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If you’re a fan of the Polaroid Automatic Land Camera or old school pop-out folders, then the Lomography Belair X 6-12 will be a familiar camera. I’ll be referring to the camera as the Belair from now on. And while the Belair shares some design features of the Auto Land Camera, the two are very different cameras altogether. The Belair doesn’t try to be anything but a fun camera that sits nicely on the edge of being a toy camera. A fairly simplistic camera, but has one thing that drew me in, the giant 6×12 panoramic images and the interchangeable lens. Special thanks to AngelaRead More →

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I like to think I have an open mind when it comes to different film stocks, but it’s easier to write that than to practice it. Thankfully thanks to these reviews I’ve found that I have come to like several stocks that I once derided. It would be in that category I will place Kentmere 100. Kentmere, once an independent company saw purchase in 2007 by Harman, and today is manufactured by our friends at Ilford. My first couple experiences were fairly terrible, especially the first and second rolls, but in those cases, I’ll chalk it up to the camera and my own mistake inRead More →

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One thing that is always satisfying is being able to come up with new processing details for rare films. I did some extensive testing with Eastman 5363 back when the Film Photography Project began to release it for general photographic use. But now I have a new challenge from the group, Derev. Of course, there has already been some testing of the film by the Alpha team over at FPP HQ in New Jersey which gave me a baseline, so I went and checked over my extensive list of films looking for similar film speeds, film feel, and developing times to see if other developmentRead More →

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Svema, or by its proper name, Свема is a film stock that is relatively unknown here in North America unless you are of course fans of the Film Photography Podcast. The name comes from the combination of two Russian words, Светочувствительные Материалы, translated means Photosensitive Materials. While Svema collapsed when the Soviet Union died in the 1990s, another Eastern European film manufacture, Astrum, continues the legacy of Svema using some of the old machinery in a new factory in Shostka, Ukraine. If I had limited experience with the 100-speed version of the film, I have even less with Foto 400. The only time I’ve shotRead More →

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I’ll be the first to admit when it comes to Toy Cameras, they aren’t my first choice when heading out. That said, I do make an effort at least once a year for World Toy Camera Day. This year the Holga rode again! Having a free Saturday Morning, and needing to take my wife’s car in for an Oil Change we decided to take a stroll through the historic downtown of our home. Every time I shoot the Holga I think, I need to take this camera out more. And therein lies the conundrum, I like to use Toy Cameras, but I can still beRead More →

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It was my wife’s idea to attend something new from Conservation Halton, the Hops & Harvest Festival. I think the idea of holding a craft beer festival in Milton is a wonderful idea. The craft beer market has been moving further and further along in the past several years. Considering Milton itself has a wonderful brewery in Orange Snail. If you haven’t tried their Rattle ‘n Nemo, I highly recommend it (and so does good friend Bill Smith). It’s the beer that made me like Red Ales again. The day itself started rather cold and under a cloudy sky but no rain in sight, soRead More →

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In photography’s history, critical technologies reshaped photography, from the earliest processes with plates and harsh chemicals to flexible films, interchangeable lenses, and folders to SLRs. One of the most significant changes is the introduction of microprocessors into cameras. This led to the creation of affordable cameras with auto-exposure functionality and the right ecosystem for creating autofocus cameras. While Minolta did not invent autofocus, they were the first to get an entire ground-up autofocus system SLR with a new look and feel compared to previous SLRs to market and meet with commercial success. The 7000 AF is a camera born of the era. While still aRead More →

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It feels wrong posting a review for Acros 100 in light of the recent news about the film’s demise at the hands of Fujifilm. But I would also feel this series of reviews incomplete without it included. One of my favourite black and white films from Fuji (which isn’t saying much there was only a handful). Bright, sharp, and with next to no reciprocity failure (you can expose the film up to 22 minutes before needing to adjust your exposure time to compensate). While I didn’t use the stock much, I did get to use it abandoned buildings where the long-exposure capacity can help outRead More →

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There are plenty of unique cameras that you can get your hands on, most of them come from the era of film. And one of the cameras in the group is the Contaflex 126. While you may recognize the Contaflex name, I have reviewed a pair of them (Contaflex Super and Super B) the Contaflex 126 is not a common camera and if you’ve got a keen eye you will have already guessed the reason. Yes, the Contaflex 126 takes the 126/Instamatic cartridge format introduced by Kodak in 1963. While Instamatic cameras are a dime a dozen, SLRs that take the format are rare, inRead More →

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Through 2016 I did a 52-Roll project where I shot the Rollei RPX films for each week, out of the three flavours available my personal favourite remained RPX 25, a spiritual successor to the iconic Agfa APX 25. These days in film photography there aren’t many offerings below ASA-100, Pan F+ is a solid choice, but sometimes you want something sharp, fine-grained, and slow. And for that, you have Rollei RPX 25. While the thin polyester base might make it hard to handle in the bag and widely thin in sheet formats, the results are worth the trouble. Film Specs Type: Panchromatic B&W Film Base:Read More →