C-41 II

Some pictures on developing C-41 at home with a minimalistic setup:
I develop in my bathroom, on the top of the washing machine. The green tub is big enough to contain 3 litres of water, the three chemistry bottles and the developing tank. I fill in 1,5 litres cold water and then add 1,5 litres boiling water, which gives enough heat to bring the developer to a temperature of ca. 38 degrees C.



Heating up the tank by filling in warm water and putting it in the tub.





After filling in the developer I lay the tank in the warm water and rotate it manually during the developing time. Before filling in the developer I check the temperature and increase the developing time when the temperature below 38 degrees C.
Note: This is not recommended by the manual and I cant say whether it will work for others!
The manual rotation is repeated for the bleach bath and the stabilization bath.



Between bleach and stabilization the watering is done under running warm water with different water changes.



Done. The tub is from IKEA and costs ca. 5,-EUR. The tank was bought on the fleamarket for 2,-EUR. The three bottles were 10,-EUR, the jugs are household ware for 1,-EUR each. Most of the equipment was used before for developing B&W and the thermometer was a gift.

Some pictures:
(Camera was the Nikon TW 2 AF, film was a 200ASA drugstore brand)

35mm

Kiev 4A with Jupiter-12 2,8/35mm and Altix-finder and
Zorki 1e with Leitz Summaron 35mm/3,5 and Leitz VIOOH finder.

C-41 I

Self developing color films as a step to be independent of professional labs is not as difficult as I thought.
I used the Tetenal Colortec C-41 kit with three baths and a Jobo 2400 tank.











The camera was the Lomo LC-A

Konica FS-1

Introduced in 1979 the FS-1 was the first SLR with integrated electronic winder for the film advance. I really like the fact that the rewind has to be done manually, which saves energy and is much less disturbing than a electrical rewind.
The energy comes from four AA-cells in the handgrip. The FS-1 has (Konica-typical) a speed-priority AE. The finder only shows the aperture, not the selected speed. The motor is surprisingly quiet, especially compared to my Canon T70, which is several years younger.
I bought my model in a kit with the 40mm/1,8, the 28mm/3,5 and a Soligor telezoom. The Hexanons are extremely sharp and distortion-free lenses and fun to use, the cameras seals had to be replaced (as usual!).

Nikon FM

In 1979 I received (as a very generous gift fom my parents) my first own SLR, the Nikon FM, equipped with a Tokina 35-70mm lens. I loved it, I used it for years, buying lenses from 28mm up to 500mm for it. In the 90s, in need of money I sold the whole stuff. I always felt guilty , it didn´t seem right to sell the first own camera. Now, after many other cameras another FM found its way to me and when I opened the package and used the controls it was like ...
The camera seemed to have stayed in a shelf for long years, the shutter needed some exercise, but now all works fine.


This was shot 1980 with a Danubia 500mm/f8

Revue 35CC

A small, pocketable camera with a tricky opening system using the advance lever for opening and closing the frontdoors. Scale focus system, program AE. My model has messy seals (no surprise) and the advance lever makes strange, scratching sounds. A flash can be attached by a screw at the side.

Yashica FR

A camera with no AE, but with electronic shutter. No pictures without battery. A little bit strange philosophy. The shutter release button is smooth and the shutter/mirror noise is low. The frame counter doesn´t work in my model. For me the highlight of the FR is the diagonal-splitfield screen. I mostly focus by using the splitfield and like the fact that I
don´t have to tilt the body when there are no vertical structures in the field of view.

Porst EL 500

The Porst version of the Dacora Super Dignette Electric, released ca. 1968. Rodenstock Color Trinon-Lanthan 2,8/45mm in Prontor-S (B, 30-500). Coupled rangefinder. The camera features two flash connections, a hot shoe and a socket for flashcubes.
My camera has a broken rewind release knob. I assembled this clumsy screw to bring enough pressure on the knob´s rest to release the rewind function. Not nice but working.

Vivitar Series 1 70-210mm/3,5

The Vivitar Series 1 70-21mm/3,5 is a big and heavy zoom with a superb optical quality, which is my favourite telezoom.
I often use it wide open for freehand macro shots. The focussing in the macro position is done by sliding the zoom ring back and forth, which is very good for holding the camera steady. I own the lens with M42 mount and use it with the Chinon CE-II Memotron, which makes a really heavy combo.

Olympus XAs

I had never realized the differences in the front "bumps" when looking at pictures of the different XA models.