Old film cameras

[self-deleted_user]

So uh...lately I've really been getting into enjoying the old vintage photography look...I got to thinking, I'm getting pretty good with my manual settings underground as far as guessing the right f/stop and exposure to use first time around. Are there any old cheap film cameras people would recommend to take underground that aren't too heavy/bulky and have the manual abilities? I am curious what modern lighting results could achieve with "old fashioned" photography and want to play :) I am guessing I could find a old SLR cheap but then that requires lenses and such still and we're back up to bulk and weight.

...yeah I kinda miss film days. Places must still develop film, right? haha. If not I think my grandpa has in storage all his old photography and developing equipment, he had a darkroom setup back in the day I know (before my time, or at least, long time ago) and considering I develop film for Western blots with Kodak film and the developer/fixer camera photography can't be *too* different, right? Only difference is safe light is some weird wavelength I can't easily detect, I'm basically "blind as a bat" in a darkroom and photos are probably a little trickier to develop than looking for simple fluorescing bands that gives leeway with how long to leave it in the developer for.

To give an idea of what is around me... http://detroit.craigslist.org/search/?a ... catAbb=sss
maybe folks in the know could give ideas based on that list?

I'm getting my best results with lightpainting so I do want to be able to have long exposures (my current camera gives up to 8 sec which works for most things just not large domes/rooms so somewhere in the 6-8 sec range min but longer would be nice!) and I would like to have some zoom ability but willing to give that one up, actually.

[Chads93GT]

I have an old 35 mm camera with some very expensive lenses and filters thats in great shape but its not cheap as its a very good 35mm camera. ;)

[self-deleted_user]

Well yeah, and old glass can be ah-maze-inggggggg (I have an older 50mm prime lens i got cheap 'cause they didn't know it was a really nice one. Sure it's all manual on my dSLR but who cares?) I really don't want to get a whole system camera though unless it's really compact somehow.

[Phil Winkler]

My favorite caving camera for many years was a rangefinder Canonet QL17 with a 40 mm lens and 1.7 aperture. Since it has a Bulb setting it was a simple matter to take pics by painting with multiple flashes. Here is a self portrait using it in Holloch:


It is sitting here on my desk. I think I lost the manual, tho.

[self-deleted_user]

That's realllllllly sweet! I love that!

A friend of mine who does a lot of b&w film photography knows this "camera mart" place to find cool old cheap cameras around here, we're gonna check it out next week. Totally keep suggestions coming though! Digital is sweet, but I really want to figure out the art behind the film! Maybe I'll suck (and probably, at least at first haha!) but I want to try!

Any stuff you can think of I should know/think about please chime in! I mean...I don't even know about differences in film used. My first camera was a Polaroid, and my second camera was a Nikon 35mm p&s but those were long ago days. Sadly when my parents divorced I think my negatives got all lost in the splitting up of photos/negatives/slides they did back years and years ago so I'm not even sure where my photos or negatives are from all that. And I never learned about anything more than "ooh hey I like that! *snaps photo quick*" in those days.

...okay that makes me sound old, but being 6-12 yrs old was over half my life ago as I'm almost 25 :P

[Phil Winkler]

Amy, Jim Jasek, a famous Texas Caver, created the Total Photo Computer back in the 70s and published a manual to go with it. I may have a copy I'll email you. His computer was sort of a circular slide rule that allowed you to calculate proper flash exposures based on film speed, aperture setting, flash to subject distance and the Guide Number (GN) of your flash whether it is a bulb or electronic. Give it any 3 and it gives you the 4th or something like it. The manual itself is an excellent tutorial on flash photography.

I think I gave mine last year to a caver in Huntsville.

[LukeM]

Here's a good, quick guide to film cave photography. It is based around flashguns though. Light painting seems like more of a digital technique since it's hard to estimate what your total light output will be and with digital you can always waste a bunch of shots experimenting.

http://www.cs.cornell.edu/people/simeon/vpp/pubs/up/fast_and_easy/fast_and_easy.html

[self-deleted_user]

Thanks for the link. Simon must be on the uk forum or something because I swear I've seen all three of those photos in wezzit threads there

[NZcaver]

I have an old 35 mm camera with some very expensive lenses and filters thats in great shape but its not cheap as its a very good 35mm camera. ;)

No offence, but there's often a big difference between what one paid for 35mm camera equipment back in the day and present day value. I found that out when I sold off my late-1980's era 35mm SLR with 3 lenses and a flashgun a few years ago. I got less than $100 back on gear that originally cost about a $1000. But at least somebody is presumably still getting use out of it.

Of course there are exceptions for collectible cameras and very high end gear, especially larger format. There's also some demand for lenses and accessories which can work with modern DSLR cameras, but these are in the minority. Even expensive filters have changed over the years, and many color/density etc filters are now somewhat obsolescent because virtually any filter effect can be replicated electronically either in the camera or in post-processing.

The good news for Amy is she should find lots of 35mm equipment available dirt cheap on eBay, at the camera-mart, or in the consignment/used section at her local specialist camera store. The latter items are often more "optimistically" priced, but have usually been sitting in the cabinet for years and may be open for low-ball offers. Kudos to anybody who wants to go "retro" and pick up 35mm equipment to experiment with. I have fond memories of spending long hours inhaling chemicals and trying to produce interesting black and white prints in the darkroom back in the 80's. Good luck!

PS Amy, my old camera model is listed on that Craigslist page you linked to. It's the Minolta X-700. It's not a bad camera, but since you like Nikons maybe try doing a little research on their 35mm models to see if you find one that suits? Manual focus systems will usually be cheaper, but having an autofocus option might be more convenient.

[self-deleted_user]

oh eggads I actually hate autofocus most of the time. I don't even use it on my dSLR. I enjoy playing with dof and I want it to focus on what *I* want it to focus on, damnit! haha. The only time it's on autofocus is when I trust a friend with it to play with it for a few shots 'cause they don't get the "what? i have to focus?" thing. My eye can tell my hand how to spin the focus thing on the lens faster than the autofocus can figure it out. I am a Nikon fan for the dSLR's but honesty for this I havn't a clue. So long as I know where my f/stop and shutter speed and iso selections are, and where the focus ring is, i'm good! haha. I have nowhere to set up a darkroom so I guess my prints will be boring unless I'm guessing my friend has access to one. I am familiar with the process kinda from doing Western blotting but I don't know how to take negative to final print as for Westerns we're just directly exposing large film and looking for the dark bands where there was fluorescing.

[NZcaver]

My eye can tell my hand how to spin the focus thing on the lens faster than the autofocus can figure it out.

Sounds like a camera/lens problem to me. You use Nikon, right?

Seriously though, I still use manual focus occasionally myself but I've been very impressed with the speed and accuracy of Canon autofocus when using the pro lenses. Sharp, instant autofocus is a must for moving wildlife targets - especially if the photographer has to more at the same time. Of course speed is not so critical in most cave photography.

For 35mm, I'd say if you find something at the right price that looks like what you want go ahead and pick it up. Maybe do a little online research first, but don't get too carried away. For cave photos, start looking for a nice wide angle lens and/or a standard with a wide f-stop. Maybe look around at lens options and then pick the body to suit?

[LukeM]

Thanks for the link. Simon must be on the uk forum or something because I swear I've seen all three of those photos in wezzit threads there

I believe Simeon is still in New York somewhere. Possibly Cornell still. He could certainly be a poster on the UK forum though. I seem to narrowly miss running into him pretty often which is too bad since it would be fun to talk cave photography with him.

[Bob Thrun]

Light painting seems like more of a digital technique since it's hard to estimate what your total light output will be and with digital you can always waste a bunch of shots experimenting.

To the contrary, the inability to do light painting is a major weakness of digital photography. A prime example is my photo on the cover of WVASS Bulletin 6, Caves and Karst Hydrology in Northern Pocahontas County. The picture was wider than printed on the cover. I walked around behind the camera and fired 6 M3B bulbs, plus Peter Sprouse fired an electronic flash. A digital camera does not have a long enough shutter speed before electronic noise sets in.

[NZcaver]

A digital camera does not have a long enough shutter speed before electronic noise sets in.

This is a good point, although digital camera technology (specifically newer model DSLRs) are improving in this regard. Good post-processing can help, too. If I can create reasonable aurora images with my DSLR at 20-30 second exposures, I could probably do an OK job of light painting. But I generally prefer using electronic flashguns in caves.

[self-deleted_user]

My eye can tell my hand how to spin the focus thing on the lens faster than the autofocus can figure it out.

Sounds like a camera/lens problem to me. You use Nikon, right?

I only have one lens built for a dSLR, kinda an "all-in-one" lens, Nikor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 with VRII (the later type of vibration reduction on their lenses). I kinda doubt it's a pro lens? but maybe, it was $750 on sale. My other two lenses are a 50mm f/1.8 prime lens older Nikor series and does not work with autofocus, or auto-anything, on my D60 body. $45 buy (which was good, new, this lens is still $100-$120). Other is a old old old Vivitar lens that has some weird focal lengths, like 23-117mm or something odd like that, it's stuck in f/2.2 the aperture blades don't move at all hence it was a steal at $20 on ebay sold as "for parts or repair". It is also my macro lens, the only one I have that does macro focusing. So uh...nah more like just most my lenses are olddddddd and so I have to do it all manually anyway so it's what I got used to, hence I'm fast/good at the focusing aspect too...and then I forget or don't like how the autofocus works on the Nikor one actually meant for my camera.

A digital camera does not have a long enough shutter speed before electronic noise sets in.

This is a good point, although digital camera technology (specifically newer model DSLRs) are improving in this regard. Good post-processing can help, too. If I can create reasonable aurora images with my DSLR at 20-30 second exposures, I could probably do an OK job of light painting. But I generally prefer using electronic flashguns in caves.

I've not had issues with grain in lightpainting on digital (except when I tried to get Sunset Dome...5 acre room, and my light was nowhere near good enough) but I've not done anything longer than 6 seconds and use 200 or sometimes 100 ISO.

Kinda ot...but eh it's my thread right? haha but flashguns...yeah I think I need to get one of those...I've tried reading about them but I can't figure out shit about them, something isn't making sense. I thought they'd just be something I could press a button and BAM light from it but everything seems...so much more complicated than that. Wire cables or sensors or needing to change bulbs every time like they only work once or something and then die? this and that and everything else....what, there's not just a magic button to press and make a big flash o' light so I have a great off-camera source without lightpainting? Is that so hard to ask?