Cheap and / or ancient cameras

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Gordon Christie, Kersaw Penguin 8-20, Lo-Fi, Old Camera

It was during an exchange of emails with Nasos that I decided to challenge myself to put a roll of film through a cheap and previously unused (by me) camera.

I went through the possibilities – the Horizont – but it wasn’t very cheap (not expensive either).

The little Yamato Pax – but the shutter is faulty.

I went through the (too long according to my wife) list.

In the end I settled on one that was gifted to me – it’s from UK, so that’s a bit unusual, it was a gift (so very cheap) and it’s in very good condition. The shutter has only two speeds, B and 1/50th. You can have f11 or f16 and that’s it. It’s a Kershaw Penguin (why Penguin? – don’t know) 8-20. You get 8 negatives at 6x9cm from a 120 roll, so that part makes sense. You can focus at 6 feet, 10 feet and Infinity. Say 2m, 3m and thousands of metres!

This camera was bought by someone who died before he could use it. So it sat in a cupboard and was eventually passed to his son, who then gave it to me. It has been with me for over two years and has not been used. It has never been used.

So what’s a challenge if you don’t share it? I decided to rope Nasos in and I set him the same challenge. We decided we would blog the results, so here it is.

The first problem – there are always little problems with film photography! – was getting the film holder spool from one side of the camera to the other. It was on the feeder side rather than the receiver side. It refused to be released. As usual, just when I was about to give up and leave it for another day, it suddenly popped out on a hinge. I don’t have instructions for it so I was working “blind”.

Next, when feeding the film across what is quite a wide camera, I found it difficult to keep tension on the film roll but eventually it was done.

Then I mis-read the indicators through the red window and went past frame 1 marker.

That was enough as I had started late and now it was about 11.30pm.

Next day was bright so I figured I could get something at 1/50th from my 100 ISO film. I went out into the garden and took 6 pictures of plants etc.

Then I asked my wife to take two more pictures – of me.

Next, rewind the film and get the changing bag. Job done.

I had just taken delivery of a new batch of Rodinal. The reason I had ordered this was that all my negatives were thin from 2 previous rolls. Not unusable but disappointing. Maybe new developer was the answer. I had been using FD10 and was beginning to doubt all my photography credentials.

No time like the present – get all the things needed together and develop the film. What’s the development time for this film on a 1:25 dilution? Only 4 minutes.

I gave the film 4.5 minutes. After stop bath and fixer and a long wash I gradually removed the reel from the tank. I was expecting thin but I got the opposite! High contrast negs at last! They looked ok to the naked eye.

 

So here’s a few – scanned in an Epson scanner and converted via its own software. I would rather it just scanned the negatives but I haven’t found a way to do that yet……..

The first two were a double exposure but not in a good way!

As Nasos remarked, they are a bit lo-fi. I went through all the possibilities. Focus could be out if the struts were not snapped into place properly. Don’t think that was it.

Nasos mentioned the lens – was it clean? I hadn’t checked it as the camera is basically new, but I should have. So I think there was a film of dust over the front element and it has diffused the light across the negatives. I still quite like them. They remind me of autochromes – in monochrome!

So from idea to fulfilment in 24 hours. It was interesting to have two exposure choices. It cuts down on decision making!

I’ve cleaned the lens and I might give another go with this camera.

Soon we’ll see what Nasos got from his challenge…..

Gordon Christie