Fun Cheap TLR's

I also enjoy using the Lubitel 166 Universal: compact and lightweight, very good photo quality. The focusing is indeed a bit more difficult, but the finder is big and bright.

Another bonus point: its shutter is very simple and easy to maintain even for novices.

I was mostly joking about fighting y'all but I'm glad to see so much love for the Lubi.

My Lomography Lubitel 166+ (which, admittedly, has modern coating on it's lens and proper focusing screen) sees far too little action these days. I should take it out for a walk!

Irrc this was taken on long expired Agfa Portrait 160:

Donald Qualls said:

Won't hear me disagreeing. The only reason I haven't put more effort into getting one is the "very challenging focusing screen". I'd sure like to get another Seagull TLR, though...

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Last time I was counter-leaning in Camera Corner Davenport, Iowa (find em online) idly fondling the used stuff I remember seeing a Seagull.
alf in Iowa

Alfred Fickensher said:

Last time I was counter-leaning in Camera Corner Davenport, Iowa (find em online) idly fondling the used stuff I remember seeing a Seagull.
alf in Iowa

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Camera Corner is my closest place now that University Camera and PhotoPro are closed. UCAM always had nice used selection.
Best Regards Mike

Alfred Fickensher said:

Last time I was counter-leaning in Camera Corner Davenport, Iowa (find em online) idly fondling the used stuff I remember seeing a Seagull.

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There are Seagull cameras (a few different variations) on eBay any give day. I just need to remember I want another one when I have money.

Donald Qualls said:

There are Seagull cameras (a few different variations) on eBay any give day. I just need to remember I want another one when I have money.

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are they any good?

GaryFlorida said:

are they any good?

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Define "good". The lens on the one I had (which I got very cheap because the leather(ette) was missing off the front panel) had a coated triplet f/3.5 80 mm and produced good images. Its focus screen is nothing special, but I presume a bright screen could be installed and/or a microprism or split-image center spot focus screen adapted from another similar TLR (or maybe the newer ones had that, I've only ever handled that one). When I got mine, they were running about the same price or slightly less than a Yashica 12 on eBay (but eBay was fairly new then, and mislisting bargains were everywhere). They're short on luxury features (manual cocking shutter, red window advance) but it was a knob focus rather than the geared helical I'd learned TLR on (Kodak Reflex II -- much better camera, IMO, but needs 620). Easy enough to load and unload, too; nothing complicated.

Toyocaflex - one of a bunch of fairly similar TLRs from post WWII Japan.
It was free - which is about as cheap as they come.
It came from the estate of a friend's uncle who besides being a very active photographer was also an inverterate thrift store visitor,
It almost appears to be unused - leather case and cardboard box included.


And this is the sort of thing you can do with it:

MattKing said:

Toyocaflex - one of a bunch of fairly similar TLRs from post WWII Japan.
It was free - which is about as cheap as they come.
It came from the estate of a friend's uncle who besides being a very active photographer was also an inverterate thrift store visitor,
It almost appears to be unused - leather case and cardboard box included.
View attachment 379497

And this is the sort of thing you can do with it:

"Play of Light"

• MattKing
• Sep 25, 2024
• 5

A detail from the net shed at the Britannia Shipyards historical site...

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wow, thats excellent!

That Toyocaflex is very similar to many other TLR's with the Tri-Lausar lens...most are made by Tougodo. (Sp?)
Many were made and badged as Skyflex, Miloflex, among others. Very Yashica-esque (is that a word? It is now!)

This Toyokaflex I never heard of, but it indeed looks like a most interesting camera.
I have both a Seagull 4 f3.5 and a bunch of Lubitels I got from poland (lubitel 2 and 166u), some quite old.
The Lubitel 2 is made from a very nice material but finding 27mm push on filters can be a real pain.
The 166 I truly love: it's VERY light, it fits 40.5mm filters, the shutter is dependable and it actually produces very good results. Most of the internet examples sporting blurred photos are probably due to defective samples or to the users not knowing about lens sync on these soviet TLRs. The viewfinder is a bit strange though, it's a plain "brilliant" design from the 30s with the addition of a small ground glass patch in the center to allow focusing (but that takes a bit of getting used to. You also need to place your eye in a precise spot in order to clearly see the image). Never had a light leak into one.
The f3.5 Seagull feels like a old brick, and finding a neckstrap for most of them can be a problem as it uses a weird pin attachment.
The mechanics is sound (expected from its weight). Optically I had results that are difficult to tell from my father's Zeiss Ikoflex in terms of sharpness (we often use FP4/HP5s, so no fancy t-grains). Filter thread's still the 40.5mm, so very convenient. If you're into double exposures YMMV, as mine has always refused to allow me to do so. I don't trust its self timer as a couple of times it jammed the shutter, so never touch it, and I usually set the shutter speed before cocking the shutter, as I noticed the lever (already quite stiff) can get even stiffer after cocking.

I've had two Seagulls and while the lens is decent, the shutter I've found to be quite frail. One of them had the lightest fall off of a car seat onto the foot mat and the shutter seized up.

My Lubitel otoh has experienced a number of falls and it's still going.

Here's the Seagull, also taken on expired Agfa Portrait 160:

This thread spans almost 20 years. Seems prices for TLR are going down now.

FWIW, I purchased a Lubitel 166 and a Seagull WWSC TLR cameras from Calumet Photographic in the 1990s.

Lubitel 166 light weight and compact dimensions made it easy to carry on trips but produced some vignetting and I eventually stopped using it due to gradual increase in resistance over time when advancing film past frame 6.

The Seagull has a 3-element lens and a film wind crank.

Viewfinder is better than the plain ground glass of the earlier versions.

I always used the cameras without a light meter using the sunny 16 exposure method.

Shutter maximum speed limited to under 1/300 sec.

I am satisfied with the Seagull image sharpness as I was shooting at F16.

Current prices bid for the Seagull version I own have been nearly identical to its 1990s retail price while the Yashica TLR is much more expensive but possesses better specs and a better reputation for shutter reliability.

Supposedly the turn of the century Seagull 4-element lens version was better than the Seagull 3-element lens version, but retailed for more than a used Yashica TLR.

I like both Lubitel 166U and Seagull 4A-105 (triplet lens), both produce more than decent photos.