Instructor: Gary Wilson

I remember Gary as an extremely nice guy. He was a great teacher and a talented artist, and I always looked forward to his class.

His course included lessons in the history of photography, camera basics, lenses, lighting, composition, film developing, and darkroom techniques.

I had already been using a Pentax Spotmatic II 35mm camera and various lenses for over 10 years, so was absolutely comfortable with the mechanics of taking photographs.

However, I knew nothing about processing film or working in a darkroom. So, it was quite a thrill learning how to develop the 35mm B&W film we used for class assignments.

NSCAD's spacious darkroom facilities, with state-of-the-art enlargers and other equipment, provided an ideal environment for creating prints from our negatives. I spent many hours in that darkroom, using up every last scrap of my (costly) photo paper.

Using the school's rather old 35mm cameras, I recall working on various class assignments and being happy with the resulting photographs. Unfortunately, I gave away most of my prints from that time, and the rest have been lost or discarded.

The 11 photos below were taken at Vancouver's PNE, (Pacific National Exhibition), in August of 1980, shortly before I returned to Halifax from a summer break.

These were not part of a class assignment, but were surely influenced by Gary's lessons.

The next 5 photos were shot around Vancouver during the same time.

This last photo was shot specifically for Gary Wilson's class.