That’s a long title, but it is what it is 🙂

On the 4th of March, I joined the joint Ilford x Leica photowalk for women and non-binary photographers in Manchester. You can see details of it on the Leica Store Manchester website…can you see me? The day before, I started to display symptoms of a cold happily given to me by some little students in my school. By the time the walk happened, I really didn’t feel well. But it was a Leica and Ilford walk, I really wanted to join it. So while inside, I wore a mask to keep the others safe and outside I kept my distance a bit.

Even so, I drove there a little early and completed a couple of Adventure Labs beforehand. In my bag, I had brought along my Spiderman Chinon CE4 and a Fed 2. I have been using the latter a bit more recently as I have left it in my drawer for a couple of years, why?? It is such a fantastic set-up and suits me completely.

Anyway, I started with the CE4 as I had already loaded a roll of HP5 before I got there.

I took a few shots before the blooming thing jammed. It sometimes does that, I have yet to figure out why. I suspect it happens while on auto if the light meter is in the red zone. The camera can’t cope and jams. It doesn’t seem to happen in manual mode. It is very irritating! Luckily the Leica peeps lent me some tools and I fixed it on return to the shop. Too late for the walk though. These are the few shots I managed to get…

No worries though as I had the Fed 2 and that is totally manual, with the addition of the Lime 2 light meter, it worked perfectly. I loaded it with a roll of XP2 that was gifted to me by Ilford at the beginning of the walk.

I love the results from this film. The more I use it, the more I like it.

We did a little circular route ending up back at the store. Along the route I asked a young woman if I could take her photo and then we wandered to where the International Woman’s March was taking place.

Here are some of my results.

It ended up being a super day out. There is a real community feel to these walks, often familiar faces turn up and lots of new ones too who end up becoming new friends.

I didn’t finish all the XP2 and took a few shots when I returned home. Unluckily for me my cold got worse and I had to take a few days off school. Luckily for me, there was also a snow day and I had recovered enough to go for a small walk to finish the film.

How sharp is that industar lens!