Agfa Flexilette

[philslizzy]

This is a camera that went everywhere with me in the 70's. I sold it for more than i paid and considered it a worthwhile profit. I regretted it later in years. The flexilette was a great camera, not the most intuititive to use but gave great results. Contrasty and sharp. What more do you need? It always attracted attention from photographers and laypeople alike. I love the quirky design. My little collection has a few quirky models, such as the Argus C3 and the Rollei b35 (german of course)

I bought this one recently on the bay and paid exactly what I got for the old one, so cheaper in real terms after 30 years. In fact I got a case with this one. Fab! I can't wait to give this a blast, probably this weekend.

some photos of my new baby...

[womble]

Funny looking beastie but fun and eye catching. Do you get 36 frames to a roll?

Congratulations on replacing your old friend.

K.

[philslizzy]

[martinsmith99]

I've seen a few of these on the bay. Their finders have put me off as I suspect they're rubbish.

Am I correct?

[hemmo]

It's so cute! Gongratulations!

Here in Finland has been also one for sale for some time. http://www.kameratori.fi/viewitem/1867
I've been looking that for a while with wondering should I get it from there or not. Should I???

[philslizzy]

[martinsmith99]

Thanks Phil. I'll see what turns up.

[womble]

[philslizzy]

[hemmo]

Thanks for all this your great information about the Flexilette philslizzy
.. and also your Mum's great comment about it

I look few more weeks about that one on sale and if it's still there after that I'll order it (I really don't need an other 35mm but after your infos and it's very attractive design.. ..

[yinyangbt]

Very interesting ! Waiting for the pics !

[hemmo]

BTW: When I first time saw some pics about the Flexilette camera, I went searching some information about it and found this site http://www.fotografiareflex.net/tlr35new.html
There's also some others very interesting looking 35mm TRLs.

[philslizzy]

[philslizzy]

Some photos done today. Very disappointed with the scans, you can see streaking and 'grain', or is that the development. And they are not sharp at all. Got them done at Jessop £8 dev and disc. dearer than ASDA (£3) and no better quality. Pics anyway'








I expected this to be flary, the sun was barely behind the wall on the left





In conclusion, it was nice to use the camera today, focus was simple, the exposures were sunny 16 guesstimated, a little overexposed if you look at the negs. I must find decent lab that wont charge the earth for good scans. Any suggestions?

[martinsmith99]

I've only tried Asda once for colour film and found them to be as good if not better than other labs. I tend to stick with B&W and home process/scan.

[Lloydy]

I had problems with one film processed at my local Tesco's and had a word with the lady in charge of the department who told me that the processing machine is calibrated once a day by sending via email a test process back to Fuji ( who's machine it is ) and they send back instructions as to whether to change the chemicals and adjust the settings. And she said there's very little that the operator can do to get it wrong. There are adjustments on the machine, but they should only be altered to the requirement of the calibration, and they have to resend info' back to Fuji until it's right.
But, having said that, the problem I had was obviously with the processing. When I got home an hour or so later and looked at the neg's they were sticky. Obviously the wash hadn't been done properly, so the dev' chemicals were probably still active and I got horrid colours and all manner of streaks on the neg's where I dragged them from the sleeve. I washed them thoroughly and managed to save a few frames. I think it was the machine that was faulty, maybe a loss of water pressure or something ?
Generally I have good results from the supermarket processing because the expensive machine does the job and precludes the operator to a major degree, and possibly it's only the big operations like the supermarkets, and big commercial processors, that can afford state of the art machines ?

[philslizzy]

[philslizzy]

maan, the flash bracket well gets in the way of winding-on. now I'm remembering why it went. Its like resuming a relationship with someone you fell out with years ago. Little things keep coming back to remind you why you separated!

[martinsmith99]