For those of you that know my work elsewhere on the internet, you know I like to shoot film as well. Film has a uniqueness that is hard to describe - but I'll save that rant for a different day. What I wanted to share with you all today is a peculiar film stock called lomochrome purple, and what I've noticed while shooting it.
The emulsion was created by the folks over at Lomography as a color negative emulsion. You can see their website description here - Lomography.com/lomochrome_purple
They created it with the intent of mimicking one of the world famous infrared films Aerochrome. Aerochrome was originally made for military usage to help with the spotting of military vehicles hidden within vegetation. The film has high infrared sensitivity reportedly up to 900nm. This means plants all turned a stunning vibrant red, and vehicles and buildings remained dark. The idea was that this would help the military see between the trees easier to spot potential enemies.
A friend poses next to the remnants of an old growth stump - North Vancouver
But as you can see from these images - that's not quite what lomochrome purple does. Instead of turning greens vibrant red, lomography stopped at purple. Generally speaking, greens become purple, blues a more cyan blue, and reds and are untouched. Purple colors generally become pure white. A large reason for this is that instead of using older mercury based development techniques, lomography opted for current c41 processing to make it more accessible to the general public.
Ocean Drive - Vancouver
One of the more interesting things is how this film captures light. As you look through some of these images you'll notice the largely pink tint that most buildings have. I've also noticed some vegetation is untouched, like this next image where the grass remains green, yet the trees and reeds have turned vibrant purple. You'll notice in the photo labelled Vancouver Special that the flowers appear near white. That's because these are dark red roses, making them appear nearly white.
Stanley Park - Vancouver
Another observation I've made is how light affects the amount of purple. In the Olympic Village photograph its clearly seen how the light striking the trees directly impacts the purple effect. The leaves left in shadow show very little shift towards purple and stay almost green instead. I wonder if this is similar to the reason for the green grass in the photo mentioned above. However I can't remember how the light was cast on the scene unfortunately.
English Bay - Vancouver
Vancouver Special - East Vancouver
Stanley Park - Vancouver
Queen Elizabeth Park - Vancouver
Olympic Village - Vancouver
Kitsilano - Vancouver
