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FishyFish

FishyFish

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Nige
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I picked up three 35mm compacts at the camera fair last week - an Olympus Superzoom 105, a Minolta Hi-Matic G2, and a Konica Pop. I've already fired off some shots with the Olympus, and the Minolta appears to work ok. The Konica, however, contained two leaking batteries, and despite my efforts to clean the terminals, there's still corrosion present and the camera won't power up with fresh batteries.

However, after a bit of Googling, I reckon I can still give it a go...

The camera has a single 1/125 shutter speed, is fixed focus, and has four aperture settings (f/4, f/8, f/11 & f/16). The aperture is set, oddly, by altering the ASA setting - 400ASA gives f/16, 200ASA gives f/11, 100ASA gives f/8, and forcing the flash up (even without power) gives f/4. I've checked this by opening the back and confirmed the different visible aperture at each setting. Given this, if I put some 100ASA film in there, and with the fixed shutter speed, I should be able to roughly shoot using Sunny 16 rules.

I just need to try and find out what the minimum focussing distance is, and then I'm good to go.

The camera cost me two quid, so it's gotta be worth a whirl, eh? :D

I'll either post some pics or moan about my failure in due course...

EDIT: My thousandth post!
 
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Well, this worked out better than it might've. I stuck a roll of Poundland Agfa in the camera a few weeks back and have been taking the odd snap since them (most of them over the last three days while travelling to a training course). The camera, despite having knackered electronics and no flash, has produced very serviceable results. Given the fixed 1/125 sec shutter speed and 2.8m fixed focus on the Hexanon lens, it's still fairly flexible thanks to the ability to hack the aperture as follows:

f/16 - Set film ASA setting to 400. Flash down.
f/11 - Set film ASA setting to 200. Flash down.
f/8 - Set film ASA setting to 100. Flash down.
f/5.6 - Set film ASA setting to 200. Flash up.
f/4 - Set film ASA setting to 100. Flash up.

This means that a rough Sunny 16 ruleset can be used.

Apart form a few slightly underexposed shots, all of them came out ok. Not all of them are great photos, but none are out of focus, and the exposure is acceptable for all of them. The lens seems to be quite sharp too. Not bad for the two quid it cost me anyway.

Anyway, enough waffling on, here're some shots. I'll post more of them later. All shot on Agfa Vista Plus 200 with some converted to B&W in Lightroom.

1

FILM - Curves by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr


2

FILM - Baa by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr


3

FILM - Moo by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr

4

FILM - About to leave for Leeds by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr

5

FILM - Incoming by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr

6

FILM - Not for the likes of me by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr
 
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Pleasant surprise by the sound of it Nige, and a very presentable set of shots as well!
 
Peter B said:
Pleasant surprise by the sound of it Nige, and a very presentable set of shots as well!
Click to expand...

Thanks Peter. I like to have a compact with me. They're useful for just throwing in a pocket for those ad-hoc snapshot opportunities when you don't have a big "grown-up" camera with you. :). I picked up two others for £2 each when I got the Konica (an Olympus Superzoom 120 G - which I've also just got a roll back from - and a Minolta Himatic G2 - which I haven't had chance to use as yet).
 
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