Did I load my film wrong?

[SomewhereLost]

Apologizes in advance for not knowing all the proper terms.

I have the Ansco B2 Cadet. I followed this video, , for how to load the film. I figured same box shape, same company, this should be right.

Well, I followed the video and put my spool with the film on it at the top. I put the spools in place and tightened the film into the spools. I noticed the arrows were the start is supposed to be was right near the top. I thought it strange, but I'm working with an old camera and new film. Perhaps this is just a quark. Film is Lomo Color 100. (Don't judge, I have better film coming.)

I start winding my film and looking through the red counter hole. It starts with the white paper and I keep scrolling a bit, and now there's no more white, it's just black. I scrolled a bit more and it's still all black. Did I load this film wrong? Should I have loaded the empty spool on top and the full spool on the bottom? That made more sense in my mind, but I was following the video. Would it be possible to use red RGB leds to fake a dark room and see what I'm doing and flip it around if that's what I need to do?

This video for the AgfaBox, , has the spools in the opposite position as mine, but the first comment says it's wrong. Can anyone tell me what's going on?

Additionally - should the red counter hole be aligned to properly count photos on modern 120 film?

 

[shutterfinger]

https://www.cameramanuals.org/agfa_ansco/agfa_ansco_b2.pdf
Box cameras have the film supply at the bottom and take up at the top by the wind knob.

 

[SomewhereLost]

https://www.cameramanuals.org/agfa_ansco/agfa_ansco_b2.pdf
Box cameras have the film supply at the bottom and take up at the top by the wind knob.

Yeah. I'm figuring this all out now. Might be able to save this roll as it rolled up and I don't think it was exposed to light

 

[Nitroplait]

The first video says that the red window is useless because it used a different standard for number placement.

Yeah. I'm figuring this all out now. Might be able to save this roll as it rolled up and I don't think it was exposed to light

If it was reversed, and you wound it with the red hole open, then it was exposed though the red hole obviously.

 

[SomewhereLost]

The first video says that the red window is useless because it used a different standard for number placement.

If it was reversed, and you wound it with the red hole open, then it was exposed though the red hole obviously.

The camera I have and the one in the video aren't the same unit. I don't think I really exposed much. I took the plunge, turned off the lights, and felt around. I seemingly rolled my film back up and any light exposure will hopefully be minimal. It seems the red hole and the Lomo I have do line up. I have found a 1 and I'm gonna assume it's correct. Guess I won't really know till I fire off the roll.

 

[Nitroplait]

The camera I have and the one in the video aren't the same unit. I don't think I really exposed much. I took the plunge, turned off the lights, and felt around. I seemingly rolled my film back up and any light exposure will hopefully be minimal. It seems the red hole and the Lomo I have do line up. I have found a 1 and I'm gonna assume it's correct. Guess I won't really know till I fire off the roll.

First roll is to know the camera - maybe there will be some interesting light leaks - who knows?
Regarding number spacing, modern film in my Rolleicord from the mid 1930's would show the numbers intended for 6x9 through the red window, thus only give me 8 frames instead of 12. Time will tell if spacing is correct - part of the fun with such old cameras.

 

[Donald Qualls]

First: B2 is an old German designation for 120 film, specific to Agfa and Ansco cameras. Red window placement of a B2 camera should be fully compatible with modern 120 film.

Second, if you got the supply and takeup spools swapped, yes, you'd just wind the film back onto the roll instead of through the camera. As noted, the empty spool should wind up by the advance knob. Just reload in correct orientation and you'll be good to go. The concern aired about loading the film "backward" is if you had the spools in the correct positions, but feeding off the wrong side of the supply, you would then have the emulsion facing the red window -- but if that were the case, you would have seen only the black side of the paper and never had the start arrows visible, so you don't need to worry about that. This is actually hard to miss when loading a red window camera, but easy to do with film inserts for some no-window mechanical counter cameras that transport the film "inside out" (for instance, it's probably the commonest new user loading error for an RB67, and very possible for a Hasselblad, Bronica, and likely a number of other "box" shaped medium format SLRs).

@Nitroplait Some early cameras with mechanical frame counters were built to use the 6x9 track to position the film for frame 1; you'd then start the counter (with my Zeiss 532/16 just pushing down and turning the counter wheel to 1) and close the red window for the remainder of the roll. As you note, if your counter is broken or you don't set it, you'll get only 8 exposures using only the red window to advance. That shouldn't be a problem with a B2 Cadet; it's a 6x9 box camera without mechanical counter.

 

[Tel]

It's worth noting that these camera designs are not consistent from one maker to another. I have 3 Kodak Brownie box cameras that all have the winding knob at the bottom front, so the unexposed film loads in the top chamber and the film winds onto the takeup spool in the bottom. Like your camera, the Kodaks use a removable film holder.