Another Zeiss Ikon Nettar (517/16) Film Camera
A while ago, I picked up a beautiful Zeiss Ikon Nettar 517/16 medium format folding camera for next to nothing from the Kamerastore website. It was cheap because it had, ‘flaws that will affect typical use.’ In this case, the ‘viewfinder has haze and fungus inside’. Otherwise, it was described as being in working condition. After a few weeks, I took it out with a roll of Lomochrome Turquoise, and the results were spectacular, but the hazy viewfinder was an issue and I really wanted to clean it out.
I looked around online and the hazy viewfinder seems to be a common problem with these vintage cameras, but quite an easy fix. However, I was still a little nervous about taking apart such a lovely camera and wanted something to pracise on first. And that’s where this Zeiss Ikon Nettar 517/16 comes in. Of course, it was in the ‘Not Passed’ category on the Kamerastore website, with ‘flaws that will affect typical use’. In this case, the 1/25s shutter speed overexposes by approximately 1 stop, and ‘there is some wear on the beams, but no light leaks were observed’. In addition, the ‘film advance knob only unwinds if its rotated backwards,’ and, of course, ‘there is blur in viewfinder’.
When the camera arrived, in a really nice leather case, it was in lovely condition apart from the aforementioned ‘blur’ in the viewfinder, which was in fact haze, as in my original version. Before I started cleaning the viewfinder, I thought it might be a good idea to check that the camera functioned properly. Although the 1/25s speed was reported as exposing incorrectly, the remaining speeds were within tolerance. As a reminder, the Zeiss Ikon Nettar 517/16 is a manual focus medium format folding camera that takes twelve 6x6cm images on a roll of 120 film. Introduced by Zeiss Ikon in 1951, it was manufactured until 1957. It comes with Novar Anastigmat 75mm f4.5 lens. There are three shutter speeds, of 1/25s, 1/75s and 1/200s.
I loaded it with a roll of Harman Red film in 120 format and took the Zeiss Ikon Nettar 517/16 to the Praia da Barra and around the neighbourhood in Oiä. To measure the exposure, I used the smartphone app Camera Meter, and made well sure to keep the shutter speed selection away from 1/25s. Fortunately, the days we went out were lovely and sunny, so that wasn’t much of an issue. The exposed film was dropped off at Forever Blue in Aveiro, and the negatives scanned at home with an Epson Perfection v750 Pro flat bed scanner and Epson Scan software.
The negatives came out fine, and I was really happy with how the camera performed. However, this was my first experiment with Harman Red in 120 format and I’m not certain that the exposures were quite correct (or maybe it’s not just the 1/25s speed that’s out of tolerance). Also, compared to the images from my original 517/16 with Lomochrome Turquoise, these results were very ‘so so’. Mind you, I’m wondering whether that’s more because of my subject selection and response of the redscaled film than the camera itself. I’ve posted the whole roll in an album (https://www.flickr.com/gp/147583812@N06/zs8864PE9m) on my Flickr if you want to see the rest of the images. I do love these little medium format folders, and now it’s time to try clean the viewfinder. ‘Stay tuned’, as they say (and wish me luck).
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#Folder #HarmanRed #Mediumformat #Nettar #Redscale #ZeissIkon #barra #portugal #vagueira
It’s Pink! Gearing Up For The Crappy Commie Camera Party (Part V): The Beirette SL 100N
The Beirette SL 100 was originally launched by the Karl Pouva KG company of Dresden in 1972 as the Pouva Start SL 100. When the company became the state-owned Kamerafabrik Freital, the name was changed to the Beirette SL 100. In 1987, the Beirette SL 100N was introduced in a range of different colours, and I was delighted to find this lovely version in pink for not very much money.
The camera is made almost entirely of plastic, with a cup-like lens cap permanently attached to the camera with an plastic strip. It’s a simple camera, with a Chromar 50mm lens, and zone focusing of 1—3m, 3—8m, and 8m to infinity marked with little icons on the lens. The shutter has two speeds of 1/30s (flash) and 1/125s (for ‘sunny’ conditions), plus B, and a fixed aperture of f11.
The Beirette SL 100N has a countdown frame counter. After loading a film, the counter is set to 0 with the wheel on the rear of the camera. The film is advanced until ’12’ is visible and the camera is then ready to use. After taking the last frame (number 1), the film is advanced three more times before opening the camera and unloading the film.
Naturally, I was keen to see how the camera performed, so I loaded the SL100N with an SL canister of probably slightly expired Lomography 100 film. I say ‘slightly expired’ because the film was supplied loose so there was no packaging with any film stock details on it. In the event, the exposure was … reasonable. Some of the images came out really well, though I felt that the negatives were quite ‘thin’, but the wind-on mechanism was rubbish with poor frame-spacing and far too many overlapping images.
There were also a lot of light leaks, though this was intermittent, and I reckon that this because of the poor quality of the recyclable 35mm cassette that I used to transfer the film from the Rapid canister rather than the camera. The Beirette is really light hungry, and will benefit from using a much faster film, even on sunny days. Despite these faults, I really like the Beirette and will certainly try it out again, though probably not before the end of the Crappy Commie Camera Party. I’ve posted the whole roll in an album on my Flickr, light leaks and all, if you want to see the rest of the images.
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#AgfaRapid #Beirette #Canister #CrappyCommieCameraParty #Experimental #HarmanPhoenix #HarmanRed #Pouva #Rapid #Redscale #Shittycamerachallenge #SLFilm #Vintage
Navid Salehi
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