Topic: 1926 P/S

[jharr]

Here is a shot from last weekend taken with my 1926 Agfa PD16 Clipper on some Kodak T-Max 400 that expired in 1981. I had no idea about the shutter speed or the aperture (or the true film speed for that matter), so I played it safe and did a stand development in caffenol-CL. The negatives are a little more dense than I would like for scanning, but still workable. The little lens on that old camera did a nice job though. Just a little ‘glow’ in the bright spots, which you would expect from this kind of lens. Still pretty sharp though. I am guessing that it is around f/11 and about 1/30 sec. That puts the film at around iso 50-100 instead of the ‘fresh’ labeled speed of 400!
I know what you are all thinking... "But James, the Agfa PD16 Clipper takes 616 film! How did you make 120 work?" Well, the image area is 6cm x 5cm, so 120 is wide enough. I had a friend 3D print some spool-end extenders that fit into the slots in the 120 spools and had holes for the 616 pins in the camera (I'll add a digi-pic of those later). Then I did a little figuring on the winding since the numbers on the 120 film are meaningless for 6x5. Anyway, it all came out pretty well, but could use some tweaking. I really like the combination of this expired film, the old 3-element lens, the 6x5 aspect ratio and the caffenol development. It gives a 'very' vintage feel to the photos.

James

[imagesfrugales]

That's amazing, James. I never before heard of this camera and obviously I underestimated the number of cameras made by Ansco and sold under the Agfa brand. And here in Europe we don't know much about Ansco at all. So I had to do some web search. What a beautiful camera, especially the colored ones. Are they refurbished or original? F.e. this one?
http://camerapedia.wikia.com/wiki/Agfa_PD16_Clipper

And of course I am very interested in the Caffenol-C-L development. How long did you develop, which and how much restrainer did you use? How is the base fog?

Best - Reinhold

[jharr]

Thanks Reinhold. This one I have is the plain black (uncovered) model. It seems to be all original with bits of surface rust, but the slide/extension and the interior are perfect as is the lens (no cleaning marks or scratches) and the viewfinder. The shutter is a simple spring loaded lever type, so double exposures are an option/hazzard especially because there are no numbers in the ruby window. I taped my counting/winding numbers onto the back and checked them off as I went along.

I developed at room temp for 70min with 30sec initial agitation and 10sec agitation at the half way point. I used 1g/L of KBr. Maybe more next time?? I would characterize the base fog as light to moderate, but definitely manageable. Overall, it is one of those worry-free cameras like a Brownie, but built like a tank and with a better lens. It was given to me as a gift after shooting a friend's wedding, so that makes it even more fun.

The funny thing is that 616 film was made up until 1984, so I could probably get fresher film in that format than the 120 I got from Beck, but I really like the way this film came out with the caffenol.

[Francois]

I'm always amazed when I see stuff like this. People think a camera has to be so complex in order to just work... when in reality it's just a lens, a spring and a piece of tin...

[imagesfrugales]

Thank you very much for the additional infos, James. I guess that using much more pot. bromide will slow down film speed, but 1.5 g/l should still be safe. I often use 1.3 g/l for fast films. I'm surprised that you don't have much more base fog, especially the TMax400 in Caffenol is somehow prone for that. But that concerns fresh film, maybe the well-hung ones behave different.

[Flippy]

I don't think the Clipper was available until the 1930s. Agfa didn't even merge with Ansco until 1928.

I have a postwar version of this camera still in its box, but I haven't used it because the red window is in the wrong spot for 120.

[jharr]

I don't think the Clipper was available until the 1930s. Agfa didn't even merge with Ansco until 1928.

I have a postwar version of this camera still in its box, but I haven't used it because the red window is in the wrong spot for 120.

Yeah, there seems to be some disagreement on the interwebz about the production date(s) of this camera. The Agfa version does seem to have been produced prior to the Ansco version though. There also seem to be a number of different looking 'Clippers'. Now that you got me wondering though, I looked in the back and found "U.S.P 2,208,799" stamped on the pressure plate. Thanks to Google Patent Search, I found out that this patent was filed on Mar 18, 1939 and published on July 23, 1940. So the camera is a little later than I thought, but still takes my "camera nerd" rating to about a 4.275. I will always cherish the look on people's face when you say, "It uses film."   

[jharr]

Reinhold, I went back and looked at the negatives again. The base fog is a little more than I remembered. Here is a reflective scan of one of the negs (in the sleeve). You can see the Kodak mark on the upper right of the scan.



And this is the negative scan.


Foot bridge by James Harr Photo, on Flickr

So the base fog is a little heavy, but still manageable, like I said. I'll try a little more KBr next time and compare.

[John Robison]

Just saw this post. Really amazing results, especially for 30+ year expired film.  Thanks for the tip of taping a check-off sheet on the camera. I have a Kodak folder that used #116 spools (I think) that I want to adapt to 120 film. The bellows appear tight and the lens is clear and the shutter seems to work fine so no excuse not to use the camera. I had thought of making spool extenders out of 1/8 inch hobby ply or even nylon washers stacked and epoxied.

[jharr]

I downloaded a shape file from Thingverse and 3-d printed the adapters, but they were way too thick for my Agfa, so it took a lot of trimming and sanding and drilling to get them to fit. This looks like a better method for adapting 120 spools if you have a couple of 116 spools.

http://kodak.3106.net/download/616panoramicconversion-RevBE.pdf