Edmonton Photographic Historical Society

I had acquired yet another rangefinder camera with a leaf shutter that wasn’t working. I had been spoiled by a couple of successes with old German rangefinder cameras, but my latest German camera— a King Regula Cita III, see previous blog—was proving harder to get down to the shutter than I expected.        I had tried the corner of a “found” hotel room key—shaped like a credit card—to unscrew the front element. The lens ring had two notches 180º across from each other. I just used the edge of the card—which almost filled the notch—to drive the ring at a 45º angle. Once the ring started to turn I could spin the ring out with finger pressure. A single unmounted lens fell out.   There were more lenses behind the front element. Instead of being a front focussing triplet it was a triplet where the entire lens moves in and out to focus.        I left the camera to mull on a solution. Meanwhile every day I walk the streets of my small town and pick...

This complete blog was downloaded from — //camera-wiki.org/wiki/Regula_III_series The Illustrations are from our camera. Our next blog will be how we attempted to fix our camera’s shutter.    Regula Cita III Manufacturer: King Date of Production: 1956 Type of Camera: Rangefinder Film Type: 35mm Lens: See description Shutter:           Prontor-SVS Shutter Speed range: 1s-300 + Bulb Focus areas:           1m-Infinity Viewfinder : Yes ASA/ISO Range: 10-3200 Size (w*h*d):           130mm x 85mm x 70mm  (5 x 3.3 x 2.8 inch)      The Regula Cita III is a fixed lens rangefinder camera based on the Regula IIId. It is in essence a fixed lens Regula IIId. There are three versions of this camera, the difference between them is the lens used, either a Steinheil Cassar 45mm f/2.8, Zeiss Tessar 50mm f/2.8 or the rarer Enna ...

I found this Monster Powercells Digital Camera Power Pack at a garage sale for $1. It was the only item even vaguely photographic, but it has some surprises.        Back in March of 2003 Monster tested two of these NiMh Powercell AAA batteries against two of their own Alkaline Powercells. They used a Sony DSC-U20 2.0 camera and found they could take two and a half more images (all using flash) with the NiMH batteries than the Alkaline cells! Incidentally, the Sony DSC-U20 was supplied with two NiMH batteries when sold.      And since the NiMH batteries can be recharged hundreds of times (up to 1000 times), you will save hundreds of dollars. They even offered a green plan when the cells were done. You could send them back to Monster and they would pay the postage! In the instructions it said— the first charge should be 24 hours* NiMH batteries will self-discharge 1—2% a day: if the cells haven’t been used in a week, they recommend recharging them for b...

     This is a Manfrotto Art. 035 Super Clamp . It is relatively cheap, very versatile for reasons that will be explained later, very tough and very well finished.      There will be a lot of images with this story, as the Super Clamp is a little hard to show in all its beauty.      In the foreground is one of many specialized studs. It has a normal US ¼” by 20 threads–per–inch tripod thread at the right end, an ⅜ inch European tripod thread on the left.        Perhaps we should start with why the stud has the six-sided nut shape on both ends. If you depress that silver rod projecting up from the clamp the stud can be inserted into the clamp so the top is flush with the near side. Releasing the rod allows a very large lock to fill the space between the ends. As a result the stud cannot rotate and cannot come out. There is a second threaded lock below the clamp handle. This “two-lock” fail-safe is similar to hanging lights ...

When a company as famous as Nikon starts to make point-and-shoots, it had to be for a pretty good reason. Nikon had several lines of Single Lens Reflex cameras so waited to see if other manufacturers would have any success with point-and-shoots. When the demand seemed to be strong they introduced the Nikon One•Touch.        Nikon made three versions of the One•Touch, labeling two of them as L35AF and L35AF2 while the third (shown here) has no identification other than the “ Nikon One•Touch ” you can see below the flash on the front. There was a data back added to some of the cameras, and sometimes the cameras were labelled differently in different markets.      Soon Nikon found they were selling 1.6 million Nikon One•Touch cameras annually. This was more cameras than all their SLR cameras combined. Of course the One•Touch sold for $210 and the SLR’s sold for various amounts—from $270 to $1500—so Nikon kept on making professional SLR’s, but the One•Tou...

     This Aster Flash Gun was dropped off at a Dump “Take Away” shed. An Edmonton Photographic Historical Society member snapped it up and brought it to our monthly meeting. He announced he would give it to anyone who wanted it and I quickly snatched it up.        I have a fair number of folding fan flash and didn’t have this one.      The flash came in a clear plastic case. I could see it had a permanently mounted bulb adapter so it could take bayonet base bulbs in two sizes. It also has an attached sync cord.      Once you fan the blades around you form a dish reflector by inserting a tab into one of the two slots. The smaller “M-2” base bulbs cast more light if the reflector is more dish shaped.   The larger “5 or Press 25” bulbs can have a flatter bowl shape.      The whole flash can tilt on its outside metal frame. The flash can also be mounted sideways on the accessory shoe. This allows you to bo...