Test Shots: Balda Baldinette

[David]

Picked up a Baldinette from eBay a month or so back for $10, but it had some serious rust issues. In a few months when I get to the photos, I'll show you the before and after shots. The repairs required a few hours with some 60-grit sandpaper and a dremel to remove the rust. I patched the holes with some black tape used for patching engine hoses. I then used Rustoleum (propr to a company I used to temp for - woo hoo!) flat black paint to repaint the interior and the tape on the exterior where the leatherette was missing. Then I glued the leatherette back on.With the camera light-proof again, I decided to use an eight-shot roll to test the lens. The film is Foma (branded Ultrafine) 400 ISO bulk rolled at home.

The shutter works just fine, and even though it has the second-cheapest lens available on the Baldinette, it does a decent job:


Pond ripples. It's a great place to relax during the day. The crawdads make for good entertainment during work breaks. And the traffic cone (what I call the one surviving coi, a bright orange thing) is a rare sighting that means good luck, or some such nonsense.


Some papyrus, bamboo, and a tree. Three different green shades with a tan background. Not a shabby contrast capture.


Papyrus. For the above shots I was on f5.6 and 3m focal distance, the two red dots. So the shots were okay. This was f4, 1/50th, in the wind. Luck only makes this not entirely blurry.


That fountain used to shoot 25 feet in the air and make such a loud splashing noise the window cubes, like mine, filled with the cacophony of water slapping water for hours and days on end. Then the pond had n algae bloom. Perhaps an unconventional mechanism to water pressure control, but life in the window cubes has improved. Lots of scanner noise, but the contrast is fairly even.

In short, a decent performer. I want to take it out and see how it does with a full roll, not just the tail end of a 100-foot spool, and also test it with color. The lens seems to exhibit good contrast performance but a slightly sub-par focus clarity. I'll have a more complete research and quality report with my entry in the equipment gallery sometime later this year. No kidding. I have that many photos to go through now that the busy season is over.

[Attila]

Good job to save a camera, I look forward more shoots.

[peterqd]

What scanner are you using David?

[David]

Thank you, Attilla. I'm better at fixing rust and physical issues than mechanical ones. I wish I could disassemble and reliably reassemble a shutter mechanism.

Peter, I have an Epson Perfection 1670. It was free, so even though I periodically (read as: often) have scanner noise and even though the photos sometimes look flat, it does a reasonable job of scanning at high resolution. I'm overall pleased with it, though I wish the negative lamp were 60mm wide so I could get the full frame of a 120 exposure. I think it's 50-55mm wide. It can scan negatives at about a 10-12MP equivalent, I think.

[peterqd]