Filmwasters
Which Board? => Main Forum => : imagesfrugales March 25, 2015, 12:35:00 AM
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Hello filmwasters,
I sware, I never shot any instant film picture before in my entire life, so I was a real bloody greenhorn. I always thought, instant pictures are inferior and expensive, more or less useless. They are inferior and expensive after conventional criteria, but useless? How does it come that I changed my mind?
Well, I saw a lot of impressive pictures taken with the inferior technique, not least here at fw. Then I stumbled across a report somewhere about the future of analogue photography and the increasing sales in the amateur market. They also talked about instant film. I searched the web and found, that the Fuji Instax FP-100c is not so utterly expensive as the Impossible films and usable with the vintage Polaroid 100 - 400 series. On plus it's not the ultra-tiny Instax Mini format that I will probably never like. The image format is about 8x10 cm or 3x4". A quick search showed that the fitting polaroid cameras are rather cheap, the battery problem can be solved easily and a local dealer provides the Fuji FP-100c at a reasonable price - praise the lord!
A few days later, last saturday, there was a photo market near my town and I found a POLAROID LAND CAMERA AUTOMATIC 103 (so the entire models name) for 15 Eur. A battery holder for regular 2x AA batteries was soldered in place and a dry test showed that the shutter seemed to work fine under different light conditions.
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7611/16298861314_495ce21b0d_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/qQgVCf)polaroid land 103 (https://flic.kr/p/qQgVCf) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
The camera is really huge. The conveniant removable front cover has a clip to hold the instruction manual, but who needs it? Instead it's great to hold the pictures you just shot and take them home safely.
(https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8739/16735063769_56922f652a_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/ruPzqe)polaroid land 103_3 (https://flic.kr/p/ruPzqe) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
The outer surface of the triplet's front element is coated, so the lenses are probably made of glass and not plastic. I cleaned the lenses and viewfinder without dismantling and the finder is a plesure to use. The image is huge and bright with frame lines and parrallax compensation(!), the rangefinder(!!) has it`s own windows. Operation of the camera is extremely easy. The shutter speed is adjusted automatically from about 10 secs to 1/1200. color film = 75 ASA means that the lens is set always wide open at f/8.8. It also means that the images are not tack sharp and you get long shutter speeds of maybe 1/15 already in open shadows. The more sophisticated models with faster and better lenses are rather expensive. And I doubt they are much better, but will reveal the limitations of the simple construction.
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Welcome, new polaroid camera lover, welcome!! :)
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Now here are some of my very first shots. I had to adjust the brightness for about +1 stop with the corresponding knob and the developing time should be more on the longer side for bright pictures.
Best - Reinhold
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7287/16895023396_064540874f_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/rJXpQQ)pola01_02 (https://flic.kr/p/rJXpQQ) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
The very first 2 pics came out too dark, but I like the popping orange frames.
(https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8706/16733505250_63f312e870_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/ruFA8d)pola01_03 (https://flic.kr/p/ruFA8d) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7613/16919636622_a0b2cb25ee_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/rM8yuN)pola01_07 (https://flic.kr/p/rM8yuN) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7633/16713591667_78720388b4_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/rsVwvz)pola01_06 (https://flic.kr/p/rsVwvz) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
(https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8754/16920936735_f6a5ac7691_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/rMfdYx)pola01_05 (https://flic.kr/p/rMfdYx) by imagesfrugales (https://www.flickr.com/people/41560554@N06/), on Flickr
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Well Done Reinhold! Some very cool shots. Welcome to the Polaroid pack film world.
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Nicely done Reinhold. I converted a square shooter to take Fuji pack film and enjoy shooting some instant film now and again as a change of pace. I'm sort of in the "can't be bothered" camp when there are still so many negative emulsions to be explored. I like your results here., just hope you don't give up on the "traditional" film quite yet. :)
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Congratulations Reinhold. I have had the bug for some time. Enough to mourn the demise of several pack films. But at least FP100C is still going strong. The really fun part of instant photography (for me) is showing the prints at once, and give them away. Most of my portraits are taken with Polaroid pack film, and given to the subject. The smiles on their faces really make it worth it.
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Thanks for sharing the story and images Reinhold.
Pola is lovely isn't it!? If I where only to keep one camera it would be my Polaroid for sure!
Check out how to rescue negatives from the fp100c, it gives a whole new dimension to the pola thing ;)
http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=5335.0 (http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=5335.0)
http://moominsean.blogspot.no/2010/12/reclaimed-fuji-intant-negs.html (http://moominsean.blogspot.no/2010/12/reclaimed-fuji-intant-negs.html)
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nice, reinhold! I can miss a rangefinder (and parallax corrected rangefinder? wow!) but I should shoot my polaroid ee100s more. well, here comes the sun... :)
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Really nice photos. I wonder if Hasselblad did a back that will take FP-100c....?? If anyone knows, please shout up....!!
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Niiice. Welcome to the instant world!! There is nothing like peel apart film ;D
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Beautiful pictures, Reinhold.
Neuenheimer Feld is a great place to shoot.
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Hi everybody, thanks a lot for the kind comments and your encouragement. I really appreciate it.
Volker: yes, the Neuenheimer/Handschuhsheimer Feld is a great place where I did take a big amount of pictures. I'm about to make up a box with prints and will post a picture essay here. It might become epic .......
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Really nice photos. I wonder if Hasselblad did a back that will take FP-100c....?? If anyone knows, please shout up....!!
Yes they did, I used to have one. I ended up cannibalising it for parts to get a Graflok pola back back to life.
Keep in mind that you will only expose a small part of the frame. (example from the world wide web)
(http://www.danielweinand.com/storage/polaroids-1.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1253989602985)
Hasselblad + polaroid gave plenty of hits over at ebay.
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Another convert! Yay ;)
I never had one of those glass lens polaroids, but I must say that even their cheapest models have surprisingly sharp lenses.. Even the plastic ones are better than expected.
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Ive got a handy chart on my website that shows the major differences between all the models
http://www. blank.com/faqs/faqcam.packfilm.php (http://www. blank.com/faqs/faqcam.packfilm.php)
The 103 is a glass lens model which is obvious from the diameter of the lens compared to any of the plastic models which are "huge" in relative size.
The reason is this: glass has a large sweet spot for sharpness whereas plastic has a small one. To compensate, the plastic lens is made bigger.
So your sharpness for both glass and plastic lenses should be about equal. The only thing is plastic lens models can not take the lens accessories like the portrait or cloeseup kits.
In this day and age, while the glass may be "superior" to anything on a Polaroid camera...I find medium format systems that shoot cropped instant shots to be wasteful. But thats just my opinion and I still shoot with my RB67 anyway.
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nice! have fun with instant while you still can.
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Up to and over 10 years past the last expired pack to ever be made.
So, long time. 8)
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Option 8, i saw your many conversions on flickr, oh my goodness...... ;D
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> I'm about to make up a box with prints and
> will post a picture essay here. It might become epic .......
i can add some too :-)
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I caught the Polaroid bug a few years ago and it has permanently settled in. I'll play with the Instax, but my heart belongs to my Land Camera 100.
Your shots are lovely, Reinhold! I especially love the last two. The Fuji 100C is very good. The 3000B (black and white) is still out there, but because it's being discontinued, the price is more equivalent to the Impossible Project films. Still, it's worth it to pony up for a few packs to try it out before it goes away. It's a gorgeous film.
(https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5547/10720451766_3dbf87a859_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/hkk7Ph)
Little garage b&w (https://flic.kr/p/hkk7Ph) by limrodrigues (https://www.flickr.com/people/51692918@N05/), on Flickr
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I still have a pack that I'm holding on to probably until it dries-up :o
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Great stuff, and welcome to the world of instant! Skj.