[pcarfan]

re the Isolette - Excellent! Are you getting a Mr. Kreckel restored one - I take the photo is his handiwork?

Yup! I am....

I am not expecting much in terms of IQ. I just adore mecahnical things, especially if it is compact and intricate. I just love the idea of using it. However, I do want useable IQ (thus the reason not to get the older version where there is no rangefinder and I have to guess distances which I am absolutely weak at). This lens is a tessar design with anti-reflective coating and should be ok (I might get a lens hood too). I've seen some very decent images in flickr takne with these isolettes.

Do you have any experience with it?

[Ratmagiclady]

Well, I still have a Pentax MZ-5n so it's an important point for me

Hee. I've managed to retain total FF compatibility, myself, (except for the kit lens, which I don't need on film cameras, anyway) and as it happens, pretty much expect this to continue for the forseeable future. The only DA lens I'm overly-interested in is a 21, which would be there to be small and wide on the digital. (Wonder if anyone knows offhand how it'd cover on FF, anyway, not that it's deeply important. )

And, yeah, Pcarfan, I think a hood's a good investment if you don't want an over-the-top retro look in what you'll be using that camera for. And there's a certain retro-coolness about the experience of popping a nice push-on hood on there, I think. Then again, I have a little Kodak Signet 35 with a Tessar-type lens which I have enjoyed using stopped way down and hoodless in bright sun with black and white film. Being somewhat sun-sensitive, I think it captures something about how the world actually looks to me when there's blaring sunlight out there. (That is, if it doesn't look like overexposed Kodachrome, which is less pleasant indeed. )

[Nesster]

Yup! I am....

I am not expecting much in terms of IQ. I just adore mecahnical things, especially if it is compact and intricate. I just love the idea of using it. However, I do want useable IQ (thus the reason not to get the older version where there is no rangefinder and I have to guess distances which I am absolutely weak at). This lens is a tessar design with anti-reflective coating and should be ok (I might get a lens hood too). I've seen some very decent images in flickr takne with these isolettes.

Do you have any experience with it?

Not with an Isolette, but I've posted some pics from a Kreckel Bessa I with a Vaskar. The image quality is fine indeed. (I have several folders, a couple of which I consider to be very fine cameras.) I haven't missed a rangefinder, as I've learned to focus fairly well without. The Agfa has a reputation of having the best Tessar clone of them all.

RML - the better folders from the '50s, and some prewar ones as well, are fully competetive with modern image quality. This little Agfa, for example, should in real life use be up to or near those classic Rollei TLRs. A hood is a very good thing to use, but not absolutely necessary.

[pcarfan]

Jussi, RML

So, these lenses take a slide-in hood, hah! and not screw in type. The Solinar 75/3.5 is a 32mm filter one unlike the others which are 30mm.

Jussi, which folders do you consider awesome.

RML those Kodak Signet 35 looks hyper-cool.....

[Ratmagiclady]

Jussi, RML

So, these lenses take a slide-in hood, hah! and not screw in type. The Solinar 75/3.5 is a 32mm filter one unlike the others which are 30mm.

Jussi, which folders do you consider awesome.

RML those Kodak Signet 35 looks hyper-cool.....

Yes. usually they'll be 'Series Something' ...sometimes with an adapter to push-on. (Kodak had its own idea of filter sizes, for instance) But, yeah, a push-on hood is very practical, considering that these cameras fold and the hood would get in the way (Pay attention! )

And, oh, yeah, Jussi: these often have nice glass: stopping way down will give diffraction, which you'd commonly see, from a combination of slow shutters and faster modern films, you kind of have to, really.


As for these Signets, yeah, one of the few true sleepers of the Ebay age: these things were originally made for the military, and are practically bomb-proof, machined out of single blocks. The lenses, (An Ektar 44) are absosmurfly splendiferous, too. In modern-dollar terms these are like Leica D-luxes for what they cost, originally. The viewfinder is peepy and teeny, but the rangefinder is possibly the best I've ever seen for vividness.

Pulled mine out of a flea-market box of old cameras that I mostly fixed up for friends who'd helped me out while in tough times. Was still operating at one hundred percent, if you don't count a laggy self-timer.

Needs some cleaning and shutter lube about twenty years later, but hey. I used to carry this in the pocket of a big man's blazer I wore at the time, (Not only does it make you look a bit bigger than you are, the pockets are like dual purses. ) and got some neat stuff before the chemistry I'd cached ran out.

I do recommend one. (And I do want to find a hood for this, but the look I was mentioning does OK without them. )

(Incidentally, I don't know if this camera has *ever* seen a roll of color film, ...not in my hands, at least, so I can't say a thing about that.)

[Nesster]

RML - you might be surprised based on this letter from a reader to Pop Photo in December '56:

Until a few years ago, I thought my 35-mm camera suitable only for color slides. After reading articles in your magazine on 35-mm photography and doing some experimental work, I have found this camera can produce negatives from which excellent black-and-white enlargements can be made. Once a 4x5 camera was considered an absolute necessity for good print quality....

Pop Photo had started a 35-mm (their preferred spelling) section that fall.

I envy you that Signet, I recently studied them and coveted one.

Re. slide on hoods - RML is right, the era had 'series' filters: you bought an adapter which screwed onto a filter holder, your series filter went in the holder, and you finally screwed on a 'keeper' ring or your light shade. There were dedicated hoods as well though.

I get mine at a camera show locally, if I need one for a new aquisition I just take the camera there, and try on different bits till I find one that fits. 32mm outside diameter may be a fairly common one, if I recall right the Kodak Retina Xenars have that dimension, as well as other medium format Xenars/Xenons in folders.

My favorite camera is a 1937 Bessa 66 with an uncoated Skopar. It has auto stop (no red window peeping) and a very nice lens. The Bessa I is a good camera as well. And I have a prewar Certo Super Sport Dolly with Xenar - the Retina shade fits - and a not quite working range finder.

Baby pics?


Certo


Bessa I


Bessa 66


The 120 kids


Samples from the Bessa I
Voigtlander Bessa I Vaskar - a set on Flickr

and from the Bessa 66
Voigtlander Bessa 66 - a set on Flickr

I haven't made a flickr set for the Certo yet

[Ratmagiclady]

RML - you might be surprised based on this letter from a reader to Pop Photo in December '56:


Pop Photo had started a 35-mm (their preferred spelling) section that fall.

Heehee. Some things never change. I suspect that may have meant that color film would only get so sharp inherently, anyway.

I envy you that Signet, I recently studied them and coveted one.

I'm not above sending him for a visit, if you'd like to see: the only thing is I haven't attended to the lubrication of the shutter, which makes him seasonally-picky, and the finder got a bit dusty somehow in storage. Nonetheless, I expect that of all my cameras, he'll be the last one running, apart perhaps from that Yashicamat I've recently adopted.

Re. slide on hoods - RML is right, the era had 'series' filters: you bought an adapter which screwed onto a filter holder, your series filter went in the holder, and you finally screwed on a 'keeper' ring or your light shade. There were dedicated hoods as well though.

I honestly wouldn't mind an authoritative note of what size this little guy's threads really are, the Net's vague on it.

I get mine at a camera show locally, if I need one for a new aquisition I just take the camera there, and try on different bits till I find one that fits. 32mm outside diameter may be a fairly common one, if I recall right the Kodak Retina Xenars have that dimension, as well as other medium format Xenars/Xenons in folders.

Yeah, I'm really not sure. Apparently the way with these was a Kodak Wratten adapter or a Kodak one for the standard series hoods and filters, or a hood made expressly for this.

My favorite camera is a 1937 Bessa 66 with an uncoated Skopar. It has auto stop (no red window peeping) and a very nice lens. The Bessa I is a good camera as well. And I have a prewar Certo Super Sport Dolly with Xenar - the Retina shade fits - and a not quite working range finder.

Baby pics?

*peer.* Ok. May as well. I'll be a minute or three. Must shoot them.


Here's a quick one of my old friend, looking a bit dusty under electronic flash, but on roughly-period camera support.

---

Last edited by Ratmagiclady; 07-01-2010 at 11:55 AM.

[Pablom]

I'd like to think of it as a modest version of Asahiflex's setup



this is how the next Pentax camera should look like, the interface is genius

[Ratmagiclady]

I'd like to think of it as a modest version of Asahiflex's setup



this is how the next Pentax camera should look like, the interface is genius

*lol a little.* You mean... Analog?

[Pablom]

*lol a little.* You mean... Analog?

I was referring to forum user Asahiflex showing off his FA* 28-70mm in post #118

[Ratmagiclady]

I was referring to forum user Asahiflex showing off his FA* 28-70mm in post #118

Ah. I think I see. I chose an Mz-5 for old-school interface, too, recently:

[Asahiflex]

The MZ-5(n) was and still is a brilliant camera. I love how Pentax decided to give us back the old, but extremely intuitive, controls on top of the camera. Who needs more than a diaphragm ring, a shutter speed dial and a exposure compensation dial? I would give an arm and a leg for a digital MZ-5n or LX. It can't possibly get better than that.

Well, it will probably stay a dream forever.

[ducdao]

I have sinned, my latest victim is Porst 55mm f1.2 K mount

[ducdao]

Just got an additional 60 liter dry box to store my recent acquisitions. Crazy how humid is it in Vietnam. It's currently 85% RH in my room!

[pickles]

My latest "acquisitions" are:
(1) 85mm 1.8 SMC Takumar with caps, hood & case...don't know enough about ratings to say "mint", but it's in beautiful unmarked condition.
(2) The Ultimate Asahi Pentax Screwmount Guide 1952-1977. Also in unmarked condition.
I hope to gain much enjoyment from both.
Cheers, Pickles.