1 – underexposed and underdeveloped cross-processed Ektachrome 100. The tip here is to always change all variables (film, development time + temperature) at the same time, so you never really know what happens why. Or something. The tip might be to not do that.
2 – same as above but with the additional point of a composition that not only hits all the clichés (fence, trains, tracks, 1/3 sky, 2/3 rest) but does so in an almost artfully bad way. Almost artfully. Fence out of focus, train partly hidden, leading lines to nowhere, sharpest part is some some random tree. Honestly I’m kinda proud.
3 – to replicate this one, get a large-format camera, open the shutter, focus on the ground glass, remove ground glass, put in the film holder, remove film holder dark slide, say shit because you realize you didn’t close the shutter beforehand, re-insert film holder dark slide. Develop as normal. It’s a river with a small pier in the foreground, roughly as sharp as I would see it without contact lenses. (“Make art about what you know”, etc)
4 – Soviet/Ukrainian color film from the 80s that has disintegrated more thoroughly than the USSR itself. I have a few more tries left – what I tried so far was mild overexposure and sort of normal development (C41 but at 25°C – that’s not the correct chemistry but there should still be something there) – didn’t work. “1 stop per decade” massive overexposure and very very very gentle development (ISO 3, C41 at 20°C, very little bleach) – also didn’t work. I’ll try Rodinal next, and then putting it into C41 afterwards, with no bleach only fixer, so at least I’ll have a black and white image left. But this particular film I have seems like it had a hard life.
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