Bare basics of film photo

Tom23 · Jan 6, 2014

Hey fellas, I hope you got a minute for couple of my questions about film photography. I want to learn the basics and try to develop my first roll of film, not for nostalgia reasons, but due to mere fact that clicking away my digital cameras is getting out of hand, 150+ GB of photos, 45,000+ files, and only couple of dozen of them (at best) are photos I would print for some physical photo album of mine. I guess digital spoiled me and I want to rationalize my shutter actuation, and I think shooting film is the best way to force myself to think and rationalize before I press the shutter and control my urge to press it down every time I see something mildly interesting.

So, with that long intro out of the way, questions.

I shot film before, as a kid, on my dad's Oly X2 and I even borrowed some Nikon SLR 10 years ago for a day of shooting. There's was no "half-shutter focus" on those things, just point and shoot and photos turned out fine. I guess that X2 probably has a slow lens so basically anything that's couple of feet away from the camera is in focus. But how did the SLR focus, I'm more than sure I didn't mess with manual focus on whatever lens that camera had, I didn't know anything about photography back then...but as I've said, all the photos I took with it turned out great.

Another dumb question - do film cameras have modes? With ISO being fixed, how do you tell your camera what ISO you work with and how do you get light metering, does the camera tell you if you're photo is blown up or underexposed? I want to know how do they operate, even though the technical part won't improve my photography one bit, but I'm curious.

I'm currently on a lookout for K1000 on local yellowpages, people sell these things dirt cheap over here, and I've heard stories about K1000 being the ultimate student camera.

Thanks

Designer · Jan 6, 2014

Film cameras have light meters built in. You watch the meter indicator through the viewfinder and make adjustments with aperture &/or shutter speed. When the indicator indicates a good exposure, focus and shoot. Film cameras usually have some means of evaluating focus, a split prism, or some other type of indicator.

Try B&W first, and maybe that is all you'll ever do. I had a love affair with B&W back a long time ago. B&W film can be developed at home, but instead of buying and setting up an enlarger, just scan the negatives and you can then print from the digital file.

Tom23 · Jan 6, 2014

Great, thanks for your answer. About the light metering, so that means that film cameras need batteries too, or do they meter light in some analog magic way

How do they autofocus?

I love the idea of developing at home...I'll look into the scanning to digital, never met anyone who did that, I hope there's no expensive equipment involved, given that K1000 usually goes for 30$ in local yellow pages.

Tiller · Jan 6, 2014

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/buy-sell/348322-donating-fuji-ax-multi-program-dx-2-lenses.html

:wink:

Designer · Jan 6, 2014

Yes, film cameras have a battery for the light meter, usually a wafer type. Lasts forever.

My Minolta has autofocus, I'm not really sure if the wafer battery does the autofocus, but uses a set of AAA batteries for film advance, and probably the focusing as well.

Tom23 · Jan 6, 2014

@Tiller: I replied in your topic

Another question is lens compatibility. Looking on ebay I see a lot of "mounts"...I presume they're not interchangeable

Did the film folks buy adaptors (just like I buy adaptors so I can put helios glass on my GH2)? Expensive?

gsgary · Jan 6, 2014

Designer said:
Yes, film cameras have a battery for the light meter, usually a wafer type. Lasts forever.

My Minolta has autofocus, I'm not really sure if the wafer battery does the autofocus, but uses a set of AAA batteries for film advance, and probably the focusing as well.

My film cameras dont have a light meter and no auto focus and dont need batteries but they are not cheap to buy like most film cameras, i use a handheld meter shooting with HP5 that i can shoot iso up to iso1600 with good results and Orwo UN 54 iso100 film, there is more to think about when shooting film you may need to underexpose the film and over develope depending on light conditions

Sent from my GT-I9100P using Tapatalk 2

timor · Jan 6, 2014

Tom23 said:
Great, thanks for your answer. About the light metering, so that means that film cameras need batteries too, or do they meter light in some analog magic way

How do they autofocus?

I love the idea of developing at home...I'll look into the scanning to digital, never met anyone who did that, I hope there's no expensive equipment involved, given that K1000 usually goes for 30$ in local yellow pages.

Hi man. I feel it's a good thing, if someone is looking in the old, film based, method of photography. Yet going back to film is maybe not so easy, as you would have to shed off many customs you learned with digital. The first one will be learning, that film camera is not taking care of everything with you only focusing, composing and pressing the shutter (that could be also automated

with dslr). If you are looking to shoot like with digital slr and have only the limitation of number of frames on the film, you have to look for camera very much different, than K1000. There are plenty of cheap and very good, when comes to exposure and modes Minoltas, there is the latest Nikon F75 (I picked up new body for $20) and if you want a camera with the size and noise and toughness of Tiger panzer get Pentax Sf1n. If your budget allows you can reach for high end and even get F5.
But if one day you will become ambitious and want to learn more about the film b&w photography, be prepared for catching up with a lot of knowledge. Which might be very satisfying.
Anyway, shooting big numbers of frames even with film is not that unusual, especially with 35mm format. Garry Winogrand left about 9000 rolls of unprocessed film, 1/3 had to be yet developed at that point.

On the other hand maybe you should take advantage of Tillers offering. :thumbup:

limr · Jan 6, 2014

Not all film cameras have light meters. The K1000s do, but as Designer said, it's not a meter that does anything for you, but just an indicator of how much light the camera is sensing. You are still the one who has to adjust the settings. It takes a small battery (LR44). If you don't have a battery, the meter needle will just stay at dead center and will not indicate anything, but the camera will still work perfectly fine. You can either learn systems for judging the metering yourself (Sunny 16) or you can get a hand held light meter. The cheapest and most convenient way to do that is to download an app if you have a smartphone. If you don't mind hauling your digital with you, you can use that for metering. But this is only if you don't have a battery in the K1000.

Here's another recent thread where we were talking more about the K1000 as well as other basic mechanical SLRs: http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/...46-cheap-35mm-battery-independent-camera.html

As for mounts, the K1000 uses the modern K-mount system that will work on any Pentax camera after the K1000. Prior to that, Pentax used a M42 screwmount and you can get adapters for that to use screwmount lenses to K-mount bodies.

But adapters between systems (i.e. Pentax to Canon or to Nikon or whatever) are tricky. I'm sure someone else knows more about this, but I'll say that lenses aren't necessarily compatible to other systems even with adapters. Has to do with distance from the lens to the film plane. And sometimes, the build of the camera interferes with the lens. I bought an M42 screwmount Zeiss lens to use with my Spotmatic. The lens fit perfectly until about half a twist away from being secured. At that point, the lens protruded into the body too far and the mirror in the Spotmatic couldn't clear it. So just because the mounts match doesn't mean the lens is compatible.

limr · Jan 6, 2014

timor makes a good point about maybe getting a more automated film camera to ease the transition.

I can't help it though, I just love the K1000

And if your goal is to slow down, then the more things you have to do yourself, the more you will slow down.

MartinCrabtree · Jan 6, 2014

Canon AE-1 would be a great camera to start with. Full manual,manual focus with available shutter priority auto. Needs a battery but they last awhile and availability is good. I did and still have 3 of the damn things. They still get used infrequently but they do get used. I've switched to Nikon but had so much fun with them I can't seem to get rid of them. Cheap,easy to use and glass is everywhere.

Designer · Jan 6, 2014

Tom23 said:
Another question is lens compatibility. Looking on ebay I see a lot of "mounts"...I presume they're not interchangeable Did the film folks buy adaptors (just like I buy adaptors so I can put helios glass on my GH2)? Expensive?

Oh, yes, we often purchased third-party lenses and adaptors. These days, those old lenses are cheap, and most will either come with adaptors, or thread-mount, for which you then purchase an adaptor.

My recommendation would be to purchase only the lenses that will work on your camera, because they are plentiful and cheap, so you can simply wait a little to find the one you need. That will save you the expense and time of buying an adaptor.

peter27 · Jan 6, 2014

If you buy a K1000 you won't be able to use autofocus, but with zone focusing or hyperfocal you should get quite good results after a little practice. Don't be afraid of manual focus, though! However, there are other very reasonably priced analogue cameras with autofocus and program modes out there: I ordered a Pentax Z-20 with power zoom lens for under 40€ and had my eye on a Z-1 with zoom lens and grip for 99€ (it was in Austria though, which meant another 20€ postage to Germany, so I let it go in the end).

compur · Jan 6, 2014

Tom23 said:
I shot film before, as a kid, on my dad's Oly X2 ...

Do you mean Olympus XA2?

... and I even borrowed some Nikon SLR 10 years ago for a day of shooting. There's was no "half-shutter focus" on those things, just point and shoot and photos turned out fine.

Half shutter focus? I don't know what you are referring to. Manual focus, maybe?

I guess that X2 probably has a slow lens so basically anything that's couple of feet away from the camera is in focus. But how did the SLR focus, I'm more than sure I didn't mess with manual focus on whatever lens that camera had, I didn't know anything about photography back then...but as I've said, all the photos I took with it turned out great.

You didn't say which model Nikon SLR you were using. Many of them have auto-focus.

Another dumb question - do film cameras have modes?

Many of them have modes, yes. Exposure modes, focus modes, metering modes, etc.

With ISO being fixed, how do you tell your camera what ISO you work with and how do you get light metering, does the camera tell you if you're photo is blown up or underexposed? I want to know how do they operate, even though the technical part won't improve my photography one bit, but I'm curious.

Most film cameras (excepting the very simple ones) have an ISO adjustment dial for setting the desired ISO.