Feeling Week

With lightening flashing around the city, we trusted vague indications that the storms did not extend westward and we piled our gear and ourselves into the car and headed 250 km to Swift Current, Saskatchewan and their annual kite festival. The gamble paid off and the weather was perfect. The sun was more intense than usual with the Seconic reading 640 with the high slide in. I overexposed a roll of 7240 shooting some antique tractors for my new film project "Grain" at a lot outside of Moose Jaw. I suspect that overexposing (and forgetting to pack a filter) is the least of my problems. I pulled the can from my cold room this morning, I'm not sure where it came from as the writing isn't in my hand. It just said "7240 short end" on tape on the spine of the round metal can. When I loaded it I discovered it has a magnetic stripe on the side, making it closer to 25 years old, not just 20. In Swift Current, the kites did not make for good cinema, as I expected they wouldn't. However, I shot a second roll of 7240 on impressions of wind. This work is all destined for colour hand processing (in buckets) sometime in the next few weeks, which reminds me that I'll be facing new restrictions from Health and Safety at the University as they will not be requiring me to use the safest alternative with all photographic chemicals. I'll certainly be returning to this topic in the near future.
I also shot a half roll of super-8 around the town of Morse where there are vast open fields of salt that look just like snow, and I say that as a Canadian who is not fooled by simulated snow in most movies. There are plows that move it around and a huge plant that does something with it. I've probably driven past it a hundred times in my life but never stopped. As it was, the tourist thing was closed so we didn't actually get information, just a shot of Margaret and William pretending to shiver while standing on top of it. There is also a mile long land bridge across a marsh that is build to hold the water and preserve the wildlife; we drove across it for the first time today as well. All captured in an collection of inexplicable birds+family waving shots that make super-8 home movies the joy that they are.