Cameras to avoid - Number 1, the Cosmic 35

The Cosmic 35, and it's alias the Smena should be avoided at all costs.
Sadly I've never taken my own advice, and lured by the cheap prices I've owned several of these beasts. You see - they used to be sold cheaply via large adverts in weekend newspapers, they must have sold in big numbers, but isn't it strange that during the 70's and 80's you never saw them being used!

Cosmic 35 used for glamour photography

When you see them for sale at the same price as a regular latte they do look to be a bargain, but in fact they're a total waste of time and money and you'd be better off with a latte.

The first one I bought wouldn't re-wind the film. The second wouldn't count the exposures. The third one, the film advance jammed up on the first film.

When they work, they're hard work. The aperture ring is deep inside the lens, almost touching the front element and it's a nightmare to adjust. Whilst it's possible to get your fingers inside the lens to turn the aperture ring, it's impossible to see the apertures at the same time!

The only positive point I can make for the Cosmic 35 is that it has a damn good viewfinder. You've been warned.

Seduced by a bacon roll

It's been a beautiful day here. I was in North London this morning, Hornsey to be exact - on a little business. The company I went to see was in a small trading estate which was shared with half a dozen other companies, which in turn leased off spare space to smaller companies (London is very crowded).

I spotted "Chicken Time" (which seems to serve everythng but chickens), wedged into a delivery yard of a builders merchant. In my 8 year abscence from the UK, burger vans and fast food seem to have grown more than any other small business! The promise I made to myself last week of one fried breakfast a week was temporarily forgotten and I was seduced by a bacon and egg roll. I couldn't fault the roll and I award Chicken Time 5/5 for the food. Sadly they lost points over the tea which suffered from anaemia and only received 2 points, one for being hot and one for being wet.

The diet starts again tomorrow. Not easy for someone who enjoys their food to the degree that I do!

W. Eugene Smith - The Jazz Loft Project

Round Midnight ... W Eugene Smith captures Thelonious Monk and his Town Hall band in rehearsal, 1959. Photograph courtesy of the W Eugene Smith archive at the Centre for Creative Photography, University of Arizona/Heirs of W Eugene Smith.

In 1957, Eugene Smith, a thirty-eight-year-old magazine photographer, walked out of his comfortable settled world—his longtime well-paying job at Life and the home he shared with his wife and four children in Croton-on-Hudson, New York—to move into a dilapidated, five-story loft building at 821 Sixth Avenue (between Twenty-eighth and Twenty-ninth streets) in New York City’s wholesale flower district. Smith was trying to complete the most ambitious project of his life, a massive photo-essay on the city of Pittsburgh. Read more.....

Stonehenge

Stonehenge

The UK has a new coalition government for the first time since the Second World War.
Last night was the coldest May night in 60 years. I had a few whiskies and went to bed at midnight. The alarm sound became part of a dream before I jumped out of bed. I made a cup of tea and was on the road by 3.30am this frosty morning to photograph Stonehenge.

I drove towards London, then around the M25 past Heathrow airport and on to the M3 towards Salisbury, the roads were empty except for the occasional lorries. Wiltshire is UFO country but I didn't see any, more's the pity. When I arrived at Stonehenge at 6am it was just getting light, it was clear, very cold and exhilarating!

For some reason the car park is cordoned off over night but I found a track within a few hundred yards of Stonehenge to park the car. I got my cameras ready for action and stalked the perimeter before the sun rose too high.

I can tell you that at dawn and only sharing it with sheep and 2 security men, this place and the lack of sleep gave me a buzz. The silence and stillness was amazing and I felt quite privileged to have this beautiful landscape and ultra-historic monument (almost) to myself. I wandered around for an hour until the light became flat and took 3 rolls of film, which are being developed and scanned as I write this. The photographs here were grabbed on a compact digital camera whose battery lasted less than 10 minutes in the close to freezing temperatures.

After Joseph Farquharson

I Bought a Book

The older I get the less I want!
I'm an avid reader but I prefer to dispose of books once I read them. There are a few books that
I keep which continue to give me pleasure and the Time Life series of photography books are some of them. I bought my first Time Life book, mail order from a newpaper ad in the early 1970's, I think they were £10 each, which was expensive at the time. I signed up to receive the full set of 12 books, but I must have cancelled because I only received the first one, "The Camera".

Yesterday (40 years later), in a bookshop in Wales, I was thrilled to find "The Art Of Photography" from the same series. It cost me £2, a saving of £8 on the 1970's price and powerful proof that all good things come to those who wait. In truth I could have bought this book anytime had I wanted to, in fact you can buy the full set of 12 from Ebay for less than £10, but I prefer to hunt them out on my travels, and collect them individually, it's a slow way of doing things but it's part of a chain of events that started over 40 years ago.

These books are so cheap and plentiful that I'm tempted to say "just buy one and check it out", but I won't. For me the Time Life books are the finest series of photo books ever published. The quality of printing could be better, but for the price of a cup of coffee they have given me access to the most amazing photographs ever made and inspired me to be a photographer.

I'm still excited by my new book. I had a quick flick through it last night and like the other books in the series it contains a wealth of brilliant images that still knock my socks off, like the one below by Diane Arbus. So much more stimulating than a photography magazine.......

The most underpriced camera

Penitent - taken using a Canon 110ED 20. Photograph by Tim Irving

Speculating on what's the most overpriced camera got me thinking about what the reverse would be, the most underpriced camera. I don't mean new cameras, I'm thinking of older cameras that once cost a small fortune and now can be picked up for pennies, or a little more.

In truth, all my cameras are cheapos. I can't remember the last time I bought new and because I use film I'd be limited to a handfull of brands if I did decide to splash out.

I'll come back to this subject again when I've done a bit more research, but I'll start the ball rolling by suggesting a camera that would have been way out of my price range when it first appeared in 1975, it's the Canon 110ED 20!!!

I bought mine in a thrift store in Texas a few years ago for $6. It used to belong to the US Department of Labor and still has it's ID label. You can still buy these cameras for less than $20.

I know it's a 110, the film has been discontinued and you'll do some searching to get your film developed and printed but these aren't big problems, people still make Daguerreotypes and you don't hear them whining.

I buy 110 film whenever I see it for sale, it's not that difficult to find. I bought 3 rolls this year to add to the 6 rolls I already have in the freezer which will keep me going for the next 10 years. To get 110 film processed I look locally, and if my local shops can't help me I'll send the film to Fotoview or any of the dozens of other companies that offer the service.

The Canon 110ED 20 is definitely under priced for its specification. It's a very high quality camera made from metal, it feels reassuringly weighty in the hand. It has a coupled rangefinder, yes a rangefinder like a Leica or Contax camera. The lens is extraordinarily good, plus it opens up to f/2. It has aperture-priority metering and the batteries are commonly available LR44's.

With the Canon 110ED 20 you get a premium camera that would have been very, very expensive in 1975, is easy to use and carry, takes great images and all for less than $20.

The Full English

I've been in the UK for less than 4 months and I'm already having to watch my waistline. Breakfasts in Europe were good for me, a 'tostada con tomate' and a coffee, nada mas.

But here I'm eating like Fatty Arbuckle (and starting to look like him). I still have cereal and tea first thing in morning, but now I'm occasionaly supplimenting this with a mid morning visit to a cafe for a full English breakfast. Not only that, but I'm finishing my breakfast with a slice of cake or a Bakewell tart. I've always been a fan of the full English, and thought about it worryingly often during my 8 years living in Spain! Obviously this is a slippery slope, if I continue on this path I'll end up listening to Celine Dion and wearing socks with sandals.

The fact is I love cafe's. Everything about them I find comforting - from the Formica table tops to the wall mounted TV. and if they have a hand written (blue ballpoint), menu I'm in heaven. Equally fascinating to me are the people who work and eat in them. And I'm never put off by the exterior - the more shabby the outside is, the more authentic the food will be inside!

But this can't continue, starting next week I'm limiting myself to one English breakfast a week. It'll be difficult but I'll do it.