to use the T4. It might behove me to do a mental checklist more often.