Today's weather has been beautiful; clear blue skies and warm sunshine. If i didn't manage to grab a camera, expose some film and get myself myself away from the computer screen, I'd have failed as a human being, let alone as a photographer!

A few weeks ago, a visit to Jessops procured a roll of Kodak infra-red 35mm film, which is no longer manufactured. From their rummage bin, it cost £2, and it's normally £9. Today's conditions were perfect for IR, but which camera should I use?

My old Yashica TLR caught my eye, and i wondered whether I could fit 35mm film into this without too much pain. An SLR is my normal choice for 35mm work, but I wanted to try something different.  This would give me 56mm long negatives with the image across the full width - including sprocket-holes - of the film. After some fiddling, I loaded the film and closed the back. This would be an interesting experiment.

I walked to the River Nene and Grand Union Canal, a rather pretty area of wild grassland between residential and industrial Northampton. It's full of wild flowers at the moment, especially dog roses, wild parsely and elderflower. Taking my time, I exposed the film through a No.25 red filter. The novelty of not carrying a tripod was refreshing, and made me more spontaneous with the camera. A 36 exposure film provided about fifteen images.

TLRs are quite fiddly to use with 35mm film, being that it's a small portion of the regular image size. Horizontal composition is especially difficult because of the camera's built-in conditions. Just try using the ground-glass screen and the alignment is anything but straight! It takes some getting used to, but it can be done.

So I'll develop the film tonight, and I look forward to seeing the results of my experiment. Who knows, my results might even be good enough for Myspace!