adetorrent; photography, lifestyle.

Unlike the rest of gibberish coming out of that Capital of the EU, a voice of reason has reached me from Belgium [.. I know, Brussels blah blah]. To paraphrase said voice, "the show must go on". So fine, I will move on to the next camera and return to the boots 500AF at a later date when I have figured out how to get the film out unexposed. It has crossed my mind to post it to the one-time use camera folk, hoping they don't notice, but that's clearly a lose-lose situation right there. The 500AF wont give up without a fight though it seems I came across some more photos at the bottom of a suitcase that has been out of sight, and out of mind for a while. As usual, I've scanned some pronto. The little gem appears to see in the dark. Check out some low light shots from a wedding in Cairo, Egypt, and a fashion show back at Uni. This must have been a 200 speed film as being the cheapest available film, that would have been my default choice. At this point, I al...

Much displeased am I to report that my nostalgia project isn’t going as smoothly as I expected. Why is it that in a mostly plastic camera, one of the only metallic parts turned out to be the least durable? The source of my said displeasure is a thin little strip of metal. Thus the story goes. Camera number 3 finally. I was excited about this one, as it was my first ‘good’ camera. Branded ‘Boots 500AF’, it has a 34mm f4.3 autofocus (hence the ‘AF’) lens. Come to think of it, both the 34mm (as opposed to 35mm) and f4.3 (rather than f4) are quite obscure values for a film point and shoot. I have no way of telling, but I assume the ‘500’ in the name denotes the maximum shutter speed of 1/500 the camera can achieve, but that’s pure speculation on my part. It has an auto flash, and the lens does a faux zoom action when turned on. Very cool indeed. I read somewhere that it was a rebranding of some Japanese camera, but again, I have found no evidence of this. Oh how...

I bought this camera a loooong time ago on Oxford street from one of those scam auction shops. You know, the ones with some guy on a microphone selling ‘unbelievably cheap’ items to naiive onlookers.  The camera looked impressive to me at the time. It had a big flash gun, and a massive looking lens.  Besides, compared to my point and shoot Miranda, it looked like one of those ‘big cameras’ (SLRs) those professional guys used.  In my defence, I managed to haggle the price down to £45 from £60 I believe, which in today’s money is a mortgage deposit.  Besides, they threw in some fake Eternity cologne, a hair brush and plastic mirror.  Bargain! The regret started when  I  announced the purchase to my aunt later that day. She must have laughed for hours, but she was glad I only got taken for £45 and not much more. I never used the camera for some reason. It just got put in storage where it laid dormant until this spring when I unearthe...

Sigh. So it's been a couple of weeks or so since my part 2 post of the miranda camera. I have been trying to shoot some new photos with the second camera I bought after the miranda, but have had a few issues with loading the film, batteries, e.t.c, but have now finally (hopefully) successfully shot a roll which is currently being developed. The lab I use takes a week! So rather than wait another week, I thought I'll post some more photos from the miranda taken late summer, including one OF the miranda itself, taken with my faithful dslr, and VSCO'd to death by the G3 filter on my iPhone. This has basically messed up the exif data, if indeed they can be seen. Without further ado, behold the magnificent light leaked photos from Camden. Really, I think this may have been my own fault. I probably didn't close the back of the camera properly. Either that or my cheapo lab is rubbish at developing film. Either way, light leaks are 'in' and hipster kids thi...

I have since learnt a thing or two about photography. In theory, this camera should be able to perform a lot better with the new and much improved photographer driving it. After all, "the camera doesn't matter" right? On a lovely late-summer day on the South Bank of London town, the Miranda was once again loaded up with battery and film after a decade and a half, and put into action. As a point and shoot, no settings were required. The only ‘control’ one has really is ensuring there’s good light and attempting as good a composition as possible given the inaccurate viewfinder. The Miranda felt quite clunky, however actually quite charming to use. It definitely brought back some old teenage memories of using this camera with my friends on the basketball court trying (and failing miserably) to replicate some Michael Jordan posters of the time. I must track those down and post them up soon. The lens is softer than a memory foam mattress, but some would like that. The...