Eda Wan Photography - Blog of a freelance photographer in Lincolnshire

For my birthday this year I received a Spinner 360 which joined my every growing camera collection (That reminds me, I should get round to shooting my full collection one day).

The Spinner 360 is a Lomography camera which spins on it’s axis as it shoots producing a 360 degree panoramic shot in one exposure. You only get 5 – 8 shots! Depending on the film’s total exposures and how far it spins in each shot.

In my excitement to try out this new camera I popped in a roll of film that I only had with me at the time which was roll of Lomography color 100, then I read the instructions I realised I should have waited to put in a 200 or 400 iso film.

However I decided to carry on as I started and give it a go. So I took it out for a test run then dropped the film off at a lab while in London. I was surprised that I did end up with some pretty successful shots and if it weren’t for my mistake in shooting with the camera set into rewind mode then I would have had more shots.

Please excuse my poor stitching, due to the expense and uncertainty of the roll being exposed I only got the film developed with prints, so I shot the prints and stitched it together myself.

Not bad for my first roll, definitely a fun camera with quirky results. As I discovered after shooting with the Spinner is most certainly a fiddly and unpredictable science. There are so many variations in how you shoot from how you hold the camera to how much you pull the cord and then to how you release it.

It has been a while since my last blog entry and shooting with digital has fallen quiet over the past few months. My new joy at current is a Cosina C1, a camera which use to belong to my father and I inherited. I’m in the middle of my third roll which I’m waiting on completing before I share.

Taken from my trip to Chicago last year, this is one of my favourite shots I took from the whole trip.

In other news I have been pretty busy, still shooting products for a local company and a trip to Focus on Imaging last month where I found myself impressed with the thinktank gear bags. Before my next trip I’m definitely looking at getting a simple holster case as a day bag.

Instant lomo a day is still carrying on, despite the rise in instax film prices due to the recent Japan disaster. Good friend and photographer Nicolas is holding a charity auction of a print with all proceeds going to help the Japan relief fund. Please place a bid if you are interested and check out Nicolas’ photos of this beautiful country he took while visiting.

Taken during my latest trip to Brussels, I stopped by Ghent to visit fellow photographer and friend Nic who took us for a beer (or two).

Wow the year is moving so fast, February already. I have found myself busy with ongoing tasks of sharing my photos from the trip to Chicago and now some work for an upcoming local company. There is also Focus on Imaging 2011 to look forward too next month.

Above is a photo I shot last summer with my LC-A at Sonisphere Festival. A newly fledged music festival held at Knebworth featuring a varied selection of live metal, alternative and rock music. This year’s head-liners are Metallica, Biffy Clyro and Slipknot and it’s looking likely that I will be attending again.

This shot was one of a few that I liked out of a roll which I sent to a new mail order lab to try out. I was quite disappointed in the results, a lot of shots were poorly scanned with strange washed out tones and contrast.

In other news I have still been following my Instant lomo a day mission and I’m long overdue for an upload update on Flickr, keep an eye on that and my twitter for recent updates.

I hope you had a happy chinese new year.

Last summer I attended the wedding of Lee and Lorraine. They had asked me to shoot a collection of portraits featuring family and friends and themselves on the day. The wedding was held on one pleasant day in August with the ceremony taking place in Dudley, and the photos were shot outside by the ruins.

The shooting was made more challenging and fun by the occasional rain shower that poured down on us while I gathered groups together. I thankfully had my friends turned assistants taking turns in sheltering me with an umbrella from the weather (and many thanks to them too!).

I think this is one of my favourite shots from the happy day. More shots can be seen on my Flickr of course.

Many thanks to the happy couple for such a great day.

Happy New Year, I hope your start to the year 2011 has been enjoyable.

I have decided to commit myself to a new project, some may remember my previous projects of ThreeSixtyFive which was a self portrait a day for three hundred and sixty five days, and also Photo a day, which was a photo every day for a year. This time I will attempt to shoot an instant lomo a day, every day, for a year. You can follow my progress here: Instant Lomo a Day.

I will be shooting with my newly purchased LC-A+ which I purchased from the East London Lomography Store just before the new year. This is the second of now two Lomography stores in London and has been open for a year. This is a fantastic little place where you pick up all the lomography cameras, accessories and film you could want.

I also picked up a Splitzer, this accessory allows you to expose a small section of a frame, leading to the possibility of different effects and surreal images. I look forward to trying out in the near future.

If you have been keeping an eye on my Flickr you may noticed I have also been uploading a few more images from my trip to Chicago from near the end of the last year. So I will finish off with a shot from inside the Art Institute:

I hope you had a Merry Christmas.

I finally have a chance to sit down and write another entry and upload another shot or two from Chicago this autumn. Above is a shot from inside the Art Institute. There are still plenty more to come so keep an eye on Flickr.

My run up to Christmas was taken up by work and a short trip to Brussels and also a day trip to the beautiful Ghent. I was one of the last few people to make it across on the Eurostar before the snow and icy weather conditions halted all travel. I was also fortunate enough not to end up stranded when the time came to return home.

Christmas has also brought me a new toy of a Lomo LC-A instant back, this nifty accessory will help turn my Lomo LC-A from a 35mm film camera into an instant film camera. Using fuji instax film photos will have all the lc-a’s character without the hassle of waiting for the results. I must say I cannot wait to get round to trying it out. I am currently considering purchasing either a spare LC-A or a LC-A+ which has now be updated to allow the easy attachment of the instant back .

And speaking of instant photographs this leads me onto one last thing: a link that my fellow friend and photographer Nic mentioned about a man who took a polaroid every day until his death from cancer. Sad but beautiful.

Have a Happy New Year.

Apologies for my absence of late, I have found myself with a busy and demanding summer which involved shooting at a friend’s wedding, followed by a swift trip to Chicago – the amazing “windy city“.

The lomo for today is not from Chicago but one of a humble fried English breakfast in a pub at Southend. This image came from a roll that was developed in a lab in Bourne which I tested out for the first time.

In the meantime keep checking my Flickr feed for more recent images from Chicago as I upload them.

Today’s image is of course taken on the London underground. Yet another out of focus shot that I personally quite like. It is also fitting since I was just in London last weekend, catching a evening of entertainment from the wonderful Penn and Teller.

This weekend I will be found at the locally ran Heckington Show where I will no doubt be filling out my newly purchased CF cards with all the going ons.

I have also been slowly testing out Lightroom 3 and it’s publish to flickr plugin, thought it seems I accidentally deleted my previous published image from my feed by removing it from the collection and publishing…Lesson learnt, do not remove from the collection – or use another plugin?

Apologies for being quiet for so long, the busyness of life has kept me away from blogging and uploading.

The summer has been filled with highs and lows, mixed in with big changes that have turned and some more to come. One big change will be the increase of activity on this site and blog. So watch this space for more.

For now I leave you with a wonderful shot from my latest roll developed from my lc-a that features a stretch of rail line shot near Peterborough.