Marineland and Steamtown on Super 8

I found this lovely super 8mm cine film at Lancaster Antiques Centre with a series of other cine films (not yet copied to digital) at the bottom of a box containing a Kodak Brownie cine projector. I bought the projector unawares of the extra contents, so a nice surprise!
Several of the films appear to be of the same family and I have subsequently at local carboot sales and junk shops, picked up around a dozen more reels again all of the same family! If I ever strike it rich I'll copy them all into digital and share!
For now you can enjoy Marineland and Dreamworld in this first reel.
Marineland was the outdoor aquarium on Morecambe promenade and Steamtown was a part of Carnfirth Railway Station. From the late 60's I'd guess.
View the film

Olympus mju - found film

The Olympus mju (stylus) camera first went on sale in 1991. It's sleek ergonomic design and case-less, ultra compact body made it an instant favourite, and over 5 million were made of this, the first model. 

I picked one up from a car boot sale in Morecambe back in 2013 for a £1, but it was a couple of years before I got around to processing the film inside that had been abandoned along with the camera.

Here's what secrets it held...

Kodak Brownie 'Cresta' update

I just got back the processed film negatives from the 1955 Kodak Brownie 'Cresta' camera that I picked up recently for a couple of quid.
Film from cameras of this age, do not usually come out too well, and when the labs rang me after processing, I initially thought it would be to say 'sorry, but there's nothing on it' as is so often the case. Surprisingly, on this occasion they called to say 'Hey, it looks like you've got some pretty reasonable negs here!' and they were right. On first inspection, they would appear to be fairly consistent with the age of the camera itself, probably taken in the late 50's, maybe someone who knows cars (looks like a rather lovely late 50's Citroen DS to me) and ladies fashions better than me can help out? Family snapshots taken on a European (Mediterranean) holiday I'd say, anyone like to hazard a guess where?

Kodak 'Brownie' Cresta Camera

A bit of a shout out this morning for DS Colour Labs in Stockport who offer a great film processing service for my ongoing Sling Film side project. They just called to say the roll of film that came in my 1955 Kodak 'Brownie' Cresta camera (£2 from Lancaster Antiques Centre) has been processed and appears to have 12 lovely 6"x6" exposures of a 1950's/60's family on holiday. Can't wait to get the negs back now for scanning!!

The Kodak 'Brownie' Cresta was introduced in 1955 and was manufactured in the UK until 1958. Taking twelve 2 1/4" x 2 1/4" exposures on 120 roll film.

The Cresta has a fixed focus f14 'Kodet' lens with a built in sliding close up lens.
It also has a single speed shutter of 1/40th second.
It's a simple hobbyist camera which was known for achieving impressive close up results.
This early model 1 Cresta can be distinguished from later models by the ribbed front casing and the presence of the coaxial flash sync cable.

Coronet Conway Synchronised

The Coronet Conway 'synchronised' box camera was manufactured in the 50's in Birmingham, England possibly by Standard Cameras Ltd. The Conway range of cameras were their popular (cheap) models which took 6x9cm images on 120 roll film.

It's a rather dashing little camera, with simple controls and a nice clean look, and my one, bought for £1 at a car boot sale on the A6 near Carnforth in Lancashire was lucky enough to contain a used roll of film, soon to be processed!

It's attractive good looks have already endeared it to my wife, who seems to have nabbed it as a prop for her vintage styling hire business!

Olympus Mju ii

Today's slingfilm post is one of those I love most - a lovely discarded camera, cheap (£1 from a junk shop in Kendal), in lovely working order, with an exposed roll of 35mm film inside, and photos salvaged from said film.
The Mju ii was made by Olympus in 1997, and it's a pretty neat little  machine.

The images from the camera are clearly taken quite recently, and appear to me, to be taken in The Lake District near Windermere. I'm pretty sure that the one of the couple is taken from the grounds at Blackwell's Arts & Crafts House overlooking Lake Windermere (I was there quite recently).

So here's a few of the best, and if you recognise anyone and would like to get in touch please do so.

 

 

 

   

 

Plastic Fantastic! (ME-101)

I can tell you next to nothing about this next little camera. I've been carrying it around in the glove compartment of my car for so long I can't even remember where it came from. It's only giveaway is the number ME-101 on the front fascia. It's a very cheaply made, totally plastic camera, plastic lens and everything. I would've overlooked it, but for the fact that I was intrigued to see what results would come from this piece of plastic trash.

I took it on our family holiday to Devon last summer and here's the results. It does have a pleasantly soft look with some heavy masking to one corner in particular, a streak of brightness down the centre and with some (to be expected) light leaks. I've upped the contrast and saturation a tad but not much else.

After the holiday I forgot to remove the film and develop it till just last week, at which point the lens fell off! I did say it was very cheaply made!