Rollei 35

Framed Tree in KEH Blog

2013 07 Rollei 35S Rollei Retro 80s-0035
Rollei 35S, Rollei Retro 80s

I made it into KEH's Photos of the Month for October with the above shot.

This tree is in a park where our boys have tennis lessons nearly every Sunday.  I have taken shots of it before, but this time the framing and lighting/shadows worked out pretty nicely.

The Rollei's 40mm lens has a narrow enough field of view that I had to back up almost all the way to the street on the far side of this open grass area to capture the whole tree.  And after shifting around for a minute or two I found a nice framing by the branches in the foreground.

While I love the Rollei cameras, I am not sure I a convert to the current Rollei-branded films (actually made by Agfa).  Retro 80s film does have a classic B&W look to it, but it has a very speckled grain at full magnification that I have yet to come to terms with.

Did you know that Rollei 35's are still manufactured today?  After the parent company went brankrupt in 2009 some of the employees launched a new company DHW Fototechnik and still make digital and analog SLRs as well as some classic TLRs and the 35.

They offer the Rollei 35 in some crazy looking special editions.

Oh, and this was the second time I made it into the KEH blog.  The first was back in their February photo post and was a picture taken of my Rollei 35S previously featured here.

Beauty And The Beast

2012-10-RolleiAddyFeet-RB67-XP2-0006
taken with Mamiya RB67 Pro-S, Mamiya-Sekor C 90mm/3.8, Ilford XP2 400 Super

My last post contained a clue hidden within the negative I was examining: I received two additions to my camera collection for a recent birthday and both were involved in that shot.

One new camera was in the picture, and the other was used to take the picture.  Despite both being vintage film cameras, these two could not be any more different.

The "Beauty" is the above Rollei 35 S, one of the most compact 35mm film cameras ever.  There are others that may be a hair smaller, but none with the same kind of classic styling.

The "Beast" is a Mamiya RB67 Pro-S 6x7cm medium format camera.  This is about as large and heavy as a medium format camera gets, clocking in at over 5 lbs for a standard lens setup.

To put them more into perspective, the Mamiya weighs about 8 times as much as the Rollei, and you can virtually fit the whole Rollei inside of the Mamiya.

I have put several rolls of film through both cameras and they are in good shape.  I think the Mamiya needs some new light seals and perhaps a cleaning, but both cameras have taken up positions in my "active lineup" of shooting cameras.

A big thanks to both my DSW and my Father for the Rollei and Mamiya respectively.  Most of my cameras (whether in use or mothballed) have come from one of you!

Vintage Star Destroyer

 StarDestroyer

Rollei B 35, Ilford XP2 Super

While I am on a vintage kick, this is arguably as vintage an example of a Star Destroyer photograph as you can possible get.

This is one of the original models used in the Star Wars movies, currently on display at the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana, California.  You can see many of the models, costumes, props, etc. on display at the Star Wars Where Science Meets Imagination exhibit. 

I took this with my Rollei B 35 pressed up against the glass protecting this model. It was fun "filming" it myself, capturing my own image.

I loved seeing the real, physical models and props from the original movies which seem so much more lifelike than the computer generated ones from the prequel trilogy.  The ship models are impressively large, often six feet long or so.

The extra Millennium Falcon Experience ride was fun for our young boys.  You sit in the cockpit and view a projected movie of flying through space as C-3PO and R2-D2 narrate about astronomy.

It was so convincing that our three-year-old actually asked us "When are we flying back to Earth?" in the middle of the ride!

However, if you are in the area and interested you had better act quickly.  The Star Wars exhibit closes down after April 15th.