terry_scott

The Russian cameras in my collection comprise three Zorkis, a Kiev

4a and a Fed-2. The Zorkis and the Kiev are easy to date, naturally.

But I'm not sufficiently knowledgeable about Fed-2 serial numbers.

Hopefully, one of you is. Can you date the camera body (and maybe

the lens)?

The body number is 1190384 (shutter speeds run 1/30, 1/60, 1/125,

1/250, 1/500, by the way).

The lens is a chrome-barrel I-26M, number 1880925. And it came with

a Minolta lens-cap! Fits, too.

One day last year, I walked into the local secondhand-cameras shop, walked out with a Petri Flex V but minus 35 Pounds (money). Must have been nuts. But the Petri does work, after a fashion.

Well, I had a Petri Flex V brand-new in the mid-1960s and shot a photo-essay of Tower Bridge, London - includng the overhead walkways, which were closed to the public at the time. So there's a bit of sentiment going back nearly forty years.

I'll second Harvey's comment (I regret to say!): Here in the UK we have lotsa litter. Near me is the Brampton Valley Way, once a railway line but now a "linear park" for pedestrians, cyclists and horse-riders. And for...litter. Too much of it, in a pretty area of the countryside. Why do they do it?

Kerry wrote that "...in May 1966 I was amazed at the condition of German and Austrian streets." I haven't been to Germany for a dozen years but, in my fourteen business visits beforehand (1974 onwards), I always noticed how litter-free were the various cities and places I visited.

Rodinal's good (I used it in the 1960s and again quite recently) but Acutol's better, IMHO (and I now have it again, after ten years of not having a darkroom).

It's really a matter of: Which product can you most easily lay hands on?

But as you're using Ilford films, among others, consider also their excellent Ilford Ilfotec DD-X. Nice balance of characteristics.

Thanks for the thought, Jon.

I've e-mailed it on to the Mamiyaflex owner and he should come back to me with an answer soon.

A friend of mine (no Web access for the moment) has a Mamiya C330

and he wants to replace its light seals. He lives in England.

Can anyone suggest what he might buy and where in the U.K. he might

get it?

And are there any wrinkles that he needs to know about doing the job?

Thanks in advance, folks.

Okay. Thought I'd just clear that point. :-)

I've had Rolleis, YashicaMats etcetera but haven't come across the problem you mention. At this point, I'll bow out and hope someone else has an idea.

Great stuff, Mark. Thanks for sharing them. Really crisp detail. And - darned good photography!

I'd been thinking (feeling) about a Retina 'C lately. I've been wondering about getting one of those. Maybe it's That Auction Site time again, with lots of care.

Of course, my hat's off as well to your film, developer, and darkroom technique.

"Process G[C?]25" it says.

And, yes, Agfa did have their very own color negative process way-back-when. Processed films had quite a different look to Kodacolor: as I recall, there was no yellow/orange color mask.

Heaven knows how you'd process it. Anyone out there with Agfa associations from The Old Times ?

"...the...Super-Isolette... [has] a mechanism which allows the front cell to move back and forth without turning, which improves the performance of the camera."

A small point: My Agfa Super Isolette has a 75mm f/3.5 Agfa Solinar. The whole lens, not just the front element, moves back-and-forth when it is focused.

Thanks for your good advice, folks. I shall take it gently and carefully and try to clean 'er. What I was most worried about was the fact that this lens, of course, has multi-coating - and I didn't want to mess that up.

Still, as has been said (and it's a valid point), it's not as if 55mm SMC Takumars are especially rare. I could indeed get another through eBay. It'd just be fun to clean this one and that I shall now attempt to do, taking into account all your comments.

I had a Pen F around 30 years ago and I've a feeling I'd love one of these again.

The old negatives scan (Canon 9900F) and print (Hewie DeskJet 950C) nicely and are remarkably good, especially considering their anquity :-)

And I'm still fascinated by the design - an SLR camera with no hump, just a very neat use of prisms. Tremendously aesthetic.

So why don't I buy one? (a) Very few on the UK division of that auction site and (b) ridiculous prices in secondhand photo shops.

Here's the foto of the fungus.

It looks like dust - but that's what it is not.<div></div>

Thanks for your suggestions.

I'll post a couple of pictures over the weekend (here, it's late evening, Friday, right now). And yes, there is always the possibility of another lens - just seems a good idea to work on this one first.

I've just bought (eBay) a Pentax SP1000 with a 55mm f/2 SMC Takumar.

But the lens has a bit of fungus creeping in from one edge of the

front glass. How can I clean the stuff off?

The lens seems in great mechanical condition and cosmetically it's

good. Moreover, it's an 'F' type - so would give full-aperture

metering with a Spotmatic F or ES/ESII (I plan to add an F to my

collection one day). I'll know about its optical qualities when,

tomorrow, I process a test roll of Ilford Pan F.

Your wise words of wiz would be much appreciated, folks.

Gene, great words!

Thanks for inspiration - I'm getting more and more tuned to the idea of old films in classic cameras. I must keep my eyes open for 'em.

The camera looks excellent and the photography is great.

Thanks a lot for sharing!

Great pictures !

As to 'rewide', well, as Everyone Knows, if you can't step far enough back to take a picture, you take it anyway - then twiddle the Rewide button...and, uh, the lens gets wider. :-)

Winfried wrote (in part), "...the tower symbol was never used by Zeiss Ikon or KaWe before WWII and was introduced after merging the east german camera industry into VEB Pentacon."

I didn't mean that the Tower was used on cameras made by Zeiss Ikon or KaWe.

Anyway, while I'm at it, here is a picture of the thing, taken in autumn of 1975.<div></div>

The building symbol is what became the Pentacon tower symbol - formerly a Zeiss Ikon or a KaWe and/or symbol, I believe.

I visited the factory in 1975 (with a party of dealers and journalists from Britain) and have photos of the place and the production line (Praktica LTLs at the time). A board on the front gate said, "Kombinat VEB Pentacon Dresden / Kamera und Kinowerke / Hauptwerk".

By that time, they had mounted a logo around the top of the tower that read "VEB Pentacon".

Click or click or c-l-i-c-k... I reckon it's between my Yashica Minister III (on 1/125th), Kiev 4a (on 1/25th) and Agfa Super Isolette (on 1/60th).

Unfortunately, I have no Leica (these days) to compare 'em against. I do have a Zorki and a Fed but they're more attention-getting, intriguing beasts though they are.