Agreed, I haven't seen .EDU Ultra under $5 in a while, and this is under $3.
Even at 120 that is crazy cheap.
Even at 120 that is crazy cheap.
I thought the Shanghai had a great look from examples I saw
Shanghai film has had a few emulsion issues in the past, but if I had to throw a brick at one or the other, my brick lands on the Yashica D. The D (and all other Yashica TLRs for that matter) were fairly crudely designed and built on the inside. When new, they were about as cheap a TLR as you could find. The optics suck by comparison to other Japanese TLR models. After more than 60 yeas, his D is worn out or is totally gummed up from half a century of disuse, as the case may be. Yashica TLRs may look good on the outside, but on the inside, there are just crudely fitted pot metal parts. The problem he describes sounds like the result of having loaded to roll loosely and not snugging it tight before closing the back. This will caused the roll to load loosely in the take up spool, As the film is advanced with photos, it becomes too large in diameter and starts jamming in the take up chamber. I did that once in my Pentax 67. If you keep forcing the roll to advance, you will tear it apart (as here) and end up stripping the gears in the film advance mechanism. I's say to have the D serviced (CLA), but that costs more than its worth.
Shanghai film has had a few emulsion issues in the past, but if I had to throw a brick at one or the other, my brick lands on the Yashica D. The D (and all other Yashica TLRs for that matter) were fairly crudely designed and built on the inside. When new, they were about as cheap a TLR as you could find. The optics suck by comparison to other Japanese TLR models. After more than 60 yeas, his D is worn out or is totally gummed up from half a century of disuse, as the case may be. Yashica TLRs may look good on the outside, but on the inside, there are just crudely fitted pot metal parts. The problem he describes sounds like the result of having loaded to roll loosely and not snugging it tight before closing the back. This will caused the roll to load loosely in the take up spool, As the film is advanced with photos, it becomes too large in diameter and starts jamming in the take up chamber. I did that once in my Pentax 67. If you keep forcing the roll to advance, you will tear it apart (as here) and end up stripping the gears in the film advance mechanism. I's say to have the D serviced (CLA), but that costs more than its worth.
I have a Yashica 12, and it's a very nice little camera that takes rather nice photographs. Granted, I did have Mark Hama do a full service on it last year, but I haven't experienced any of the issues described by Randy Stewart. While it has a very different character to my Mamiya C33, that's not necessarily a bad thing.
Well, what is similar to a Mamiya C series? I suppose you could compare it to some modular medium format press cameras of the time, but that loses some of the character. I think it was the only bellows-based modular TLR in medium format that didn't fail in the market immediately.
The Yashinon f/3.5 lens in my Yashica 12 may not be quite as sharp as the Sekor 80mm f/2.8 in my C33, but that doesn't mean it "sucks".
Part of the complaint expressed about Yashicas was that "the optics suck by comparison to other Japanese TLR models"-- The Yashinon f/3.5 lens in my Yashica 12 may not be quite as sharp as the Sekor 80mm f/2.8 in my C33, but that doesn't mean it "sucks".
People who talk trash about Tessar designs are very silly. There are qualities where Tessars are lacking but not everything is mural-level sharpness and perfect color correction. Tessars more often than not have good character even if they don't compare to more modern lenses in any single metric.The Yashinon and Yashikor were very respectable triplet and Tessar type lenses. If someone has experience to make them think those lenses "suck" they may have had a bad one, or one mis-assembled by a servicer ("professional" or amateur) after, say, a cleaning. By the time the Yashica TLRs were out, even an f/2.8 Tessar type lens could be pretty good (and I don't recall Yashica TLRs with faster than f/3.5).
People who talk trash about Tessar designs are very silly. There are qualities where Tessars are lacking but not everything is mural-level sharpness and perfect color correction. Tessars more often than not have good character even if they don't compare to more modern lenses in any single metric.
I've shot Soviet Industars and Argus Cintars that had appealing qualities at middle apertures and far-to-middle distance, and both are of inferior quality to most German and Japanese Tessar types.
I don't ever know what to think of people who obsess too much over the extremely fine technical characteristics of lenses. It calls their skills into question.
I've just had a strange experience with some bottom-shelf Chinese 120 BW film, Shanghai Pan 100 or 200 (don't remember). I loaded it into my Yashica D about a year and a half ago. I think it may have been the very first roll I loaded into it, as I've basically never used the D. Vaguely I remember at some point before the seventh frame the winding knob got incredibly stiff to the point that it hurt to turn even gripping it through my shirt.
I promptly forgot all about it and shot mainly 35mm since then.
Pulled it out today, clipped on my new Kodalux L meter (I especially like the incident light metering) and went out to shoot. After frame seven, I pressed the release button and found once again that it was incredibly difficult to turn, and began to remember something about it being that way before.
I finished the roll, having a bunch of fun doing incident metering for the first time in forever, but struggling with the winder. I found it especially hard to turn the knob the last few turns to wrap the film up in the backing paper.
When I got inside I opened the camera and found a mess. The film had torn loose from the backing paper, stayed wrapped the first spool, and was rubbing against the backing paper and creasing up into the gap between the gate and the takeup spool, apparently pinched.
So first of all, don't fall to the temptation of using this bargain film. If I remember right my Medalist may not have liked it either.
Second, do you think this could have damaged the frame-spacing mechanism of the Yashica? There's no visible damage to the gripping wheel or anything else on the inside, but I know first hand how temperamental 120 film transport mechanisms can be.
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