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<p>The above pictures were on FP4+. I shifted to Pan-F for the following ones, not for finer grain (which wouldn't be useful, given the limits of the lens) but for slower speed on a bright day.</p><div></div>

<p>The next picture is a brutal thing to do to a Brownie: uncoated lens, one shutter speed and one aperture, shooting into the sun.</p><div></div>

<p>It doesn't show when the pictures are on social media or most web pages, but blown up to do dust-spotting I can see some camera shake on a lot of them. The camera is lightweight and the shutter is slow, so even being careful you get some movement.</p><div></div>

<p>As I noted in a post some months ago, my <a href="/classic-cameras-forum/00dEgD?start=10">Brownie Hawkeye Flash</a> is the camera I take out in the snow. It's sturdy plastic, mostly, so it doesn't hurt if it gets a bit wet; there are no batteries to wimp out in the cold; and no light meter to make white snow into a medium gray. So the Brownie went out to play in the snow we had here (Washington DC area) in January.</p><div></div>

<p>Of the several cameras I've presented, the Brownie got more responses and comments than any other. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's the sheer amazement that something so--<em>unsophisticated</em> can do so well. Or the challenge of using it, like writing a sonnet in a foreign language. It is gratifying to the scientist in me that we all seem to agree on the range of best focus.<br> As to the number of photographers who started with a Brownie--well, maybe everyone starts with something like a Brownie, and most stay there. Or perhaps if you can do something with a camera at this level, you've learned most of what you need for any camera.</p>

<p>Thanks for the encouraging comments. <strong>Chuck</strong>, the UV project is still in progress; I'm not sure where to post it, here or in the "alternative" section. Few things reflect much in the UV, the sky is bright, so in general it looks like a bright overcast day on the coal planet. There is an old-time feel, because of course in the old days emulsions were only sensitive to UV and blue. It's not spectacular and surreal like infrared. (If you can make it out, in the picture of the building there's a street sign. You can't read it because the white and dark green paint look the same in the UV.) <strong>David</strong>, the first picture (inside at the party) was taken with the Summar, the first UV with the Summar also, the building with the Elmar. <strong>John</strong>, point well taken on the importance of condition for prewar lenses, as well as Soviet counterfeits. I will keep my eye out for opportunities, but it appears there's no drastic need for a different lens.</p>

<p>Thanks for looking. I have many more pictures from this camera, but not many scanned.</p>

<p>That wasn't an overcast day; in fact there was a clear blue sky.<br> I do have a question for people who know about such things. I'm aware there are very, very good lenses for Leicas, legendary in their performance. From a bit of online reading I gather that the summitar is better than the summar, and the summicron better than either--though of course I could be seeing someone's prejudice or have misread something. Is there an uncoated (=prewar) lens for the thread-mount Leica that is significantly better than the summar and elmar?</p>

<p>And here is an old wood house, here in Alexandria (Virginia), surrounded by newer brick buildings (and cars):</p><div></div>

<p>The f/2 Summar is fast enough to handle low-light situations, like a party lit only from the windows. There<em> is</em> flare from the uncoated lens; sometimes it's an interesting effect. The "backlight suppression" feature of my scanner supresses it very much in the picture above; if I were to print that in an enlarger, there's be big haloes.<br> So the Leica III has proven unexpectedly good at pictures of people, especially in low-light situations, once I got used to its idiosyncracies and limitations (especially flare). Along the way I've picked up several filters, which are push-on and set-screw types, which bother me a little. The polarizer is more ingenious than useful, I find. I might like it more if I shot more color.<br> Oh, the ultraviolet project? I'm still working it out. It's not as striking or spectacular as infrared (which I've done with the Leica also). People with sunscreen on look as if they're coated with black oil. Vegetation is dark. Here are a couple of examples:</p><div></div>

<p>And yet, this is one of my favorites. A small part of that is the satisfaction of making it work--real klutz's don't operate prewar Leicas. Part of it is the feel. I can only describe it this way: other cameras are held in place by springs, and rattle if shaken; this one is held in place by things fitting together exactly. The cliche "Swiss watch" comes to mind.<br> But mostly, once I've conformed to its habits, it's a small, quiet, unobtrusive camera of excellent quality. People don't notice it, or quickly forget it's there; just as Henri Cartier-Bresson found. (I am <em>not</em> comparing myself to him.) Just look at it there next to the Contax: the f/2 Sumar is far less threatening than the f/1.4 Planar. The SLR is built around the heavy-caliber lens, while the Leica is a more compact bit of machinery.<br> That said, going to the 90mm Elmar and the necessary viewfinder, the package is no longer unobtrusive and compact. The Elmar is not a telephoto: the lens is actually 90mm from the film. And the viewfinder is mirror-reversed (meaning vertical compositions are seen upside-down) and not magnified, seen at the end of a tunnel. More to get used to.<br> And the Elmar, when in one's luggage, gets attention from the TSA people. I suppose it looks like a gun barrel or something. To their credit, whenever they've asked me to open things up, they've always been impressed by the fine old machine.</p><div></div>

<p>This is a camera designed by and intended for people who know what they're doing, sort of the Linux of cameras. The rangefinder window is separate from the viewfinder, and both are small and dim. (In fact, in a museum once, with lots of bright pinpoint lighting, there were enough reflections off the knurled ring around the rangefinder that I couldn't see to focus, and had to guess.) There are two separate dials for the shutter speed, and you have to have one set in the right position if you're using the other. The shutter speeds are not in any standard progression: 1, 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/20, 1/30, 1/40, 1/60, 1/100, 1/200, 1/500. Sometimes you have the luxury of third-stop adjustment; sometimes you have to ponder whether you'll need to use a different aperture. And loading! There are people who will tell you the bottom-loading Leicas are actually easy to do. They are mistaken. You can learn the process to the point where it becomes normal; but that's not the same thing.</p><div></div>

<p>This is my other favorite camera, along with the <a href="/classic-cameras-forum/00dPJJ?unified_p=1">Rolleiflex</a>. They're different enough that in most ways they don't compete, so I don't have a first favorite and a second favorite.<br> <br />Several years ago I had three working cameras, a 35mm SLR, a 645 SLR and the Rollei (plus a non-working 35mm rangefinder that was repaired later). I did not need another camera. But I conceived a project (working in the ultraviolet) for which an uncoated lens was necessary. That meant, essentially, a prewar camera; and one of high quality, so there'd be someone who would repair it if necessary (as opposed to my<a href="/classic-cameras-forum/00dI5n"> Agfa</a>, which no one would look at because it was too cheap to be worth repairing). After doing my research, I settled on either a Leica or a Contax. Going into a camera shop, one of those that had been around forever and is now gone, I asked about the Contax there in the window. The salesman asked if I intended to shoot with it, and when I said yes, he said, "I wouldn't do it to you." The shutter curtain was too likely to break and too hard to fix. So I wound up with the Leica III, a 1934 model, at a reasonable price. It is not the IIIf or IIIg, which can sync with flash and are thus more expensive, but I had no intention of using it with flash. It's not even the IIIb, where the rangefinder and viewfinder windows are right together. There it is, on the left.</p><div></div>

<p>I like the colors of the flowers; certainly underexposure helps with transparency film. My experience is that 1/3-stop under is best, even 1/2 stop is too much (though it can be tricky to do depending on the settings on the particular camera)--can you read the installed meter to 1/3 stop?<br> The lighting and the camera do make the colors and details of the sunlit pictures pop out. Good shots.</p>

<p>The GE is also marked in 1/3-stops, but calibrated in foot-candles, since when you take off the hood entirely it's an incident-light meter. I've never used it that way, though.<br> Comparing the Weston to the formula in Ansel Adam's book (calculating from candles-per-square-foot to exposure, there in chapter 4 of <em>The Negative)</em>, I find the Weston giving 1/3 stop less exposure. And doing some research I find that old Weston ASA figures are indeed different from others; George said 2/3 stop, which may apply to the current system. Some systems measure from a certain base-fog-plus-density, and Adams framed his calculation in terms of medium gray, which may account for part of the diversity. I leave it to an expert to explain the matter. I haven't had a problem with any consistent under- or overexposure; I suppose my picture-taking is not precise enough.<br> Ironically, a Gossen Luna-Pro I bought later in order to have an up-to-date meter sees almost no use. It took the old mercury battery, and the Wein cells that replace it have a short lifespan.<br> Anyway, Geoge Milton does an excellent job. Again.</p>

<p>Note that it's prominently marked in 1/3-stop intervals. That's rather finer than you really need for most picture-taking, but it does encourage you to think precisely about what you're doing. The meter is calibrated in candles per square foot, so you can translate directly to the Ansel Adams books if you're so inclined. Also, the range from underexposed (U) to overexposed (O) is seven stops, a bit less than current emulsions can handle; and the center (the silver arrow) is not exactly in the middle of this range.</p><div></div>

<p>Last month, with one good-as-new meter and two that probably needed calibration at least, I called up George again. He was happy to take the GE and the second Weston. In fact he called the GE a "collector's item," and was impressed at its good condition. He did a superb job on the Weston, replacing the high-low light baffle, the calculation dial (which had a bit of its paint scraped off)--indeed, the whole front plate--and found a good-as-new leather case for it! To top it all off, he also had an original user's manual. It's the sort of job that old camera people like us dream of.</p> <div></div>

<p>As I mentioned in my description of the <a href="/classic-cameras-forum/00dI5n">Agfa Super Silette</a>, when I graduated from Instamatics to a real camera I got a light meter at the same time (now there were adjustments to make, and the camera had no installed meter). The meter was a Weston Master II, silenium cell (no batteries required), reasonably antiquated even at the time. As with the camera, after some hard use the meter was pretty beat-up: the cover glass had broken, the needle was broken off; one couldn't use it. And as with the camera, I was told by repairman after repairman that it wasn't worth fixing. But I never got rid of it.<br> Finally, a few years ago I heard about Quality Light-Metric there in Hollywood, and sent them the meter. George Milton fixed it up good as new: needle, cover glass, calibration. It still looks new (on the left in the photo below).<br> In the meantime, while stuck with a broken meter, I moved to England and found another Weston II in a camera shop there. Although the design was now thoroughly antique, I stayed with it. It's there on the right. I used it for many years, until the leather cover was falling apart, things were loose inside, and I distrusted the low-light readings. Still functional, though.<br> In the mean-meantime, when I was separated from the second Weston, I found the GE meter there in the center, and picked it up. It was sold "as-is," with no guarantee of calibration or even that it would work at all. It seemed functional, though I didn't trust it at low light levels.</p><div></div>

<p><strong>Lance</strong>, I'm aware of several adapters for the Rolleiflex to shoot other formats, but I'd never heard of one for 645. Since I already have a Mamiya M645, which works very well for that format, I'm not sure I'm highly motivated to find one; but certainly a few extra frames on a roll could be very useful sometimes. If I found a Rolleikin (35mm) adapter lying around unused I might try it out. A friend sent me a plate adapter: one can use 6x9cm plates; I've never used it, and of course plates are not in production now. (I think Ilford <em>may</em> do them as part of their annual one-off.) Someone seems to have modified it for sheet film, but 6x9 sheet film is also hard to get. Mostly I admire it for the fine machining.</p>

<p><strong>Rick</strong>, excellent presentation. If you keep this up, we'll all know our way around your hometown without ever having set foot there.<br> The shutter release is pushed front-to-back, toward your face, is that right? That seems a bit awkward. The same motion as the Argus Seventy-Five, which I found conducive to blurred pictures. But that's waist-level viewing, so I suppose this is better--at least the results say so.</p>

<p><strong>Subbarayan</strong>, I forgot the shutter button as something peculiar. You have to flip up the collar, then press down on the post; easily enough done with forefinger and thumb and something I don't even think about now. But it is different from the normal way of just pressing down on a button. I suppose it's intended to keep from taking pictures in the bag, or while walking along, though I wouldn't think that's a problem. </p>

<p>I'm still not entirely sure why this is my favorite camera. Maybe I just see square.</p><div></div>

<p>I don't think this is a great picture (I caught Teressa with a very unflattering expression), but I think the square composition works.<br> In landscapes, the wider-than-50mm-standard format can act to draw your eyes from the foreground to the background effectively:</p><div></div>

<p>(which clearly could use someone more experienced with scanning prints). But panoramas and telephoto shots are best done with a different camera.<br> I find it's very good at taking pictures of people. Not close-up head shots; that produces distortion that I think is simply ugly (though Henle has a few in his book); but half-body compositions, and groups of two, or several people. The waist-level camera with the quiet shutter is, no doubt, a bit less threatening than a big lens held at eye level (as <a href="http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2015/07/the-fauxliflex-chronicles.html">John Kennerdell</a> concludes). My point is that the compositions one finds of small groups are often square ones, like this:</p><div></div>

<p>Why is this my favorite? I'm not completely sure. It's not as capable as the M645, for all that Rollei promoters consider it the most versatile of all possibilities (though Alex Perlman's <em>Rollei Manual</em>, 3rd ed., 1957 and Frits Henle's <em>Guide to Rollei Photography</em>, 1956 both antedate the M645 by decades, there were equivalents out there even then). The single lens is the most obvious limitation. You can in fact crop and enlarge the big negative to produce something like a telephoto picture, like this one:</p><div></div>