This Swiss CD player costs more than a used car. The front panel features an analog VU meter and gob-smackingly expensive controls.
Nick DeWolf was an engineer and an entrepreneur who co-founded a technology firm, but he also was a prolific amateur photographer. His son-in-law Steve Lundeen has taken on the job of archivist and has posted 45,000 of DeWolf's photos on Flickr. They are an awe-inspiring and powerful trip through the latter half of the 20th century.
Lundeen, who has been uploading the images since 2006 and adds a few dozen more nearly every day, writes that DeWolf left behind "many thousands of pre-digital images" that date back to the 1950s. "He carried a camera with him at all times, usually a family of cameras. If you knew Nick, you got used to this ... eventually, he'd be pointing his camera at you," Lundeen says.
The photos are a trip through DeWolf's life, passions and side interests. The subjects are all over the place, including the offices of Transitron and Teradyne; early integrated circuits; trips to Cape Cod, Las Vegas, Europe and Hong Kong and places in between; mid-1970s yoga classes; college football and pro hockey games; family life; sailing; a loving pictorial of a 1954 Mercedes Benz 300; bullfighting in Tijuana; and even late-life trips to Burning Man.
It's easy to get lost in the images. Perhaps because they are so mundane and shot by an amateur — an extraordinarily talented amateur at that — the photos transport the viewer to a different time and place. By documenting so completely for so long, DeWolf offers windows into not only his life, but fashion, politics and a half century of technological progress.
[Via Flickr blog]
The Fujifilm FinePix X100 large sensor compact camera is aimed at wealthy hedge fund managers with great taste. It offers impeccable retro styling, along with a fast 23mm fixed focal length lens and a hybrid optical/LCD viewfinder. Its body houses a newly developed high performance 12.3 megapixel CMOS sensor that can capture 720p HD video at 30 fps.
Pseudo-vintage glory doesn't come cheap. The X100 is slated to hit store shelves sometime next spring at a price of around $1000. Given the stratospheric price tag and the fixed focal length lens, I'd be more inclined to pick the svelte new $449 Nikon Coolpix P7000 instead.
Fujifilm FinePix X100. More than you imagined. [via dpreview.com]
The quirky 35mm Sprocket Rocket from Lomography captures panoramas with a super-wide angle lens that exposes the image past the sprocket holes. It includes dual winding knobs that make multiple exposures easy, along with a b-setting for long exposure, zone focusing, a flash hot shoe and a standard tripod thread.
It's compatible with all types of standard 35mm roll film, although getting a place to print a panoramic shot that includes sprocket holes could be a tad difficult. Conveniently, Lomography offers a kit that includes the DigitaLIZA 35mm Scanning Mask to ease the task of capturing your film on a digital flatbed scanner.
The Sprocket Rocket is €79, or €100 with the DigitaLIZA 35mm scanning mask.
Vladislav Kern writes, "Hey guys, if you remember me from the KGB cameras, I thought you'd get a kick from our underwater camera enclosures section. Just thought maybe some of these would be worthy of mention in your blog. I always got a kick out of them."
I can only imagine the delight my family would have experienced taking one of these technological marvels along on a relaxing mission holiday to the Baltic seaside, nestled safely in the back of our faithful little Zaporozhets sedan. The KRAB housing above was produced around 1960 for use with the GOMZ Leningrad 35mm camera. If you look closely, you can see a 1958 Leningrad camera nestled safely inside.
Believe it or not, this color photograph was shot in 1910. It's one of over 2,600 images captured by Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii between 1905 and 1915 that are now part of the Library of Congress collection.
The Library of Congress explains how this priceless collection made its way to the United States:
"The photographs of Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii (1863-1944) offer a vivid portrait of a lost world--the Russian Empire on the eve of World War I and the coming revolution. His subjects ranged from the medieval churches and monasteries of old Russia, to the railroads and factories of an emerging industrial power, to the daily life and work of Russia's diverse population.
In the early 1900s Prokudin-Gorskii formulated an ambitious plan for a photographic survey of the Russian Empire that won the support of Tsar Nicholas II. Between 1909-1912, and again in 1915, he completed surveys of eleven regions, traveling in a specially equipped railroad car provided by the Ministry of Transportation.
Prokudin-Gorskii left Russia in 1918, going first to Norway and England before settling in France. By then, the tsar and his family had been murdered and the empire that Prokudin-Gorskii so carefully documented had been destroyed. His unique images of Russia on the eve of revolution--recorded on glass plates--were purchased by the Library of Congress in 1948 from his heirs."
I've been a huge fan of View-Master 3D all my life. It wasn't until I was an adult that I discovered the older scenic reels. When View-Master started in 1939, it was originally intended for what we might today refer to as virtual sight seeing. It was decades later in the late 60s that the line morphed into being more of a childrens toy (admirable that the standard for the reels has stood throughout the product's entire lifetime. Any reel will mount into any viewer ever made).
The Model M viewer is from the late 80s and wasn't available for very long. I briefly thought that the Model M might have an advantage over more conventional viewers as the clear back would theoretically let in a lot of light. The transparent plastic is more to inspire the fascination of children as they watch the reel advancing mechanism work. As it turns out, the structure of the internals actually block out some of the image. Makes you wonder how this got off of the drawing board.
The curious shape is actually somewhat reminiscent of the first spindly View-Master Model A, so I guess it might be somewhat interesting for that reason. Though if using it occludes part of the dazzling 3D imagery within every View-Master reel, it's probably better to just put it back in the toy box.
related:
Ultimate View-Master
View-Master reels that talk!
View-Master 3D Trivia Quiz board game
The Impossible Project continues to expand its menu of offerings. It just announced its first color film, a "first flush" for SX-70 and 600-series cameras. Not to be missed is that it also is now selling Silver Shade films for three different styles of Polaroid cameras — the two aforementioned models, plus Spectra variants — at a shipped-to-your-door cost in the neighborhood of $25 per 8-shot pack.
Impossible has come a long way in a relatively short amount of time, but it's important to know that its films are still experimental (triply so for its "first flush" versions, which are literally the first batches). While it is making continuous improvements, its own website contains frank discussions about all sorts of ominous-sounding maladies that can affect your photos, from the loose lamination problem, a now-resolved issue that the company traced to film made over a specific time frame, to killer crystals, a humidity-related problem that permanently mars photos.
As it stands right now. Impossible's film must be shot, developed and stored under pretty specific temperature, humidity and light conditions. Shooting in a warm room? Put your new photo in a cool place. Shooting in winter? Stick it in your pocket. Always let the photo develop face-down. (The color PX70 film has even more stringent light-protection requirements.) Each Silver Shade film order is accompanied by a silica gel packet to help keep humidity down in your chosen storage vessel. Impossible's website even warns you of potential problems when you put a film pack in your cart.
To some people, these are understandably show-stopping hurdles, especially considering the per-photo cost. But a more generous view is that they merely represent constraints for the photographer to navigate — not unlike ambient light levels or lens limitations. If you want to shoot outside those environmental parameters, you must be prepared.
One thing's clear: This is not point-and-shoot photography, at least not the kind practiced by Hugh Laurie in this old Polaroid ad.
I had mixed success on my first pack of Silver Shade. But I can say this: The good ones were immensely satisfying.
The last roll of Kodachrome slide film to come out of a Kodak factory has been shot and processed, according to The Wichita Eagle. Steve McCurry, a freelancer who may be best known as the photojournalist who shot National Geographic's "Afghan Girl," got Kodak's permission to be the person to shoot it. McCurry took photos in India, New York and Kansas, home to the last Kodachrome processor on the planet, Dwayne's Photo Service.
National Geographic is documenting the film roll's journey. Kodak's museum will get the 36 resulting slides. Dwayne's will stop processing Kodachrome in December.
Among people who know about toy cameras, there seems to be two camps: the lovers (cute! fun!) and the haters (plastic lenses! the price!). Which makes me wonder whether the SuperHeadz 35mm Camera Kit and the Gakken TLR Camera can unite these two camps.
Think of these as slightly more sophisticated versions of those assemble-your-own or print-your-own pinhole camera kits. (Or the modern version of the 1977 LogiKit camera). The parts — nearly all of them plastic — snap together, though a few connections require screws. Both cameras are fixed focal length and fixed aperture. But they also are relatively inexpensive compared to some other toy cameras out there.
The resulting photos from the point-and-shoot "Plamodel" and the "Gakkenflex" TLR will probably give the toy camera-haters fits. I imagine light leaks abound and quality is probably comparable to a disposable camera — but even the haters might appreciate the price point and the enlightening journey it takes to get those tepid results.
The Impossible Project was formed by a group of former Polaroid employees following the end of instant film production. Their goal was simple: to create and market a portfolio of unique instant films for the millions of Polaroid Land cameras that still exist around the world.
The first new film to see the light of day is the brand new PX Silver Shade Instant Film. They describe it as an "Astonishing monochrome material in a limited First Flush Edition. Optimized for use in traditional Polaroid SX 70 cameras. First Flush Film is an experimental material that will produce changing results depending on light conditions and temperature." Each 8 exposure pack costs $21.
Let's hope this is the first of many quirky and original film types from the team.
Learn More About The Impossible Project [thanks, Paul!]
Tim Putz writes, "From 1960 to 1970, I photographed the first 100 Sambo's in the country. Today, only the first is still in operation here in Santa Barbara. At one time there were about 1200 locations from coast to coast."
These beautiful images make me long for a time machine so I can slip into the past for a short stack of pancakes with friendly people who wouldn't dream of wearing sweat pants in public.
Not only are these photographs a window into a soon-to-be-forgotten past, they also demonstrate the longevity of film. The images were shot on Kodak Vericolor Type L film with a 4 x 5 view camera and 90 mm wide angle lens. As a result, these 40 to 50 year-old photos look like they could have been captured yesterday.
My only complaint is that the images on Tim's site are too small to fully appreciate -- even the largest shots are a mere 350 pixels wide and there's a lot of detail hidden in each negative. This is a collection that could easily go viral and generate millions of page views with decently sized images, and I'm sure Tim would sell a surprising number of prints in the process.
I often find myself amazed at the projects people undertake in their spare time. In the days before the Internet, many slipped by unnoticed. Mercifully, that happens much less these days. A case in point: an intrepid Frenchman named Denis decided to create an SLR camera more or less from scratch. He documented his progress on a camera forum with lots of stunning pictures.
Denis says that he had this project in mind for 25 years, but didn't have the technical skill or expertise necessary to complete the project until now, at 42. His goal was to avoid reusing parts, except for the cloth shutter and the occasional ball bearing and screw. He even made his own first-surface mirror and ground glass viewing screen. Along the way, he ran into challenges -- especially light-proofing the body and getting the shutter to work properly.
Boitier appareil photo réflex maison "homemade SLR camera" [via Make]
PolaPremium has a small supply of new old stock Polaroid Image 1200si instant cameras available for € 98 each. The 1200si uses Spectra instant film packs (starting at € 15 for 10 shots) made using warehoused Polaroid film by a group of former Polaroid employees in the Netherlands who call themselves The Impossible Project.
The camera is compatible with all Image, Spectra and 1200 films. It features a 3-element 125mm, f/10 glass coated lens, sonar autofocus, built-in electronic flash and a self-timer that allows ghostly multiple exposures.
Polaroid Image 1200si Instant Cameras
Classic Retro Thing |
