#50 Agfa Agfamatic 100 Sensor

Agfa Agfamatic 100 Sensor                                  Este post em português

Agfa Colorstar lens 42,1 mm f11, fixed aperture and focus

Parator shutter, rotating metal blades, armed with the film advance, 1/40, 1/80 sec.

Number maximum of exposures on 126 cassette film: 24

Made in Germany around 1971.

It uses the same shell of the 50 and 55C, the main difference is the possibility of choosing the shutter speed, by turning the ring, around the lens shutter assembly, to one of two positions, marked with meteorological signs: sunshine 1/80 sec and cloudy 1/40 sec.

The sensor refers to the shutter release button, that big orange invention of Agfa, that with its smoothness prevented, in some degree, camera shake.
It is also equipped with a Magicube flash adaptor, if the lamp, in firing position, is already burned a indicator is displayed in the viewfinder.

I bought this one at a flea-market. I can't speak for its quality or usability because I haven't used it.

Stay tuned (o;

#49 Halina Paulette EE II

Versão portuguesa deste post

Halina Paulette EE II manufactured around 1975 by Haking, Hong-Kong
Viewfinder camera using regular 35 mm film
The lens is a Halinar Anastigmat f=50, 1:2,8
Central leaf shutter, with a speed range of 1/30 - 1/250
Uncoupled Selenium photometer, hence the EE or electric eye
Flash synch both by hot shoe and pc connector.
This example, although clean, is inoperative due to a flaw in the film transport system.

I bought this one because of my soft spot for Halinas, my father's camera and the first "real" camera that I operated was a Halina.
Stay tuned (0; 

#48 Gallus Derby-Lux

Em português

Gallus Derby-Lux
France ~1941
Boyer Saphir lens  f=50, 1:3,5
Focal Plane shutter, self-capping cloth curtains, shutter seeds range 1/25-1/500, B.
The shutter is cocked by turning the shutter speed selector.
16, 4x3cm exposures on 127 film, the film advance is controlled, by two little windows on the back, with a sliding device to cover them with a red or green gel, for orthochromatic  or panchromatic film.
The focusing is achieved by means of an helical that displaces the front element of the lens.
The body is made of an aluminium alloy, without any covering. The bellows is made of leather.

This camera is so beautiful that two of the pictures that I uploaded to Flickr made Explore:

  

This was made in the occupied France, during WWII, it's a copy of the German Foth Derby.

I found this camera in a flea-market. I had already some nice finds in my bag when I saw this one. It was a mess, dirty, with obvious signs of attempts to repair...
I wasn't familiar with the brand. The seller asked me 25€ and I passed.

When I got home, started digging information about it.
What I found gave me the urge of rip my hair, if I had any to rip.

You can imagine, next week I was there at eight o'clock, in the morning. I went to the seller, my heart almost stopped, when I saw it standing there. Casually I asked the seller, how much he wanted for it. This time he didn't ask for 25€, but only 15. I tried to take it for 10 but he didn't gave. So 15 it was.
But look what I took home:

 

Here you can read about it's restoration, and here how I made it anew set of shutter curtains.


Some pictures taken with it:

Stay tuned (o;

#47 Nikon TWZOOM

Em português

My brother-in-law, Mário Gamelas, has contributed frequently to my camera collection.

This camera is one of his contributions. 

He bought it when it was launched and gave it a good use.

This camera was presented in 1988 and it was the first compact Nikon camera equipped with a zoom lens.
It's a 35-80 mm f3.5-7.8 with macro function.
Image size selector
Continuous focus
Several exposure/flash/focus modes
The flash has continuous zoom function
Uses regular 35 mm film.

A view of the control panel.

The zoom in the 80 mm position

Stay tuned (o;

#46 Zorki-4K

Em português

The Zorki-4K is one of the last descendants of a long lineage of Russian clones of the thread mount Leicas, namely the Leica II and III.

This lineage includes also the FED cameras that are very close related with the Zorkis.

These cameras were made by the KMZ factory in Krasnogorsk, near Moscow, in the glory days of ex-USSR.

I bought this one at a flea market, with a Jupiter-8 lens: 50 mm 1:2 and the original eveready case.

This model was produced from 1972 to 1976. As the two first digits of mine read 74 I assume that it was made in 1974.

The main differences of this model to it's predecessor are the flimsy advance lever and the fixed take-up film spool.

The positioning of the shutter speeds on it's dial looks very weird, first there is 1/30 then B, 1/1000, 1/500,...,1/2, 1 second.

Leica III had a second dial, on the front, for the slow shutter speeds. In here they decided to squeeze them in the extra space between 1/125 and 1/30.

You may ask: why 1/125 and not 1/60? That's another quirk. In this camera 1/30 is the slowest of the fast shutter speeds and 1/60 the fastest of the slow ones.

Puzzled? Look in here, there's a very clear explanation of all the reasons for those apparently crazy decisions.

It also explains why it is so important to cock the shutter before changing the shutter speed in these cameras.

 

As it shares the mount with all old Leicas and clones, the m39 Leica thread mount aka LTM, the lens offer is immense.

You can see it, in the following picture, wearing a Canon Serenar 35 mm 1:2.8

As the viewfinder is corrected only for the 50 mm lens I made this wide-angle viewfinder for it, using the viewfinder of a disposable camera, the help of this site and some ingenuity.

Later I had some trouble with the shutter speeds and had it CLA, now it's working fine at all speeds.

Main features:

• Coupled rangefinder, 41 mm base length, 1x magnification factor
• 50 mm viewfinder with dioptre correction
• Horizontal travel, cloth, focal plane shutter
• Shutter speeds: 1/1000 - 1 second and B.
• Flash sync at 1/30, pc sync on the front plate, M or X selection by rotating the collar around the shutter speed dial.
• Self timer: delay 10 seconds.
• Film advance coupled with shutter cocking by rapid advance lever
• Film rewind by revolving cylinder, the film release is done by rotating CCW the unmarked cylinder surrounding the shutter release button, making it plunge into the body of the camera, it must be returned to the original position before shooting.
• Progressive, manual reset, film counter.
• Cold accessory shoe
• Detachable back
• LTM interchangeable lens 
• 135 standard cartridge film
• Size*:  143 x 92 x 70 mm
• Weight*: 700 g

*with Jupiter-8 lens

Some pictures taken with it:

More pictures taken with it in here

Stay tuned (o;

#45 Minolta Vectis S-1

Em português

In 1996 Minolta presented this single lens reflex APS camera.

The looks may deceive you due to the lack of the characteristic hump, produced by the pentaprism, that characterizes most of the SLR cameras.

This camera has this shape thanks to a quite ingenious play of mirrors.

        

I bought this one at a flea market, at the time, I didn't even know this model, I found it nice and got a sweet deal on it, so I bought it.

Later browsing *Bay found a complete kit with the two lens, 28-56 and 56-170 mm, and the dedicated flash SF-1.

Once again the deal was nice and I ended up with two units.

It's a model with everything you might expect on a SLR of the 90's. Several shooting modes, portrait, landscape,..., full auto, aperture or shutter speed priority and manual.

Also several flash modes, including TTL an fill-in.

I haven't used these cameras much, frankly the second unit is untested with film.

From my short experience I can tell you that it's a very lightweight camera, with good glass and quite ergonomic. The controls are, like in much of the electronic apparatus of the same vintage, very confuse with lots of buttons that, if you want to take full advantage of them, makes you consult the manual quite often.

The results are impressive for such a small negative:

Stay tuned (o:

#44 Kodak Ektralite 400

Em português

Kodak Ektralite 400
Reomar lens 24 mm 1:6.8
Fixed focus 1,20 m - infinity
Three speed shutter: 1/60, 1/125 and 1/250
Built-in electronic flash
110 cassette film
Made in Germany

The Ektralite series were introduced concurrently with the Ektra series. They are in fact the same cameras with a built in flash.

The slider with the sun and the lightning, turns the flash on/off.
Flash on f6.8 @ 1/60"
Flash off f9.5 @ 1/250, using Kodacolor 400 film, or f9.5 @ 1/125", using Kodacolor II

Stay tuned (o;