Frugal Film Project – Marius Voicu

FFP 2020 – April – Red 

When the themes have been chosen last year my thoughts were: “Oh man, I am going to shoot a lot of red things since in April all the flowers come to life, I can go to the countryside and shoot some poppies (a whole field of them)…it’s gonna be awesome!”. And then COVID-19 came and all went down the drain. Since this pandemic I have shot only 3-4 rolls in 2 months, which is not good for any photographer’s morale. Seeing pictures posted online only made things worse. I could post something from the time before the pandemic, but that would not be okay with the world. Just like last year’s edition of Frugal Film Project, whether you feel like it or not, you have to shoot one roll per month and that should keep you connected and creative. These last two months were in tune with that feeling, I needed to shoot so that I kept myself busy and in the game.   

April’s theme, RED, gave everyone some thought about what to shoot since there were restrictions regarding going outside. As such one had to get creative inside the house and find objects or subjects that fit in this category. While some members struggled with getting film to actually shoot, I was in the other group where I needed to find something that I could use for further. This was the first part of the equation. Secondly I needed to think of a subject or setup so that I could give some kind of meaning to the theme.  

After some time spent seeking for any red item in the house, I have found a vase that fit the bill and some dead red roses in another one. Usually I prepare better, and have plan B, C, D, …and so on in case plan A fails. Now plan A had to be successful or things would get critical very soon, very fast. Out of those two options only the red vase proved to be the right choice and delivered what I needed. Unfortunately for the other option I ran into some user and film issues. On the user issue part I metered a bit off and the available light did not helped. Also, I have not focused the camera accordingly. But with the Kodak Brownie Twin20 there are not much ways to focus and if you fall in-between the three focus distances available then you are screwed. Second issue was the film. I am not sure what went wrong, but I managed to get the markings on the backing paper onto the negative itself. Not sure how you do that since the markings are on one side and the negative is on the opposite (black) side. I kept the film at room temperature after I shot it and it was developed correctly since 9 frames were OK and the last 3 had backing paper markings. Would be interesting to find out what happened and how can I avoid that in the future. 

The chosen frame for this month’s theme is called “Tribal dancing”. Hopefully I will find more subjects for the May theme and this film issue will not repeat itself.