Popagandhi

St Patrick's Day in San Francisco

Published on March 21, 2023

Some photos from the first roll of film I developed and scanned myself.

I have been wanting to learn how to dev and scan for many years now. The sheer number of items and chemicals to procure left me dizzy, and I never did. I'm lucky to be near the city-run community darkroom and photo center, Harvey Milk Photo Center. For a reasonable price ($193 for 6 months, you can have unlimited access to the developing chemicals, equipment, and darkroom and digital lab.

While walking to a black and white film development class, I came upon the St Patrick's Day parade that the mayor of Cork and the mayor of San Francisco took part in. I took some photos, and less than an hour later (including transportation to the darkroom, and learning how to load film into reels for developing.. challenging for a person like me with dexterity issues), I was able to see how the photos turned out, on a light table.

It took some more time to scan. I am still figuring out my dev and scan workflow, and will keep trying different things until I find something I feel I can stick with.

a scan of a black and white photograph of the mayor of cork, ireland, in a car in San Francisco's St Patrick's Day parade

The mayor of Cork, Ireland, was visiting San Francisco and took part in the 2023 St Patrick's Day parade.

a scan of a black and white photograph of a group of people participating in the St Patrick's Day parade in San Francisco

Many people participated, in spite of the weather (the 10th or 11th atmospheric river event in San Francisco!)

a scan of a black and white photograph of a bus that says Galway Association of San Francisco with people in it, and a person walking alongside the bus with a poncho

Rain or shine.

All photos taken on Olympus XA2 and Tri-X 400, developed in Kodak D76 1:1 for 9 min 45 seconds, and scanned on Nikon LS-40.