Praktica M60, wide simple and good

The Praktica M60 is a simple point-and-shoot camera with a wide lens

The body is very compact and has a fixed wide angle 28mm length lens made of glass. There is only one aperture, f8 I believe. Shutter speed is fixed at 1/80th sec. If the night mode is selected from the top display the shutter can go to as low as 1/4th sec that makes difficult to hand hold the camera. Other options on the display are Auto Flash, red-eye, no flash, forced flash and self timer with flash on. The wide angle lens needs no focussing for objects more than 1 meter far.

The camera takes very sharp pictures at daylight with some vignetting. With the low shutter it is difficult not to shake the camera.

I loaded the camera with a 100 ASA film that expired in 2004. It seems that the lens is not sharp at infinity. For distances 1 to 10 meters all objects are sharp. However the colors are very bright and saturated.  Here are some samples:

I used the forced flash setting for fill-in

 

 

 

 

 Background at infinity is not very clear

I used the night setting for the previous one - I see no difference...

Argus A2b, small and pretty

This is a small bakelite camera made by Argus in the USA. My camera is the A2b model that is manufactured after the WWII - there are pre-war and post-war models.

There are shutter speeds of 1/25th, 50th, 100th, and 150th plus B and T. (Bulb - holding the shutter button the blades stay open and Time - one click leaves the shutter open the second click closes the shutter blades).

The lens is a 50mm f4.5 retractable. It pops out by turning, that is the position for objects from 18ft to eternity. By turning the lens some more the lens extends to a fixed position, for objects 8 to 18 ft.

There is also an extiction meter on the top of the camera that is not working. The meter helped the owner to judge the correct exposure settings.

The shutter lever lies on the front of the lens and as the lens body rotates easily it is very easy moved when clicking the shutter resulting in shaken photos.

I used a Fuji 200 ASA for testing the camera. I got many shaken pictures and some blurred ones as the position of the lens for close focus did not worked well. Furthermore at open apertures the lens is very soft.

Here are some samples

an airplane at f11

Out of focus stairs with the close focus setting

Out of focus moto with the close focus setting

At night

I pressed the shutter three times here 1/150th and f16

At low shutter speeds

Church with the close focus setting

 

Chairs with the close focus setting

Olympus OM-2n, some more

The Olympus OM-2n is a small but capable SLR

Here are some more samples from the 1600 ASA film

Fed 3, a capable rangefinder.

The FED 3 is a soviet rangefinder, a Leica clone.
It takes interchangeble M39 Leica Thread Mount lenses. There are many shutter speeds from 1/500 sec to 1 sec plus B (Bulb).

The camera is pictured here with the Industar-22 50mm/f3.5 collapsible lens. I must grease the shutter gears as one curtain is stuck. No doubt it is a beautiful camera.

Lubitel, teaches photography

A simple manual TLR. It was made in the Soviet Union and was not expensive. The camera teaches photography because the photographer must think well before taking the picture. Framing is difficult, exposure must be judged, focus distant is by guessing and a small magnifying lens on the top viewfinder

 Shutter speeds are also limited, but the camera lets the photographer take full control, and the pictures are very sharp.

Olympus OM-2n another try

I tried the Olympus once more, I had a 1600 ASA colour film that expired 6 months ago so I gave it a try.

My camera has a 50mm f/1.4 Zuiko lens that is suitable for low light photography. There is an accurate built-in lightmeter and a good viewfinder so aperture priority mode is very easy to use.
Unfortunately the wide open shots came out very soft, with the lens stopped down sharpness increases.

Here are some samples