John Shephard has spent three decades photographing Washington State on Fujichrome Velvia 50, using two cameras nobody makes anymore. One of them has a lens mounted on a rotating cylinder that takes two minutes and twenty seconds to complete a single exposure.

It started at five in the morning in a Skagit Valley tulip field in 1999, when he met an Australian photographer named Ken Duncan and ended up spending four years as his assistant, two of them living in Australia.

Now John has made his own book. Washington Wide is a panoramic portrait of the entire state, shot on film, drum scanned on a 25 year old Heidelberg Tango, with a foreword by Randy Lewis. It releases this fall.

We talk about why he only buys 20 rolls of film a year, which corners of Washington he still wants to shoot, and what happens to an art form when the film, the cameras, and the people who can repair them are all quietly disappearing.

Also: the Salmo-Priest Wilderness, why summer is his least favorite season, and a firm vote for huckleberry pie.

Chapters

00:00 Meeting Ken Duncan in a tulip field
11:59 Two cameras, two ways of seeing
16:34 What film cannot do that your eye can
23:35 Washington before and after Instagram
41:22 Going digital
46:38 Deciding to make the book himself
01:11:08 Washington Wide, out this fall
01:22:00 Wrapping up

Links

John Shephard Photography: https://johnshephard.com
Washington Wide, preorder: https://washingtonwide.com