License To Kill.... Errr, Shoot

To shoot with a spy camera, that is.  You've seen the nifty little spy cameras that James Bond uses in the movies, they are totally cool!  Well, here's some tiny cameras of my own that are pretty small and easily hidden.  And they really work.

This is the first subminiature camera I ever got, a Rollei 16 - you may recognize it:

Yes, it's the same camera that Carl Kolchak used on The Night Stalker.  Although his pictures hardly ever turned out, this camera can take very good images.  It's a well-made piece of solid metal that was manufactured in Germany in the 1960s and has lots of useful features on it.  Here's a photograph I took with it, and even though it's only 16mm, it still takes surprisingly clear photos:

 

My second example is a Minolta-16 II.  It has the clever push/pull action to arm the shutter and advance the film like you've seen James Bond do a hundred times.  It has adjustable apertures and shutter speeds and it's fully manual - it doesn't need batteries to work:

One look at this next image I took with it will convince you that it would, indeed, work well as a spy camera.  If you're needing to photograph top secret documents, you definitely need clarity in your camera:

It's so clear, you can read every label on these spices.

My last example isn't a "spy camera" per se, but it actually came about because of the scarce conditions in Japan just after World War II.  Everything was hard to come by because Japan was recovering from the war and items such as film were scarce and expensive.  So the clever Japanese invented a tiny camera that used tiny amounts of film.  They called it a "Hit" camera.  In Japanese, Hit means "hand."  I suppose because you can hold one of these cameras in your hand.  They're only a little over an inch high:

Needless to say, with a negative only 14mm x 14mm, it doesn't take very clear pictures.  But, they do work.  Here's one I took outside my house when I first got it.  I suspect it can do better than this and I need to try shooting with it some more and find out:

So, there you have it, ladies and gentlemen, my spy camera arsenal.  I guess I could search the want ads and see if anybody needs a good, capable spy.  Because I already own some of the equipment I would need.

Those Cheap Old Plastic Cameras

 In my camera collection, there are a few lesser quality cameras that I have found here and there throughout the years.  I guess what attracted people to them in the first place was their "quirky" looks.  Yes, these have designs that are not usually seen in cameras, but you just can't deny that they look interesting in their quirkiness.  Most of these I probably got for a dollar or two, so they weren't worth very much.  And when you use them to take pictures, you find out just why they're not worth much - they don't take very good pictures.

But, nevertheless, these six cameras are part of my collection and I have shot with all six of them.  Marvel at their plastic goodness!  Below each camera is an image taken with that camera:

USC Reflex III

 

 

 Ansco Cadet II

Spartus Rocket

Windsor (Diana Clone)

 Imperial Mark XII Flash

 Bell & Howell BF35

 

 

 

At the very least, you have to say the results are "quaint."

 

Nostalgia

Here's a post that is somewhat nostalgic for me.  Back in 1978, when I was 17 years old, I joined my high school's yearbook staff during the latter half of my junior year as photographer.  They used a huge Polaroid Land Camera and a Konica Autoreflex TC 35mm SLR for their picture-taking needs.  I ended up getting to use both of those cameras, but the one I remember most fondly, was the Konica 35mm.  Here's an image of it in the hands of the guy who was the yearbook photographer just before me, his name was Randy.  This was taken from my junior yearbook:

And here's that same camera in my hands from my senior yearbook.  Both images were cropped:

I learned a lot using that camera and here are some pictures I took using that camera.  The first three were for the yearbook, and the last three were some I took for myself:

I liked that camera so much that I ended up buying one of my own many years later.  When eBay came along and became huge, I realized that you could find practically anything there.  Remembering how much I liked the school's old Konica Autoreflex TC, I searched and found one on eBay - and bought it!  Here's a picture of it:

And a picture taken with it (after I had gotten a lens for it:

It didn't come with a lens, so I got me a second one from eBay that had a lens on it.  The second one didn't work, but was pretty cheap and it had the advantage of having the lens I needed.  That one looked like this:

The first one did work when I first got it, but it jammed up soon after and I haven't had a chance to fix it or use it until recently.  But I did manage to fix the second one I got that didn't work and here's a picture I took with it.  It shows some of the buttons in my late Mother's collection:

At first, however, I now had two of these Konicas and neither one of them worked.  So, I went back to eBay and found a third one that worked, but it, too, didn't have a lens on it.  Not to worry, though, because I had a lens.  Here's what that third one looked like:

And here's a couple pictures taken with that third Autoreflex TC:

Fast forward to 2019.  I was again searching on eBay and found an auction that had nine great old single lens reflex camera bodies, and two of them were Konica Autoreflex TCs!  I ended up getting those cameras and paid less than $10 for both of the Konicas together.  Here's what the first one looks like and a picture taken with it:

And here is the second one, now the fifth total Konica Autoreflex TC cameras in my collection, along with a picture taken just last night with that camera, more buttons in my late Mother's collection:

So, that's the tale, (so far....) of the Konica Autoreflex TC.  Who knows how it will end up?  But every time I use one, I'm transported back in time to when I was teenager and blissfully taking pictures that captured a special memory each time I clicked the shutter button.

Film Box Pinhole Camera

This post goes back in history.  The year was 2010, but it hearkened back to my college years and my first photography class in late 1979.  In an attempt to teach us the concepts of photography, we built our own pinhole cameras out of cardboard and a soda can for the pinhole.  These cameras produced 4"x5" negatives because we used 8"x10" photo paper and cut it down into four equal sizes, which gave us four "negatives" per sheet.  This type of early photography, from the 1820s, was called Calotype photography.  As an example, here is one of those shots I took back in 1979:

It shows the parking lot of Southeastern Illinois College, which is the college I went to.  I chose that subject because you could only load and take one picture at a time and to load and unload the camera, it had to be done in the darkroom - and I used the college's darkroom.  Plus, the original shot was a "negative" image and had to be contact printed to get a positive print.  Fast forward to 2010.

Remembering those early, (for me), pinhole camera days, I thought I'd revisit them and make my own pinhole camera again.  I had read where people were using all sorts of containers to use for their camera bodies and then adapting photographic paper or different sizes of film for their negatives.  Some of the smallest cameras I saw being made were out of matchboxes.  This inspired me to use an empty box of film for my camera body.  When it was finished, this is what it looked like:

But to use it, I had to cut down a piece of 35mm Kodak Tri-X 400 black and white film to shoot in it and then tape up the box so it wouldn't have any light leaks.  For my "shutter," I simply used a piece of tape over the pinhole "lens."  It didn't look so polished, but it did keep the film from the light:

It took me several attempts of shooting before I was able to get a decent image, but one of the earlier images that didn't turn out so good looked like this:

Finally, I was able to get a fairly good image, and it was taken at the Fairfield, Illinois fairground during their Fall Fun Fest days of 2010:

I don't know what that curved group of light blobs were or what caused them, but they were present in all my shots, even when I used a different pinhole piece of aluminum in my final iteration of the camera.  The above shot looked like this taken with another camera, which employed about a 28mm focal length, so I guess my film box pinhole camera had a pinhole about the equivalent of a 28mm lens:

Since I eventually got my pinhole camera to take a picture you could somewhat recognize, I considered it a success.  Now, I'm wanting to build another pinhole camera that uses photographic paper and get back into taking some calotypes.  Stay tuned!

My New (Old) Camera

I'm still here! Family matters have demanded my attention for the last couple months and I haven't been able to blog with any regularity. But, things are getting a little more back to normal and I just had to post this little item about my new camera.

Pictured above is what it looks like - this is the actual camera body I bought used on Ebay. It's a Pentax K1000 and it comes with the strap but no lens. I haven't gotten it yet, so the above picture is the actual one that was used on the auction's page to get people interested in it. It got me plenty interested in it! A little story behind why I bought it.

A friend of mine gave me a great little Pentax 28mm wide angle lens, but as it's a K-mount, I didn't have anything that it would fit on. I've been wanting to use it, so I did a little research to see what Pentax cameras it could mount on. I found out that pretty much every Pentax film lens will fit on just about every Pentax film camera they ever made. That's why they've been around so long and why people always remember using a Pentax. The Pentax K1000 was introduced in 1976 and they made it virtually unchanged until 1997! The reason it was so popular is because it is totally a manually-operated camera - no automatic shooting modes. This made it cheap and popular with schools who would buy up bunches of them for beginning photography students. They were easy to master and quite well laid out, even in their simplicity. Another reason I finally bought a used one, (for $20 no less!), was that in 1977 and 1978, when I was looking to make the move into a really good 35mm camera over the ones I had been using, I began to look around for something that would fit my needs. Olumpus had one called the OM, Minolta had a revolutionary camera that would shoot in all operating modes and manual, too, called the XD11. And the Pentax K1000 looked attractive to a 17 year old for it's smaller price. I ended up getting the Minolta XD11, which I have talked about before here on Photo Journey, and the Pentax and Olympus just settled into being what almost was. When I found out that a Pentax K1000 would take the lens I had, I jumped at the chance to finally get the camera I almost bought over 30 years ago! I can't wait for it to arrive so I can start to shoot some film with it. Below is the lens I have that was given to me:

This lens is an expensive and well-made wide angle lens, an SMC Pentax-A 28mm, f/2.8. Another great thing about this lens is that it came with a 2x tele-converter, which I'm sure the original owner purchased so that he could use it in tandem with this wide angle lens and bring the focal length up to the range of a normal, prime lens. 28mm times two equals 56mm, which is well within the range of normal lenses. They run from about 45mm to 58mm and make subjects appear to be normally proportioned on film. So, I'll have a lens that is equal to the normal shooting distance and it can double as a wide angle lens when I want to include more in my frame. I can't wait to try out everything when I get it all together!

Below is what my new camera will look like with the 28mm wide angle lens on it. I have digitally manipulated two different images so that it resembles what my new rig is going to look like. There's nothing quite like shooting with a film camera in the manual mode! One other thing I really like about my new K1000 - it can be used without having to put batteries in it!

April 1st, 2010 update - Here's my new camera:

The Cameras I Use

There are a lot of blogs out there where the writers post wonderful pictures they've taken. You might be able to guess that those are the kind I frequent most. Well, I see all those photos and I wonder what kind of equipment they used to create those images. What brand of camera, what size of lens, the speed of the film or if the camera is digital. All these things interest me greatly because I've been taking pictures for all of my adult life, and more. Looking at a beautiful image is nice, but I always want more. I mean, did they push the film to get such vibrant colors? Or did they hand hold a fairly long timed exposure? What about the lens; was it a telephoto or a zoom? I have too much time on my hands.

So, in case you're wondering these things about my photographs, (I know you are!) I thought that this would be a good opportunity to make you familiar with what I am using these days. But, before I tell you what camera I used to take the pictures on this post, we must go back.... way back.... so everybody hop on board the Wayback Machine and let's go to the beginning. A very good place to start.

At the ripe old age of 15, I acquired my first camera. My neighbor, Dan, gave me an old 35mm rangefinder camera that didn't work. Of course, I tinkered with everything in those days to see how it functioned, or in this case, why it didn't. In due course, I got it to working correctly. Here is what that camera looked like, although this isn't the same one. It's one I purchased within this last year because the original one finally gave up the ghost in the late 1970's and didn't work anymore:

Kodak 35

It was a Kodak 35 rangefinder, made in 1948. Recently, I discovered that there is a code in the number on the front of the lens that tells exactly which year it was made, as they manufactured this model from 1940 - 1951. The one in the above picture seems to have been made in 1948. So, I dug out my original Kodak 35 and, lo and behold, it was made the very same year! What are the odds of that happening? I ended up shooting many a roll of 100 ASA film through that camera. I was hooked on photography.

In the next few years, several other cameras joined my collection, mostly Kodak cameras - box cameras from the early 1900's, a Brownie Holiday, and over a half-dozen Brownie Hawkeyes, among others. I shot color film through those, and black and white, too, and learned a lot about taking pictures. This became a plus, for in 1977, when I was a junior in high school, I joined the yearbook staff as photographer. The school I went to had purchased a new Konica Autoreflex TC camera in 1976, so I inherited a nearly-new, state of the art piece of photography equipment. Several of my pictures made it into the 1978 yearbook, and I was smitten with this new technology. So much so, that I began to check into the latest cameras myself, with the thought of getting the best one out there for myself. You can bet I devoured a lot of photography magazines and read a lot of reviews.

In early 1978, the camera everybody seemed to be talking about was the new Minolta XD 11. It was revolutionary at the time because it was the first camera to offer not only aperture priority, but shutter priority and manual as well. This sounded to me exactly like what I needed. Then, I would have the best of both worlds, and manual exposure settings, too, so I could experiment to my little ol' heart's content. And, brother did I!

Minolta XD 11

When it was first released, it was only offered in black and chrome. But, I knew they were going to put out an all-black model, so I worked all summer, saved up my money and waited for it. It came out just after school started for my senior year, so I ordered one. Along with the black body, I got the dedicated flash unit for it, the power winder, (2 frames per second!) and the super standard normal lens they offered as an upgrade, a Rokkor X 50mm f/1.2. All for around $700. I was in electronic 35mm bliss!

My trusty and well-built Minolta became my main camera and I used it practically exclusively up until the late 1980's. Perhaps it was a virus or something, but then I began to experiment with other types of cameras again. I had all sorts of point and shoot cameras that I kept in the glovebox, 126 instamatics, 110 pocket flash cameras, etc. Throughout this period, though, my handy Minolta wasn't very far away for the important pictures. I even used it to photograph both of my weddings.

During the course of my second marriage and subsequent divorce, I got reenergized about taking serious photographs again. And it has been since the turn of the new millenium that I finally bought some extra lenses for my trusted old Minolta, ones I always wanted but never bought at the time. The picture of my XD 11 above shows one of those new lenses - a Minolta 70-210mm zoom lens. With it back in service, I felt I needed another camera to use so that I could shoot two types of film at the same time and have lenses that would interchange. From eBay, I bought a late-1970's release of a Minolta XG 1 - another truly well-made camera.

Minolta XG 1

This camera had the normal 45mm f/2 stock lens, so I added a 28-210mm Vivitar zoom lens to it. It's a great little camera, too, and comes in handy for just about any occasion.

Along about this time, the Digital Revolution was in full swing. And again, I started reading review after review, trying to see what was out there and would fit my needs. A chance Dell computer catalog fell into my hands and I came across a camera that seemed to have all the features I was looking for in a digital SLR. It turned out to be made by Konica Minolta, who had recently went into business together, so I knew, having used both brands of cameras before, that they made quality products. An order was duly phoned in for one Konica Minolta Maxxum 5D Digital SLR, (with the all-black body, of course!) and the standard 18-70mm zoom lens they offered from their own designers.

Konica Minolta Maxxum 5D Digital SLR

Just ask anyone who ever bought one what they think of it, and you'll hear resounding unanimous praise for this well-thought out jewel of a camera. It is well-made and has a lot of great features that I like, but sadly, they retired from the camera producing business after I purchased it. Where they were, hands down, one of the greatest innovators of cameras, they were slightly behind a lot of other manufactures when it came to the promotion end of things. This, more than anything, was what brought about their demise. I'm going to miss them.

Oh, and one last little side note: When I recently added another lens to my Minolta film camera stable, one online auction had included in the sale a classic Konica automatic rangefinder camera. As soon as I can locate a film door for the bottom of it, I fully intend to try it out, as I hear it takes great pictures! But, I wouldn't expect anything less, because Konica made some pretty good glass back in their days, too.

Konica C35 Automatic

And, after I've shot a roll or two through this little camera, you can be sure I'll be posting an article featuring some of it's pictures.

I'll end this post with a little levity that is probably applicable to 99.9% of all photographers out there. Even though I myself have worked freelance for a few newspapers, been a professional portrait photographer and shot a lot of weddings, my intense affair with cameras has hardly been able to support me in the manner that I've become accustomed to. Even though it probably never will, I'll keep snapping a shutter, trying to catch that perfect image.

Q. What's the difference between a large pepperoni pizza and an aspiring photographer?
A. A large pepperoni pizza can feed a family of four.