Tangling with a $5 eBay find ... Franken-sr-T

IT'S ALIVE!!!!  ALIVE!!!!!

Well, I decided to find a cheap broke (not really broke) camera on eBay.  I found an old Minolta 35mm SLR.  Minolta sr-T101.  I bought it for $5.00 and it cost $9.50 to ship it.  Hey, if nothing else it is parts and that would total much higher were I to purchase only a dozen of the hundreds that make this beauty work.  Well worth it.

So, I get it.  It needs some TLC.  And when I begin to trip the shutter at longer exposures (1/8th or longer) the shutter curtains are moving slow enough and separated from each other enough so that the curtains cannot engage the mirror return spring and, randomly, the curtain even stays open, not travelling all the way to the left side of the back of the mirror box to end exposure.  So, not only some TLC but a CLA.

The seller also stated the light meter did not work.  Now, sometimes a little foam can flake off inside the top of the camera or, as in this case, a little grease can accumulate inside the edges of a small hole in the side of the exposure meter moving coil set.  So I disassembled the camera.  I removed the top cover by removing the winding lever, the S/S-ISO dial and the rewind crank and four micro screws.  I then was able to remove to screws holding in the prism retainer and lift the prism from above the ground glass.  There was, indeed, a little grime built up in the travel area of the meter needles.  So I removed that, cleaned all surfaces that I had access to, including the viewfinder lens once I removed the assembly.  Put it all together, et viola!

Light meter, check.  Timer, check.  Aside from the curtains not closing for long exposures (so I shoot it at short exposures) is that the DOF preview button is completely missing from the lower right side of the front face of the camera.  The only concern there is that something might inadvertently work its way inside the camera and gum up the hole works.  So I need to find something suitable to plug that up with until I get a true parts camera and can rob the part from it.

I love buying these old cameras that not many know about and getting them up and running again.  Feels good.  And for $5.00 plus post I have another camera.  Win-win in my book.

Admittedly, there is one little thing.  I have four extra screws and do not know where they should have went.  But everything is sandwiched together and operating properly and I am not adventurous for a second breakdown tonight.

Thanks, Dad.  I get it honest.

Another Page Turns

Well, today is my 45th birthday.  45 years ago I sprang forth unto the scene, full of cries and waughs.  I was such a cute baby.  What went wrong.

I have had a camera in my hands and making photographs seriously and otherwise, on and off again, since 1982 with an old box camera for a Christmas gift from my grandmother, Mary Walrath.  It was not an earth shattering gift, I did not see any direction at that early stage.  But I, to this day, fondly remember using that camera and a couple photographs used with it.

I was given a Kodak Disc Camera for Christmas in 1984.  I did not use it much.  however, I documented my own 15th birthday party.  Wow, 30 years ago.  I have a lot of photographs of good childhood friends to this day as a result.  Dean, Mark, GT and others.  No great shakes this camera, but it more than served it purpose.

I then took a point and shoot with me on a mission trip to Ensenada in 1986.  I exposed a few rolls down there.  A lot of landscapes of the desert and coastal mountains which have not survived to this day.  I recall them, though and one might think that given the skill I have today there might have been something going.  As they were, they were documents of what I was experiencing so that I could show all once I returned.

I used my mother's X-370 for yearbook senior year.  I don't recall shooting much that made the yearbook, if anything.  But I made some pretty decent photographs with the camera and black and white film at my youth group in Dover, Delaware in 1989.  I still have a few of those.  Some good poses and a couple of fantastic candids.

I then bounced around a few cameras until I was given my first camera in 1997.  A Minolta XG-M.  And my own photography began in earnest.  I learned the basics of control by using that little yellow booklet that Kodak published on making better 35mm photographs.  The name escapes me but that was probably it.

I used this camera off and on for a few years.  My mother, Kathryn, had learned the ins and outs well enough to get me started down the road of learning how to manipulate a camera through the exposure settings and depth of field and such.  I poured over the pages of Outdoor Photography and fancied myself a Galen Rowell wannabe.

Then in October 2001, Dad and I escaped one weekend to the Outer Banks and I accidentally made the photograph that pushed me over the edge.  We visited old haunts and ended up at Bodie Island Lighthouse. The light was flat, a front had rolled through the night before.  I had made a couple of lackluster exposures.  We pile in the Jeep and I begin to back out of the space when I look up and the lighthouse is brightly lit by the sun.  I scramble out, stalling the Jeep and almost backing over my own foot in the process.  I snap a horizontal and vertical shot of the lighthouse and the turbulent clouds beyond and get back in and we go our way.  Imagine my surprise when getting the photographs back from Cutler Camera in the Dover Mall and finding that someone had stuck a photograph in with all the pictures.  And to this day, I have seen one or two photographs of the Light that rival mine.

In 2002 my photography took off.  I was burning film.  About 40 rolls that year.  On my salary, that was a good bit.  In 2003 I joined my mother in her wedding and portrait business, A Moment In Time Photography.  In 2005 I joined APUG (www.apug.org), the Analog Photography Users Group and have enjoyed a lot of conversations there over the last few years.  Made a few friends as well.  In 2006 I purchased a Mamiya M645j medium format camera.  Also in 2006 I discovered Ansel Adams, his work and his technical series of books.  It is here where I am forced forward in photography.  And I have NEVER looked back.  In 2007 I began to process my own film.  In 2008 I began to make my own prints.  That year I also purchased my first large format camera and made a few exposures with expired Polaroid P/N 55 film.  And on and on.

Yes, a lot has happened in my life.  But, seeing as this is a photography blog after all, I thought it would be good to share my progression through photography through the years.  A lot of people have been influencial to me.  Mary Walrath (grandmother), Kathryn Walrath (mommy), Dot Tarbuck, Damon Clauss (grandfather), Galen Rowell, Ansel Adams, many others, and of course my late wife Faith Elisabeth Walrath.  How I miss her.  She was just really getting into photography. And she encouraged my own photography.  I really appreciated her in my life.

So, what lies ahead?  No one knows.  But I can hardly wait for it to get here.  It will be so grand.

Happy Birthday to me, I guess.

Stones - Mispillion River - Milford, Delaware - 2009 (work print)

Stones - Mispillion River - Milford, Delaware - 2008 (work print)

Technical Gobbledygook:

Neopan 400
HC110b for 6'00" at 20C

Nikon N75 w/ 35-80 zoom
No exposure recorded

Printed on Orient Seagull RC-VC II 8x10 glossy
Enlarger used: Fujimoto Lucky 60M (Little Boy)
Enlarger Height 20"
Aperture f/11
Exposure time 22 seconds
Controls: Dodging for the last six seconds of exposure.
I used a 4x5 film holder and slid in from the right to reach the left side at exposure stop time.

This is admittedly a work print.  I have the shadows exactly where I want them.  I want to bring the highlights up a zone or two.  I plan on adjusting development time.  The shadows come in after 15 seconds.  The print is fully developed after 60.  This is an exposure factor of four.  Since the highlights take longer to develop I plan on reducing the exposure factor to, at first, 3.5 (53 seconds?).  By pulling the print early the highlights do not have the opportunity to become as dense as they are at 60 seconds developing time.  If I am still not happy with that I will pull it at EF3, 45 seconds.  We will see where we are at that point but I am hopeful that this will succeed.

Felt good to be back in the dark after all this time.  And here is what I done.  I hope you all like it.

Fat Man and Little Boy Ride Again

It has been almost three and a half years.  Three and a half years since I have had the darkroom set up.  Three and a half years since coming to the realization that having the camera gear and not using it was making me feel guilty right in the middle of getting through Faith's death.  Three and a half years since I sold all of my camera gear.  Fortunately, no one bought the darkroom gear and I knew I would eventually set things up again so I stored it away.

For right now.  Wednesday I rearranged the old bedroom to provide an empty wall against which I placed the entire contents of my walk-in closet.  I then set the darkroom up.  Thursday I got it up and running, test gear and such.  Today, I discovered a very fortunate and unforeseen choice.  I covered the window on the front of the house with an old dark red bed sheet.  It is folded three times and stapled to the sill.

When I went in today to make sure the room was light tight I noticed two things.  First, the curtain with the bright and direct afternoon sun on it made a red safelight for the whole room.  Secondly, It was REALLY bright in there.  So I ran a test strip to test for fogging.  With the lights out and only the red from the window, I exposed a cut strip of photographic paper a section at a time.  5 minutes, 2 minutes, and three more sections for one minute.  This way I had a test strip that had been exposed for 10-5-3-2-1 minutes and depending on where the paper showed it was getting darker would be the time limit that the paper could be out in the room before the light in the room, what there was, would fog the paper.

Don't you know, there was nothing on the paper at all?  Safe for at least 10 minutes out in the open.

Tomorrow is Sunday and tomorrow I get back into the pool.  I have selected the first negative I am going to print.  It is a copy of an old print of a friend's mother on her motorcycle.  I did not know if it would work when I took the photographs five years ago.  But I found them in the inside over of my negative book and put the best looking one into the enlarger.  When I focused it the negative image looked really good.  Good enough to try.  My initial fear had been that the negative would not be sharp enough to do any meaningful work with.  But looking at it, it has great tonal range and it looked very sharp in focus.  Definitely worth a go.  Hope it turns out well.

My intent is to finally get back into photography wholesale.  I was rereading an old Black and White Photography magazine from the UK.  A favorite columnist, Mike Johnston, was writing about his own version at the time of the Photography Blues.  He said something that I may never now forget.  "Photography is not something you think about.  It is something you do."  Well, for at least seven and a half years I have done MUCH MORE thinking about photography than doing.  Time to live up to a favorite movie quote.  "Get busy livin' or get busy dyin'."

Time to live.

Beauty Behind The Storm

So, I have ten rolls of film I never got around to developing before. So a couple hours ago I go upstairs to load a couple rolls onto spools so I won't have to when I decide to process them.  Well, I went this far...

So I says to myself, let's just do it.  Now, mind you, I have never successfully loaded a roll of 135 in my life. Tonight I nailed it. Glad I did. A roll of 120 as well.  TMY-2, T-Max 400, both rolls.  I mix up some chems, the dev was HC110, dil B.  I decide to give N+1 due to the age of the film.  I soup the 120 first. A couple frames of my brother burning stuff at Mom and Dad's and some landscape from Prime Hook, typical stuff for me.

Then I soup the 35mm. I inspect the negs. Only about ten frames. I see it is, again landscapes. But I can't place it. I see the last frame. Bright and blurry in the center. Hmm, that almost has to be running water...

Faith died April 2011. In October that year, I almost talk myself out of going to meet fellow APUGer Lee from Dayton for a photo hike. My brother invites himself along. Now I gotta go. I was having a very bad few days and shortly thereafter is when I decide to put the cameras down.

Yeah, I just processed the Rickett's Glen negs. I can hardly wait to see the beauty that came from a very bad day for me.  I would pull an all nighter right now to print and see the images. That's what the 12 year old in me is screaming for.

Well, sometimes the 44 year old wins.  I'll post some pics when I get them.

Project: Dachau

A customer of mine and I spoke a couple of years ago about printing some enlargements from some negatives made by his wife's uncle in Europe in the 40's. He was attached to the forces who first entered the Dachau camp in Poland, IIRC. He warned me that some of the subject matter is on the graphic side, documentary in nature, but bald, no sugar coating.

Today he was in and I broached the subject of photography. He asked if I could work with old negatives. I asked if he meant the Dachau negs. Then he remembered we had talked. He will be bringing in the negs and I will make some contact prints so he can see what there is and how, if at all, he might wish to proceed, you know, what to do with them.

I remember when we had first spoken that the scope of what I had agreed to hit me. The enormity of what could be and the respect with which I needed to approach the subject matter were and still are foremost in my mind.  I do not doubt I can do the negatives justice. I look forward to the work.  And I will definitely keep updates here as they come to me.

Squaring Shadow Up and Film Holder Notching System

Well, the Calumet showed up at the store in the post this past Monday.  It's beautiful. I know the camera's name was going to be Ellie. That changed. I'll touch on that below. At any rate, I'm going to have the shutter CLA'd in a mo. That's how the magic happens.h or two. Works fine, just has some serious lag at 1/2 and one full second. The camera moves smoothly. The Schneider Kreuznach Symmar  f/5.6 180mm lens has some minor dust. So, I have me some cleaning to do.

I got the camera from Barry Dial of Bennington, NH. He is a fellow APUGer (WWW.apug.com) and really hooked me up with this deal.  About $700.00 of camera and glass for $300.00.

So, I have spent today watching my son's gift to me, Duck Dynasty Season 1, and taking care of some loose ends. I have been making my exposure log sheets, more on that later. Also, I have been notching my film holders. Here's how I do it. On the bottom of the holder is an edge the folds out when you remove the darkslide so you can put the film in.

Here's what I do. The film notches go on the bottom left. On the bottom right I measure over a quarter inch and cut in a notch where light will pass through it and expose the film further up from the edge so you can see these notches on the negative. Then I put a series of notches inside of that marker notch that is on each holder. Each notch, depending on its location in relation to the marker, indicates a numeric value to 'number' the holder. A notch 1/4" left of the marker denotes '1'. 1/2" to the left is a '2'. 3/4" is a '4'. 1" is an '8' and so on.  Holder number 1 has the first notch cut out. Holder number 6 has the second and third notch cut out, leaving the first one blank. The second notch is '2' and the third one is a '4'. 2+4=6. Holder number 13 will have the first, third and fourth notches cut leaving number two blank. 1+4+8=13.

Mostly, just enjoying quiet day after this holiday season. Today is Dad's birthday. He died last March from dymensia. So, it's just a nice day to bum around and do what I want to for the day. Hope you have had a great holiday. Keep on clickin'.

Oh, and why did i name it Shadow? Brought home the camera Monday night after work and found myself singing 'Me and my shadow...'