Film photography

[Pete the Elaner]

I had 3 film SLRs & resisted the switch to digital right away because early digital lagged behind on image quality & usability. My first digital camera was a compact & took about 2 seconds to release the shutter after pressing the button. It was hopeless for photographing the loco of a moving train.

 

A decent system camera is a different matter though. I rarely take pictures with the phone but enjoy using my mirrorless system cameras, using them in aperture priority mode for most of the time.

I have more recently started to use focus stacking, which is great for model photography which benefits from a better depth of field than is possible with a single frame even with the lens stopped right down. This is impractical with film.

 

I gave away one of my SLRs last year because I simply didn't use them. I still have the other 2: 1 of which is mechanical & has a very organic feel to it. That one still has a roll of film in it which I started off last summer.

Edited February 24, 2022 by Pete the Elaner

[spikey]

2 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

... and Knome enlarger balancing over the dishes below, those were the days 

 

Aaaargh!  Gnome.  The first enlarger I had when still at school was a Gnome Beta 2 with a Wray lens.  It was cheap and cheerful, but better than nothing.  A few years later I found a Leitz Focomat 1C complete with the Leitz masking frame in a junk shop in Canterbury priced at £15.  The proprietor obviously had no idea what it was, so gladly accepted my kind offer to take it off his hands if he threw in the 5cm f4.5 Focotar and the set of 20 x 16 trays in which it was sitting.

 

Anybody else start with 120 in a box Brownie and see-saw developing in pie dishes before contact printing? 

 

 

[spikey]

8 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

I gave away one of my SLRs last year because I simply didn't use them. 

 

After we switched from 35mm to digital for weddings and needed to convert the darkroom into a lightroom, I ended up chucking our Durst enlarger, three Nikon enlarging lenses, loads of print paper and all the rest of a complete pro darkroom into the landfill skip at the local dump.  We literally couldn't give the stuff away. 

[4630]

In case this thread might encourage a few more to re-engage with using film, next weeks Amateur Photographer, due out on Tuesday 1st March, is apparently a 'film special'.  Might be worth a look through first at Smiths/Sainsbury's/Tesco, etc.

 

I've used digital since 2002, mainly for ease and convenience, but I still have and use my beloved 1960s vintage Rolleiflex TLR and just for a bit of fun my Pentax ME Super.  

[peach james]

There are 10 rolls of TMY sitting at home for my trip in March- I'm sure my sister will bring her DSLR, but this way I can have some fun with a real camera.

 

[spamcan61]

2 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

I used to get loads of people at work coming into the office and asking what's the best camera to have for holiday/family/sports/landscape etc...I always answer first "the one you have with you"

 

So many buy masses of gear then don't bother, or cannot be bothered to take it with them because its a pain.

Absolutely, I have a reasonable digital camera (Fujifilm XE-2) but 95% of my photos are taken with my phone. 

[CameronL]

I bought a Canon EOS 500 over 30 years ago, still have it and used it about 8 years ago for a wedding. Funnily enough the 30-year-old lenses still work with my current Canon EOS 1100D and 100D DSLRs. They're as quiet and fast as the new lenses, just a bit heavier.  I have a lot of old kit - my camera bag still has film can loops.

 

I don't feel the need to take a huge,  bulging bag out if I want to take some photos. I find that a body and two zoom lenses, an 18-55mm and a 75-300mm cover most situations. If I'm feeling really minimalist I just take a 35-135mm which is the most versatile lens I have.

 

I agree that it's possible to take great photos on a phone, but there are some things a phone just can't manage - 

 

 

 

 

[ejstubbs]

On 23/02/2022 at 17:17, tigerburnie said:

I see you can buy brand new film these days rather than old out of date stuff, but who does the developing these days?

 

I get my films processed through the same place I buy them: my handy local vintage/used camera shop.  It might be a bit cheaper to use one of the online processors but I enjoy popping in to the shop for a browse and a natter.  They also refurbished my Dad's Yashica Minister camera which I inherited when he died (at a cost which I thought was very reasonable, but SWMBO thought was extortionate for "a knackered old camera").

 

My first camera was a Kodak Brownie 127.  My first "proper" camera was a Zenit E, and I've still got one of the later versions (a Zenit 12e) as part of my ageing 35mm camera 'stable'.  One advantage of the Zenit is that it's fairly handy as self-defence weapon (a bit like the jar of Pond's cold cream in the handbag that certain ladies of my acquaintance used to swear by) as well as taking not-too-bad photos...

Edited February 24, 2022 by ejstubbs

[Hroth]

1 hour ago, spikey said:

 

Aaaargh!  Gnome.  The first enlarger I had when still at school was a Gnome Beta 2 with a Wray lens.  It was cheap and cheerful, but better than nothing.  A few years later I found a Leitz Focomat 1C complete with the Leitz masking frame in a junk shop in Canterbury priced at £15.  The proprietor obviously had no idea what it was, so gladly accepted my kind offer to take it off his hands if he threw in the 5cm f4.5 Focotar and the set of 20 x 16 trays in which it was sitting.

 

Anybody else start with 120 in a box Brownie and see-saw developing in pie dishes before contact printing? 

 

 

 

I started with a Zeiss Ikon Box Tengor 120 camera from a jumble sale (still got it...). I bypassed the seesaw development technique, my uncle gave me an old bakelite 120 developing tank. Again, I still have my little 6x6cm contact frame.

 

My first enlarger was a Russian UP5, rather like a Gnome, that packed away into a briefcase style box. The enlarger I still have is a medium format Meopta, with a colour filter head, ideal for dialling in the filtration for Ilford multigrade paper.

[boxbrownie]

2 hours ago, spikey said:

 

Aaaargh!  Gnome.  The first enlarger I had when still at school was a Gnome Beta 2 with a Wray lens.  It was cheap and cheerful, but better than nothing.  A few years later I found a Leitz Focomat 1C complete with the Leitz masking frame in a junk shop in Canterbury priced at £15.  The proprietor obviously had no idea what it was, so gladly accepted my kind offer to take it off his hands if he threw in the 5cm f4.5 Focotar and the set of 20 x 16 trays in which it was sitting.

 

Anybody else start with 120 in a box Brownie and see-saw developing in pie dishes before contact printing? 

 

 

Gnome (damn Apple auto know-it-all-spell-check) Beta 2 was the one, I think mine had an Taylor Hudson lens, all secondhand from the local camera/chemist shop, and still have the Boxbrownie* I started with, and it’s still in its original box!

 

My first photos when I was seven or eight were from negs in a contact frame and used paper that didn’t need processing but gradually an image appeared, what was that paper called?

 

*hence the name…..I am old and I’ve taken pictures all my life 

[dhjgreen]

5 minutes ago, boxbrownie said:

Taylor Hudson

Spell check again?

[Danemouth]

I live about a quarter of a mile from the old Gnome factory on Caerphilly Road in Cardiff - long since demolished and is now a supermarket. Never had a Gnome enlarger but did have a slide projector which I sold when I changed to Leitz Pradovit projectors.

Recently put the latter in a skip - couldn't give them away

 

Dave

[boxbrownie]

11 minutes ago, dhjgreen said:

Spell check again?

I hate Apple…it gave me no choice…..see what I did there? 
 

I actually think it all works great but the bloody spell auto correct is a pain sometimes.

Edited February 24, 2022 by boxbrownie

[boxbrownie]

Just now, Danemouth said:

I live about a quarter of a mile from the old Gnome factory on Caerphilly Road in Cardiff - long since demolished and is now a supermarket. Never had a Gnome enlarger but did have a slide projector which I sold when I changed to Leitz Pradovit projectors.

Recently put the latter in a skip - couldn't give them away

 

Dave

I threw two Kodak Carousels in a skip about ten years ago, they cost a fortune when new.

[spikey]

17 minutes ago, boxbrownie said:

... used paper that didn’t need processing but gradually an image appeared, what was that paper called?

 

Wasn't it printing-out paper?  That's what I knew it as anyhow.  

 

I'd forgotten about using that.  Same goes for the extinction meter that I acquired from an elderly uncle.  There was a knack to using it, but it was better than always relying on the sunny 16 rule.

 

DIN film speeds.  Scheiner ditto.  And all that stuff.  Gevacolour.  Agfacolour.  Ilfacolour etc etc.

 

Ref the Brownie 127 mentioned above, when I worked in my stepfather's shop in the days when day-trippers expected fillums to be put in their cameras for them, I was accurately timed taking a Brownie 127 out of its case, loading a film into it and winding it on to number 1 in under 30 seconds - with my eyes shut, apart from for the winding on.  No particular skill needed: just a teenager's dexterity and constant practice from the number of 'em we used to do all day during the holidays ...

[boxbrownie]

6 minutes ago, spikey said:

 

Wasn't it printing-out paper?  That's what I knew it as anyhow.  

 

I'd forgotten about using that.  Same goes for the extinction meter that I acquired from an elderly uncle.  There was a knack to using it, but it was better than always relying on the sunny 16 rule.

 

Same stuff, I was trying to remember the trade name, I used to buy it at a big photographic shop in Dalston London, damn I cannot even remember the name of that shop now.  

[Hroth]

40 minutes ago, boxbrownie said:

Gnome (damn Apple auto know-it-all-spell-check) Beta 2 was the one, I think mine had an Taylor Hudson lens, all secondhand from the local camera/chemist shop, and still have the Boxbrownie* I started with, and it’s still in its original box!

 

My first photos when I was seven or eight were from negs in a contact frame and used paper that didn’t need processing but gradually an image appeared, what was that paper called?

 

*hence the name…..I am old and I’ve taken pictures all my life 

 

Probably a Taylor Hobson...

 

13 minutes ago, spikey said:

 

Wasn't it printing-out paper?  That's what I knew it as anyhow.  

 

I'd forgotten about using that.  Same goes for the extinction meter that I acquired from an elderly uncle.  There was a knack to using it, but it was better than always relying on the sunny 16 rule.

 

DIN film speeds.  Scheiner ditto.  And all that stuff.  Gevacolour.  Agfacolour.  Ilfacolour etc etc.

 

Ref the Brownie 127 mentioned above, when I worked in my stepfather's shop in the days when day-trippers expected fillums to be put in their cameras for them, I was accurately timed taking a Brownie 127 out of its case, loading a film into it and winding it on to number 1 in under 30 seconds - with my eyes shut, apart from for the winding on.  No particular skill needed: just a teenager's dexterity and constant practice from the number of 'em we used to do all day during the holidays ...

 

Printing out paper, thats the stuff

 

I had some Kodak Gaslight PoP.  You loaded it into the printing frame in dim light and then exposed it either to an electric lightbulb (or a gas light!) and developed by inspection, the hinged back of the printing frame allowed you to see how far it had cooked.  A blue-black image was the target. Then out of the frame in dim light and fixer for a few minutes.

 

I also had some Kodak Self-toning Solio which was a similar sort of thing, but gave a sepia image.

 

Amazing what older relatives had up in the attic!

 

To be honest, Its amazing what I've got - A Weston Master II with obsolete film speed scales, a couple of extinction meters that my dad had, etc, etc....

 

[Morven]

Film photography is going through a bit of a trendy moment right now, so if you have any old gear you no longer want you might be able to make a pretty penny -- especially medium format or older, mechanical SLRs from reputable manufacturers, or high-end compact cameras (popular with the instagram set, it seems).   Meanwhile 80s and 90s SLRs are still cheap as dirt.

[spikey]

28 minutes ago, Hroth said:

 ... a couple of extinction meters that my dad had, etc, etc....

 

Alas, they're extinct now.  Like glass plates and pack film (by which I mean pack film, not the Polaroid* stuff).

 

*  Polaroids - what you get if you sit on an iceberg for too long.

[Oldddudders]

I have a Weston Euromaster somewhere, I think. Several film Nikons from F2 to F5, DSLRs from D1 to D500 and D750, mirrorless cameras from Nikon, Fujfilm, Sony. And more lenses than you can shake a stick at. 

 

My name is Ian and I am a camera addict.

[Danemouth]

Sold all my Nikon film gear including a pair of F100s - initially used the lens the a Nikon D70 and later a D600, now I've gome mirrorless with a Z6.

 

For many years I lectured around the Soth Wales camera clubs using a pair of Pradovit projectors with an Imatronic dissolve unit - as I said in an earlier post I ended up putting them in a skip

 

Dave

[boxbrownie]

1 hour ago, Hroth said:

 

Probably a Taylor Hobson...

 

 

Printing out paper, thats the stuff

 

I had some Kodak Gaslight PoP.  You loaded it into the printing frame in dim light and then exposed it either to an electric lightbulb (or a gas light!) and developed by inspection, the hinged back of the printing frame allowed you to see how far it had cooked.  A blue-black image was the target. Then out of the frame in dim light and fixer for a few minutes.

 

I also had some Kodak Self-toning Solio which was a similar sort of thing, but gave a sepia image.

 

Amazing what older relatives had up in the attic!

 

To be honest, Its amazing what I've got - A Weston Master II with obsolete film speed scales, a couple of extinction meters that my dad had, etc, etc....

 

That was it, Kodak Gaslight……thank you 

[boxbrownie]

1 hour ago, Morven said:

Film photography is going through a bit of a trendy moment right now, so if you have any old gear you no longer want you might be able to make a pretty penny -- especially medium format or older, mechanical SLRs from reputable manufacturers, or high-end compact cameras (popular with the instagram set, it seems).   Meanwhile 80s and 90s SLRs are still cheap as dirt.

My old Hasselblad equipment bought me a Porsche Boxster S……..quite a bit more fun 

[Bernard Lamb]

2 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

Same stuff, I was trying to remember the trade name, I used to buy it at a big photographic shop in Dalston London, damn I cannot even remember the name of that shop now.  

Ditto.

Chemicals and developing tanks and trays at silly prices.

Even found a very early and very crude digital darkroom timer.

But I can't remember the name of the place.

There was a similar outlet in Finchley.

Bernard

[EddieB]

5 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

Same stuff, I was trying to remember the trade name, I used to buy it at a big photographic shop in Dalston London, damn I cannot even remember the name of that shop now.  

Frank Martin...

 

 

(Flickr image from Kevin Lane).

 

Looking at that advert, I think I bought nearly everything at one time or another - but mostly from Marston & Heard in Leyton (more local to me).  Trying to remember what I bought from Frank Martin, I think it may have been the Zenith enlarger and a glazer.  (The chrome glazing plate quickly rusted and was replaced with a stainless one - thank heavens for RC papers!)