I recently found a 50+ year-old Nikon F on eBay. It is in great condition. The listing turned out to be true; that it was an estate find, and had been in a box, probably unused. My expectations were guarded until I opened the box and found that it had been true. It looked like new-old stock and I was excited.
I took my new-old three-pound Nikon F to Chicago with me to test it out. I loaded it with a roll of Kono Galaxy which is a fun psychadelic effects film; but I found that it clashed with this superb machine. It felt as if the Nikon was trying to correct the very incorrect Kono. The images didn't thrill me, but the heavy Nikon has impressed me thoroughly.
I re-loaded it with roll of Fujicolor 200 and ended up shooting after dark. The Nikon F does not have a light meter, and after using the Holga for so long, I'm very good at guessing exposure. I never thought about a plastic camera teaching me about exposure; I guess in the end, it comes down to a simple equation of time.
The above image shows that the film at some point jumped the tracks. Being a lomographer, coming home with film tracks in the image of an iconic movie threatre is a happy accident. I brought back a cool poster, which is compensation for missing the traditional shot that I went for in the first place, because less than minute after the above was taken, the lights were turned off. You can view my "I don't belive it!" understudy shot in the portfolio.
But on a serious note I will have to take the Nikon out again and figure out what, if anything, is wrong. My Holga 135s jump tracks but that's a character trait; not so with a Nikon. If you're wondering what's up with the title Butterflies in Chicago well, the image below was shot in Millennium Park, and the purple bush (in the foreground) was loaded with butterflies; the best shot of this anomaly is pictured top right where you can spy one butterfly with open wings (look closely now).
I'm still doing crazy amounts of developing and it's affecting the blog schedule; hang in there with me; scheduled weekly blogs are coming; lomographer's honor.
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