Rusty shutters #33.

Polaroid SX-70 SE Sonar OneStep.

October 2007.

This blue-button SX-70 – that’s why it has “SE” as part of the camera’s name, maybe – was purchased at the San Jose Photofair.

Sadly, I no longer have this camera. It started to produce a series of 4 small, fuzzy, and bright yellowish dots vertically just off-center left. Don’t know why or how that began, but I stopped using it altogether about a year after I got it.

I got some great shots with it before its demise, though.

I did a slight variation of Adrian Hanft’s hack

Auto focus was pretty cool. I was able to use a bit of my 600 film stash, too. At the time 600 film was still available and I would snag 5-packs at Costco for around $40 US, as I recall. A good deal.

To use that film in the Sonar OneStep, I did a slight variation of Adrian Hanft’s hack, which involved just removing the ND filter over the photocell and turning the light/dark dial all the way to dark for each shot. It worked well.

Body: Black plastic with brown vinyl porvair
Focusing: Split-image rangefinder. manual or autofocus
Lens: 4-element 116mm glass
Manual focus: 10.4 inches – infinity
Shutter: Electronic
Shutter speeds: 1/180th to 14 seconds
Aperture range: f/8 – f/74
Dimensions: DWH 6.49in x 3.93in x 1.77in

Cowgirl boots

Marek

Grate|Ripples

Nicki

89

Walking among the dead.

Austin’s history under foot.

I met Kevin Thomas at Oakwood Cemetery in Austin last Sunday morning for a film stroll.

It’s a place I’ve been wanting to shoot since I saw Kat Swansey’s cemetery shots in her IG stream and her recommendation for a visit to Oakwood.

Foggy and a little chilly, it started clearing around noon. The drive down I-35 wasn’t bad at all.

I brought along the Yashica-Mat 66. I loaded a roll of Tri-X 400 in it the day before. Everything seemed pretty normal. Sunday I couldn’t get the film to advance properly. Hmmm.

Also on hand was my little Instax Mini 8, and I burned through two packs of Mono Chrome. Got a coupla’ keepers.

I thought I was prepared. Apparently not!

The Minolta XG-1/24mm ƒ2.8 + mystery roll, too.

I had the Sony RX100MIII in the bag, as well. Sadly, when I tried to use it, I discovered it had a dead battery.

So, I shot bunches with the iPhone 8 and Blackie App.

I thought I was prepared. Apparently not!

It was a good 2+ hour walk.

On my way back home I stopped at Austin Camera to pick up the negs/prints from the 4 rolls of C41 I left there last Saturday. Pretty cool to see what they contained. Around 20 keepers, plus I still have to scan the shots from the Sprocket Rocket.

Order

Early

Cross

Path

Bark

Flag

Dove

A.B.N.

Detail

Rusty shutters #27.

Polaroid one600|Ultra.

January 2006.

I’m pretty sure I bought this camera at Costco. 13 years makes an old man’s memory shaky.

At any rate, it was before Polaroid stopped producing their 600 film, which was available from Costco at a not-too-terrible price. As I recall, 5 packs were less than 40 dollars US.

This guy got a lot of use before I moved on to the SX-70. I shot it around downtown San Jose and my old neighborhood in Santa Clara, CA.

Sad thing is I no longer have this camera – or if I do, I don’t know where I stashed it – but I do have a few other Polaroids that’ll use up my remaining packs of 600 film.

Body: Two-tone silver/darkgrey, pop-up
Lens: 100mm, 2 element, plastic, fixed focal length
Aperture: ƒ/2.9
Shutter speed 1/3 – 1/200sec
Flash modes: Auto mode, flash off mode, red-eye reduction
Viewfinder: LCD info screen shows flash mode, film counter and self timer status
Focus: 2 ft to infinity
Size WDH: 4.7in x 6.2in x 3.6in
Weight: 18oz

Vapor

Balloons

Brent

Walk on by

SSS

Rusty shutters #24.

Fujifilm Instax Square SQ10.

June 2017.

A lot of photo review sites panned the Fujifilm Instax SQ10, but I really like this funky little shooter. A hybrid digital/film instant camera just made sense to me.

I like the fact that you can shoot first, print later. Makes for fewer wasted shots and that, in my opinion, saves money.

IQ is what it is. I did a side-by-side comparison of photos made with the SQ6 (which I’ll feature in the near future) and I’d be hard pressed to tell the difference. Plus, the LED display on the back of the SQ10 makes framing a shot super convenient. You see what you’re getting in realtime.

From vignetting to a number of creative filters and brightness adjustment, the SQ10 makes tweaking shots easy. It even does double exposures and the quick auto-focus is nice.

Along with 35mm and 120 cameras, I carry the SQ10 plus an extra pack of film in my film-only camera bag. Its small footprint makes it an easy choice to always have at the ready.

I like this little guy lots.

Resolution: 3.7 megapixels
Film size: 3.3 x 2.8in
Image size: 2.4 x 2.4in
Display: 3in LCD @ 460,000 pixels
ISO: Auto (100-1600)
Shutter Speeds: 10 sec – 1/29500 sec
Aperture: ƒ/2.4
Focal Length: 28.5mm
Macro: 3.9 in
Metering: Multi-segment
Dimensions: 4.1in x 2.3in x 1.3in
Weight: 15.9 oz
Power: Fujifilm NP-50 lithium ion – MicroUSB charging
Memory card: MicroSD/SDHC card
Size WDH: 4.7 x 1.9 x 5in

Step right in

Portal

Pink Rose

Red rims

Art sticks

Rusty shutters #20.

Polaroid SX-70 Model 2.

November 2008.

I’d won an SX-70 SE Sonar OneStep (with a blue button) on eBay around a year earlier. It was working pretty well but after a good amount of use, 4-5 evenly spaced white spots started to show up in the pictures I was taking, lined up vertically and slightly left-of-center. A real bummer.

Looking for a replacement, I won this Model 2 on eBay.

It was in really good shape. The plastic was clean, and the porvair was spotless. And everything worked. I was using the Hanft-hack so I could use a few packs of my 600 stash.

I still have it. The porviar has degraded pretty badly over the years, but the camera still works.

When I went to fetch the camera for the product shot, I noticed there was an empty 600 pack in it. When I pressed the shutter – amazingly enough – the camera went through all the motions. Those batteries are incredible.

I have a few packs of 600 film left… I better get to taking pictures before my luck runs out!

Body: White plastic with brown vinyl porvair
Focusing: Split-image rangefinder
Lens: 4-element 116mm glass
Manual focus: 10.4 inches – infinity
Shutter: Electronic
Shutter speeds: 1/175th to 14 seconds
Aperture range: f/8 – f/22
Dimensions: DWH 6.89in x 3.93in x .98in

Giraffe

Molly

Hoody

Scotty

White rod

Rusty shutters #16.

Polaroid Colorpack II.

April 2008.

Funny story. I bought five of these cameras on eBay to cut up and make into pinhole (pinholaroid) cameras. Two pinholes got made. The other two Colorpacks were junk.

But one Colorpack II was in such good condition that I just couldn’t bring myself to altering it. So I kept it as is.

I still have it. Great little camera. I should use up some of the remaining Fuji peel-apart I have stashed. Maybe when the weather gets a little cooler, this Fall.

Film: Peel-apart 100-Series or Fujifilm FP-100C, FP100B, or FP3000B
Lens: 114mm, f/9.2
Shutter: Electronic, 10s-1/500s
ISO: 75 & 3000
Focus: 3 feet to infinity
Batteries: Two standard 1.5V AA batteries
Cold clip included

Flamin’ ’55

Diana

ARS

A slight breeze

Toy car

Rusty shutters #4.

Polaroid Spectra System AF.

I haven’t used this camera a whole lot. Finding useable film on eBay wasn’t an issue when I first got this camera back in 2006, and I only went through a few packs using this cool shooter.

I’d like to use it again, but the time just isn’t right. Polaroid Originals stopped producing film for this camera for a short while, apparently because of issues with the film jamming at ejection, so I’m reluctant to spend any money on what amounts to an experiment with their pricy film.

First released in 1986 and simple enough to use, a majority of the Spectra AF’s controls are located at the back of the camera. Among them, switches for autofocus off/on, flash off/on, and exposure compensation. The sonar auto focus could be tricky at times.

The viewfinder is positioned at the back of the camera on the left side and the shutter release is located top right, just above the picture counter.

The right side of the camera has an adjustable hand strap that makes it easy and secure to hold the camera and access the shutter release.

I like the images I made with this camera, and although I haven’t used it in quite a while, the Spectra AF is still in my collection.

Image size – 3.6in x 2.8in
Film size – 4in x 4.1in
ISO: 640
Shutter Speeds: 2.8 sec – 1/250 sec
Aperture: ƒ/10
Focal Length: 125mm
Dimensions: 5.3in x 3.7in x 6.8in

 

Bums

Overhead light

Jet

Church

The 5 part