Found film and Present Results - Continued

I wrote about first impressions with this camera here.

As mentioned, it was produced by Blair Camera Company, originally from Boston.

This copy it seems, at the time of production, was produced in Rochester, which indicates that the company was already acquired by Eastman Kodak. Hence this would place this camera production date no later than about 1915.

It's called Hawk-Eye Weno No. 5, with Hawkeye name continuing to live on in many lower cost Kodak cameras to come.

For a box camera, it's impressive, with light polished wood furniture inside and good manufacturing tolerances. The lens is some sort of cemented doublet, which as I had mentioned in the previous post had been flipped with convex side pointing out, potentially for portraiture work.

I did my usual steps, cleaned and polished both finders, removed lens barrel and cleaned the accumulated dirt - reversed for landscape work, and put it all together.

The camera had come with a roll of exposed #118 film inside which was tempting. I removed the film from its backing paper and put it in, in a light tight box. The backing paper and the spool was used to sandwich a roll of Holga 400 film so I could take advantage of the frame numbers for a shoot at the local beach.

After some research on the type of film - I found out that this is Kodak Orthochromatic film was produced no later than about 1931.

Attempts to rig some sort of a reel for it failed.

Since this film is safe to handle in safelight, I took advantage of doing a manual "dip and dunk method" in a plastic bucket I got from the dollar store.

I used HC110 A at 65F for about 6 minutes. I was pretty excited to get two images, which I will share below. I am guessing the photo of the young girl is from mid to late 1920s. The second photo is more obscure with the shadow of the photographer taking center

stage.

Negatives were scanned on and Epson 4870 with piece of frame glass to hold them flat.

Camera and results below.

I was disappointed to get light leaks on most of the frames on the Holga film, this camera only allows about 6 frames per roll, so I ended up with about 3 keepers. Results below.

Saxophone man

Sun bathers and beach walkway

Your camera looks much like two Kodak box cameras I inherited from my grandmother and her sister. Their cameras bear a strong resemblance to yours but place the horizontal- and vertical-format viewfinder portholes next to each other instead of spaced apart. Both of those ancestors are long departed, but family lore says they received these cameras as Christmas gifts in 1914 or thereabouts. One of my cameras is embossed "Kodak No. 2 Brownie" and "116". The other camera lacks this label.

When my grandmother died, we found a shoebox full of negatives in her attic. Apparently she kept every negative she ever made, because the earliest ones show her as a teenager, around the time she received the camera. I scanned all the negatives that weren't spoiled -- about 1,200. They date from the 1910s to the 1960s.

ralf_j..and tom_halfhill.

These old photo's always interest me , thanks for sharing.

If you are prepared to do so , please do share some of the other scanned negatives.

I wrote about first impressions with this camera here.

 

As mentioned, it was produced by Blair Camera Company, originally from Boston.

 

This copy it seems, at the time of production, was produced in Rochester, which indicates that the company was already acquired by Eastman Kodak. Hence this would place this camera production date no later than about 1915.

It's called Hawk-Eye Weno No. 5, with Hawkeye name continuing to live on in many lower cost Kodak cameras to come.

 

For a box camera, it's impressive, with light polished wood furniture inside and good manufacturing tolerances. The lens is some sort of cemented doublet, which as I had mentioned in the previous post had been flipped with convex side pointing out, potentially for portraiture work.

 

I did my usual steps, cleaned and polished both finders, removed lens barrel and cleaned the accumulated dirt - reversed for landscape work, and put it all together.

 

The camera had come with a roll of exposed #118 film inside which was tempting. I removed the film from its backing paper and put it in, in a light tight box. The backing paper and the spool was used to sandwich a roll of Holga 400 film so I could take advantage of the frame numbers for a shoot at the local beach.

 

After some research on the type of film - I found out that this is Kodak Orthochromatic film was produced no later than about 1931.

Attempts to rig some sort of a reel for it failed.

Since this film is safe to handle in safelight, I took advantage of doing a manual "dip and dunk method" in a plastic bucket I got from the dollar store.

 

I used HC110 A at 65F for about 6 minutes. I was pretty excited to get two images, which I will share below. I am guessing the photo of the young girl is from mid to late 1920s. The second photo is more obscure with the shadow of the photographer taking center

stage.

Negatives were scanned on and Epson 4870 with piece of frame glass to hold them flat.

 

Camera and results below.

 

[ATTACH=full]1427444[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH=full]1427445[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH=full]1427446[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH=full]1427447[/ATTACH]

I don't know Ralf, it looks like late1960's suburbia to me. The hip roofs, landscaping, and especially the half dressed girl in a Flower-child blouse.

Maybe the one who ended up with the camera also inherited a 40 year old roll of film and started clicking away.

Great work on the rescue.

I don't know Ralf, it looks like late1960's suburbia to me. The hip roofs, landscaping, and especially the half dressed girl in a Flower-child blouse.

Maybe the one who ended up with the camera also inherited a 40 year old roll of film and started clicking away.

Great work on the rescue.

You may be right - I have a picture of my grandmother from mid 30s and the girls seemed more "conservatively" dressed at the time.

Which film is it?

Verichrome (not yet Pan) was made until about 1956.

Verichrome Pan, even back to 1956, usually works well.

Otherwise, yours look pretty good!

You can get Brownie models using 120 film from about

that time and quality. Much more convenient to use film

that you can still buy.

(Not that I am against using old cameras and old film.)

Which film is it?

 

Verichrome (not yet Pan) was made until about 1956.

 

Verichrome Pan, even back to 1956, usually works well.

 

Otherwise, yours look pretty good!

 

You can get Brownie models using 120 film from about

that time and quality. Much more convenient to use film

that you can still buy.

 

(Not that I am against using old cameras and old film.)

Hi Glen, the original film was already exposed and inside the camera. It is a kodak Orthochromatic film which kodak last produced in the early 30s. I processed this film in an open tank under safelight. The first two shots are from that film, and from what was said from one of the posters, taken some time in the 60s, judging from attire.

Orthochromatic Verichrome was until about 1956.

Before that the usual film was NC (Non curliing), I presume because earlier film curled.

Panchromatic films were available long before 1956, but I suspect that they kept selling the

orthochromatic version for home processing.