1st Belair Photos

I’ve been putting off shooting with the Belair, as I’m missing a couple of pieces. The viewfinder I have is for the wide-angle lens (this camera would originally have had two lenses, each with matching finder). I’m also missing the attachment to shoot 12×6 negatives*, I’m stuck with 9×6 and 6×6, which is disappointing; I like a good panoramic photograph. This means that the framing is a bit hit and miss, as I’m not sure how a 90mm lens and 58mm finder work together…

Lomography help desk are working on finding me replacements for these pieces, which is decent of them as I’m not even the original owner of the camera. I thought it would be a bit cheeky to ask for the wide-angle lens too, although I’d have liked to shoot with one, if only to see if they are as ‘soft’ as everyone says. (I’ve shot a bit with Lomography’s Sprocket Rocket camera, and that’s a bit soft, but in a good way.)

Since the Belair is auto exposure, I can shoot slide film with the expectation of it coming out ok. Slide doesn’t really have any latitude, not compared to negative film which you can under or over expose a fair bit before ruining your photographs. Although, some shots have come out with very white skies, so it’s not a perfect system.

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There’s a bit of lens flare on a couple of them, but I’ve located a lens hood for it for next time.

 

 

 

*The Belair takes medium format (‘120’) film, which is quite a bit larger than 35mm, with a corresponding increase in resolution. Although nowhere near as large as some large format film, where sometimes the negatives are 10″x 8″ or bigger.

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Random Camera Bits

Random Camera Bits

I saw some random camera bits on eBay the other week, bidding starting at £10.  It wasn’t completely obvious what some of the things were, but some of them looked useful – the small lens hoods looked like they’d fit my Voigtlander Vito B cameras.  There were a few filters in there too, and a rangefinder, surely some of these would be useful. So I put a bid in.

 

No-one else bid, so I won the lot.  Some of the stuff is useful, some not…

• Small lens hoods: both 30mm and I need 32mm! No use to me at all!
• White shutter release cable: not bad at all, that’ll get used
• Black shutter release cable: broken, not repairable
• Monocular: Seems to work fine. Do I need one? Not really.
• Rangefinder: Numbers are almost too faint to read, but it works.
• Light Meter: Works ok I think, although it’s designed for old, slow film types
• Leather-covered box: Catch works, no key, but great condition (except strap has perished)
• Filter Glass 31mm: I can use these with filter holder
• 42mm Filter: Or is it a lens? Not sure what it does, fits 3 of my cameras
• Close-up Filter: Can use with 2 cameras (or anything accepting Series VI)
• Small film Spool tin: No use for film, but tin could be handy
• Filter Pouch: Ok, I could use this. Probably won’t.
• Small Metal Thing: It has small thread and large thread, no idea what this is!
• Filter Box: A disappointingly empty filter box. Am using it to store a filter.
• Drawstring bag for telephoto lens: If I ever buy a tele lens…

The weird thing with the numbers on it and an eye piece is a kind of exposure meter, which as it has almost no moving parts, is still in working order. The numbers on the rangefinder are almost too faint to read, but it works.

The small black lens hood unscrews to fit the filter glass, I’d never seen one like that before. So I bought one that fit my cameras and now I can use the filters, and there is less to mess about with when taking photos as filter and hood are one piece.

It was a bit risky buying a collection like this, which is obviously the seller having a bit of a clear out…