My final roll of film out of San Antonio was Kodak Ektachrome on 35mm, shot with my Leica M4-P and a Hexanon 28mm f/2.8 lens. These photos are from the missions on the outskirts of San Antonio, which have a complicated history to say the least. We spent an afternoon visiting each one, since no Bouie family vacation is complete without a history detour.

The next set of rolls are also from San Antonio. The first photos are from a little aviation museum on the outskirts of the city. _I_ had a lot of fun, but I think the kids were a little bored. But hey! They’re kids, they’re supposed to be bored sometimes. The rest of the frames were taken around downtown San Antonio, during a long walk I took one morning. The film is Ilford XP2 Super and the camera was a Mamiya 6 rangefinder.

The next six rolls or so will come from the spring break trip we took to San Antonio in April. It was a great time — lovely city! — and I was able to go through most of the film I brought. These photos are from the botanical gardens as well as downtown San Antonio. They are Kodak Gold shot with a Mamiya 6. There was a light leak hence the bright marks on each photo. I have since gotten the camera repaired!

My 11th roll of the year was a roll of Kodak Portra 400 that I shot on a long walk up and around Mt. Robidoux in Riverside, California. I was in the area to give a talk, and I gave myself a bit of time to do some exploration. I used my Leica M4-P and the M-Hexanon 50mm lens.

These photos are from a roll of…Kodak Tri-X(?) that I took during a trip down to southern California, partly in Los Angeles and partly in Riverside. One theme of this series is that I have gotten pretty ruthless about what I keep, and so from a roll of 36 frames — and probably 20 separate scenes — I have four photos. I…do not want to think about how much money I spend on this hobby.

In the interest of trying to use the film I have stockpiled, I brought a couple rolls with me to the “No Kings” protest in Charlottesville, Va. earlier this year. I used the Mamiya 6 and a 150mm telephoto lens (equivalent to 90mm on a 35mm camera). Out of 24 frames I had about 4 that were good enough to keep. (Although if I were being exceptionally strict with myself I would have only kept 1 or 2 photos but then, where’s the fun in that?)

These photos are from two rolls of 35mm film that I shot throughout the first few months of the year. The issue is that they weren’t shot sequentially, meaning that I have frames from as early as January and as late as April. But I finished them in April and so that’s where they fall on the list. I shot these on my Leica M4-P using one lens or another from my set of M-Hexanon lenses, produced by Konica for its electronic rangefinder back in the early 2000s. Photos were taken in Charlottesville and New Orleans.

I went through a bit of a rut earlier in the year and so this roll has just three keepers and even these are…not great. But I still have them just to mark where I was in February: Bowdoin College and Miami.

I took these photos during a brief stop in New Orleans for an event. I spent a day wandering and you can more or less trace my route from the scenes I have here.

Seen on US-29 passing through Madison, Va. Shot with a Panasonic LX10 point and shoot. Edited in Lightroom.

I shot my second roll of the year during a brief stop in Grinnell, Iowa, where I gave a talk at the college. These photos are of Grinnell’s downtown, which is quite charming. You’ll notice that there is no one on the street. That is because it was 10 degrees and I was very committed to taking photos during the 48 hours or so I was in town. Once again, these were taken with the Mamiya 6 using Kodak Gold film.

Doing something a little bit different this year when it comes to sharing photos. Rather than organize by place, I'm going to just share the keepers from each roll, in chronological order. This roll of Kodak Gold is the first roll of film I shot of 2026, in downtown Los Angeles where I was visiting for work. I used my Mamiya 6MF which, unfortunately, has a light leak that I need to fix before I head out for a trip abroad in a few weeks.

I have been sitting on _hundreds_ of photos to either develop, scan or edit. My goal for the next month is to both process those frames and post more often on this blog. And we are getting started with these photos, which I took all the way back in December. I used my Leica M4-P, a 50mm lens and Kodak Tri-X.

Longtime followers know that I spend most of my Christmas break in Charleston, South Carolina, visiting my family and enjoying the warmer weather. I took some photos (as usual) and here are the ones worth sharing. Locations include Charleston proper, Mount Pleasant and Sullivan’s Island.

Last October, I gave a talk at Syracuse University. I always try to give myself some time to walk around a place and take pictures, and I managed to carve a few hours out of the trip to do that in Syracuse. These are the keepers from two rolls of Kodak Gold 200, shot with a Mamiya 6 medium format camera.

The other camera I bought last year was a Canon Autoboy XL which, as per its name, is a comically large point and shoot with a surprisingly sharp zoom lens. I put two rolls of color film through it — I think this was Kodak Gold but I have no idea — and these are the keepers. I am keeping this camera and I actually bought another copy — in a different color, black — to use as a dedicated monochrome point and shoot camera. (It helps that these things are cheap and plentiful on the used market.)

Every year after Christmas we take a roadtrip down to Charleston, South Carolina to see family and relax. Here are photos from last year’s trip, plus some photos taken along the way.

No particular theme here, just some of the stuff that caught my eye while out and about in the months of October and November of last year.

Between family and the occasional work trip I am in Charleston, South Carolina a couple times every year. During a September visit, I took some extra time to just walk around as much of the city as I could. Here are a few of the photos I took.

Final batch of photos from my trip last summer to Athens. We were mostly covering old territory, so these are just snapshots from here and there.

We spent our fourth day away from the city on the island of Aegina, to sit by the water, check out some ruins, and do a little exploring. It was a nice change of pace and convinced me that for our next trip to Greece — whenever that is — we are going to have to do some serious island hopping.

On our third day in Athens last summer, we mostly went to museums and wandered around the Psyrri neighborhood of the city. I switched back to black and white film, which I think worked for these compositions. The Acropolis Museum.

We spent most of our second full day in town trying to see aa many of the tourist sites as we could manage. There was also plenty of walking and observing and eating and drinking. The photos I’m sharing here are from the Agora, the neighborhoods nearby, and the Acropolis. This one is a nice vista of the city, focused on its highest peak.

For our first international vacation since our honeymoon, my wife and I spent a week in Athens this summer, eating, exploring the city, and doing as much tourist stuff as we could fit into each day. I love spending time in an unfamiliar place and we both had a blast. I, obviously, took a lot of photos. I brought three cameras — one film, two digital — but imposed a few limits on myself to encourage a little creativity. First, I would shoot either color or black and white on each day, never both. And second, I would restrict myself to one focal length as much as possible for the length of a day. This is all to say that on the first day, I loaded up a roll of Ilford black and white film, slapped a 28mm lens on my Leica, and walked as much of Athens as I could with my wife (with a Rick Steves guide as our companion). When the film ran out, I switched to my digital Leica. Here is a selection of photos from that first day. These, I think, are the clear keepers — or at least, the ones I’m willing to share. As always, let me know what you think.

Photos from a short trip over the summer. _Camera: Yashica-D. Film: Ilford XP2 Super and Kodak Gold 200._

A few of the keepers from a car show I attended out in Louisa County over the summer. _Camera: Leica M4-P. Lens: Konica M-Hexanon 35mm f/2.0. Film: Kentmere 100._

random items from the first half of the summer

These are photos from a neighborhood in Charlottesville known, unofficially, as “Hogwaller” after the old stockyard that is still standing. I took them using a Yashica-D and Ilford XP2 Super film. I believe I took them on a nice August evening but I honestly don’t remember!

Seen on US-29 going north to Charlottesville.

Each year, Ashland, Va. has a big street festival celebrating the fact that it is a hub for various rail lines in the state. There are vendors and games and music and also people gather to watch trains pass by. It’s a good time! The festival was in April and somehow I forgot to post the photos. So, you know, here they are.

These are the keepers from a few rolls of 35mm that I exposed back in May. The color film is Kodak Gold and the monochrome is XP2 Super. They were taken in Charlottesville, Richmond and Washington DC, which is to say, the usual haunts.

I was in Cambridge for a few days in May and managed to take a few photos in-between sessions at the conference I was attending. Here are the keepers.

I _think_ this was a roll of Ilford XP2 Super. I shot it on my Leica, as usual, and all of these were taken in places around Charlottesville.

Back in April, my wife and I took a short trip to Savannah, Georgia while my kids were with their grandparents. We did our usual thing: wandered on foot and ate as much as we could. It was a good time and I took my fair share of pictures. These, I think, are the best of the bunch. The square format photos are film (Ilford XP2 Super and Kodak Gold 200) taken on a Yashica-D. Everything else is digital, taken with a Lumix GX8 that met its maker soon after the trip.

These are the keepers from the first roll of film I shot this past April. It was Kodak Gold 200 and I used, as always, my Leica M4-P. The photos are mostly from around Charlottesville but there’s one at the end that I took in Deerfield, Massachusetts. One of the things I was trying to do, with this roll, was play with color blocking, as you’ll see.

I took a very brief trip to New Orleans this past March — for a fun (for me) conference on Reconstruction and constitutional law — and had just enough time to wander and take a few pictures. Here are the frames, which came from most of a roll of Kodak Gold 200 in my Yashica-D. I also had a few snaps with my (now-departed) Lumix GX8.