The Exakta V

Local Devoted Readers will likely have a nodding acquaintance with this bicycle, I believe it's a Sears ten speed, which can be seen at various spots along upper First Street, some times by the Chinese restaurant and, as in this case, by the Italian restaurant. Some times the bicycle spends the night on First Street. The peregrinations of this bicycle have begun to fascinate me and, since I now have a camera with me at all times (but more on that in a paragraph or two!), I've begun to photograph it.

You can tell we live in a small town because the owner has simply chained the bicycle around the post where the seat and the cross bar thingummy meet, not, as one would certainly do in an urban environment, through the front tire. Anyone could have boosted the front tire! I find that rather heartening.

Thursday morning I went up to the camera store to pick up some film for today's photographic excursion. While I was waiting my turn in line, I noticed an Exakta 35mm camera and case behind the counter. I knew it was an Exakta camera because it had Exakta V/Ihagee, Dresden written over the prism in wonderfully stylized letters. I don't know anything about Exakta cameras. But you see, reading all those Sherlock Holmes stories does pay off now and then.

When I was my turn, I purchased my 120 film and said to the camera store owner, "I see you have an Exakta. Those are supposed to be pretty good cameras, aren't they?" "Someone brought that in this morning," he said. "I thought about you. It's very clean and everything works. Do you want to put some film through it? If you're interested you can make me an offer." Well, I could hardly refuse so I bought a roll of Fuji colour 35mm film.

The Exakta is a peculiar camera and, with the aid of an instruction manual, it took me a few minutes to figure out how it worked. I loaded up the film just fine, closed the back and looked through the prism. I couldn't see anything. I took the lens cap off. I still couldn't see anything. I quickly ate my lunch and drank my tea and went back to the camera store in a state of perplexity. The owner took a quick look at the Exakta and informed me that in order to drop the mirror, the camera had to be cocked. Oh. So now that I understood that I went off to take a few photos. Now that I could see through the prism, everything was incredibly dark. I couldn't focus. I didn't want to return to the camera store yet again and say "now what do I do ..." so I turned the dials on the lens in various ways until I opened the aperture up completely ... and I could see to focus. So one has to open the aperture fully, focus the rangefinder, then close the aperture to the desired setting and take the photo. Okeh.

The lens is some funky French lens and the whole camera looks like it could fire small missiles. It's very heavy, too, rivalling the Argus C3 for heft. On the inner ring of the lens are words Retrofocus Type R1. Retrofocus ... I like that! So I ran around taking photos and grew to like the Exakta very much.

One thing that I really liked was that it came with a case and strap. I love the Argus C3 but I don't have a case for it and I'm a little concerned about it getting injured, especially since it is a pre-WWII ten speed model. The Exakta is protected in its leather case.

So, photos taken, the roll turned in, processed and printed. I was really pleased with how sharp the images are and how generally cool the Fuji colour film is. I do like the Kodak Portra for its dreamy lushness, but the Fuji is more accurate. I made an offer on the Exakta and the camera store owner countered my offer with a much lower amount ... $25. Wow! The case is certainly worth $25, let alone the camera. Coolness.

In other news, the poetry/writing group may reform with Thena, Angie and myself. The plan is not to write in obscure and complicated rhyme forms, to meet twice a month and not to discuss ... all that nonsense we hashed over in the short-lived writing group.

Thena and Sarah are interested in forming a photography group. Sarah showed me the photos she'd taken with the Pentax K-1000 she borrowed and they're really good!

I'm meeting with Robert and Claire next Monday to look over our respective photo portfolios. Robert and Claire use a twin lens Rolleiflex. They're also interested in forming some sort of local photographic collective, which could be very cool.

Jace suggests we all read this book.