lars_giner

Hey y'all,

yesterday I ran into a Yashica Electro 35 GT in a flea-market I regularly visit. They always seem to under-value older

film cameras. For example I found a very, very nice Ricoh FF-1S in mint condition with original case for SEK 50,

about 7 $. Well, I opened the eveready case to see what treasure that was hidden inside. Shame on me, I must

admit I was disappointed to find the old Yashica.

Back in 1981, when I took my first stumbling steps into photography, I bought a Chinon F-EE but soon I switched to

Nikon SLRs. I remember diving into the technical details of every camera presented in the photo magazines.

And the Yashica seemed like a remain from the past with its odd specifications. Sadly, it even served to decrease

the value of the Yashica brand, whereas Nikon, Canon and Pentax, possibly Minolta were the top-of-the-line

competitors. Yashica was for nerds not knowing better, and for poor people that could as well stick to a Praktica.

(remember I was only 16 yo, which is my only excuse).

I put it back and went away. But later, I decided to come back and pick it up. The price was SEK 40, about 6 $.

I thought I might be able to get some money by selling it on the BIIIG auction site.

I took it home and had a closer look at it. The external shape is excellent and it seems unbelievably clean, all the

way from inside and out.

Reluctantly I was impressed by the smoothness of its controls and its priceless feeling of quality. Its weight

suggested it had been constructed by the same fellow who made the German WWII tanks. Then I searched the web

for more information, and was amazed by the wealth of praise over it.

So, I decided to keep it and put a roll in it just for fun.

But the main issue is, wth did the designers actually have in mind making it so fabolously large? It's HUGE !!!

The body could easily be mistaken for a 6x7 camera. As I generally prefer gadgets with the best combination of

small size and nice features, I adore the Minox 35 style. Then, the placement of the lens makes it seem intended for

a left-handed person, as there is little space to the right of the lens to keep the camera steady, but too much body to

the left to easily focus the lens...and the focusing ring is the inner-most of the three control rings, which seems weird

to me. I guess my new friend will have a hard job to justify itself for these spots. Bokèh, huh ?

Well, don't tell anyone, but I love it...damn...

As I am an optometrist I would like to add a few details on this subject. I tried making this low-tech rangefinder and it seems to work correctly. However, it is urgent to have a certain level of visual acuity on both eyes to be able to read the lines and align them to the distant subject.This will exclude persons with so-called amblyopia, i.e. functionally one-eyed individuals.Furthermore,special attention should be paid when wearing bifocal or multifocal spectacles, as they possibly might distort the image.Such spectacle lenses are usually customized to fit the (converging) pupil distance at near vision, thus creating a slight move of the image,probably creating a major error when reading the measured distance on the RF card.

And, finally, the easiest way to obtain a correct measurement of your pupil distance is to visit your local optician, who will use a device made for this sole purpose.

Best regards!

Lars Giner