Dagies LA-Blog

Kino z fusów – Kaffeesatz – Coffee Grounds

I was invited to give a workshop in Warsaw at the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art last weekend. Pure pleasure! Great group of 7 people, one day intense super 8 … filming and developing in good old coffee and nice new chrysanthemum juice! Chrysanthemum! Flower of the dead, used only for funerals or on graves (at least in some European countries), flower of the dead month November … we transformed it into something living, pulsating fresh analog film.

Power Pole

Sorry, it took me a while … I’m back in Berlin now, suddenly winter, scanning my 100 pinhole negatives, editing my films, enjoying life somewhere else with less colours and light but still beautiful …

Here’s one of my favourites:

Funny Wlan Names

Alvarado / Sunset

I don’t know why, but I love this crossing, junction, x, streetchaos …. Alvarado Street / Sunset Boulevard in Echo Park in Los Angeles. The Echo Park Film Center is there … a magic spot, a home spot … please be there a little bit longer!

Oakland Day #1

Oops! Suddenly I am on another planet. Car dominated too, but louder. Different colours, many colours, warmer wind, more palm trees. Gentrification buzzing in real time. A Russian truck with yummy Russian Food: Pelmeny! Beer breweries everywhere. One millimeter, sorry: inch! away: many many homeless tents. A little Kreuzberg feeling coming up. No, much tougher, I guess. Do I like it here? Yes!

Honeycat

When It Gets Dark In Willits

Strolling through the streets … this is my favourite front garden.

Random Rungirl

… in our exhibition / artist in residency at North Street Collective, Willits, California.
I love this photo, it’s so full of wild energy! The cool boots she‘s wearing …

6 New Films Made In California

Oceanwalk

I see the Tree and the Tree sees me

Salt eats Film

They have Swans now in Echo Park Lake

Finding the Haiku in Ukiah

CC Rider 65

A Green Girl With 3 Flipflop Feet

Next week I’ll be in Oakland … look what I found strolling around on Google Maps! A space time shift! A green girl with 3 flipflop feet!

Fav Bagel

I read so many news today and they really make me feel sick but what is feeling sick when others die, one after the other in an ocean of coldness and without a horizon in sight and get killed by very empty and ill young losers – what can I do? What does it mean if I smell the fart of toxic masculinity which is so harmful not only for women and the whole society but also for men themselves.

So I post a lovely bagel topped with smoke salmon cream cheese and salsa (medium hot), and my shabby golden shoes which have seen better days but I love to keep on walking in them.

The Crazy Welterklärerin

… means „the crazy world explainer“ … explainerina … explainerette …

It is my youtube channel! Follow me! I tell you all my secrets about analog film developing in eco drinks and more! Here: www.youtube.com/channel/UC2HCES7eg5hBfijVmWNaw4w … I need some more subscribers: from 100 I can put the name of my choice in the url!

Willits‘ Sign In A Pinhole Camera

Wow, I think I love this one! Taped my little can camera on a tripod, guessed the angle and exposed the negative inside 30 seconds long. Developed it in Caffenol and this is the result! I love it!

Pinhole Power Pole

I don’t know why but for some reason I am fascinated by these electro poles or posts or however they are called … maybe for me as a European they look so retro?

Anyway, of course I must portray them. Set up my tripod and my Illy pinhole camera, hole pointing pole upwards, never really knowing what comes out, perspective for sure unordinary, risk of sunlight beams falling into the camera, they would darken the negative but who cares, I’m the devotee of adventures and accidents!

Right on the bottom: first of three, positive paper from a negative, both developed in coffee.

Misty Fort Bragg

I like you nevertheless.

Kodachrome In Kelp And Coffee

Recently I developed an old Kodachrome in a special soup … see & scroll a few days down … here you can see stills from the film, original orange and inverted to a blue positive!!

Oh Ocean

Redwood Pieces

How can I present my photos?
I made positives from the pinhole negatives using 40 years old ORWO (made in the GDR) paper which is still amazingly awake and alive and gives me crisp results! I develop them in coffee / turmeric / bark tea / kelp-coffee …. and some more.
I thought about wood pieces. Noel (one of the two founders of North Street Collective) said: „Oh! I have lots! You can have them!“, came over with his gigantic chainsaw and sawed me some little pieces.
Pictures of tree, developed in tree, mounted on tree. I love it!

TinType Fake App

I love it! People think, me as a puristic super 8 filmmaker would hate these fake apps but on the contrary, I love my 8mm app and my TinType app!

(“A tintype, also known as a melainotype or ferrotype, is a photograph made by creating a direct positive on a thin sheet of metal coated with a dark lacquer or enamel and used as the support for the photographic emulsion”, says Wiki)

(“This incredible filtering tool will have you looking old-timey in no time”, says the app)

Illy On The Beach

I put my favourite pinhole camera on the beach and let it take dramatic pictures!! 🙂
In the can: a piece of black & white negative sheet film. Put it on a piece of photo paper – FOMAbrom baryta – so I receive a positive image! Develop it in Caffenol … which seems to give it an extra dramatic tone! Brown-greyish. I love it!