As I type this, I am looking forward to our 'outing' to Whitby. I hope we have fine weather, but I have been told the East coast can be a bit unpredictable! Anyway, a report and photographs will be included in the next issue. I apologise to many of you who write in and I fail to reply. I often get distracted from magazine issues and so invariably do not have the time to put finger to keyboard. It is not that I am ungrateful, I very much like receiving correspondence but unless it specifically warrants a reply, I omit to do so. Please do not be offended.
I have been undertaking a negative/transparency cataloguing exercise this winter. The long evenings, with nothing worth watching on TV, have prompted me to start this monotonous task. Using a refined technique, as outlined in CRU Issue 10, I laid my negatives in their clear sleeves on my homemade light box and photographed each sheet with my Canon 400D. The images were inverted (negative to positive), colour corrected and printed on a colour laser printer, as previously described. I had contact printed many of my films when I had an operational darkroom but now I have to make use of a less than perfect method of locating negatives but it is quick and easy.
I have been able to find negatives that were virtually impossible to identify visually. I have created a database on my computer into which I entered the subject, not of each negative but of general film content. A real journey down memory lane! I have not completed the task yet but I estimate that I have about 20,000 negatives - most taken with a Rollei camera. I dread to think of the cost over the years. Digital would have been a much cheaper option had it been around in those days!
You may have read that 'Polaroid' film is being produced again; see http://the-impossible-project.com/. Whilst sorting my negatives, I found a couple of glass plates that I had taken using my grandfather's Ica 'Halloh 510' quarter plate camera when I was in my teens. I thought it would be great to use it again so I planned to 'butcher' a Polaroid back/film holder and use it with Polaroid 100 type film - which is quarter plate (size 2¼ x 3¼). I recently purchased an automatic Polaroid 320 bellows camera at a camera fair for £5. Having done some subsequent research, I found that the 320 required a special 3 volt battery and so I made an adapter to take a lithium CR2; also that the shutter was not accurate and I found that some of the switch contacts had oxidised, so I cleaned them with a fibreglass pencil - I now have a working fun camera which has a cheap plastic lens - however, I have not achieved my initial plan to be able to use the Ica. If you want to experiment, look for a model 100, 101, 102, 103, 250, 350, 360 or 450 which have 3 element glass lenses. These are a bit more expensive but the quality should be better. The best ones to buy are the 180, 185, 190 & 195 with quality lenses and manual shutter.
Contents:
Front Cover: From Rollei Archive.
3 The Rolleiflex 2.8B by David Morgan
6 Your Forum
7 My Visit to the Rollei Factory by Wulf Koehler
14 Carnevale 2010 by Denis Camp A.R.P.S.
19 Small Dimensions Make a Big Difference by Nate Skipper
19 Wanted
20 What is Your Rollei Worth by Ian Parker
23 The 'Practical Accessories' Revisited by Jim Graves
24 A Humble Pilgrim's Progress by APDOO
25 Autum Print Competition Information
26 A Spring Break in Bosham by Denis Camp A.R.P.S.
Back Cover: 'Poppy' by Brian Brading
