Analog film photography and cameras

A few from our last club run, all taken on Olympus XA and Agfa Vista 200.

Getting better at judging distance for focusing then shooting from the hip as I ride.

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A few from the streets / wandering about the place.

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One of Calder's kinetic sculptures

Would sticking exposed rolls in the fridge asap after shooting be the best way to store them for future processing? (1-2months at least)

..some even say freezer, though I always worried about condensation with drastic teperature changes.

I put my stuff in the fridge before / after shooting.

reeeally like your last two posts!

Cheers very much. I was happy with them too, really enjoying shooting the XA and these were all on Fuji film which I'm going to definitely use again in future.

Really need to learn how to judge distance better with my XA, I find focusing with the viewfinder extremely difficult in a lot of situations. Wonderful shots by the way!

Thank you :-)

Nice ! especially the lighthouse...

90% of the time I just zone focus with the distance scale on the XA.

Nice bus, sand ladders = overland touring machine, or used to be but now dumped? Where is it?

Maybe I'm being thick but I got some lightleaks on one of my recent rolls that puzzle me.
Shot with a Nikon SLR in great condition, closes tight and seals are fine..
Please examine attached pic (as you can see the light is on the left side of the frame, pretty evenly spaced, blasting over the sprocket holes as well - then disappear, only to re-appear on the right side of the frames towards the end of the film) -

...ideas?

just a thought but could the film have been cross threaded on the dev tank spindle, perhaps it didn't develop evenly.

No, this has been developed at a pro lab that does "Hängeenwicklung" (don't know the english word for this - the film is not transported through a machine but hangs in tanks for dev, fixing and drying).

Couple shots from last year, shot with a Pentax Asahi MX x Kodak Tmax 400

Have also made a new page on selling prints on my tumblr, what do you think about what I have wrote?
Writing isn't my forte. http://neverseekpermission.tumblr.com/prints
Any feedback would be great :-)

Thanks man, for all the biking shots I just set the distance between 1 and 3m and F5.6 and try to position myself to suit. I've heard a little bit of yellow filter on the range finder can help with the contrast if you are using it that way. Also cheers @IzMota

A leak that coincides with frame spacing suggests the issue is with the camera not the processing.
Full width of the film suggests the leak is from the back, not from the front (not shutter, lens mount etc.)
That it moves relative to the frame implies that it does not originate from a single source such as a hole or crack in the body or back.
I would inspect the back, looking for distortion (twisting?) of the back itself or play in the hinge - something that might permit slight movement when the camera is handled. The impression of closing tight may be caused by the seal being highly compressed in one area but barely touching in another, giving intermittent sealing?
Are there any common factors to the frames with leaks? Hot weather? One handed operation? Case on or case off? Tripod?

love the shallow depth of field along those train tracks, really draws your eye through the image

A few from Notting hill Carnival last year -

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Thanks for your feedback!

Did inspect the back again.. seems really okay though there's (very) little play on one side.
It's an old but cheap Nikon (EM) - albeit bought in mint condition, delivered good results so far, has never been dropped etc. and always been kept in a padded bag.
Guess I'll have to tape the back and shoot a quick cheap roll through it so see if it leaks from there.

But why do the leaks appear neatly on the left edge of the frame, then go away, and then re-appear on the right side of the frame??

So the auto roll-back motor on my ESPIO Mini seems to have stopped working. It rolls on when I load a film, and when I take a shot it rolls onto the next frame, but when I finish a film you can hear it trying to roll on but stopping (as if it's reached the end of the film). The 'force rewind' button has stopped working too.

Any ideas what's going on or where I can get it looked at? Eye Culture has to open the film in their darkroom and manually wind it back for me the other day...

SALES SPAM SALES SPAM SALES SPAM
I have a couple of cameras for sale... well quite a few actually...
Lomo action sampler £0
Brownie 44 new and boxed (NOS) £0
Slide projector £Beer?
And still have a Minilux for £190 or whatever I last said...

More sales spam

Olympus Mju 2 zoom 115 all weather - a compact that I'm not going to use.

Offers

This is purely speculation, based partly on troubleshooting badly abused cheap cameras in a school environment - TVEI Photography probably didn't make it to Berlin...

With time and use, the seals will suffer permanent set, i.e. deformation that does not recover when pressure is removed, which will compromise it's ability to conform to the lip around the edge of the back.
If the back is distorted by having a twist to it, modest hand pressure could hold the top edge in full contact with the seal and allow a gap to open at one side of the bottom edge. Similar pressure at the bottom edge would cause this gap to close but a similar sized gap to appear at the top edge but on the other side - imagine the back rocking on opposing diagonal corners. Potentially there might be a mid position where the back 'just' seals all round, and any light leakage will depend on how you are holding the camera and the temperature of the back and the body (curvature of ribbed plates being a function of thermal expansion - had any hot days this year?)

Some play is to be expected in the hinge, but it might be worth opening the back and looking for signs of the free edge (side with the catch) being at an angle to the axis of the hinge pin.
If you're going to run a test roll, try applying deliberate pressure to the back at top left, then top right, bottom left, and bottom right before taping one edge at a time - and keep notes on what you did, in what order, so the results can be interpreted correctly and you gain more information than 'it leaks' or 'it doesn't'.

Equally, I could be talking a load of (overly verbose) rubbish...

After moving house I've finally unboxed a load of stuff that has been packed since I came back from Japan, including my near mint Nikon FM2.

So, what is the best way to acquire cheap B/W film in the UK so I can start running some rolls through it?

Also, scanning - I have a Canon flatbed (9000F?) still packaged for posting back to the UK. Is it worth getting out or should I sell it and use the proceeds for a lab to do a better job when the process my negatives?