Time to get your Argus out

Winter and spring are now trading days here in the North. Coats still hang near the door, however soon they will not be needed. Once people in the north headed outdoors for the warm weather and didn't come back inside much until the weather got cold again. Back in the 1930's during winter a warm house and entertainment from the young days of radio was popular. Radios sold well. In summer radios often sat quiet in the hot house and no one was buying a new radio. Now that was a problem for the International Radio Corporation of Ann Arbor MI.  During the cold months there were lots of radios to make and everyone was working and making money. But not in the summer. Now cameras were something people used in the summer so IRC decided to make one. The result, the Argus A, became one of the most popular cameras of the time. IRC changed it's name to Argus Corporation and stopped making radios. The next camera in the line, the C3 became the most successful camera of all time. And all this happened as a result of the seasonable habits and inventiveness of the people of the great industrial north.

Today neither the North nor the seasons have the influence they once did. Argus now exists in Ann Arbor as a museum. Fortunately, today many Argus cameras remain ready to take pictures. So with the warm weather returning to the north the time is right to get an Argus and head outdoors.

The images here were taken with an Argus C4.

Rokinon Automatic MC 1:2.8 f=24mm

A while back the external hard drive that I had a lot of my older negative scans stopped working.  Unfortunately, I hadn't gotten around to backing it up. I figured it was just a problem with the case and that the drive was probably okay. Anyway it took me a while to get around to taking the case apart and putting the drive in another case. Fortunately once I did I was able to see the drive again. And this time I backed the files up immediately. Anyway now I have access to some stuff that I hadn't written about before and some images I am revisiting.

I did write about the Rokinon 24mm three years ago.  At the time I had mostly used it on my digital camera. Since then I have used it a few times with film. I found it to be a good performer. Especially for a lens of this focal length that is usually fairly cheap. I remember I got this one for under $10 because the seller said there was a problem with haze. It turned out the haze was just some film from cigarette smoke that was easily cleaned. Even in good condition this lens was selling for around $20 to $30 on Ebay a few years ago. However I did look at recent sales on Ebay and it was selling for between $50 and $77. Not sure what the reason for the increase is other than people are using it on digital. And it does do well on digital where the crop factor can eliminate the edge problems that this lens can have.

So here are some images from the Rokinon 24mm. The B&W are on Legacy Pro 100. The color are Fuji 200. The last image of the Cinema Theater in Urbana IL, is where the late movie critic, Roger Ebert, watched movies when he was growing up. It was called The Princess Theater then. I also made a gallery a while back which mostly has digital images made using and M42 adapter.

Kodak Retina Reflex III

I bought this camera last summer for 50 cents at a garage sale. Back during the early 1960's the Retina Reflex III sold for the equivalent of $2000 in today's dollars. Today that same price would get you an entry level full frame DSLR from Canon or Nikon.  I imagine that you would either have to be a fairly serious photographer or have a lot of spare change to have bought a Retina Reflex III when it was new.

The Retina Reflex III is certainly a nice camera to look at even after all these years. When the shutter is pressed it is one of the most quiet, vibration free SLRs that I have used. Part of that is because the mirror doesn't return automatically.  Like many other SLRs from this period the mirror doesn't return until the film is advanced. Overall the Retina Reflex is a fine specimen of a high quality German made camera. That being said I don't think I will ever take pictures with this camera. The main reason for that is the very limited options for exposure.

The Retina Reflex III uses one of the selenium meters that were popular in the early 1960's. You made your exposure by turning a ring on the lens until a needle in the viewfinder was centered. Probably in 1961 this was quite a feature. Unfortunately in my Reflex III the meter is dead. Still there is the option of selecting your own shutter/aperture combination.  When you move the ring you can make various selections of shutter/aperture pairings. Each shutter speed is paired with one aperture.  Like if you want to use f/8 the shutter speed is 1/30.  Now the bad part is 1/30 is the only shutter speed you can use with f/8.  There appears to be no way to decouple the shutter/aperture combinations. And that is a killer for me as far as this camera is concerned. I could probably figure out a way to make this set-up work, however it is more figuring than I want to do to get pictures from this camera.

I kinda wonder if this lack of flexibility didn't help to kill off the Retina Reflex line.  Probably there were other factors, however like today I think that a photographer laying out some serious cash for a camera would want at the least the ability to make his own shutter/aperture selections.

So for me the Retina Reflex III falls in the category of interesting and nice to look at, but not for taking pictures.  Which isn't bad for 50 cents.

If you want more details about the Kodak Retina Reflex here is the entry from Kodak Classics.

Canon EOS Rebel GII

• Autofocus: TTL with 3 selectable focusing points
• Focus modes: One-Shot AF, AI Servo AF, Manual Focus
• Light meter: TTL Evaluative, Centerweighted average, Partial Metering (approx. 9%)
• Exposure: Intelligent program AE, Shutter priority, Aperture priority, Depth-of-Field priority, Full auto, Picture modes, Manual, Auto exposure bracketing, and Exposure compensation
• Built-in flash, 1/90th sec. sync 
• Shutter speed 30 seconds to 1/2000

2014 was different for me as far as the cameras I saw at garage sales, thrift shops etc.  The main difference was that I saw very few of the cheap plastic point & shoots that were so common in years past. Not sure what happened to them. The cameras I did find were mostly decent cameras for good prices. The find that surprised me the most was a nice Kodak Retina Reflex III which I got for 50 cents. 

I found this Canon Rebel GII last summer at a church sale for $4.  There also was a Speedlite flash included. Introduced in 2003 the GII was one of the last film cameras that Canon made. Pretty much if you have used Canon digital SLRs you will be at home with the GII.  My biggest impression of the GII is that it is the lightest SLR that I have ever used.  It would be easy to carry this camera around all day.  Still as can be seen in the list above the GII is a very capable camera. 

The GII came with an EF 35-80mm kit lens.  Now I don't have the blanket dislike for kit lenses that some seem to have.  However this kit lens does seem a little soft although the contrast seems pretty good. It certainly is a usable lens and it appears that the softness isn't so great that it can't be fixed somewhat by a sharpening filter.  Still when using the GII you might be happier with a different lens.

The GII runs on two photo lithium batteries. I'm adverse to paying more to put batteries in a camera than I paid for the camera. So I was happy to find that I can get photo lithium batteries at the local Dollar Tree store for $1 each. So far these batteries have held up about as well as the more expensive ones.

It is a funny thing that even though the Rebel GII is a very good camera I doubt that I will use it much. I think my irrational knock on it is that it is too much like my digital camera experience.  Now I have nothing against digital photography, however when I am using film I want it to feel like a different process. To me film feels like it should be used with a camera that can live without a battery.

So I get one more post in before the new year.  Thanks to all who have read my efforts this year.  I wish each of you the best in the coming year.  I leave you with a few images made last summer with the GII.

Minolta SR-T 201

Every since I again took up film photography I had wanted to get my hands on a classic 1970's Minolta. The easy way would have been to look on Ebay, however I figured I would go local for this one. I remember back in the 1970's that Minolta was a common brand of SLR in this area. I think I saw them almost as often as Pentax. So I didn't think it would be long until one showed up in a garage sale, thift shop, or etc.. While that line of thought turned out to work for Pentax it wasn't true for Minolta.  A few years passed until recently I came across this nice Minolta 201 for $10 at a garage sale.  My ideal choice would have been the classic SR-T 102, however after all this time I am happy with the SR-T 201.

The SR-T 201 was lower priced than the SR-T 102 and SR-T 202 and lacks some of their features.  However it does have the two features that I most wanted. The first is CLC metering.  With CLC Minolta used two cds cells to combine spot and center-weighted metering.  The second is the MD 50mm f/1.7 lens which is one of the classic lenses from the 1970's. The great metering system and lens combined along with an economical price made the Minolta SR-T series one of the best-selling cameras during the 1970's. 

 In just a brief experience of the Minolta SR-T 201 I can say that the exposure system lives up to its reputation. Pretty much every image I took was spot-on as far as exposure. The lens also lived up to expectations. Overall a very good camera. If you go looking for a Minolta SR-T 201 look for the letters CLC on the front.  There was a late version of the SR-T 201 that only one cds cell and these do not have the CLC marking. 

Right now I am in the middle of switching to a new ISP and it isn't going so well. For some reason the connection is very slow and that doesn't make blogging much fun. Hopefully another call to support will get things working. 

 

Mikona MV-828

I saw this Mikona MV-828 sitting on this shelf in a local antique shop for at least two years.  A few months back I was there while everything was half-price, and feeling sorry for the camera I bought it.  Now I would like to say that this story ends in my having found an unexpected jewel. 

Well, if not a jewel than I am offering the rare opportunity to see some photos taken with a Mikona MV-828.  My guess is that this may be the only time in 2014 that photos made by this camera will be posted.  And if not I am fairly certain that this will be the only blog post about the Mikona MV-828. 

You can learn all you need to know about the Mikona MV-828 from looking at the picture at the top.  It doesn't have any features that you need a manual to learn about.  It does seem that the makers of the Mikona MV-828 took their claim for being a focus free camera seriously.  The lens consistently remains free of focus from the center to the edges.  This particular camera also suffers from light leaks and flare. 

I admit that I like the first two images.  For me the softness, the glow of the snow, and the leaks add something to the images.  I probably will at some time put some expired color film in the Mikona MV-828 to see what will happen.  Still I don't think I will start calling myself a lomographer.

Revival of Vinyl Records and the Survival of Film

I was listening to this podcast talking about the revival of vinyl record sales and I had the feeling that for some parts of the show they could have changed the word vinyl to film.  Especially when they were talking about a return to vinyl recordings being a reaction to the perfection and sterility of digital recordings.  Overall they made the point that some felt that vinyl records seemed like a more involved, and more human way to listen to music. It was interesting to me that Vinyl records have been increasing in sales since 2007.  They were up 30% last year.  Now it doesn't look like they will ever reach the level where they once were, however it does appear that vinyl has a stable niche.

I think film is in a similar place.  I would guess that many of you are like me in being tired of hearing people say that film is obsolete. Still like the vinyl crowd I think there is a segment of people who find something missing in digital images. I think the challenge for the film making industry will be to adjust to that smaller market.  Film like vinyl likely will never recapture the mass market.  Still I do believe that there is enough of a market for film to keep a film producer in business if they go out there and cultivate that market. While I know that many have problems with companies like Lomography, however I do believe that they are a good thing in that they are about the only people cultivating a market for film. And while it is likely that the Lomography thing may just be a fad for some, fads do have a way of helping to discover what may become a lasting preference. Hopefully, the message that film is not dead will start to be heard more.

 Taken with Fed 2 with Industar 61 on Legacy Pro 100.

Canon FTb

I remember in the 1970's when I was first looking to buy an SLR that the Canon F1 was the professional camera while the FTb was for the amateur or for use as a backup camera. Without a doubt a lot of Canon F1s were sold to professionals, and I imagine that a large number were sold to people like myself who had no real aspiration to become a professional. I do think that I fell somewhat for the allure of thinking that top of the line equipment would make me a better photographer.  I have never regretted buying the F1, however there is little that I have done with the F1 over the years that I couldn't have done with the FTb. 

A lot of the difference in expense with the two cameras has to do with the use of more durable materials for the F1.  For example, the F1 has a titanium shutter whereas the FTb has a rubberized silk shutter. Overall the F1 was made to stand up to heavy use and hazardous conditions and that costs more.  Most of us are never going to subject a camera to the kind of use that the F1 was built to endure. And the FTb has nothing to be ashamed of concerning toughness.  I think it says a lot about the quality of Canon products of that era that the FTb was considered an economy camera.  If you can get your hands on an FTb I think you will be impressed with its quality look and feel.  And by all accounts it is a remarkably durable camera.  I have read countless reports of people using the FTb for decades with no complaints.

Anyway my point in comparing the F1 and the FTb is that many times we pay for professional equipment when the lower priced models may serve our needs just as well.  I think that may be more true in the digital age where I don't think that current cameras will have anything like the lifespan of an F1 or FTb. At least if you payed for more camera than you needed in the 1970's you could still count on it for decades of use.  I don't think that will happen with today's digital cameras. 

Now the FTb also lacked a lot of the features and options of the F1.  Still it has everything that I would need most of the time. And it does have useful features like mirror lock-up and a nice depth of field preview that many cameras in its class lack. I haven't checked out how well its exposure meter works since I find it easier to use a hand-held meter than to mess with battery issues.

I have only recently gotten first-hand experience with the FTb.  I just happened to come across a nice looking FTb body for a good price on Ebay.  I actually didn't expect to be so impressed with this camera.  My thinking mostly was that I should at least have one of what as become one of the iconic Canons.

Canon FTb Gallery

Here are some of the details for the FTb.
At Wikepedia
Canon Camera Museum

Blue Deluxe 35mm Compact Camera

I suppose that I have a belief that every camera should have its day in the sun.  I would guess that the Blue Deluxe 35mm Compact Camera hasn't had many of them.  I picked this camera up at a garage sale last summer.  Its design did stand out from the other cheap plastic cameras, which seem to be trying to imitate whatever more upscale point and shoots are out at the time of their conception. I don't have any idea what the inspiration for the design of the Blue Deluxe was.  I think its appearance is fairly unique.  As far as capabilities go it is the same as other cameras of its type.  One shutter speed, probably 1/125, and one aperture which looks like f/8. The lens is very soft, lacking even much sharpness at the center. 

In honor of recently deceased film critic, Roger Ebert, the Blue Deluxe took a picture of the Cinema Theater in Urbana IL.  The Cinema was named the Princess until 1967, and was the place where Ebert often saw movies while growing up in Urbana in the 1950's.

There really isn't much more I can say about the Blue Deluxe.  It was kind of a fun camera to use and I like the pictures it makes.  I imagine that for as long as it continues to work I will run a roll or two of film through it every year.  I did make a Blue Deluxe Gallary.

Olympus Pen EES

When introduced in 1962 the half frame Olympus Pen EES was the first camera with a programmable shutter. A setting of either 1/40 or 1/200 was selected based on the light readings from its selenium meter. An appropriate aperture also was automatically set. If there was not enough light or too much light a red flasher appears in the viewfinder. There is no manual option with the Pen EES. The lens is a 30mm four element D Zuiko f/2·8.  The Pen EES uses zone focusing.  You select from portrait(4ft), group(10ft), or wide open(50ft).  In actual practice the lens on the Pen EES has sufficient depth of field to achieve reasonable focus in decent light most of the time using either the group or wide open setting.

Probably the greatest obstacle to sharp images with the Pen EES would be camera shake with the slower 1/40 shutter speed.  So it is best to use the fastest film that the Pen EES can use to help have the higher 1/200 shutter speed be selected. And the fastest film the Pen EES can use is ISO 200.  To younger readers that may seem slow, however when the Pen EES was introduced 200 IS0 was considered fairly high speed.

With its selenium metering the Pen EES doesn't need a battery.  As long as the selenium meter is functioning you are in business.  The Pen EES that I have came from some film cameras that I was given which used to be used by my old high school's photo club.  While the camera definitely shows signs of use the meter still appears to work fine.  When I wanted to test the camera all I had on hand was some 400 ISO HP5.  So I set the meter to 200 and pull processed the HP5 for that speed.  I think the results turned out reasonably well. At least they showed that the Pen EES is working okay. Right now I have some Fuji 200 in the Pen EES so I can get an idea of how it functions with what probably is one of the optimal films to use with this camera. I will have a more well-developed opinion of the Pen EES when I get those pictures finished.

Konair 35

I saw the Konair 35 on Ebay with what seemed like a cheap buy-it- now price and so I bought it. I couldn't pass up a 1950's rangefinder with a  f/1.9 lens.  As I found out I don't think that many people have heard of this camera.  There is next to no info about it online.  The only listing I could find for this specific camera model is in McKeown.  It appears that the Konair 35 was made in 1956 by the Windsor Camera Company.  The same camera was also sold as the Windsor Deluxe. The Windsor Camera Company was a Japanese company that was originally called Toko Photo Works.

I am not sure what the source of the Konair name is.  I had no better luck with info about the Konair 35's Velex shutter.  The shutter speeds are 1 to 1/400 and B.  The f/1.9 Super Color Sygmar lens seems to be just as obscure as the rest of the camera.  On Ebay other than the auction that I won there are no current listings or recently closed listings for the Konair 35 or for the Windsor Deluxe.  There were a couple of sold listings for the Windsor 35, which seems to be the one Windsor Camera company product for which there is info available online.  One sold for $61 and the other for $76.  Since the Windsor 35 with its f/3.5 lens and slower shutter appears to be more common than the more fully featured Konair 35, maybe I got a good deal at $22.

In actual use the Konair 35 should satisfy any fan of the 1950's all-mechanical rangefinder.  Even after nearly 60 years the operation is still smooth and the rangefinder is bright and contrasty.  For a test I loaded up just 10 exposures of bulk HP5.  I think the results look promising. 

Hanimex Compact R

Hanimex was a company started after WWII to import cameras and other photo equipment to Australia. Sometimes Hanimex rebranded or co-branded cameras made by other companies.  Other times they actually did the design work and had the cameras manufactured by another company.  The Hanimex Compact R appears to be a slightly altered version of the Ricoh 500 G.  Introduced in 1972 the Hanimex Compact R is one of the compact fixed lens rangefinders that were popular in the 1970's.  Originally the Compact R used a mercury PX675 battery to power its aperture priority exposure option.  However if you can't find a battery the Compact R will still work in manual mode.  The range of shutter speeds is from 1/8 to 1/500.  The lens stops down to f/2.8.  At least on my version the rangefinder spot is quite good and remains usable even in fairly dim light.  The shutter is quiet and the camera is light and small.  Not quite shirt pocket small, however easy to fit in a decent sized pant or coat pocket.  As far as usability I think the Hanimex Compact R is in a league with the better compact rangefinders of its era.  As far as picture taking results it may be just slightly below what some of its brother compact rangefinders can do.  Although the difference probably isn't all that great.  However if there is a difference  I don't think it is great enough to detract from an otherwise well-made image.

The Hanimex Compact R must not appear often on Ebay.  I couldn't find any recent listings for it. However the Ricoh 500G is common and usually sells for between $10 to $25 dollars on Ebay. There is also a version made for Sears called the Sears 35 RF. 

I made a few images with the Hanimex Compact R that were not made under the best of conditions.  Basically I just popped outside on a cold snowy day to take some pictures to make sure the camera was working.

Agfa Silette

When I was going through film images from the past year I noticed that I hadn't made a post for the Agfa Silette. I must have been planning to do so since I made a Silette gallery a while ago.  First made in 1953, the Agfa Silette is a fairly simple scale focusing camera using 35mm film.  The one I have seems to be the most common of the first version of the Silette.  It has a 1/25 - 1/200 plus B Pronto shutter and a 45mm f/3.5 3 element Agfa Apotar lens.  One notable feature of the Silette is that it has a film advance lever. That actually was a fairly advanced feature for a camera for this era. And to add to that the film advance also cocked the shutter! The Silette is a scale focusing camera.  Which means you have to guess the distance and then select it with the scale focusing ring.  The lens focuses to three feet.  Scale focusing may be a little intimidating if you haven't used it before, however with some practice and a study of the depth of field charts for the camera, it is easy to get good results.

The Agfa Silette appears to have originally sold for around $40 which would be a little over $300 today.  Just judging by the numbers of this camera that are still around Agfa must have sold a lot of them.  Ansco also sold the same camera in the US as the Ansco Memar. It is not hard to see why the Silette was so popular.  It is a well-designed easy to use camera capable of giving very good results.  For the money I think it could be argued that it was one of the best cameras around during its time. 

Agfa Silette Gallery

Alka Box Camera

Made by Vredeborch in Germany starting in 1953, the Alka Box is one of my favorite box cameras as far as looks goes.  That it uses easy to find 120 film is another point in its favor.  Also unlike many of the box cameras of its type the viewfinder on the Alka Box is fairly helpful. The Alka Box is a well-made all metal camera. Technically the camera is simple with one shutter speed, one aperture, and no flash synch.  It uses a single fixed meniscus lens.  The image format is 6x9 cm.

I was surprised to realize that I have only taken pictures with this camera once.  So I have just recently ran a roll of Ektar through it.  However I haven't sent the roll in yet.  So the only results I have today are from a roll of Arista.edu 100 that I took about a year ago.