To me, one of the more fascinating aspects of using old film cameras is that it feels like I’m actively touching history. I’ve written about this before regarding my Rolleiflex Automat MX, which was made in 1951 — making it the oldest camera currently in my collection. But when I received a pack of four 4×5 film holders from an eBay seller recently, I was brought into a similar type of reflection, and it all started with two words hand-written on the bottom of the holder: Graveraet Tatler.
Continue reading…History
A Big Deal: Reflecting on the Significance and History of the Rolleiflex
I originally wrote this article while working on the review of my own Rolleiflex Automat MX (a review I’ve since published). While researching the history and origins of the camera, I became fascinated with (and derailed by) some of the history of the Rolleiflex itself, and just how significant the camera actually was (and is).
Continue reading…Rediscovering Film: Part Four
In Parts One, Two, and Three of this series, I talked at length about getting reacquainted with old friends: film cameras. While I’ve not taken the Polaroid out since Part One, I have shot film in my old Duaflex (Part Two), and my Minolta XG 1 (Part Three), and have finally received them back from the lab.
Continue reading…Rediscovering Film: Part Three
In Part One and Part Two of this unplanned series of posts, I dusted-off my old Polaroid OneStep and my even older Kodak Duaflex II cameras. Digging through boxes that have remain untouched since moving here over four years ago, I found another camera relic: My old Minolta XG 1, a 35mm SLR, which I bought for photography class when I was in high school after draining a small savings account someone had set-up for me as a kid.
Continue reading…Rediscovering Film: Part Two
In Part One of this series, I talked about Polaroid instant photography, and the walk down memory lane I had finding my Polaroid OneStep from the mid-1990s, loading it with new Polaroid Originals film, and taking some interesting shots. While digging around in pictures and cameras, I also thought of another old camera: my Kodak Duaflex II. The old Kodak, however, was sitting on the lower shelf of a side table in my living room, where’s it’s been little more than a knick-knack for years now. I thought it was time to say hello again.
Continue reading…Rediscovering Film: Part One
Recently, I’ve been going through old stuff — boxes from my late mother’s house, boxes of stuff from childhood I’ve moved from place to place over the years. You reach an age where you start to think, “It’s time to thin this pile of stuff down a bit,” and that’s where I’m at.
Part of the old stuff is photographs. Lots and lots and lots of photographs. And lots of cameras, some of which took some of those many photographs. It got me thinking: When was the last time I actually shot a photograph on… (gasp)… film?
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