Monteperdido

Since the moment I discovered the existence of this paradise I made it my magical place, my: "Before I die I must get lost in those mountains". What I didn't know is that I would be lucky enough to make the already desired trip completely perfect and unforgettable. 

Finally, at the beginning of this year, in late January, we went there, one of the most beautiful and magical places of this planet: the Parque Nacional de Ordesa y Monteperdido.  

I've never been to any place as magical and gorgeous as this national park. Immense mountains growing in front of you every little step you take, surreal lakes miles before getting close to the mountains' bottoms and a special light and atmosphere I've never seen nor felt anywhere else.

The winter sun, the landscape covered in an thick layer of snow... It was as if nature itself knew that we were coming and prepared everything according to my definition of beauty. I still have all those landscapes, trees and snowflakes in my retinas and the cold, the heat, the sun and that silence broken by the cold winter breeze caressing our faces impregnated in my skin and feelings

We spent a week literally in the mountains, sleeping in a mountain refuge and after that a few days in a little, almost lost town that barely had 20 buildings. 

I hope I can make you enjoy with these photos as much as I enjoyed this magical trip.

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All photos taken by me with a Hasselblad and with Kodak film

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Suisse Express (BCN-Geneva-BCN in 36 hours)

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A week ago I got a call from a friend, apparently it was a normal conversation, but he said he had something to propose to me, (a crazy think I hoped, and so it was).

Let me paraphrase: Dude, you wanna come to Switzerland on Monday and come back the next day at night? To which I answered: Hell yeah!  But how are we gonna go there?  Then he answered: BY CAR!

How could I say no to such a cool plan?! So that's what we did, this Monday we met at 9 and started our express road trip to Geneva with 1548 km to cover ahead! 

But, a couple days before starting our journey, I had an inner dilema: Which camera should I bring? Should I go for 35mm? Medium Format? Slr? Rangefinder? And then I told to myself: Joan, you've been devoted to film photography since the start of the year, you haven't shot a digital camera since (almost) November of 2014, why don't you dust off your little digital travel companion for that occasion? And so I did, I dusted off my beloved Fuji X100 to document the whole experience. (Which after a long time of not using felt like shooting with a new camera and made me think about making a review of my experiences with it but that may come in another post).

Hopefully you can enjoy the photos as much as we enjoyed the trip, which was short but full of magnificent experiences.

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Castell de Castellcir

About two weeks ago I went to an old castle ruins. And to experiment a little bit I decided to bring both my film and 1 digital camera, the little fuji X100 that was collecting dust at home.

Here are just a couple shots I took which were taken based on a project I'm now working on.

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all the photos were taken with a fuji x100 

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Quick Update

Well, it's been a long time since I posted something and I don't want you to think that this blog is dead. Not even close.

From the beginning of this year I've been devoted to film photography. Basically I haven't used a digital camera for my personal photography since December of 2014.

I've added one more step into my film photography. Until now I developed my own B&W film at home. Now I've started digitizing myself as well, so I've got complete control over my photos.

Below is one of my first attempts on digitizing film with a dslr and some extension tubes, although this concrete photograph has been made only with a 50mm lens.

Be sure to come back as in these last two months I've been traveling and exploring some places and there are plenty of photos and projects to come to the blog and the web.

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 - Hasselblad 500 C/M - Carl Zeis Sonnar 150mm - Ilford HP5+ - Self Developed and scanned -

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Norderney on film pt.1

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Last summer (2014) I went to Germany, concretely to an Island which I didn't know of its existence, in fact, as my german geography is almost non-existent I didn't even know that Germany had Islands. 

But without even thinking about it (only a few hours ruminating) I accepted the proposition of going there to work (2 months) and therefore improve my german.

I must admit that my relationship with the island is something very peculiar, let me explain why:

I went there completely alone. So, when I arrived there, I found myself in a foreign country, don't know how many km far away from home and with a language which I had barely spoken in the last few months. (Must say it looked promising right?).

So here starts my definition of the island: It's a beautiful and a too small for anyone used to living in a city piece of land (only 12km long and barely 2km wide). And while it's a really beautiful place I had one of the worst experiences there. A few weeks there were like living in hell, countless hours of work and a solitude accompanied by the deserted island after 4-5pm plus it's never summer there( as the weather changed every 2 hours and the temperature was always cold) made an interesting cocktail which I hope to be shown and transmitted in the photos I took, as my only escape and therapy there was to have a bike ride with my cameras and walk walk walk, countless hours of walking in the endless beaches of the island.

Overall I can say it was useful, I learned a lot there (both from life and spiritually, even when having a bad time, that helped me specially) but I say this now, after almost 4 months of being back from there. Nobody can imagine how much I hated that island and how nostalgic it's making me right now to see the photos from it.

After all this amount of words here comes what I think about Norderney: I deeply hate and like this piece of beautiful landscapes hell. 

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All the photos have been taken with a Yashica Mat 124G and a Nikon F3 on Kodak Tri-X and Portra 400

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In Paradise with the Hasselblad

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Little is left to say how special was this trip to the mountains. 

It was like a dream come true, everything was as I wanted it to look like, a cold, foggy and rainy day. And although it was mid winter I didn't get angry because there was no snow.

I think the Hasselblad has something magical and makes you see the world in a completely different way compared to all the cameras I've used and owned. Some of the photos look as if they were about to pop and get out from the screen or the paper.

It's not about composing in a square and seeing the world inverted as I had that shock when I bought a Yashica Mat 124G. It may be that I'm in love with the Hasselblad and everything related to "her" but I'm definitely experiencing a different way of shooting and viewing things.

This was my first trip with the "little" Hassie, and since I had taken these photos I've been wondering how would they look, as I was trying a new film in some conditions I've never shot before and I was shooting with a new camera.

I could be writing the whole day about how wonderful this camera is and how much I'd love to live isolated in the mountains as we did for a few days but I think it's better if you sit down, relax and take a look to that wonder that is nature.

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All the photos have been taken with a Hasselblad 500 c/m - 80mm f/2.8 CT* and Ilford HP5+

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