Month: July 2017

This photo was taken shortly before the start of The Great Race here in Jacksonville, Florida. It’s actually one of the best photos that came out of the Zenit 3m.

Besides the horrific light leak, there were only 13 relatively properly exposed frames on the 36 exposure roll. Several frames were overlapped, and all this occurred in the middle of the roll. The beginning and end of the roll were not exposed. So there are some shutter problems, and some film transport issues.

A gentleman with a Nikon FE walked up to me to congratulate me on being the only other film camera user in the crowd. He said he was too cheap to go digital. As long as he could still get film developed, he’d be shooting film. God bless him – I wonder if he realizes that the places he takes his film digitize to a very low resolution. Like 4 Megapixels. Now, you don’t need a lot, even for an 8×10. I have a very nice 8×10 hanging in my livingroom, from my Olympus C2100UZ (the famous “UZi”), which is only a 2 Megapixel camera.

I wouldn’t have any problem replacing the light seals on this Zenit, but the other problems are show stoppers. Cheaper to buy another Zenit off of eBay that to fix this one. However, I don’t think I’m going to playing Russian Roulette trying to find a workable camera.

But I do like the idea of trying some of the Russian lenses, like the Helios 44 family 58mm f/2 lens. However, Nikon cameras have a lens mounting flange to film plane distance that’s too long for most Russian lenses (typically M42 screw mount) that prohibit focusing at infinity without some sort of intermediate lens (that ruins the optical characteristics). So I’m in persuit of a more modern camera with an M42 (a.k.a. Pentax/Praktica screw mount) lens mount.

Stay tuned!

Nikon D300, 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6, 1/60 sec. f/4 at ISO 200 w/ pop-up flashA short while ago, I bought this 50 year old veteran of the Former Soviet Union (FSU). This is a Zenit 3M. Since it had markings on the top to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution, I thought it would make a nice conversation piece. But, I had to go try it out. Right now, it has it a roll of Kodak Ektar 100 film in it.

The camera is very simple. Zenit basically took an old, pre-WWII Leica II rangefinder camera, deleted the rangefinder focusing mechanism, and put a small mirror box and pentaprism on it to make it a Single Lens Reflex. Other simplifications were made, such as elimination of the slow shutter speeds (longer than 1/30th of a second). This isn’t really a problem for a camera of the day. You wouldn’t want to hand-hold a camera at shutter speeds less than 1/30th of a second, anyway.

The film advance has been updated from a knob to a ratcheting lever, and the film back opens on a hinge, unlike the Leica II this camera is based on.

I have to say, in short, I really like this camera, quirks and all. Quirks? Yes. There is no focusing aid in the ground glass viewfinder, and the mirror doesn’t automatically return after the exposure. The astute reader will notice I’ve added a larger shutter release button. The shutter button is a bit stiff, and has some knurling on top that makes it rather uncomfortable.

Did I mention how small this camera is? Let’s compare it to my Nikon F5 – another film camera that is similar in size to many professional DSLRs:

The F5 also happens to be loaded with film. This time, Fujicolor Superia ISO 200 film.  Yes sir! They still make 35mm film!