Holga 120-PC Pinhole Camera

In honor of Worldwide Pinhole Photography day I decided to post a photo from the first roll shot through my Holga 120-PC Pinhole Camera last year. I received it for Father’s Day, shot one roll of Kodak Portra 400 with it and put it aside. Finally this weekend I pulled it out again for Pinhole Day.

As you can see it provides surprisingly good images, much better than my home made cardboard 35mm pinhole camera that I used for the first two Pinhole Days I participated in. I just finished shooting another roll of Portra 400 in the Holga 120-PC and sent it off to the Darkroom for processing. 

The image of the bridge shown above is the way into a local arboretum. The pinhole camera is unique in that it has an infinite depth of field and presents everything in focus.

Stay tuned until next week when I will be hopefully showing off my latest pinhole creations. 

Don't Forget - It's Pinhole Time Again!

Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day is this Sunday, April 27th, 2014.

Check out the link below to get in on all the action and be sure and take some pinhole pictures to post and share with the world.

http://www.pinholeday.org/

Canon Sure Shot A-1/WP-1

Canon pretty much invented the auto-focus point & shoot cameras with the release of the first Sure Shot back in the late 1970’s. I bought one of those to compliment my “Go-To” Olympus OM-1N and remember thinking at the time that it was the greatest thing since sliced bread. 

The little gem shown below is one of the last versions of the Sure Shot line before the digital revolution and this one also happens to be water proof. 

I was looking for some kind of water proof 35mm camera to give to my soon to be daughter-in-law for her birthday. She has a nice Pentax Q-7 digital but I wanted something she could take on the honey-moon and use by the pool or beach without having to worry about ruining it. I ran across the Canon Sure Shot A-1/WP-1 at www.Shopgoodwill.com and was able to rescue it for a very modest amount of cash.

I cleaned it up, checked the seals, put a fresh battery in it, and took it for spin with a roll of Fuji color 200 film.

The huge bright viewfinder was my first surprise. What an awesome view! Next was the crisp clean action as the chunky, well-built camera impressed me with it’s quick and precise autofocus, crisp shutter, and instantaneous film advance. And, as if that weren’t enough, the super sharp wide angle lens delivered a set of dazzling images that were so impressive I didn’t even notice at first that the local CVS pharmacy’s One-hour Photo Lab had scanned them all in backwards. 

Here’s an image of the camera borrowed from the Canon web site (since I don;t have it anymore).

Oh, and I forgot to mention the built in flash which did about as good a job as any such flash can. The mantle shot above was taken in my living room using the on-board flash unit. I rescanned it correctly (not backwards). No one but me probably would have noticed but it would have driven me crazy every time I looked at it on the blog. Besides, I’ve wanted to play with my new Epsom V550 scanner since I got it for Christmas. I will be blogging about it too as soon as I’ve used it enough to have something to share on the subject.

At any rate the Canon Sure Shot A-1/WP-1 is definitely a keeper that I am sure will be enjoyed for many more years to come.

No Cameras? Surely you jest!

As the father of the groom I was expected to dress up, show up and shut up. Knowing my passion for all things photographic I was also told to stay out of the (professional) photographer’s way and not to take pictures, “Don’t even bring a camera!”

Well, clearly that was not going to happen! I did dress up and show up, but I stashed my diminutive Nikon P-300 in my coat pocket and when no one was looking “shot the shooter” as well as a few other choice compositions.

The ability of this little gem of a camera to take fantastic pictures, especially in low light situations never ceases to amaze me. Could I have gotten better photos with one of my other cameras? Certainly.  In this particular instance however, that would have been inappropriate. Besides, sometimes a small point & shoot you can slip in your pocket is simply the best tool for the job.

 In any case, the “stay out of the way” point is valid and I can say with all honesty I don’t think the photographer even knew I was there. Only a few friends knew I had a camera with me and only because they happened to be near when I whipped it out for a quick pic.

I took a total of 47 pictures that day. The photographer however was relentless. She was everywhere, taking hundreds of photos with two Nikon DSLR’s sporting two huge (meaning fast) zoom lenses. One DSLR carried a serious flash but she was clearly favoring available light whenever possible. Her “second” was almost as unobtrusive as I was popping up here, there and everywhere, with a smaller Nikon DSLR taking candid shots and generally catching the peripheral action. I would be surprised if at the end of the day there weren’t at least a thousand photos to pick from for the wedding album. Clearly her work has only just begun!