john_robison4

<p>The 'one camera-one lens' school of thought has been much discussed over the years. In many cases it comes down to personal preference and working style. It is for myself a "good idea" that is none the less hard to implement in real life. It is easier to do if shooting with a fixed lens camera, then you have no choice but to play to the strengths of that angle of view. For miniature format, ie 35mm, I prefer to mount a 40~45 degree 'normal' lens and carry a moderate 65~75 degree wide angle in a vest pocket. You mentioned the Pen F with 25mm lens. I have that combo but with the slower but very compact f4 optic. With that camera I'll mount the 38mm f1.8 and slip both the 25 f4 and 100 f3.5 into a cargo pocket of my vest. I find it mentally difficult to go forth with only one lens.</p>

<p>Are you going to use the autofocus lenses? If you intend to use manual focus then most OVF's in these cameras just don't work well. My 410 screen is too bright and does not have enough 'tooth' to nail focus in manual and I never could get a replacement plain matte screen like the 1-10 I use for my OM film cameras.</p>

<p>What I think is funny was the "film is dead" proclamations by so many early digital adopters ten or so years ago. Although the precipitous drop in film sales of 90% or more has now abated, and even turned around in a small way, film simply has not 'gone away' as some predicted. The market today is small but seems healthy, especially compared to the disastrous drop in compact and interchangeable lens digital cameras brought on by various factors, i-phone improvements among those factors. Of course I could be a real contrarian and say 'classic manual cameras?' bah, real photographers only use wet plate.</p>

<p>Back in the old film days (and now in the current film days) us folks who shot 'half frame' sure talked about 'equivalent focal length, generally a 1.4X factor or with best crop of the 24X36 negative a 1.33X factor on the enlarger. Of course a 50mm lens stuck on my Pen F with an adapter is still 50mm but the angle of view/field size at a given distance is less than full frame.</p>

<p>That is true Glen, Mine is a post war model, from what I can tell early 50's production. It certainly is fancy for a 6X9 box camera with a instant/bulb shutter w/lock, double exposure prevention, cable release fitting, standard PC flash sync, 1/4-20 tripod bush, three focus zones, three apertures, and a Goerz Frontar lens (not marked for FL) and a slide cover for the red window.</p> <p>Strangly, last night my neighbor just handed me a Ansco Shur Shot, kind of grubby but it still works. It is absolutely minimal and made out of wood, cardboard and metal and uses 120 roll film so no respooling needed.</p>

<p>Mike, I have a Box Tengor but to my great shame I have not finished it's first roll I put in over a year ago. No excuse suffices so I won't offer one.</p>

<p>The RC will be the least troublesome, long term. The more complicated shutter of the RD is more likely to arrive either gummed up or be slow. The RC has a slower lens but is smaller and lighter. If you get an RC then order a 43.5mm to 43mm step down filter ring from one of those E-bay sellers from Hong Kong. Then you will have access to the much cheaper and available 43mm size filters.</p>

<p>Kinda off topic but it would be nice if someone made a nice little 120 film 6X9 box camera. A 90mm f11 single element lens with a rotating disc plate with waterhouse stops for f16 and f22. A simple shutter with 1/50 and 'B', standard mechanical cable release socket, 1/4-20 tripod bush and lens set for infinity and a couple of add on plus diopter lenses for closer. Could be threaded for some common filter size, say 49mm.<br> It would probably only wind up costing $400 each.<br> Sorry, that last was a little snarky.</p>

<p>I think limited production and sales would = expensive. Certainly not a mass market item which would be needed to hold down costs.</p>

<p>Sometimes buying just discontinued models make good economic sense. New in box with full warranty but discontinued can run a 30~40 percent discount over introduction price. The feature changes between the latest and 2 year old model sometimes are not major improvements in IQ or they don't address any of the features you find important to you personally. Just another thing to factor in to a purchase decision.</p>

<p>Usually 'last a while' and 'digital' are not in the same sentence. Depends on what you mean by "...a while" Certainly nothing like your 20 years with the SRT. But 5~7 years would be reasonable I think for a current mirrorless offering.</p>

<p>I've never seen a Gami except in photos. It looks somewhat large compared to smaller 16mm submini cameras such as the aforementioned Mamiya 16 and the Minolta 16II</p> <p>I really like the Minolta because finding NOS film cartridges to reload is not too hard, I have a dozen, and reloading them is a snap. The Mamiya's retractable metal frame finder works ok, and there are no optics in it to get fingerprints on. I also like that it has a standard cable release attachment on the shutter button. As you can probably tell I like small and so I am willing to give up a few features to obtain it. </p> <p> </p>

<p>Of all the 16mm submini's I think the one that checks the most features, at least for me, is the Mamiya 16 Super. Compact, focusing lens, retractable viewfinder (relates to 'compact') usable range of shutter speeds and apertures, full manual control.</p> <p>The only downside to the Mamiya is hard to find film cartridges, the metal ones. Oh yes, lack of a regular PC flash connection. Really not too much of a problem, I think that in the last 15 years I've used flash with a submini once, or perhaps twice. </p>

<p>What! No Minoltas?</p>

<p>Yeah, what Knut and Robin said. Also, regarding repair, just curious but would not this be a less expensive fix just to replace the rear cemented group? That is, if Leica could furnish it as a replacement part.</p>

<p>Buy SLR,s that are fully mechanical in operation. They might still be broken but at least no 'weird' faults related to the electronics. As a companion to the OM-4 you can pick up a nice OM-1 body for not much money.<br> This opinion is not intended to disregard Gus Lazzari's excellent advice. If you can it is nice to get these fine cameras up and running. </p>

<p>To bad you had the OM-10 just serviced. If the advance has been damaged you might find overlapping frames on your next roll. If not, then the body should be ok to continue to use. OM-1 bodies can now be had for $50~100 and are all mechanical, if your OM-10 has been damaged I'd go that route instead of getting it repaired.</p>

<p>NM- That is a fun challenge. I'm an old timer who remembers Minox sales reps back in the early 70's who would set up a camera on copy stand and using line copy film photograph a standard 8.5 X 11 inch printed page. They would then enlarge the negatives and you could read every line on the page. Of course this was like microfiche film, negatives of soot and chalk, so not really useful for continuous tone grey scale reproduction. Hope you are able to sort out your image chain to get the results you want.</p>

<p>Looks like yours are higher contrast and he has added a sepia tone to his scanned film. Detail appears similar, that Minox lens is certainly amazing. I've been shooting old Ilford Pan F (exp. 2010) at ISO 25 in 1:60 HC110 as a one shot because that is what I got on hand. If I manage not to scratch the dickens out of it, then it's not too bad, considering. Certainly nowhere near the performance this guy gets.</p> <p>This is what I think. I'm not going to shoot a 8X11mm negative and then try to make it look like 35mm, for that I got 35mm.</p>

<p>Good one Sandy. When folks ask why I still shoot film I tell them the truth, that is, because that is what the cameras I like take. To be honest the Fuji X-T1 with a shutter speed dial and understandable controls did interest me, especially if I could adapt my OM lenses to it, in the end though, I just cannot stand to spend $1000 [ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS!!!]. Especially when about 3 weeks ago I went to a photo show and there were several OM-1 bodies, all working, but I didn't check the meters, from about $15 to $25 each, depending on how worn they looked. I didn't buy anything, my current OM's refuse to wear out and, with a flick of the thumb I set a new sensor at the film gate for every shot.</p>

<p>Same way I manage now, except a decade ago I switched to HC110. When they make a digital back for my OM-1, (the same time I flap my arms and fly like a bird) then I'll shoot digital.</p>

<p>In William White's list there is one minor quibble. The Minolta 16II is a 22mm, not 25mm focal length lens. My personal experience with these 16II cameras is they are good for the price. I've never paid more than $20 for one. They are also very reliable, simple and almost always work. The major problem, in my view is that they are fixed focus at 2.5M, about 8 ft., and you have to use tiny and fiddly supplementary lenses to bring the focus to any other distance. Very slow and inconvenient. Outside and walking about I've often just left the "0" lens on the camera and let DOF cover as best it can. The "0" lens is a minus .25 diopter that brings focus to 10M, about 33 feet. At that focus point, even at f2.8 objects in the far distance still appear to be in focus for small prints.</p>

<p>The Steky has a quirky look to it, neat in a old fashioned mechanical sort of way. Too bad the lens does not focus. That really limits it's usefulness IMO.</p>

<p>Years ago I bought one of those 3 element .42X aux fisheye lenses that had a series 7 thread and mine came with a 49mm to series 7 adapter. It was a cheap closeout for $15 from a JCPenney catalog. I have been surprised at the results. Stopped down to f11 I'd say you could make perfectly acceptable 5X7 prints. Used on a 50mm lens it would cover the frame with about 170 degrees across the diagonal and a 28mm lens rendered a nearly circular image with black corners. Cheap fun to play around with. I still see these .42X lenses available with several filter thread choices on ebay but I think they may be different from mine which is almost 30 years old.</p>

<p>Rick, just looked at that offer on the trioplan. Holy cow!? Fifteen hundred Euros!? If I wanted a 100mm f2.8 in an M42 mount I'd stick with a much more affordable 105mm Takumar.</p>