Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Rollei 35

Shame on me: Stephen Gillette made me want to have a Rollei 35, so I bought one on eBay. Lucky for me I don't care about how it works, and the meter does not work, so I got it much cheaper than it normally is.

In case you've never seen one, it's tiny, like a pack of cigarettes. But full 35mm quality, and great lens.


Isn't it beautiful?
I wonder if it is also beautiful to people who are not camera geeks?

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm not a camera geek but I've learned to appreciate the beauty in classic gadgets --- mainly music related hardware but the sense of aesthetics translates over to these light capturing things very easily.

Incidently, I was just reading the newly published review of Leica M8 by Phil Askey, so I was in the mood, so to speak.

Your Rollei 35 is a beauty. Too bad it's not fully functional, though.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Doesn't matter to me. I never use film cameras anymore. To me this camera is like jewelry or a sculpture. And it saved me at least $100, I estimate.

Anonymous said...

This style of 35mm camera from Rollei was quite good. The optics were well received. However, I had a problem judging distance and then making proper camera adjustments. With no coupled viewfinder this proved rather difficult when my developed shots were more out of focus than not.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Yes indeed, the lack of a focussing mechanism is a downside when using large apertures and close subjects.

Alex said...

I forgot, my first 35mm was my Grandad's old Halina. Again, no reflex lens. I must say though, it had the quietest shutter I'd ever used, it was an iris that opened and closed.

The camera was failing when I put two films through it, and mostly urban landscapes it fared very well, but the shutter was slowing, and gave an interesting vignetting to the pictures I had not expected.

My Ricoh was positively thunderous with it's dual curtain shutter.

I used to pick up things which looked good. Trouble is I now share a house with a wife and two kids, so there isn't space for all my crap...

Anonymous said...

Yes, it is interesting. But to a non-camera guy like me, I just want them to work, not something I'd spend my hard-earned sheckles. But then you might say the same thing about my soprillo sax or contrabass clarinet.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Exactly. I find that good guys usually has one area where they care about quality and aesthetics.

Alex said...

Hmm, I must be a bad guy. I care about aesthetics in cars, buildings and toys.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

That's three areas, all the better.

Dibutil said...

I was looking for one that would work because I wanted to shoot with it... End up with Canonet QL-19 which is nice and cheaper too.

Alex said...

Gotta ask, is that the flash shoe on the bottom right as we look at it.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Yep!!
It's a good example of the interesting design choices they made in order to make the camera so compact.

Alex said...

I guess I'm just used to a flash being up and left. A top mounted flash gives faces a more natural light, underlit faces are more creepy, ask any kid whose stood wish a flashlight under their chin.