Autumn Hill Preserve Trail Head

Discovering the Autumn Hill Preserve Trail Head led to thoughts about the relevance of website analytics.

I just remembered about the Autumn Hill Preserve Trail Head on Blue Spring Road when I noticed it during one of my early morning walks. With the leaves and trees almost all gone, it was more visible. Seeing the sign for Autumn Hill Park got me thinking about the phrase, "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" which got me to think about "If a brilliant blog post is published to my website and no one reads it, does it matter?"

That got me thinking about my WordPress statistics and whether I need to look at or care about them. Like many, I am curious about who reads my content and what parts they find interesting. Ben Brooks seems to think website analytics are useless.

Whether people enjoyed your writing is all that really matters, and all that really should matter. Analytics can't tell you any of this. You can try to infer it, but people hate-read as much as they read something because they love it so anything you infer is likely wrong.

He has a point, and I will consider if I want to turn off or stop looking at my WordPress analytics.

Tip of the hat to @Pratik.

Kodak Vision3 50D - One Good Frame

I was disappointed with all but this one frame.

I shot an entire 24-exposure roll of Kodak Vision3 50D 35mm film that I bought from the Film Photography Project. I exposed the roll while out for a mid-October hike looking for fall colour in Community Park North and Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve. Because of the low ISO, I brought along my Manfrotto tripod, Minolta XD-11 and exposed each frame from the tripod.

The roll was developed at Boutique Film Lab and scanned with VueScan 9 on my Epson Perfection V600u using my normal workflow. I spent $10.00 for ECN-2 processing plus $6.50 for return shipping. The total cost to produce these frames, including the film, was $25.49.

I was disappointed with all but one frame, the one in the post header. All of the other frames look terrible. They look flat—what a waste of money. This is similar to my experience with Kodak Vision3 250D. Fortunately, this was my only roll of Kodak Vision3 50D. I will not be using this film stock again.

I have two rolls of CineStill 400D that I am now apprehensive about using. Compared to the digital versions, there is nothing desirable about these frames.

Name Kodak Vision3 50D
Price US$9.99
Type Motion picture film (negative)
Native ISO 50
Format 35mm
Process ECN-2
Features Exposure latitude from -5 to +5 stops
Lab Boutique Film Lab
Scanner Epson Perfection V600
Software VueScan 9
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2
Billie Johnson Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve · Kodak Vision3 50D · Thursday 13 October 2022 · Minolta XD-11 · MD Rokkor-X 45mm F2

Early Bird on Race Street

Bill Brokaw was the heart and soul of The Photographers Group. After two long years apart, it was remarkable for the Hunterdon County photographic community to come together to pay tribute to Bill at his studio in Frenchtown. I did not know Bill well. We met online during the pandemic when he reached out to the Princeton Photograph Club for participation in a Hunterdon Barns, Bridges and Buildings Photo Project for the Hunterdon County Chamber of Commerce.

Jennifer Bubb Brown purchased The Photographers Group from Bill. It will continue under the joint leadership of Melissa Mertzman, Jenn, Lori Lucas, Ken Curtis and Mike Brint. The main goal will be to keep that spark alive and continue to pursue Bill’s passion for projects. The new leadership team will make an announcement detailing our first project in the coming weeks.

After what was the group’s first meeting after the lockdown from the global pandemic and also a member-only sale of Bill’s extensive list of digital and film photography gear, I walked across Race Street to Blue Raven Records. A few minutes later, I walked out with a used copy of Michael Jackson’s Off The Wall album.

Lambertville, Race Street, New Jerset, Hunterdon County
Sunday 10 July 2022 | FujiFilm X-T3 | XF27mmF2.8 R WR