One of the great things I like about Lomography is the power to create something sophisticated out of simple idea without having to bother so much about technicalities. Think too much, and you’ll be going against The Ten Golden Rules. Very counter-intuitive, really.

Which is why, despite my Film Soup and #FriendsonFilm projects, I will occasionally attempt something new on a whim just because I can. It’s usually the spur of the moment idea that often surprises us the most. So anyway, a few weeks ago, I came across this great article by stonerfairy (a cool Lomography community member). It was pure genius. So much so that it got the honorable mention as Lifestyle Feature of the Week. I recently developed the mantra to shoot anything but the ordinary, so this idea of creating surreal photos was definitely in line with my current state of mind. Needless to say, I got inspired and immediately prepared the necessary “ingredients”:

• A roll of film. (I used Agfa CT Precisa, but I’m sure any slides will do. The run of the mill photolab near my house recently stocks Precisa and T-Max which is usually unheard of. I foresee being their regular very soon. I wiped out their Precisa stock when I was there last)
• A camera. (If you read my previous post, you’d already know that my LC-A came back from the dead miraculously, and surprisingly it worked its charm on this roll as well)
• A large flat screen display. (As a gauge, anything larger than a standard laptop screen should be fine. Why? This is to prevent the screen’s frame from appearing in the photos. I personally think it’s an eyesore. Actually, this also depends on what camera you are using. If you’re using a wide angle lens camera, you’ll probably need an entire movie theater screen. Go figure.)
• Large sized/HD images. (Google is your best friend here. Search anything you want. Of course, I was going for the surreal theme so the images I chose were mostly paintings of alternative universe/mythical creatures/a random octopus. I even used photos of cool bokeh effects. As for how many images, that’s entirely up to you. I downloaded about 40 images so that at least 36 different exposures are guaranteed on my 35mm roll).
• A storage device to download all the images into. (USB/CD-ROM)
• A video/photo player or projector of some sort. (DVD/VCD player…or in my case, my brother’s PS3 came in handy cos it’s USB compatible.)

Once I have downloaded all the images I want to my computer, I firstly resized them to a standard size (1024X768p pixels is good). This step is optional of course, but images of this size look cleaner on my flat screen TV plus there won’t be any annoying black borders. Next, I copied the images into my USB. I didn’t bother to put them in any specific order. However, if your photo project requires it, now’s the best time to arrange them in the order that suits you well.

Subsequently, I plugged in the USB to the PS3. If you have not loaded the film to your camera, now’s the best time to do so. Then, as each image appeared on the screen in all of its HD glory, I snapped a picture of it. Do this repeatedly till you run out of film. Once done, rewind, go out and reshoot the roll! For best effects, cross process the film. Let me know what you think of the photos :)

More photos from the roll can be found here.