film advancing question

[Abby Rose]

Hi,

I'm test driving a Minolta xe-7. I've taken two frames, but when I've wound the film advance lever thing the little frame by it still says "s1". But I opened the camera in the dark (and probably ruined the film, I know) and it's definitely winding around the spool things.

Why is it doing this? What am I doing wrong?

 

[Abby Rose]

No one? Should I just keep snapping away with my fingers crossed?

 

[KenC]

Can you really tell in the dark whether two frames of film plus the leader is on the take-up spool? When I was worried about this with film cameras, I used the rewind knob to take up the slack in the film cartridge and then when I took the next shot and advanced the film I looked to see whether the rewind knob turned. If it did, the film definitely had to be advancing.

 

[Abby Rose]

No. Honestly, I figured it was advancing because there was film on the spool, but you certainly could be right.

However, I wound the rewind thing until there was resistance (it didnt take much), and then looked up while I took the picture. The rewind thing didnt move at all, and when I "advanced" (which I am clearly failing to do ) the film, s1 was still there.

So. How can I remedy this?

Crap. Before I posted this I was playing with the rewind thing to see if maybe I hadnt done it properly, and accidently rewound all (three frames, yay...) of the film. Sigh. I suppose there isnt anyway to unrewind it?

 

[dxqcanada]

DIY 35mm Film Retriever - a set on Flickr
DIY Film Puller | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
Film Picker/Retriever/Extractor - Rangefinderforum.com

 

[KenC]

If you rewound it all the way into the cartridge, you would need a special tool used to fish the leader out of the cartridge, and then you could reload the film and advance a couple of extra frames to get the previously exposed area out of the way. I suspect there may be a way to get the leader out using common household objects, but I don't know how.

 

[Abby Rose]

Awesome. Do you think I could use the leader from the other roll of film I have? Because I dont have any other pieces of film...

 

[dxqcanada]

I took a look at the XE-1 user guide ... there is a note about a red bar in the Safe Load Signal window.

 

[Abby Rose]

I'm not sure what the safe load signal window is.... I have no user guide. Which is probably why I've screwed up. ;-)

 

[dxqcanada]

Minolta EX-1 instruction manual, user manual, PDF manual, free instruction manuals

 

[Abby Rose]

Wow, thanks! All the manuals I found I would have had to pay for to view.

 

[dxqcanada]

Free camera instruction manuals

 

[Abby Rose]

Point taken. Thank you.

 

[dxqcanada]

You can try those DIY film pullers from the links I sent.

I cannot tell you how easy they are ... I have always had film extractors so I never needed to make one.