I am doing a B&W film docu type thing centred around the Covid-19 pandemic. I decided to go old school and use my two Leica's, an M4 and M5. The film of choice is Kodak TX400 developed in good old D76. No my favourite developer but I'm trying to stay old school on this one.
My M4 has decided it doesn't want to shoot at 1/1000 anymore so have switched to the M5 as my main camera. I actually prefer the M5 as it's a real "shooters" camera.
I am bulk loading my film and it seems I didn't use enough tape to attach the film to the take up spool. Once I got towards the end of the roll all of a sudden I noticed it was way easier to advance the film. Never a good sign! I attempted to rewind and that verified my fears that the film had become detached and was all sitting on the crank side of the camera.
On Nikons and such getting the film out is an easy task. Not so with a Leica due to its design. Everything was so tight in there I could not even get some needle nose pliers in there to grab on to the film. Naturally this is all being done in total darkness in my darkroom. Or as I call it now the "self isolation chamber".
After messing around for a bit I noticed this little bit of plastic that had dropped down from within the take up spool. I grabbed it and it came out a bit further. I turned it and nothing special happened. Then I got the idea why not pull on it. Out popped the take up spool with all the film wound around it!
Got the film in the tank and then turned on the lights. This little plastic thing was designed to solve just this type of issue. I quickly checked my M4 and it didn't have one. Bummer.
I'm not sure if M's after my M5 have this feature or not but I sure was surprised and amazed they had thought of it.
I love my M5!
Eric
My M4 has decided it doesn't want to shoot at 1/1000 anymore so have switched to the M5 as my main camera. I actually prefer the M5 as it's a real "shooters" camera.
I am bulk loading my film and it seems I didn't use enough tape to attach the film to the take up spool. Once I got towards the end of the roll all of a sudden I noticed it was way easier to advance the film. Never a good sign! I attempted to rewind and that verified my fears that the film had become detached and was all sitting on the crank side of the camera.
On Nikons and such getting the film out is an easy task. Not so with a Leica due to its design. Everything was so tight in there I could not even get some needle nose pliers in there to grab on to the film. Naturally this is all being done in total darkness in my darkroom. Or as I call it now the "self isolation chamber".
After messing around for a bit I noticed this little bit of plastic that had dropped down from within the take up spool. I grabbed it and it came out a bit further. I turned it and nothing special happened. Then I got the idea why not pull on it. Out popped the take up spool with all the film wound around it!
Got the film in the tank and then turned on the lights. This little plastic thing was designed to solve just this type of issue. I quickly checked my M4 and it didn't have one. Bummer.
I'm not sure if M's after my M5 have this feature or not but I sure was surprised and amazed they had thought of it.
I love my M5!
Eric