Ever since the invention of the automobile and aeroplane, the way people moved changed rapidly. Henry Ford’s Model T put the dream of a personal car within reach; improvements in planes through the inter-war period into World War Two and the post-war period allowed long-distance travel at an even faster rate. While steam motive power continued to drive many railroad operators through the war, the rise of diesel began to reshape even the train industry. Through the war, fuel and material shortages spiked passenger train services, but even now, those were starting to decline. It became clear that the golden age of rail had comeRead More →

When it comes to camera gear there are some that have the feels, and there are others that don’t have the feels. So in this episode, the gang discusses the cameras that have amazing ergonomics that are a joy to use, others that we tolerate because the image quality is amazing! What cameras are on the table today, some are pretty obvious including the Nikon F4, Hasselblad V System, Olympus OM-2 and the Mamiya m645. And it cannot be an episode about ergonomics without including an Exakta. Want a subscription to SilverGrain Classics and are a fan of Classic Camera Revival? Visit their shop onlineRead More →

It has been far too long since I got together with this amazing group of people in-person since all of this started in March 2020. And while I was unable to make it out to the first meetup since our last meetup in February 2020 (at least it was the largest meetup to date). And through early 2021 there were some attempts at virtual meetups, the fact of the matter is that the TFS group is best served with in-person meetings. Thankfully with things looking far better real meetups kicked off in October with a second meetup taking place at the beginning of the month.Read More →

Being in North America and raised on Kodak and Ilford developers, I did not even know that Atomal existed, other than seeing it listed on the Massive Dev chart and just passing it by as another European developer. But when I was hunting for more Rollei developers at Freestyle, I came across Atomal 49 as an ‘other people purchased’ listing. I was excited to give this a shot, and after mixing it up, I posted in a Film Photography Chat group on Facebook and asked if anyone else had used the stuff. The response was overwhelming how many people used the stuff. However, the bestRead More →

The late 19th century brought the final push to extend out the transcontinental line. The arrival of the 20th century, the Canadian Pacific Railway was the only line that extended across Canada, at least from Vancouver to Montreal. In Ontario, Grand Trunk managed to secure itself as the big player in the province by absorbing all the competition but could not do that with Canadian Pacific finding itself against a competitor that it simply could not buy out. This was the golden age of rail travel when mighty steam locomotives travelled across the country; rail networks connected people and places, mail and cargo were easilyRead More →

It is always a good idea to future proof your lenses, especially when working with the Minolta manual focus cameras. I say that because, like Nikon, while the original 1958 SR-Mount is basically the same as 1977 SR-Mount, there are subtle differences, like the Nikon F-Mount. I first picked up this lens as part of a drive to get better glass for my Minolta X-7a, my second Minolta SLR. While I could go with MC variant lenses, I went with the MD variant. The reason being that if I had updated my X-7a to an X-700, I needed lenses that would work with all theRead More →

While we love shooting and talking about our own cameras, what happens when you’re thrown for a loop you can get some interesting results! So with the gang all back together in person, we decided to take this favourite format and take on another mystery camera challenge! This time around we have John, Jess, Bill, and Alex all trading cameras around the table. John takes over Alex’s favourite, the Minolta Maxxum 9. Jess getting to work with a beautiful Nikon FM from John. Alex lugging around a beast, the Nikkormat FTn from Bill. And it wouldn’t be an MCC without Bill ending up with aRead More →

When it comes to slide film, it is not something that I like to shoot often, mostly because when it comes to processing, it’s time-consuming and costly; even purchasing the stock is costly. Plus, scanning some slide films stocks are difficult to nail down both exposure and colour balance. And then there’s Provia 100F; Provia is a solid performer and one that gives an excellent starting point in the world of shooting slide film. It reminds me of Sensia and Astia, both excellent slide films with a bit more forgiveness than the Velvia line and natural colour reproduction. It also scans easily without too muchRead More →

In about three decades, the railway in Ontario had grown from a small collection of operators to the principal means of moving people and cargo around the Province and, by extension, Canada. But the one thing that it still lacked was a complete link across the entire length of British North America. While some efforts had been made in 1873, the resulting scandal ousted the MacDonald conservatives, and the new Liberal Government made some efforts to start the construction in 1875. Despite completing 1,000 kilometres of track by the time they were voted out in 1878, not enough had been done. MacDonald returned to power,Read More →

When it comes to medium format cameras, there are two formats that I’ve always been drawn to, the iconic 6×6 square and the slightly smaller 6×4.5 or 645. I’ve run with a Pentax 645 and more recently the Mamiya m645. I have shot with other medium format cameras, 6×9, 6×7, and 6×8 and even larger exposure sizes. But I keep on coming back to 645; it’s great for everyday shooting and gives you that larger image size than 35mm. But the cameras are often bulky unless you go with a folder. But what about the best of both worlds? Enter the Fujifilm GA645Zi, the thirdRead More →