Blended Exposures

These Blended Exposures are all created in-camera (using a 1962 Leica M3) and on film. The pairings between the left and right side of each frame are completely random. The technique is as follows: I cover half the lens with gaffers tape, shoot the through the entire roll, exposing only one side of each frame. When the roll is finished, I rewind the film, careful to leave the film leader out of the film canister, then reload the film, being certain to load the roll again according to the exact sprocket holes I used previously. I switch the tape on the lens to the opposite side, and now I'm ready to shoot through the roll once more, this time exposing the other side of each frame. Unlike cameras with an orthodox double exposure feature, my technique does not superimpose a full image on top of another. Instead, my method blends two unrelated scenes, centrally overlapping, often exposed days, weeks or months apart. By combining unassociated moments which push disparate scenes together into a single frame, these Blended Exposures work well as a story-telling device, suggesting the imperfect chronology of memory’s recall.