Holga Abuse

[wickedmartini]

Finally had to retire one of my Holga's after many years of joyful abuse.

Picked up a new one from Freestyle and ran a test roll. To my disappointment

the images are far to "nice"--a little to crisp, too sharp and only a hint of

vignetting. Anybody have any tips or suggestions for getting this Holga to

take the same beautifully crappy images that my now retired Holga used to

take? Anybody do any "pre-abuse" to get the look that they desire? Any

suggestions would be appreciated. Sample images would be awesome too! Have

fun!

 

mdd

[pico]

Yup. I noticed that, too. Way too sharp and good coverage. Why, even the focus was spot-on at 5'!

 

If Holga doesn't get back to its anti-quality effort they might have to move manufacturing to the USA to make it happen. But then it would be $100. Doggone Asian folks make good stuff by accident!

[wickedmartini]

Yes, they ought be be ashamed of themselves...

[tripanfal]

I've read sandpaper to the lens or smearing with vaseline.

[squareframe]

god knows .. I would pay good-money to have them under-engineer and forego any quality-assurance. their improvements are wholly unacceptable! geez ... a guy/gal just can't buy a decent 'funked-up-blurry-aberrated-vignetted-defocused' camera anymore.

 

and by the way ... I am totally serious!

[don_hill]

Pop off the lens and give it about 10 - 20 seconds in the microwave to start. Try a test roll

and zap it again until you are happy with the look of your fantastic new lens. While the

results are less than repeatable, they are beautiful.

[jon_b.1]

I, too, had to recently retire my venerable old Holga. It broke at the worst possible time...I had in my sights a beautiful shot of my son with the Los Angeles City Hall in the background, hit the button...and nothing. Tried it a few more times, and nothing. Sure got my money's worth out of it, though. I took it apart and saved the lens, and switched it out with my new one, and I can still get those great crappy shots. Try that if you have not yet tossed out your old one. They disassemle pretty easily.

[chromatic-aberration]

<i>Pop off the lens and give it about 10 - 20 seconds in the microwave to start.</i><p>

Every now and then, you stumble across a sentence that has likely never been uttered before

in human history. This may be one of those moments.

[randall ellis]

Just take the lens off your old one and put it on the new one. They are only held on by a single screw. Remove the screw and keep turning the lens until it comes off. Then take off the lens of your new one, put the old lens on the new body, and replace the screw. Viola! Images just like before.

 

- Randy

[stephen hazelton]

The insert holds the film flatter, helps with focus, helps prevent light leaks, masks the image so there's less vignetting. Ergo, remove the insert, have more light leaks, poorer focus, more vignetting.

 

Vignetting is also a function of contrast, so use higher-contrast film for more of it.

[joe tarrant]

Back when the alternative cameras forum was so new that it didn't yet have sub-folders, I posted <A HREF=""http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00Cd7Q&tag=">a message</A> to the same effect: that my Holga was a much better camera than I had been led to expect.

 

<P>One of the funnier pieces of advice I was was "Set the oven to broil, make sure the lens is pointing up, and put it in there for 30-second bursts, until it's "just right".".

 

<P>I don't recommend it myself! ;-)

[wickedmartini]

Thanks for all of the inspiration... Gonna pull the old lens off of the Holga and put it on the the new one... I'll let you all know what happens... But, the thought of popping a lens in the microwave has really got me thinking...