Dustin McAmera

I think you may be talking about reciprocity failure , which is a thing for film. Under normal conditions of light, if you close down the aperture by one stop (from f/8 to f/11, say, or from f/2 to f/2.8), doubling the exposure time gives the same overall exposure. However, if the light is very low, and you're using a long exposure time, this relationship may break down. The film doesn't record light as effectively if it arrives at a very low intensity. Typically, you don't need to think about this for exposure times shorter than about a second. Where it begins, and how much you need to increase the exposure by, varies from film to film. If you need to know this sort of thing, the film makers usually have a data sheet that you can download; or it may even be printed somewhere in the information on the inside of the film box.

Are we talking about 35mm? In that case, there isn't a correct start point. All that matters is that, while you're loading, you can't help exposing the leader to light, and also enough film to reach across from the cassette to the take-up spool. So you need to wind that much on to get to unexposed film for your first photo. Once the film is firmly attached, I close the back and wind on and fire the shutter, three times. Then (my camera lets me do this; not all cameras do) I adjust the frame counter to '1'. In the back of the camera, near the take-up spool, there's a tiny toothed wheel that engages with the perforations. That's what measures the length when you advance the film.

I searched in the flickr group 'Agfa Isolettes' for the Igestar (as Jgestar): https://www.flickr.com/search/?group_id=958618%40N25&view_all=1&text=Jgestar There were just three photographs. One shows significant flare from the sky - probably needs cleaning. But you can see even the cheapest lens is capable of good pictures. All these are taen in good light; but then the Igestar only opens up to f/6.3.

If this were mine, I think I'd look for dirty/hazy elements first: just open the shutter on B/T and look through it.

Took some hunting to find one for Fuji. Here's one in a 1958 Fujipet: https://www.flickr.com/photos/127540935@N08/28501608750/ Fuji was a film maker first, and only later made cameras. Maybe they assumed everyone would think of them for film without being told.

Here's a Kodak one, moulded into the bakelite. These are better than simple adverts, if they remind you what size you should buy. and one from Ensign: I found quite a few Kodak examples, mostly reminding you to use 620, in the camera-wiki group at Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/boxxcarr/29707627187/

My glass and I are half drunk.

From July '21: https://investors.fiverr.com/press-releases/press-releases-details/2021/Fiverr-Expands-Online-Education-Offering-With-Acquisition-of-CreativeLive/default.aspx and also check, from October '22: https://www.creativelive.com/photonet

That's not the Century Graphic: 'century_graphic' was previously my Flickr username (and it sticks as your url, even if you change your screen name). The camera in the picture is my Calumet CC401. It's true I don't use the Benbo often enough, and I need to take a moment every session to re-learn the way of adjusting it without collapsing it. It's not the camera I would choose for the great outdoors; too big and too heavy, it doesn't sit comfortably on my shoulder, and I don't need big movements. The Century Graphic is actually pretty good outdoors. The body is 'mahoganite' - a thermoset resin, so it's light, and it folds up small so I can put a limited kit in a small rucksack, and use it on my light tripod. The Calumet's the only 4x5-inch I have. It cost me 38 quid, plus picking it up: that's why I have it. I then bought the tripod for it, again chosen because it was cheap, and some film holders. The lens cost more than all those put together. I have a stepped hole-cutter somewhere, but not for lensboard-hole sizes. I also don't have a drill-press to hold it steady.

I opened up the hole in a board without much difficulty or fancy tools. This one is aluminium, maybe 3mm thick. It's for my Calumet CC401 monorail ( https://www.flickr.com/photos/century_graphic/52390812125/ ). The mounting ring has a rebate like Joe describes. The board already had a hole of some size, so I couldn't use compasses to mark the new hole out. So I measured the mounting ring and cut a card disc of the right size, and centred it on the board, nudging it until it was equidistant from all four corners. Then I held it firmly and drew round it. Then I put the board in a vice, and used a half-round file to enlarge the hole toward the new line. When it was close, I switched to emery paper wrapped round a short length of dowel. Once it got very close to the line, I held the mounting ring up to the hole, to judge where I needed to do more, and slowed down. I was impressed with the neat look of the finished hole. On its own, the shutter body is loose in the hole, but it sits perfectly firmly once the ring is set in the hole and tightened.

I was wrong: there is still a link to CreativeLive, under 'Learn'>'How-to' in the top menu.

I wouldn't hold your breath waiting. I don't think Fiverr really meant to take over Photo.net. They wanted CreativeLive's range of courses, which make money. Photo.net was an old stray dog living in CreativeLive's garage, and Fiverr didn't have the heart to kick it out in the cold. They've put a blanket down, and a little food, but I don't think we'll be sleeping in the house any time soon. It seems the site is being run by two men and a cat, one day a week, plus the member-volunteers. Fiverr haven't even put a link to their own stuff here; their name is hardly mentioned anywhere; where CreativeLive had a banner on every forum page. But there's nothing to stop us posting How-to threads in the Photo.net Site Help forum. I recall something like that being done on the old platform. Even Flickr, which seems to have a lot of staff, encourages you to try the Flickr Help Forum (i.e. other users) first.

That was my fault. 😳 I copied a link to your Albums tab, to get its format, then overwrote it with Sanford's member number; but the URL it linked to was still yours. Now, it sends me to Sanford's Activity tab, because the Albums tab doesn't exist.

You mean here at photo.net? https://www.photo.net/profile/44041-sanford/?tab=node_photonetgallery_galleryImages If you manage to create that albums tab, that one will be https://www.photo.net/profile/44041-sanford/?tab=node_gallery_gallery

That exists in Flickr, but is quite well-hidden. If I go to my own page, there's an 'About' tab. On that tab, if you scroll down past my 'About me' text, and my 'Showcase' of my own favourites of my pictures, and the details of when I joined, my city, etc., there are these stats about my Flickr account: 457.6K views 1.4K tags 2.5K geotags 258 faves 55 groups And all those entries are clickable. The 'tags' entry links to https://www.flickr.com/photos/century_graphic/tags If I look at that while logged in as myself, it shows me an alphabetic list of all my tags, and for each how many times I have used it. When I look at the same list for one of my contacts, I don't see the numbers, just the list of tags (and not even one-to-a-line any more). I can click on any tag in the list and see the photos that have that tag. So I can click on my tag 'barn' and it sends me to https://www.flickr.com/photos/century_graphic/tags/barn/ - if I'm not logged in, I get shown half a dozen sample stock photos from a Flickr affiliate, and an ad for Flickr Pro accounts with my results. There's another thing about tags; Flickr has a bot that puts its own tags on your photos. When this was introduced, I was offered an opt-out, though it was clear the tags would still be applied; I just wouldn't see them. But those system tags seem only to be used for searching; they don't affect viewing via tags as I describe it above. As far as I can see, this is the only way to do this via mouse-clicks. Of course, you could write that url for yourself. If some of my photos were to do with my interest in civil war monuments, I could send fellow monument-visitors a link to flickr.com/photos/century_graphic/tags/civilwarmonuments/ And of course, you can do the same job with an Album named Civil War Monuments instead. Each photo can be in any number of overlapping albums, and submitted to interest-groups named 'UK monuments', 'English Civil War', 'Obsessing About the Past', etc.

This started early for me, because I use some old sizes. 127 film and quarter-plate have been hard to get for a long time. For 127 I mostly cut 120 film down for width, and for length too if I want to use it in a TLR. I contemplated buying a decent guillotine to cut 4x5 down to quarter-plate, but using a guillotine in complete darkness - really? So I do occasional orders from FotoImpex in Berlin and make them a worthwhile size so the shipping isn't too big a fraction of the total. I have also used Ag Photographic and Silverprint in the uk. My film activity has fallen off a bit; I haven't done an order from Berlin in a while. There are some things I can't get now because of Brexit, and there are frequently items out of stock. No shortage of daft 'effects' films. For a few common types of film, in 35mm and 120 size, and a couple in 4x5, I can buy it over the counter from one or two places in my city. I try to buy my HP5 and FP4 that way because if we don't buy the stuff, why would they stock it?

Glad that worked. I'm not sure what to make of the crack: I've never had a cracked lens. Maybe it'll make an obvious flaw in the photographs, but maybe you'll be lucky, as long as the two parts of the lens are correctly together. If one has shifted from the other, I'd expect a double image. The whole thing doesn't look in bad condition; so I think I might run a film through it, and see what you get!

There's a manual for the Contina at Mike Butks's site: https://www.butkus.org/chinon/zeiss_ikon/zeiss_ikon_contina/zeiss_ikon_contina.htm It seems you should press the two black plates at the sides of the front door together, near the top, to close the front.

Pictures of the lens and the folding struts would help us advise. 522/24 is the model number. Later versions are called Contina. http://camera-wiki.org/wiki/Contina According to Camera-wiki, it will have had a Tessar, a Xenar, or a Novar Anastigmat when it was made. None of these are hard to replace, though capable of taking good photos, especially the Tessar and Xenar. If they need you to pay someone for repair, it would be a labour of love, I think; that is, it would cost you more than buying another camera. 'Internally cracked' sounds bad. If any glass were to actually break, I would expect it to be the element exposed at the front. Might what you have be separation of two cemented elements (with the Xenar or Tessar)? Correcting that is tricky, but I have read people on the web who did it. I don't know if anyone does that commercially. I'd verify that the shutter works; you can cock it and release it; before getting into any repairs on the struts. Dropping the camera, or forcing it to close when it's not properly aligned, can screw up the struts so they'll never work properly again. First though, be sure you're trying to fold it right. I think you need to push the lens/shutter unit into the camera body a little, before it will let the door fold up. That's how my Super Dollina II shuts (different maker and years later, but a similar strut mechanism). Otherwise, look on the side of the lens/shutter unit, where the studs on the ends of the struts slide in a slot; are they binding there? Maybe you can free them, add a tinyy bit of grease or just run over the surfaces with a soft pencil as a lubricant. Also look at the joint where the struts cross; does that look like it's stuck; dirty, corroded? Maybe you can clean and lubricate it. Also look at the hinge of the folding front door; That could be dirty or corroded. Add a little oil or grease, and try to work it free, and wipe away any rust and dirt as you go. Good luck!

So that's a 2x3 camera? I have a pdf of a brochure for Fujinon lenses, which is more relaxed about the Copal sizes. It just says 35, 42 and 66mm. My Fujinon is in a Seiko #1 shutter, which is a little bigger than a Copal 1, and needs a 48mm hole. There's also a Seiko #0, which is supposed to be about the same as the Copal 0. I don't know if there are larger sizes of Seiko.

I had a look at Flickr; I can only find pictures of the battery holder with 5 normal AA cells: https://www.flickr.com/photos/schwigor/286776302/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/93988609@N05/32834607353/ However, I found a link to this page: http://www.fuwen.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=34&Itemid=84 .. where it says: The SL 2000 F / 3003 used 5 AA batteries. Interestingly 5 NiCd rechargeable batteries would work better than alkaline ones. On some bodies the shutter might get jammed when alkaline batteries were used. Some however had no problem. I had been using modern NiMH batteries with my SL 2000 F and 3003 and had found no problems so far. The SL 2000 F was supplied with empty battery housing that would accept 5 batteries. Later this convenient battery pack was discontinued and only integrated type of NiCd battery pack was supplied. The integrated type though convenient to use, but you will need to find some electricians to get the batteries replaced once they were faulty. So it seems likely that what you have is five Ni-Cd cells. Maybe you can find a way to charge that pack, though old NiCds aren't usually much good. If not, I guess yor options are to buy one of the empty battery holders, or pull the NiCd cells out of the one you have, and maybe add connectors at the top and bottom of it to put five standard AAs in series. You would then have the option of using disposable AAs, or NiMHs or even Lithium cells. Reading some of the old posts, it seems modern cells can damage the camera: maybe stick to alkaline ones if you manage to do this. Good luck!