What's your oddest camera?

Mr Flibble · Dec 8, 2022

Choices, choices......

I guess the weirdest one in my collection:

Simmon Brothers Combat Camera.

Only some 250 made, unfortunately, as film packs are no longer available, it's a bit of an expensive doorstop.

gone · Dec 8, 2022

I just noticed that my post now says that the image is no longer available, as does Cholentpot's. I just checked Imgur and everything looks OK there. Odd.
{Moderator's addition: it is post #13 in this thread}

abruzzi · Dec 8, 2022

Philippe-Georges said:
Sometimes, when I go out shooting with 'that' camera, people look at me as I am still living in an other world and ask if that camera is something of an odd East-German relic from behind the iron curtain, and think that I must be a little 'deranged' (am I?).

A few moths ago somebody asked me if it wasn't a waste of time trying to take pictures wit such an old camera...

But you are right, actually, not the camera is odd but their reaction is (isn't it?)...

makes sense. In that sense most 35mm SLRs fly under the radar since they don't look that different from modern DSLRs. I remember taking a Pentax MX to a group photowalk, and being asked if it was one of those new mirrorless cameras. The layout of a Hassleblad with a WLF, or even more a view camera, definitely throws some people. Someone once got upset because they thought my Arca Swiss was a surveying device, and I was surveying their property. They thought I was a government tax official or something.

Digital Wendy · Dec 8, 2022

Was thinking 'All my cameras seem pretty normal to me . . . ' and then I remembered this one.

Beer can with a pinhole in it pointing down the river towards the sun.

We'll take it down at the solstice and see what we've caught . . . if anything.

Donald Qualls · Dec 9, 2022

Oh, well, if we're going to include pinhole...

I've got a pinhole camera I made from the roll core out of a mini-lab print paper roll (don't recall what machine or paper brand). I saw them about to toss it, and asked for it.

It came with a pair of plastic plug caps with reduced holes to center the roll on a spindle, and by coincidence is an exact fit for two 9x12 film sheets (so exact they'll hold each other against the inner surface with the film edges butted together at both seams), short end to short end, wrapped inside the tube.

I blacked out one end cap and plugged the hole, then installed a 1/4-20 blind nut in a piece of 1x2 board for a tripod mount; on the other end cap, I trimmed away some internal bracing and glued a lid from a steel food can on the outside, drilled a centered hole and mounted a pinhole behind that, using a small magnet (wrapped in blue painter's tape for easy grip) as a shutter.

The whole thing is pretty compact, and makes a 9x24 two-piece negative with a 360 degree panorama (angled "upward" if the camera is standing upright on the tripod mount).

titrisol · Dec 9, 2022

Stereo Cameras are odd,

Verascope (Jules Richard) ~1900

Sears Tower 83 (Iloca Stereo IIa)

Tower83-Stereo ~1956

MattKing · Dec 9, 2022

titrisol said:
Stereo Cameras are odd,

I would argue that there is nothing more "even" than a stereo camera

titrisol · Dec 9, 2022

MattKing said:
I would argue that there is nothing more "even" than a stereo camera

Only when they are leveld
The Tower has a "central" prontor between the lenses that triggers the leaves on both sides
A royal PITA to clean and lube

awty · Dec 9, 2022

Mr Flibble said:
Choices, choices......

I guess the weirdest one in my collection:

Simmon Brothers Combat Camera.

Only some 250 made, unfortunately, as film packs are no longer available, it's a bit of an expensive doorstop.

I reckon you could modify the back to take roll film, be cool for street photography.

awty · Dec 9, 2022

titrisol said:
A royal PITA to clean and lube

I have a TDC Stereo Colorist II thats a pain as well, has shutter on one lens which fires the second. I think they just used a standard single shutter which isnt powerful enough for two.

Mr Flibble · Dec 10, 2022

awty said:
I reckon you could modify the back to take roll film, be cool for street photography.

The film pack holder is integral part of the back plate unfortunately and it includes part of the rear flip-up sight assembly.
I guess it can be done, but it would require a complete new designed and built back instead of wrecking the original.

If I only if I was better at 3D design and printing

I suppose my KW Pilot Reflex is a little odd too, at least 127 format is still in the realms of possibility

John Earley · Mar 11, 2023

<<<This
It's a half frame 35mm, zone focus, film cartridge loaded and removed box camera. One of the earliest 35mm cameras mass produced.

I also have a Mercury ll in very nice shape.

Cholentpot · Mar 11, 2023

John Earley said:
<<<This
It's a half frame 35mm, zone focus, film cartridge loaded and removed box camera. One of the earliest 35mm cameras mass produced.

I also have a Mercury ll in very nice shape.

The Merc isn't all oxidized?

Kino · Mar 11, 2023

It would have to be between the Olympus sub-mini microscope camera and the Detrola 127 camera.

awty · Mar 12, 2023

Half frame Nikon.

Cholentpot · Mar 12, 2023

awty said:
Half frame Nikon.
View attachment 332237

What is this and where do I find one?

Willy T · Mar 12, 2023

S3M - under "Nikon"

HALF-FRAME CAMERAS

BAC1967 · Mar 12, 2023

I have a Nikon M-35 thats set up to attach to a microscope, not sure what that one attaches to.

Cholentpot · Mar 12, 2023

Willy T said:
S3M - under "Nikon"

HALF-FRAME CAMERAS

Subclub links never work on my pc for some reason.

BAC1967 said:
I have a Nikon M-35 thats set up to attach to a microscope, not sure what that one attaches to.

Can it attach to a standard F series camera?

abruzzi · Mar 12, 2023

it almost looks like a graflok back, but the light trap ridge on the left would stick out, not in.

awty · Mar 12, 2023

BAC1967 said:
I have a Nikon M-35 thats set up to attach to a microscope, not sure what that one attaches to.

This one is probably meant for a copy stand or maybe a baby view camera.
It still has the M39 thread but the darkslide is in the film holder attachment which is bolted to the camera.
Thought I might be able to fit a leaf shutter lens, but the smallest I have is a 65mm Angulon, which would need a long helicoid. Or I could maybe butcher a Holga and use that.
Its cool it can switch from full frame to half frame on a roll. Be even cooler if it had its own shutter.

BAC1967 · Mar 13, 2023

Cholentpot said:
Subclub links never work on my pc for some reason.

Can it attach to a standard F series camera?

It’s a m39 mount with no shutter, won’t work with F series. It doesn’t even have a shutter, the button is just for advancing the film. It has a dark slide if you need to remove it from the microscope. It attaches to another device that has a shutter. The one I have is the M-35, not the M-35s, the M-35 doesn’t switch to half frame.

Don_ih · Mar 13, 2023

awty said:
This one is probably meant for a copy stand

It looks close to what it would need to be to fit on a camera like the Polaroid MP-4 I have. With that camera, you can set the lens to make reductions -- easily down to 35mm half-frame size. It has a sliding camera mount attachment, so you could have this thing attached (assuming that mounting plate is correct), focus, slide the camera into position, pull the dark slide, fire the shutter (lens is mounted in a shutter). It'd actually be very convenient for it.

Cholentpot · Mar 13, 2023

BAC1967 said:
It’s a m39 mount with no shutter, won’t work with F series. It doesn’t even have a shutter, the button is just for advancing the film. It has a dark slide if you need to remove it from the microscope. It attaches to another device that has a shutter. The one I have is the M-35, not the M-35s, the M-35 doesn’t switch to half frame.

Thanks.

BHuij · Mar 13, 2023

I've got a few oddballs, but probably my top two "strangest" cameras are cheating because I built them myself.

Strangest camera I own that was commercially manufactured is probably my Kiev 30M. It's one of those little spy cameras that slides open and closed to cock the shutter and takes 16mm film. I shot it once or twice.

Strangest camera in my collection is probably a 5x7 pinhole I designed and 3D printed with a fixed 150mm focal length. I had this idea that I could use paper negatives to get high contrast, and then make salt prints and whatnot from those negatives. Turned out to be a failed experiment. The camera worked and made some pretty cool paper negatives, but printing alt processes through a paper negative makes exposure times unacceptably long, and it turns out it's not just contrast those processes want, it's density and dynamic range

I also have a Goodman Axis that I'm putting off finishing. I have to make the bellows next which I'm not looking forward to. When it's all said and done, I'll have an awesome technical camera with a wide range of front and rear standard movements, that fits my Mamiya/Graphic 6x6 and 6x7 backs and can use lenses like my Agfa Solinar 85mm and Kodak Ektar 101mm. All the work of shooting my Intrepid 4x5 with none of the portability and less resolution

What's your oddest camera?

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