I was driving home from an editorial photo assignment this past week north of Barnsdall, Oklahoma. I stopped in Barnsdall and grabbed a 4×5 photo, then drove on south along a dirt road on my way home to Edmond. The sun was just about down and the day was overcast, and I wanted to grab one more 4×5 image for the day. I saw this old pump jack off to the side of the road so I grabbed my Toyo 45a and a 4×5 film holder loaded with Kodak TMAX-100 and set up for this image. I wanted a decent depth of field to capture the scene but also knew the dim light and ISO-100 film meant I would have a hard time freezing the action of the pump jack. I could have pushed the film a couple of stops to gain more shutter speed, but instead I decided to try and catch the pump jack right at the top of the stroke where it is not moving much. You can see in this photo the wheels are spinning but the pump jack is nearly frozen. I shot with 1/4 second and F8. If I had snapped the shutter mid-stroke, the pump jack would have been slightly blurred.
Pretty happy with this picture. Nothing earth shattering and I prefer people in my photos, but sometimes I just want to grab a photo to document my home state Oklahoma that I really love, and the oil field is a big part of Oklahoma history. Now I have some of that history on film.
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