Farkle-Mpls

Canon R5 with Canon FD 100/F2.0. Shot at F4.0, probably. Sarnath, India.

Canon R5 with Canon FD 100/F2.0 lens. Wide open (as it was meant to be shot!) Bit of a backstory ... I wanted to prove to some photography friends that older glass can be just as good -- certainly for Web posting! -- as modern glass, assuming the lighting wasn't tricky. (I admit modern coatings help in complex lighting situations.) So I took this FD 100/F2.0 to India in February and shot my friend with it. I ended up leaving it on for another hour, stopping it down to F4 for some DOF and to forgive some focusing errors. It worked great. But these two are shot wide open. Sarnath, India.

I think someone else referred to this earlier in the thread but I will call it out anyway: when I had my F1 or F1n (the first two versions) serviced, I asked the technician to convert them to take 1.5v batteries. It must be a minor bit of surgery as the work was always done (and I tested it afterwards) at no additional cost.

I thought the EF had a voltage regulation circuit enabling it to use modern 1.5v button-cell battery without worry. Maybe someone can confirm that for me.

After years of not seeing one around for many years, I saw a used safelight in a box today at a camera store. Looked to be in perfect condition (its original box too) ... might have to buy it for this same purpose. Thanks!

I love it -- I can use this for timing my pour-overs (which I keep telling myself I'm going to take time to learn how to do correctly). Thanks!

I teach IT courses at the University of Minnesota. As part of the course requirements at semester end (now!), students needed to do a 4-5 minute presentation on an approved topic. As we had 35 students to get through in a short amount of time AND we wanted to emphasize to the students the importance of managing the length of their presentation, my co-instructor was asking for ideas on how to give the students some visual feedback on how much time had already elapsed during their presentation. I had this seldom-used device still in my darkroom/bathroom so brought it to class the two nights of the presentations. None of my GenZ students knew what it was and I'm not even sure the co-instructor (a Millennial) knew. Anyway, I turned the buzzer down as low as it would go without being silent and off we went. I prepped my laptop with each student's presentation, then set the hands on the timer to 4m15s and told them to hit the toggle when they started. They had 5 mins max. Worked pretty well and the timer got used for several hours over the course of two weeks. I joked with the student that since it was for use in a dark room, if we lost power (this was a night class) and the room was plunged into darkness, I expected them to keep going as they could -- very surely! -- still see those glow-in-the-dark hands on the timer. Not sure they really "got it" but I laughed. I think they got hung up on the fact that the projector would shut off. It occurred to me that the timer was older than everyone in that classroom, except me. Enjoy your day.

I'm not sure what forum this questions belongs in but I've been most active throughout the years in this and the Canon FD forum and I know a lot of collectors and users of older lenses hang out here. Over the years, I've turned from "shooter" to "shooter/collector" and have amassed quite a few lenses. Most are older -- 1950s-1980s -- and as the value of the collection has increased, it causes me more and more concern that I may uncap a lens to discover it has fogged or the cement holding the lens group together has begun to crystalize or ... whatever else can surprise us. Mold isn't a huge concern in the chilly midwest US area where I live and A/C manages the humidity well in our summer months. Also, I've always stored my bodies and lenses in well ventilated areas. There is plenty of air circulation. As I found hoods to go with almost all the vintage lenses (a fun project, I discovered), I began storing the lenses with the hoods on and the caps off thinking that getting some indirect lighting through the body of the lens might not be a bad thing. (Not sure why I believe this, just figured this is what happens when you USE a lens so it shouldn't be detrimental ... hopefully.) I assume there are some other collectors here OR simply people who use older lenses. What has worked for you? Thank you!

I sent my T90s to Steve @ Camera Clinic. He fixed them up. IIRC, once fixed correctly, you don't need to worry about EEE errors from the shutter magnets again (and mine was fixed almost 10 years ago and it still fires the shutter -- just did it a couple days ago). Of course, if the EEE error wasn't related to the shutter magnets, your outcome may be different but I'd still consult Steve. His contact info: Steve Sweringen, Camera Clinic, 100 2nd Avenue NW Mandan, ND 58554, 775-829-2244 .

Jim -- that scanned E6 image looks great. Can I ask how you scanned it (what scanner and software)? For me, Velvia 50 has always proven very difficult to scan well.

1312LeNiCa -- Greetings also from Minnesota! (Minneapolis) ... I just had two F1s serviced by Steve Sweringen last month. Steve was mentioned above. He specializes in F1s! His price was reasonable and turn-around was about two weeks. Good luck and nice to meet another F1 shooter in Minnesota. Carl

I took one of my F1N's and a few lenses around Amsterdam, Bruges and Antwerp a couple weeks ago. I had tried the new CineStill400D before -- thought it was intriguing -- so I took my remaining six rolls to Europe with me. Avoided all airport xrays (not really a big problem). In nine days, I shot all six rolls. Camera was a F1N (1984 Olympics), and lenses were FD 24mm/F2.0, FD 50mm/F1.4 and 80-200/F4L. The film is quite warm. A little too warm at times. It utterly blows out (can I call this "halation"?) around bright areas as a couple photos will show. Not the general purpose film I thought it was when I tested a roll before my trip (my test images were shot in reasonable light). Curious to get other people's thoughts. Outdoors. Dunkirk beach. Bruges, residential street. 24mm. Those blown highlights end up with a curious red bleed. "Red bleed" is more pronounced at night. There was NO red neon ... that's all some sort of bleed-over on the blown whites. Another example. I included a shot of my F1N too as I just love that camera. First time posting in the new format so I hope this is a readable post/images! I could've posted in the Film forum too but I tend to follow/contribute more on the FD forum.

I still shoot a fair bit of E6 and look at photos shot only 2 weeks before and ask myself "Why?" ... especially with wide angle shots, for some reason (maybe the detail is lost in the wide field of view ...?) BTW, I did discover on my trip to India in April that Velvia 50 captures the colors of India beautifully! I always thought of it as a film just for fall colors, not people.

Continuing on the India theme ... this is from February 2020, just as the pandemic was getting attention in India. Mala beads anyone? I think I bought two strands from this guy for my sisters.

Sandy and JDM -- thanks for the comments. One additional footnote which I want to emphasize is that I bought that film holder to make is as easy as possible for the airport security agents to hand-check my film. I'd emphasize taking that approach if you hope to get your film hand-checked anywhere with minimal push-back. To your point, JDM ... I took my Leica M10R as well since I was unsure how the whole film experience was going to go. I set the camera for B&W JPGs as well as RAW files. All the previews on the rear screen were B&W and as I looked at the JPGs I was really impressed. It made me think what many others have said for years: leave your film cameras at home. Even without shooting a "proper" Leica digital monochrome camera, the images were far better than I could've gotten with any B&W film. I knew this intrinsically but when I went out at night and shot at 8000 ISO, I was completely blown away. I do love the artistic look of film -- particularly B&W film -- but I also really like to shoot in the evening hours and the digital experience was very, very impressive. Might be the last time I shoot film when I travel internationally.