Photo above – Sunrise along the Shonai River while out on my mountain bike.

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It’s been a while since I shot a roll of film on my Leica. It was browsing through the wonderful book of photographs of adventures throughout Asia in the 1970s called Asia Grace by Kevin Kelly*, and John Sypal’s Zuisha (随写) that did it. Kelly did what I didn’t have the foresight (or talent) to do, and Sypal takes everyday scenes of Tokyo and adds magic to the mundane.

None of the photos I shot on the roll of film are particularly good. But that’s okay. The ability to interpret a scene via film and a tiny black box and then digitise it and post it on this blog is magic enough. It’s amazing that it’s possible at all. It’s also the slowing down and the lack of instant gratification. And of course there’s the joy of using a camera that’s probably the pinnacle of camera engineering. Leica film cameras do exactly what they need to do and no more. They are an absolute blessing in today’s world when everything – everything – seems unnecessarily complicated.

All photos were shot on Fuji Provia 100 slide film while out cycling last week.

*You can listen to a wonderful interview with Kelly here.