jason_withers

Yes, one of the most beautiful!!

I’d recommend reaching out to CameraWorks in Latham, NY. I think they will repair the Medalist cameras. Log into Facebook | Facebook

Here are a couple more

Kodak Chevron 620 camera. I love the heft of this one. Feels good in the hands, but I wish the viewfinder was bigger. Stellar Ektar lens!

Late 40s or early 50s Kodak Reflex II 620 film TLR camera. 120 size will fit if you trim the plastic flanges of the spool down. You’ll need a 620 size take up spool though. The twin 80mm Anastar lenses are pretty sharp!

Rick, do you find that most of the old gear you by works as it should, or do you have to send a lot of it off to get fixed (or fix it yourself)? For me, its usually the latter....

Ooops, didn't realize I was adding on to an old thread.... the OP probably found something by now.

Older light meters can still be pretty accurate and also easily adjustable if they aren't. I use my trusty General Electric PR-1. They are cheap online and have that classic look. Easy to use as well!

Thanks Chuck! Yeah, Fomapan R is already a reversal film, but I had the guy at dr5 chrome run it through his usual process (which turns negative film into a positive) as I was curious what the results would look like and I had difficulty finding anyone here in the states that would process b&w slide film. I think the yellow filter helped darken the coloring of the deep blue skies that day since we were at a high altitude.

Thanks Ralf! I do like the results of this dr5 processing, and I would use it again. I may try some of the T-max films next time and see how those turns out.

Thanks Mike and Hunter. Mike, that’s great that you inherited some of your great aunt’s slides that she took with the camera. I imagine the colors on the Kodachromes still look great after all these years! Hunter, my Kodak Signet 35 certainly wasn’t perfect when it arrived to me. The viewfinder was very dirty and the shutter wouldn’t reliably fire at all speeds. A service tag inside indicated that it was last serviced by Kodak many decades ago. I knew I wanted to use it and didn’t want to have to worry about the shutter failing, but I didn’t want to try fooling with it myself. So, I sent it off to Camera Works in Latham, NY and they CLAd it and I believe may have ultrasonically cleaned some of the pivot points and shutter to make sure it fired reliably. I later bought another Signet 35 (later version with the x-sync flash) and the shutter works on all speeds and didn’t require any repair work, so I’ve been using that one as well. I too am a big Kodak camera fan. All the models I have are interesting, if not quirky! But, I just don’t get excited when using other film camera variants by Canon or Nikon the way I do when I use one my Kodaks. I have a Nikon F2 and FE that a friend gifted to me, but they do absolutely nothing for me, so I don’t use them.

Well, every camera has some limitations. The viewfinder on this particular model is fairly small, but it’s useable and the rangefinder works wells. Having to manually cock the shutter for each exposure does slow the camera down a bit. I’d sometimes forget to set it before taking the picture, but a minor inconvenience. I wouldn’t say that this model would be the best camera for fast critical work, but it’s a durable, pocketable camera. It’s well made to boot. When I bought the camera, the viewfinder was pretty dim, but expected after 60+ years. I had it cleaned and it vastly improved its usability. I think it’s a fun camera to use :)

Thanks Dave! Yeah, I was pleased with how the processing turned out. The film has an interesting look and I think it worked well with the arid landscape of the White Mountains.

This past may, my partner and I took a long overdue trip to California and visited Yosemite, as well as the Bristlecone Pine Forest in Bishop. For the trip, I wanted to take along a camera that was fairly light weight, portable and would also easily fit into a jacket pocket and not be burdensome to carry on day hikes. I also did not want to have to fool around with multiple lenses or batteries. My Signet 35 camera fit the bill perfectly! For those that may not be familiar with this camera, it's pretty small for a 35mm rangefinder, and only has 4 shutter speeds (25, 50, 100, and 300), but it does have a nice 44mm f/3.5 Ektar lens. Since the camera is all mechanical, without a light meter, I also carried my trusty G.E. PR-1 exposure meter. I brought along a couple rolls of Fomapan R100 film, a yellow filter, and a lens hood. I unfortunately didn't research in advance where to develop the Fomapan film once I finished the rolls, but I came across a guy in Iowa (dr5.us) online who takes traditional rolls of B&W negative film and runs them through a reversal process he created to get B&W slides. Of course, Fomapan R is already a reversal film, but I thought the results came out well through his processing. A few shots from the Bristlecone Pine Forest are below. I hope you enjoy! #1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11 #12

I feel fairly confident that the Retina reaches at least close to 1/500, as I had it CLAd a bit ago and it was brought to spec when it was done. I haven’t finished the roll of film as of yet, but now that I’ve played around with it, the whole setup is a bit impractical to use with any frequency with the camera. The 522 flash with the retina reflex III is incredibly heavy and so I’d only use it occasionally. I agree with others too that a slower shutter speed would probably be better in most situations to capture some of the ambient light available.

Thanks AJG! Yeah I feel more confident to try it out with the Retina than I would with a DSLR.

Thanks Mike. I might experiment with it a bit to see what happens if I follow the instructions as written and use the flash with the 1/500 of a second shutter speed. The instruction manual just cautions to not use a shutter speed that is above 1/850 second, but perhaps it will still offer the proper exposure at 1/500 with leaf shutters.

I recently picked up an old Sunpak 522 auto thyristor flash and would like to use it with my Kodak Retina Reflex III camera. The instructions for the flash unit say to set your camera to the highest flash sync speed, which should be 1/500 sec since this is a leaf shutter camera and then match the aperture and film speed. My question is in auto mode on this flash unit, should the shutter on the camera always be set to 1/500 for proper exposure (and only vary the aperture setting)?

Another TLR camera which often gets overlooked due to the 620 film format is the Kodak Reflex II. It's a 40s-50s era camera, but has very sharp 80mm Anastar lenses and the overall construction of the camera is great. Very solid! I believe it was also the first TLR to use a fresnel viewing screen and its quite bright! I don't bother respooling the film onto 620 spools, I just trim the plastic flanges of the 120 roll down so they are flush and then smooth them out a bit and they fit perfectly in the camera. It's a very minor inconvenience IMO to be able to use this gem of a camera. Just grab yourself some metal 620 take up spools and you're in business. Kodak Reflex II - Matt's Classic Cameras Kodak Reflex II

Some folks just getting into photography may not want to learn techniques using a digital camera. They might just want to start with a manual film camera.

Also, check with Mike Butkus. It looks like he has the repair manuals for the Reflex I and II on his website Kodak repair manual, kodak service manual, Kodak carousel parts manual

I love these Kodak TLRs. They are capable of very sharp photos. I've both the I and II but haven't taken the lenses off before. The focus on the II is a bit stiff, probably from the decades old grease, but it works well enough and the fresnel lens in the viewfinder is great. John, you are right regarding the fixing point on the side being for the flash as Kodak made a dedicated flash bracket for these cameras. I hope you get the focus sorted out on yours.

Few pics from the Kodak Chevron camera. Ektar 100 film

I dunno about that. Just search completed sales for the Contax T3. There are at least 12 that recently sold for $1,500 +. That's crazy if you ask me.

Have seen quite a few Contax T series P&S cameras on the big online auction site lately. I don't remember them fetching the huge prices people seem to be asking now, some upwards of $1,500. They must be the greatest point and shoot ever if someone is willing to pay those kind of prices!