A Duraflex and an Argoflex

A few months ago, I found some photos done Through the Viewfinder. I thought they were gorgeous and different and just ........wow. I wanted to try it myself, so yesterday Sarah and I went out on a search through the local "treasure" stores and I found two box-type cameras that I could use for the process.

Just looking down into these cameras gives me this silly sort of thrill. The picture looks so silvered and it's hard to explain if you haven't actually looked into one yourself. They remind me of an old mirror that has had part of the back scratched away.

The cameras were really inexpensive - I don't know if either of them work, you just use them for the lens - but they are so cool-looking. I'm going to have them as part of my decor when I'm not using them.

Sarah loved the treasure shops. She is fascinated with old equipment - especially typewriters. She told me a story yesterday and it went something like this....... when she was in the first grade and changing in her teacher's office for the Halloween parade, she saw an old typewriter and she admitted to me, "I might have maybe touched a key or two." I love that idea, that she was so fascinated by the typewriter, that she was tempted to touch it.

I used the cameras to take her picture yesterday. She was pissed. I don't know how I'm going to get her to let me keep practicing on her.

This was one of the first images that I took with the TTV. It's the trees out front, up through the branches, which is something that I enjoy shooting. I'm not sure why. I do it over and over.
I'm not sure which camera takes better pictures yet. I still need to figure out a better box for the camera to fit into - you shoot down the box, with the duraflex at the bottom of the box. When I get that right, then I can figure it out.

There are some huge fires in my area. The wind kept the smoke away, but made the fires really hard to contain. They had to evacuate some areas - down in the canyon where my friend Tony's family lives, up in Paradise, where Steve's dad lives. The fire burned out by my college - the campus is in large part a wildlife preserve.

This morning the wind died down and I woke up to a smokey smell in my room. Sarah just came in from playing on the patio and she smells of it. Strong of it. The people in Paradise are being allowed back into their homes. I can't imagine what these people have gone through in the past 36 hours. I feel very lucky.

In this picture, you have no clue that there's any smoke, but a little to the left, there's a huge plume of it.

Here's my son, Max, taking a nap. He lies on this big pillow called a Cloud Nine. His head is to the right, but it's hard to see.
I'm taking off now. It's time to give him his before bed medicine. Take care.