The lens on the 24EW is a smc PENTAX power zoom 24mm – 105mm F4.9-F12.5 lens; 7 elements in 5 groups. At this point in time many of the point and shoot digital cameras remaining on the market start at an equivalent focal length of 24mm but one has to remember that this camera does it across an entire 35mm film frame, well sort of its not exactly a stellar image quality performance in the corners or sides or away from the center but the mere fact that it exists is special.
Although I didn’t take advantage of it with this roll it will also focus down to just under 12inches at the 24mm setting so you should be able to get some unique macro shots not possible with other point and shoots.
As for the expired Kodacolor 200 and its long ago best before date this is the sort of grain it gave when taking an image of a hazy sunset.
More posts that reference this camera can be seen here Pentax 24EW
One thing about one camera: When you turn the Pentax 24EW on, it briefly displays the last date that a picture was taken before displaying the current date.
As I was writing this I was trying to remember is this film is from Rollei or Agfa because it seemed to me I had written about it as both. And sure enough the little canister has a small Agfa logo towards the bottom so its both. Agfa makes it, or more accurately made it and Rollei sold it.
The Open Seadragon gallery is best viewed full screen. You can see the effect of the unwanted light striking the film diminishing as you progress through the roll.
It’s often fun to go a little wider than 28mm and the Ricoh R1 has it, although in the form of a Panoramic aspect ratio.
The R1 falls into a small category of point and shoots that have a secondary lens that swings into the optical path in order to provide a second focal length. Most of them are for the purpose of offering a little bit of telephoto capability and most of them also predate the placing of zoom lenses in compact cameras. The R1 bucks both these trends offering up a substantially wider view and being introduced in 1995 which is well into the era of compact zoom cameras.
You can see from the lens diagram showing the additional elements in place that at 30mm it is 4 elements in 4 groups and then the two additional small elements just in front of the last element on the film side provide the 24mm view.
The autofocus of the R1 is also claimed to be very sophisticated for the time with 128 steps in 7 zones. The effectiveness of this is somewhat hard to test with the slow feedback loop of film but I haven’t had any issues where I though the camera miss focused.
One thing about one camera: The Ricoh R1 spools all the film out when you load it so that as you take pictures it pulls the exposed frames back into the canister. This does two things it counts down the film so you don’t need to try to remember how many frames are on that roll and it protects the images you’ve already taken from inadvertent exposure in the event of the camera back being opened.
I really like the postage stamp edges the Braun Super Paxette creates on the film, so much so that most of the time I don’s crop them off.
I first tried this roll of expired Ferrania Solaris in my Ricoh R1 which first spools the film out and then brings it back in with each exposure but something about it caused the R1 to have a fit likely because it had been in the canister for so long that it didn’t want to come out (That’s my theory and I’m sticking to it) So the two frames are from the R1 and then its all Super Paxette.
The downside was that I had to pack around the Solaris on my trip until I could get back home and pull the film leader out of the cartridge to give it another try in a much more mechanical camera.
The Solaris gives a particular expired film look that could be mistaken for cross processing if it were a little more prominent, however it still retained contrast and relatively fine grain which hasn’t always been the case for cheap films I’ve shot long after their expiration date.
The Seadragon gallery is best view in full screen mode.
Over time I’ve managed to put together what I think is a nice little Olympus OM1 kit with a 28mm, 50mm f1.8 (Of course), a 35-70 zoom and a 200mm f4 telephoto. Not comprehensive but small enough yet versatile. I loaded up the OM1 with some Kodak Portra 160 and pointed it at some stuff. Back in the early 1980’s this kit would have cost around $700 but now they can be found at just a fraction of that. As an all mechanical camera I don’t bother with a battery and shoot it without a meter, using a digital camera instead as a pre-exposure test if necessary. More about the OM1 in this post OM1 Metering in case you want to use the meter though you’ll need to find a 1.35V PX625 battery if you want it to be accurate.
