Kiev 30 spy camera

I bought this small camera at the Sunday Flea Market for 10 euros. It is in very good, like new condition. It is a full manual camera with aperture and shutter settings. The camera is sliding open and gets ready for picture taking.  There is a focusing ring beside the shutter button. Takes a special 16mm film catridge.
As soon as I find some film I will test the camera.

The camera open and ready. The focus ring is next to the shutter button.

There is an exposure indicator next to the viewfinder, and to rings to set the aperture and shutter speed to the side of the camera.

Canon Prima 120 classic, 2nd film

This time I loaded the camera with a Kodak Ultramax 400 that gave amazing colors.

Samples

an old car    

a wrecked car

Shop displays

with flash:

tree detail

and a pano from two merged shots

Dacora Digna 1st roll

I loaded the camera with a Fuji 120 film (100 ASA) to test the camera. I noticed that when depressing the shutter button the shutter blades let some light fall over a small part of the picture. I tried to cover the lens first and then release my finger from the shutter button, but this was not done in every picture.

The Camera

I rephotographed the negatives and converted them to positives in Lr3

 there is some nice detail here

 The car was in a shady area and the camera underexposed the scene.

 a panoramic shot from three overlapped photos.

and an accidental double exposure - changing of the guards by the metro railway!.



Kodak Instamatic 104

This Kodak Instamatic was at the street with its original box. I gave the seller a 2euro coin and bought the camera. It works fine but I must find an empty 126 catridge to put some 35mm film in it to use the camera. If I also find a used cube flash to put it in the flash slot I will have a second shutter speed.

A yoghourt toy camera

This toy camera was offered as a promotional gift with flavoured yoghourt for children. I found it at a street seller with its original box. I gave 1 euro and the toy was mine.
It's all plastic made with a fixed lens, fixed aperture and a fixed shutter speed.

It had a chinese noname 200 ASA film in it, with 12 exposures. From the viewfinder it looked that the lens was around 45mm but from the pictures it seems it's an 28mm!
There is vignetting, lack of sharpness and overexposure.
Here are the results:

Yashica minitec, Point 'n' Shoot

A small simple point'n'shoot camera. It has an 32mm/f3.5 lens with autofocus, autoexposure, auto flash. The flassh cannot be switched off, but has a red eye reduction setting.
I loaded it with an Agfa 100xrg expired film and put some black tape to make the camera read for the DX code of 25 ASA. I found out later that the camera cannot read under 100ASA.

The pictures came out underexposed by two stops and with low contrast, but the lab scanner successfully scanned the negative. It seems that the camera takes well exposed and very sharp photos.

Samples:

I also took some multiple photos to make joiners.

Original scene panorama from 3 pictures joined with Autostitch  

Hand joined images.

Joined with Autostitch

and one frame scanned by my scanner. It was unable to pick up the color from the faint negative.

Argus A2 camera

The Argus A camera is the first 35mm camera made in the USA, by Argus, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Mine looks like the A2B model manufactured between 1945 and 1950. I cannot locate the serial number to be sure. I bought it from an antique shop for 15 euros.
It is a manual exposure camera with a built in extinction meter which I couldn't figure out how it works. It has a fixed 50mm collapsible lens. After extending the lens, focusing is done by turning the lens barrel until a click is heard.
If I come to understand how the film advances I will give the camera a try.