Year: 2013
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Testing the Kodak Retina 1a
In today’s world of camera that are fully automatic, and only the hard-core photographer bothers to worry about and understand concepts such as aperture and ISO, managing to get decent photos from a camera where you must set everything manually can be fun and rewarding. So I loaded my newly-received Retina with a 36-exposure roll…
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Zeiss Ikon Ikonta 35 (522/24) Focusing Woes
The Zeiss Ikon Ikonta 35 (522/24) is a cleverly-designed little camera from the late 1940s and early 1950s that fits in your pocket and is easy and fun to use. In fact, after World War II, this German-manufactured camera became a hit with GIs stationed in Germany as it was sold in military PXes. The…
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Found Film: “Backyard Family” and “My Puppy”
In a continuing series in which I share photos I get from old rolls of film that turn up out there, whose original owners forgot to ever develop them… Here are a couple of rolls where I barely got anything whatsoever, but you can still make out just a bit of detail. The first is…
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Vintage Camera: Kodak Duaflex II
One of the key aspects of the vintage cameras I collect is that they should function. This was the case with the Kodak Duaflex II, a plastic (bakelite) camera manufactured from 1950 to 1954. It is normally held at waist level, and you look down into the brilliant glass viewfinder, which shows where the camera…
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Diwali Fireworks – 7 Steps to Help Photograph them Effectively (Even if it’s Cheating!)
Yesterday I posted about scenes from Diwali (Deepawali), the festival of lights, as seen during the day in Chennai, India. The firecrackers that had been steadily and constantly building over the last few days continued to build until Saturday night, when the nature of the sounds changed. Wandering up to our roof, I was amazed…
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Photowalk: Diwali
This morning, we rose early to go on another Chennai photowalk, especially for Diwali. Again the route chosen for the group took us near the Kapaleeshwarar Temple, in Mylapore – which I blogged about a few weeks ago. At this point, many of you will be asking, “What is Diwali?” If you ask the question…
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Found Film: Trip to Vegas
The latest batch of “found film” comes from Belleville, Illinois. This roll was one of those 126 cartridges they used to put in Kodak Instamatics – in this case a Kodak Instamatic 15F, where the film still resided when I got it: Judging from the cars in the photos, the film is not all that…
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Photowalk: Triplicane
After the long series of posts on Goa, we’ve been back home again for a few weeks, and I’ve been able to join another photowalk. This time, it was to the part of Chennai known as “Triplicane”, which is one of the oldest parts of the city. Much of the city that became Madras and…
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Going to Goa: Spotted at the Beach
During our trip to Goa, we took a trip to Palolem Beach, locally considered the most beautiful beach in Goa, and the setting for the opening scenes of the movie The Bourne Supremacy. Luckily we were there before the tourist season, which means there was space to walk along the beach as vendors worked diligently…
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Going to Goa: Rome of the East
When I asked some photographer friends what I should look to photograph in my (then-) upcoming trip to Goa, I was told, “Churches! Goa is the ‘Rome of the East’”. I did some digging around and discovered that in fact “Old Goa” with its many churches is a UNESCO World Heritage site for that very…
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Going to Goa: Sights on the Streets
If you ever find yourself planning a vacation in Goa, it’s pretty easy to hire a local driver to get you around. For foreigners, the temptation is to just rent a car and save money, but hiring a car plus driver is actually pretty inexpensive – plus you get someone who can navigate the traffic…
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Going to Goa: On the Beach
Sharing a few photos from our recent trip to Goa, a former Portuguese colony in west/south India. One of the things tourists love about the beaches here is how clean they are. Whether it’s the currents, the population size or some other reason, we can definitely say there is a huge difference between what we…
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Ayudha Pooja in our Community
The other day a group of colleagues living close together and all of the domestic staff they employ came together for an annual tradition called the “Ayudha Pooja.” This is something which Hindus, especially in South India, have celebrated as long as anyone can remember. Traditionally it is observed on the final, or ninth day…
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Going to Goa: Sahakari Spice Plantation
One thing you can do when you’re visiting the Indian state of Goa, on the south/western coast, is to stop by a spice plantation. Presumably the spice plantations that dot Goa and other parts of India are remnants of the once-extremely-profitable spice industry which drove Europeans farther and farther across the globe in search of…
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Going to Goa: Shri Mangeshi Temple and Procession
We recently took several days to visit Goa, a small state and former Portuguese colony on the western coast of India. For one of our outings, we hired a local driver, “Seby”, to take us around for the better part of the afternoon, to see some of the local sights. One of the places we…
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Street Photography: Is Black and White Best?
A few days ago, I came home from work and sat down at the computer to see what folks were up to on Facebook, and I saw the “Photographic Society of Madras” was hosting a talk by an American street photographer, to start in 15 minutes – and it was only a mile away! So…
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The Ansco Craftsman Camera: Should I Build It?
I recently came into possession of an Ansco Craftsman Camera Home Construction Kit, and I don’t know what I should do with it. These kits were introduced in 1950 and marketed through magazines like “Boys’ Life” to try and recruit schoolchildren into photography, presumably to make them lifelong consumers of Ansco film. The idea appears…
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Chennai Photowalk Part 3: Kapaleeshwarar Temple
…as far as this particular photowalk goes, I’ve saved the best for last. We initially went into the less-trafficked entrance entrance to this amazing temple, following the lead of the Indians in our group, and after a few photos, were ushered out and told to come in the other entrance. But not before I scored…
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Chennai Photowalk Part 2: Streets at Night
It seems strange to think that, after 2 months living in this city, we haven’t really been out at night. I’ve been out very early and there are a surprising number of people up and about – this is the time when the trucks are unloaded bringing new stock to the shops. But in the…
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Chennai Photowalk: In Search of Golu
Golu, also known as Kolu or Bommai Golu – the “festival of dolls” – has come to Chennai. Golu is celebrated during the festival of Navratri in southern India. I find the background of the festival confusing, not knowing many of the stories relating to Hinduism, but the festival manifests itself in southern India in…
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From the Township to the Championship: The Amazing Story Behind One Photo
This is Sofia Simon, a fifteen-year-old, in Giza, Egypt. She’s on a layover in Cairo, on her way to compete in the World Biathle Championships in Cyprus. Never heard of biathle? Eighteen months ago, neither had Sofia. Eighteen months ago, she couldn’t swim, either. And tomorrow she will represent her country in a sport that…
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Crater Lake and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
I just finished “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” – probably the only person to have never read this book. The characters follow almost the exact same route through Oregon and northern California as we did on our very own “Chautauqua” last summer. I have always been drawn to Crater Lake – I’m not…
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Found Film: 110 “Pocket Instamatic”
One of those small 110 cartridges people used to put in “pocket instamatic” and other miniature cameras in the 1970s and 1980s came into my possession the other day. All twelve pictures had been taken. No idea whose it was originally – it was probably found in an old camera picked up at a garage…
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The International Coastal Cleanup: Chennai, India
Today we joined thousands of Chennaiites in taking part in the 2013 International Coastal Cleanup. Regular readers in this blog will recognize that Chennai struggles to maintain clean beaches and waterways, like many large urban areas on the coast. It was impressive to see the number of people involved and active in this annual event.…
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Vintage Photos with the Agfa Billy Record I
Here’s another post about vintage cameras from this blog that doesn’t know what it wants to be. Agfa’s Billy Record I was produced from 1950 to 1952 in the U.S. Zone of post-World War II Germany. The export model (to the U.S.) was known as the Ventura 69. It shoots at 3 speeds (1/25, 1/50,…