Soviet hardware is fun

[aerius]

If the take-up spool is hollow, you can take a dremel tool and cut an angled slot in the spool and thread the film through it. I have a camera that sorta works like that, the film leader goes into the slot and when the spool is turned it pinches down on the film and locks it in place.

[Bounty]

The spool is solid with a single vertical opening, no clasps, no second slit to thread the film back on itself. When I thread the film through it and fold back the end sticking out, winding the camera usually keeps it in place, but every so often it just detaches or becomes too loose to wind properly. Lately I just tape down the end, but that means I fully can't wind the film back into the spool without opening the case to release the tape.



I is the spool, II is the spool with the film, II is a top view of how I secure the film where the blue bit is tape.

[Simplicius]

Spools for 120 film are like that, with just a slot through the middle. If you have a spare finger, you can hold the film against the spool until you've wound up a frame or two, trimming the leader beforehand if you find it gets in the way or pushes the film back out of the slot.

Someone on Rangefinder Forum posted a way to make a Kiev spool from a standard 35mm cartridge spool (which you should be able to get for free, or pennies, from a drugstore photo lab) which is billed as easy-to-load. It looks basically the same as an ordinary Kiev spool to me, but maybe there is something there that makes a difference.

[img]http://rick_oleson.tripod.com/kievspool.jpg[/img]

Thanks. I try to pay attention to things like light and composition, but still I always seem to end up with the same tourist shots. Ah well, at least I'm having fun.

Nothing wrong with snapshots; they kept me satisfied for my first twelve years of picture-making. If you are looking to do more with your photos, though, I would recommend not only reading how-to photography books (especially older ones, since they will tell you more about film and manual cameras), but photobooks by photographers who shoot the sorts of things you want to shoot, or the sorts of things you find yourself shooting. Figure out what it is you like about their photographs, and then try to imitate those qualities in your own.

[Bounty]

It's probably "easy to load" because the opening is lined up for modern film - the Kiev spool was designed for a roll where the leader tapers towards the middle, but all the Kodak film I've used so far tapers off to the bottom. I just recut the film.

If you have a spare finger, you can hold the film against the spool until you've wound up a frame or two

Not sure I understand this - wouldn't you lose your two first usable frames? Two get exposed while securing the film, two more while you wind with the case open.

If you are looking to do more with your photos, though, I would recommend not only reading how-to photography books (especially older ones, since they will tell you more about film and manual cameras), but photobooks by photographers who shoot the sorts of things you want to shoot, or the sorts of things you find yourself shooting.

Do you have any recommendations?

[Simplicius]

It's probably "easy to load" because the opening is lined up for modern film - the Kiev spool was designed for a roll where the leader tapers towards the middle, but all the Kodak film I've used so far tapers off to the bottom. I just recut the film.

You'll find the bottom taper in all the Western brands of film. Judging by my cameras, it's been the standard since at least the 1960s.

You could always take your Kiev spool and lengthen the slot to suit bottom-taper film with a razor saw.

Not sure I understand this - wouldn't you lose your two first usable frames? Two get exposed while securing the film, two more while you wind with the case open.

Once the leader is fast in the spool I advance one frame with the back still open, for certainty, and once with the back closed and lens cap on, to set up fresh film for the first real exposure. I do always lose those two frames, but there is enough extra built into the roll that I still get 26 or 38 frames and my film never slips off the spool.

Do you have any recommendations?

I'm off to work right now, but I can give you some titles either here or by PM tonight.

[Bounty]

I do always lose those two frames, but there is enough extra built into the roll that I still get 26 or 38 frames and my film never slips off the spool.

I know there's extra film on there, I wind through the first two shots with the cap on as SOP says to do so in the manual as well. I first though you mean winding the film on four times total, which sounded weird.

You could always take your Kiev spool and lengthen the slot to suit bottom-taper film with a razor saw.

Nah, I'm not going to risk ruining a perfectly good spool. Cutting the leader isn't much bother.

I'm off to work right now, but I can give you some titles either here or by PM tonight.

Feel free to post them, I'm sure I'm not the only person on the board who'd find this interesting.

[Phantasee]

I'm off to work right now, but I can give you some titles either here or by PM tonight.

Feel free to post them, I'm sure I'm not the only person on the board who'd find this interesting.

Seconded.

[Simplicius]

I confess to not having made a lot of use of the basic how-to photography books, not because I am a brilliant photographer but because I didn't have any when I was starting. I wouldn't say they are strictly necessary, but they make a good foothold, especially if one is wondering about fundamental aspects of photography. For someone like Bounty who has already been shooting, there will be certainly be some "Well, duh" content in there, but also some useful advice. I have three at present, of which one is a library book:

John Hedgecoe's Complete Photography Course, John Hedgecoe, Mitchell Beazley Publishers Ltd./Simon and Schuster (USA ed.), 1979.

The New Manual of Photography, Hedgecoe, Dorling Kindersley, 2003.

The Basic Book of Photography 5th Ed., Tom & Michele Grimm, Plume, 2003.

I would say these books compliment each other reasonably well, in terms of dated and contemporary information, and illustrations vs. text. Hedgecoe is a professor of photography at the Royal College of Art, so I imagine his other books would be useful reading as well.

I have also seen Langford's Starting Photography, Langford's Basic Photography, and Langford's Advanced Photography offered as recommended reading, though I haven't read two of those. Starting Photography seems to have the same kinds of information as the Hedgecoe books, though a lot heavier on the digital camera and digital workflow. I'd like to flip through Advanced Photography, but I haven't encountered it yet.

There are some other more in-depth technical/conceptual books out there that have crossed my path that are also worth reading.

Photographic Seeing, Andreas Feininger, Prentice Hall, 1973. To see your shots before you take them, you have to imagine how they will look to your camera and film, rather than to your eyes. This book does, IMHO, a very good job helping the reader to do this. As a bonus, it also contains a (minor) section on personal vision as manifested in really cheesy '70s photomanipulations - the gross overuse of HDR and Photoshop filters of the day.

On Being a Photographer, David Hurn and Bill Jay, LensWork Publishing, 1997 (3rd ed. 2007). This is an interview, with Hurn offering straightforward opinions of the mental process of photography. I would go so far as to call this a must-read for anyone looking to go from casual to serious shooting, and it would probably make interesting reading for the general photography enthusiast as well.

The Camera, The Negative, and The Print, all by Ansel Adams. How-to but very heavy on the technics and techniques - I have been on the lookout for these for a while. According to Amazon, John Schaefer wrote a two-book guide called The Ansel Adams Guide: Basic Techniques of Photography that re-packages Adams' work, makes it easier to grasp, and updates it for digital and color photography

As for photographers to take inspiration from, it really depends on the subjects you like. If you have something in mind I might know of a body of work to point you towards, but otherwise I'd say browse bookstores and libraries whenever the mood strikes you. Photobooks may be expensive, but they are easy to read through in situ.



EDIT: Sorry this took so long. I'm a slow-ass writer - I've been working on it for hours.

[Phantasee]

Never fear about how long it takes, it was worth the wait. I'm printing out your list right now.

[Bounty]

My Christmas list just doubled. Thanks for the recommendations.

[Simplicius]

There's actually one I forgot to mention: Pictures from the Country: A Guide to Photographing Rural Life and Landscapes by Richard W. Brown (Camden House Publishing, 1991). I would include it in the category of in-depth technical/conceptual even though it isn't terribly technical or philosophical, because there is good talk about composition, exposure, use of light, and 'finding the shot.' The photos that illustrate it are also of good quality and are worthwhile photographs in their own right.

[Bounty]

So then, the mysterious statue.

A couple days ago I spotted a Mother Mary statue that look pretty impressive from where I was standing, so I tried to get close to it. I didn't make it, unfortunately, but I did manage to snap a few pictures along the way.

The statue:





This is as close as I could get. The statue itself is on a hill called Emperor's Mountain, which used to be a ducal fortress before some monks came and turned it into an abbey. Going up the hill from the west, you move up past some battlements which look either pretty modern, or pretty damn well maintained:



Into the abbey, where I bumped into a "private property" sign.



Tackling the hill from the east, I discovered the road loops back to the canal. However, I did spot a footpath going up into the forest.



It's a weird sight: to the left there's woods, to the right you can just about see InBev's global headquarters.







Unfortunately, the footpath ends at a freeway which passes back over the western road, so I had to give up getting to the statue.





On the way back I ran into this sight; I thought I'd double-backed to the canal, but instead I ran right into a church.







15th century, part of an abbey in the middle of the city. Medieval monks had amazing soundproofing skills; within walking distance of a busy freeway and right next to a construction sight, the abbey was quiet enough to hear a pin drop.

Inside there was a pretty neat building; in 1914 the Germans occupying the town panicked when they thought a counter-attack was heading their way, executed dozens of people and burned large swaths of the town, destroying over a thousand homes. Afterwards a monk scavenged the ruins and built a new house from rubble he'd collected. Apparently this house contains twelve distinct architectural styles.





Finally, to commemorate the first world war, the city council has put up large photos around town, showing what particular streets looked like right after the fire and the fighting. I think I spotted my great-grandfather in one of these...

[The Grim Squeaker]

The wall photo (with the bicycle rider next to it) look EXACTLY like an identical shot I have from Oxford... Odd . (Well, almost identical, my shot was done with a tiny, cheap compact camera. And looks better. )