Agfa Clack photos

<p>I'm showing my inexperience here, but was a little surprised to see how OK (not great, but OK) the photos from this camera turned out to be. I'll include 4 variations of the same negative. I post-processed one to show how I thought the photos from this camera would look like. <br>

Some have a color tint because in order to make the positives I taped the negatives to my computer screen and took a macro shot of them. I actually had to make a frame with cardboard to keep the negative away from the screen. Otherwise, I found that the computer screen pixels showed clearly through the negative to create a checkerboard pattern.</p>

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<p>And one not post processed. (Actually I had to invert the colors/tones and up the contrast a little)</p><div></div>

<p>One showing original color shift</p><div></div>

<p>And one pretty much as shot. I don't know if the low contrast is the lens, my development or the conversion to digital</p><div></div>

<p>Interesting range. The Clack is one of the better box type cameras and does take pictures one notch above the usual Box Brownie etc.</p>

<p>The Clack and the Click were enormously popular cameras in Europe, and I've always been a fan. Cunningly, Agfa curved the film plane to mitigate some of the shortcomings of the lens, and the compromise works very well. I really like that photograph, <strong>Joe;</strong> change the girls' clothes and it could be a pic from the 1930's. Clever solution to digital conversion!</p>

<p>Joe,</p>

<p>You have a great nostalgic look to these pictures. I am reminded of some family shots from the 1930's and 1940's.</p>

<p>I copied your low contrast image. I used the Curves adjustment, the Shadows and Light adjustment, and did some Smart Sharpening. The resulting image looks too modern. I like the result you got in Picasso better.</p>

 

<p>I did some adjustment too, things I might normally do to my digital photos and I agree, it destroys the look of the images. Its hard to just leave a low contrast pic the way it is when its so easy to change it even with the free and simple software like Picasa. We (or at least I) have a tendency to go for the sharpest, most perfectly exposed images. Its fun to try something different for a change.<br>

Of course it helps that our little farm looks like something out of the 20s even with modern photo techniques :-)</p>

I am always trying to get the sharpest contrast rich image in a plain vanilla result. There are nips and tweaks to change the photo and I'm not above it, it's just I want a base image to be close to my ideal concept. I'm also not against happy accidents like box cameras results with curved results or middle sharp and vignetting etc I am impressed with your ingenuity in digitizing and other creative efforts with classics.

<p>Thanks Chuck. As someone should have said if they haven't: poverty is the mother of ingenuity :-)</p>