this is jose marco, a local photographer friend who attended the grain over noise show at space gallery.
it was my 3rd time using the “party camera” and I think I have it pretty much down now, thanks to some tips from a flickr contact. basically, i flipped the sunpak 444d to auto mode. it uses its thyristor to measure light bouncing back to it and stops when it hits a certain point. then i just pick a reasonable shutter speed, use the rangefinder to focus, and let the flash do its thing. and then you have a 4×5 shot at night in good focus!
i accidentally shot this film set (delta 100) at iso 400. it’s not usually pushed so there wasn’t good data on how to develop it in rodinal. i started with a base time of 14 minus for 1+50. i added 20% per stop and came to 21 minutes. seems that pretty much did the trick.