It covers everything in the South. I think it’s beautiful.

Another one with Polaroid 59. It turns out I wasn’t allowed to be as creative with the ID photo as I was told. I don’t like this one as much, but it’ll have to do, because I’m out of film.

The image I’m submitting for my student ID at SCAD.

Sure is hard to frame things up on a focusing screen in the dark. 6.5 minute exposure. Took three tries, and it freaked the owners out… a big white guy with a funky mustache across the street with a view camera for 15 minutes.

I asked Parnell to come over after work today. I’m asking several of my co-workers to come over for a shot or two before we leave town. You can read more about that on CrazyWalker. This was shot with expired Polaroid 59 (it’s the only kind I can afford now).

Check out this gorgeous image from my friend Polly Chandler.

This is one of my longtime college roommates and friend, Andy Bain. Of course, now he’s a grownup and likes to be called Andrew. Even his fiancee calls him that.

We’re moving in just a few hours, about 5 miles up the road. But it’s a bigger house, and I’ll actually have a pretty sweet darkroom setup on the second floor. I’m just not looking forward to moving the drymount press and 3 enlargers up the stairs. Andy and I moved them downstairs the other night and it just about wore us out.

Miss Laura has worked for the House of Representatives as a cook (among many other duties) for 33 years. She’s 82 years old, and a sweetheart of a lady. I met her several months back during an event held by the Speaker’s office. After talking for awhile, I asked if I could take a picture of her sometime soon, and she eagerly agreed. But as session raged on, we never had a chance to meet up.

Then, a week ago I ran into her while she was waiting for a cab to pick her up from work. We spoke a bit and she told me that she was still interested in posing. So today I walked over and asked if she was up for it. We shot this next to a window on the House Floor, and she was one of the best, most patient models I’ve ever had. Even with my Polaroid back malfunctioning and one of the Polaroids falling apart in front of my eyes, she pushed her schedule back to accomodate me. And I like how this shot turned out. I’m going to print it gigantic.

UPDATE: Thanks for all the kind comments, folks. I really appreciate it. However, I’d like to clear up any confusion, whether implied or not (and this is directed at no particular person… it’s more a pet peeve of mine). Laura seems to come across to people in this shot as very solemn, perhaps indignant, and downtrodden. I can’t say I know a whole lot about her background, but I do know that she is very upbeat, happy and an absolute joy to be around. She pretty much lights up a room. And our first take of this shot was her with a nice smile on her face. But smiles are hard to keep still during a long exposure and maintain a natural look. So I asked her to relax her face and try not to laugh. A more accurate portrait of her character would probably have to be taken with ISO 1600 film and a smaller format camera, because she seems to always be laughing and smiling. Still, you’re welcome to interpret the photo how you wish, but I felt that background was necessary for a little more accurate depth.

This is what our evenings consisted of in Colorado, for the most part.

I first shot this with some color Polaroid, but I underexposed the shot. So, having only that one sheet, I pulled out some Pola55. And while I wish the color shot had worked, I like this one quite a bit.

This shot (really two shots) took me two hours to set up. The scratches were the least of my problems. I had to wash them in river water. Man, I’m tired.

We got back from Colorado (officially) tonight. Stayed in Midlothian last night, actually. I spent this afternoon/evening finally organizing my e-mail in Outlook. I had over 1400 e-mails in the inbox, 500+ of which were “unread”. So as I’m going through some of them, I came across this image from last year. Sure, it’s not fresh, but I’ll be posting pictures from Colorado soon enough.

My wife probably couldn’t even stand within 10 feet of this toilet without gagging. It’s probably been out of commission for at least 50 years, but I’m not sure that’s kept people from using it. (No, not using using it.)

This is from my recent trip to a ghost town called Payton (Peyton?) Colony, Texas. It’s about 8 miles East of Blanco, and took quite awhile to set up all my shots. I shot 12 sheets of Tri-X 320 so I should have those up soon.

As I washed these, the emulsion lifted and floated away. So sad, but that’s what I get for not taking sodium sulfite with me. I’ve learned my lesson.

Drove down to Wimberley last weekend (it was 80 miles from our house) and took this inside Fischer Hall which is about 12 miles past the town center.

Nothing special.

Another view of the same church from yesterday.

The first of two shots of the Haynie Methodist Church Chapel, which is apparently located in Garfield, Texas, just Southeast of Austin on Highway 71.

Another from my adventure down Hwy 71.

I took a drive down Hwy. 71 outside of Austin, past the airport. I didn’t really know what I wanted to shoot at first, but things like this quickly appeared. So as you’ll see, I didn’t spend the weekend in Westlake Hills again. This was shot with Polaroid 79.

The new flyover for 620 near the Williamson-Travis county line.