Since this camera was a gift from my father-in-law, I thought it would be fun to bring it with us on our vacation to Maine this summer, putting the old Owl back into service capturing family memories, one generation later.
Around sunset, August 2, 2021.
While my test shots with expired Kodak film mostly came out alright, for actually documenting our vacation, I opted to use known-good film, specifically, Fuji C200. It is a cheap consumer film, so nuanced color and fine grain are not to be expected. But my goal here wasn't to create perfect images, but to capture some of our vacation memories in a style befitting the design and purpose of this camera. I'm also interested in trying out some of the lower-end film stocks to see if there was one I particularly like.
Midday on the beach.
As is perhaps fitting of shooting with fresh film, I found more keepers here than in my roll of expired Kodak HD. This is not because of the particular qualities of Fuji C200, as much as it's because I didn't have to do as much post-processing to wind up with usable images.
Sure, there were some misses.
Wiggly Bridge Distillery is worth a visit and a tasting if you have the time. We had a very pleasant visit, and I particularly enjoyed the Bottled in Bond Bourbon. Re: this shot, this is the result of operator error. I’m spoiled by SLRs, and I thought that I’d framed this so the peak of the distillery would appear in the shot. I did not. The framelines on this camera’s viewfinder are a bit worn down and/or difficult to discern, so going forward, I’m just going to try and be extra-careful to make sure that any key elements stay well within what looks to be the frame.
But for the most part, I got the shot and, to my eye, they mostly looked pretty good, and I don't have to think about it all that much after the fact. Whereas with the expired stuff, I found myself doing a bit of mental gymnastics, like, "eh..this one's ok...if you want a particularly vintage look."
#accidentallyWesAnderson
Yes, some shots from this roll still work because of their low-fi or somewhat dated look, but some just looked good, and it's nice to not have to qualify that.
The location for nearly all of these was Ogunquit, Maine, a place I've visited with family before, though always with more modern digital cameras. With a 200 speed film and a camera like this, most indoor photos will wind up using the flash, and the results of that are just about how (if you're my age or older) you remember it—frequently not great.
From Ogunquit’s Marginal Way.
Outside, though, and on the beach, the camera performed quite well, and I'd say I did a reasonable job here managing my expectations for what it could handle. Getting that "portrait mode" or shallow-depth-of-field look, in which your subject is sharp and the background is blurred, wasn't likely, nor was getting shots with corner-to-corner sharpness (I'm not much of a nit for that sort of thing, but I did notice sharpness tending to fall off towards the edges).
As fitting for a vacation/family camera, it did do a good job capturing memories and a decent bit of the environments in which they transpired.
Approach to the George Washington Bridge, from the trip up.
Spring Creek, in downtown Bellefonte, PA. The shadows are crunched down towards black in the left and right of this shot, but to their credit, the camera and film are capturing a pretty wide range of light here, between those shadows and the sky above.