Revisiting Ruby Beach - part I

In my last post, Gas Works Park, I explored Ilford HP5 400 developed in Xtol using 120mm film. The grain structure with that combination is surprisingly fine, so to be fair I wanted to delve a little deeper into the results by shooting the same stock in 35mm format. I decided to make a day trip to Ruby Beach, taking advantage of a rare dry spell during one of our wettest months of the year here in the Pacific Northwest. The light was challenging — I had been hoping for a bit more brightness and natural contrast — but it lent a moody character to the scene. The beauty of HP5 is that it performs quite well in flat light, holding detail and texture in the shadows while rendering soft highlights with a pleasing grain. And the grain is significantly more pronounced with a smaller negative than on 120mm film (as you’d expect), but I like grain and rough edges where the detail pops off the page — it accentuates, renders unshaven, raw, and beautifully honest. Here I present a small smattering of images, a modest selection for now, which will be expanded later with some Kodak color photos to come…