Embracing mistakes

I have a problem: I tend to be a perfectionist. Sometimes, when something doesn’t turn out well I get so annoyed that I don’t touch it again forever. Or for a long time. (Recently, I learned that people with autism and ADHD like me have severe ‘rejection sensitivity'). Being mindful of this, I’m trying to actively embrace mistakes.

So when I pulled out my film and found many ‘spots’ on my photos I decided to embrace that mistake, too. I had left a small amount of Photoflo in a container that I also used to stir my Ilfosol film developer. After developing, I noticed that my solution was bubbly. For some reason the detergent bubbles only showed up on one reel of film and not the other. In fact, it lent an interesting visual effect to some of the photos.

a scan of a black and white photo showing a Mexican restaurant called Donaji and its front door. There are a bunch of bubble patterns on the right side of the image

Dinner the other day.

a scan of a black and white photo showing a few lamps at a restaurant with a woven pattern, in front of a TV showing NBA basketball

Surprised at how well Kodak 5222 performs in low light indoors.

a scan of a black and white photo showing showing a lady cooking pupusa on a flat grill

I’ve been delighted to see more street food vendors in the Mission these days, especially on Friday nights outside very busy nightlife spots. From this lady I also had a delicious, freshly made pupusa with pork, beans and cheese. She was shaping the masa to order when you ordered one. Or twelve.

a scan of a black and white photo showing a few pupusas being cooked on a flat grill

I think I can eat four of them at once.

a scan of a black and white photo showing a Volkswagen van carrying tourists on a hippie tour of SF near the Civic Center area

More bubbles. Thankfully, they only impacted less than 20% of the photos.

All film shot on Minolta Hi-Matic 7S II, on Kodak 5222 film, developed in Ilfosol 1:9 for 7:45 min, scanned on Plustek 8200i.

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Adrianna Tan @skinnylatte
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