Plate availability?

Seems like christmas came in early this year. A vist at my grandmothers, ended in me getting a 4x5" plate-camera. It is hard to tell anything about it, except that it seems to have 7-plateholders (only one plate ) and perhaps a polaroid-back.

Pictures at www.flickr.com/photos/audungk.

Carrying strap is engraved Lola136, and the small brass-sign on the sides states the dealer. I doubt he exists...

Since the shutter, and the controls seem to work (Only front-rise, focus slider) my main problem will then be the plates.... Is it hard to make them oneself? Would it be possible to get premade? Should i go for film?

Links or information would be highly apreciated.

That looks like a 9x12cm plate holder to me!

Can you read what's written on the lens?

The thing which looks like a polaroid back is a film pack magazine. Film packs have unfortunately been out of production since around 1950.

There are basically three ways to use these cameras: With plates, or with sheet film, or with a rollfilm back.

Plates are still available, but very expensive - adjusted for inflation, they cost almost half of what they did in 1930! www.retrophotographic.com had some plates last time I looked.

Sheet film can be used with special "film sheaths", which are sometimes found on ebay - especially ebay.de. Film can also be used lightly attached to some firm support, I use orange marmelade for attaching film to glass plates up to 30x40cm.

Roll film backs can also be found once in a while, but like many useful things they tend to come as a part of a package - often including a camera.

But it's worth it - here's a picture I took last winter with a 9x12cm plate camera, using a Slavich glass plate:

9x12 seems like a more qualified measurement! (At last, found a ruler....)

Lens says "Novar-Anastigmat", apertures from 6.6 to 36. Focal length seems to be 135mm.

It is printed: "Akt:Ges.Dresden" on a brassplate inside the housing

Also, the letters ICA/JCA/IOA (not sure of which combo) are typed in at various places.

If plates are hard to get, i might go for the sticky-film-option... Luckily, Amund has offered me a LF class!

ICA is one of the companies that became absorbed into Zeiss-Ikon in 1926, so that dates your camera to around that time or a little earlier. In fact there's a Lola in this list from 1922!

The Novar Anastigmat is a triplet, and can be a very good one. 135mm (or 13,5cm as it probably says) is the standard focal length for a 9x12cm plate camera. I think we've found it

I've just got an ICA plate camera myself, a Plaskop 603/2 stereocamera for 44x107mm plates...

Thank you very much for helpful information, Ole!

As mentioned, i've found 12 plates on ebay, hopefully they are still useful...

Funny, I have always thought of getting into larger format, but i never thought i would enter via a plate-camera....

Lets hope santa claus knows where to get more plates....

audungk said:

Thank you very much for helpful information, Ole!

As mentioned, i've found 12 plates on ebay, hopefully they are still useful...

Funny, I have always thought of getting into larger format, but i never thought i would enter via a plate-camera....

Lets hope santa claus knows where to get more plates....

Click to expand...

I think a lot of us have got in by that "mistake". Hope to have time to make plates over christmas.

good luck!

Welcome to the club! My first plate camera was an 9x12 Ica. Should have kept it...

Hi there, I've just joined and found this thread interesting - I've recently purchased a Wallace Heaton 9x12 plate camera (which seems to be loosely based around a Voigtlander Avus(?) camera). It came with the Compur Dial set shutter, ground glass screen and 6 plate holders and a film pack holder.

I have yet to develop the film, but I found that 9x12 sheet film is actually slightly too big to fit in the plate holders, so I had to cut that down to size using a craft roller-cutter. The plate holders are obviously too deep for the film, but I found that cutting some black mount board to fit in the holders held the film flat, particularly as the pressure springs act against the mount board.

I'll let you know the results once I have developed the film (Fomapan 100).

Cheers,
David.