TRIPS
LISBON ON PORTRA 160
A LAST MINUTE TRIP TO LISBON TO EXPLORE THE VIBRANT AND COLOURFUL CITY, TAKING MY 35MM FILM CAMERA TO CAPTURE ITS CHARM.
Lisbon has become one of my favourite European cities after travelling this summer, with its colourful and vibrant buildings, great restaurants and bars as well as having its own charm that separates it from other European cities. Widely considered San Francisco’s little sister city, Lisbon really is a unique jungle of culture to explore. I primarily shot film in Lisbon, my last roll of Kodak Portra 160 I bought for my summer trips.
Zeb Zakovics
Author
A Land Of Pastel Colours
Lisbon has always been known as being a very colourful and vibrant city in south-western Europe, with pastel colour houses randomly spread across the city as well as houses covered in magnificent colourful tiles. The vibrancy of Lisbon makes it perfect for film photography, with colours, bright lighting and dynamic shadows of the architecture, this city really is a place where your photos always come out perfect.
I never edit my film photography images unless I am going for a specific style or atmospheric effect, however looking at my Lisbon film shots as they came back from the lab, I have to say that they didn’t need any editing at all. Every single photo showcased here of my short trip to the city is exactly how it was shot from camera and developed/scanned at the lab, no edits anywhere other than a little bit of straightening up.
During this trip I shot one roll of Kodak Portra 160 (the images you are currently seeing) as well as an expired roll to experiment with. Unlike other trips around Europe this year shooting Kodak Portra 160 at a nominal box speed of 120 ISO, I decided to shoot all of the Lisbon shots at the box speed of 160 ISO.
Comparing my Dubrovnik film images to these Lisbon ones shows a bit more dynamic range in the shadows and a better exposure latitude. Most of the time I was shooting in diffused conditions with very light cloud cover helping to reduce the harshness of light throughout the city. I think this is what has attributed to the images from Lisbon being some of my favourite I have taken on film so far.
Overall I am extremely happy with the results of this roll from Lisbon and how the images accurately document my short but fun time in the city. Portugal really does have some fantastic cities and landscapes worth visiting and photographing, and I look forward to visiting other places such as Porto in the future.
Thanks for being here ✌️