When it comes to feeding my aforementioned GAS* habit, I'm a bit of a cheapskate, always lurking around the bargain basement. On a recent wander around the 'Bay I stumbled upon this Kodak 66 Model II for a very reasonable sum, little more than a couple of pints of beer at the local (barely one if you live in London).
For some reason, there was never a Model I, just the II and III. The model III came with a faster lens (f4.5 rather than the more humble f6.3) and a slightly more sophisticated shutter. These were made in Britain and take the common 120 size film, unlike the majority of Kodak folders, which took 620 (essentially the same sized film but on a different sized spool - a crafty marketing ploy by Kodak, maybe?)
Operation fairly typical for a more modest folding camera of that era, no bells and whistles, just the basics. When stowed in its matching pouch and shoulder strap, it makes for a surprisingly small, lightweight unit.
Mine is in nice condition for its age, but had a couple of small issues when it arrived. The shutter firing linkage didn't work properly and the front cover latch was a little iffy. A bit of judicial fettling** with a pair of pliers put both problems to rights.
I popped a roll of Kentmere 400 in and over the space of a couple of local walks, bagged my 12 (and a half!) exposures. The camera is a delight to use, although as a 'lefty" my face does get rather squished against my right hand when looking through the viewfinder. To overcome this I simply hold the camera in the vertical orientation, there obviously being no issues with it being a square format. The small bonus with holding it like this is that the camera is then braced against my head better and, hopefully, less risk of shake.
Once I'd developed the roll in my usual caffenol brew*** and scanned the film, I was very pleasantly surprised how well the little Anaston lens performed. Images are pretty crisp and with respectable contrast for its age. Even the corners hold up. There was very little editing done to the scans, essentially just the basics (white/black points, a subtle lift of contrast to suit my taste and a little 'dodging' on a couple of images).
I did, though, discover the result of forgetting to wind on to the next frame straight after shooting the current one in one instance - silly me. Ah well, sometimes double exposures can be fun.
All in all the '66 was a lucky find and one that will see more use in the future.
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*Gear Acquisition Syndrome
**Fettle - to fettle is to fix or repair something
*** Caffenol delta (24g of washing soda, 20g vitamin C, and 45g of coffee powder per litre of water) @20 degrees centigrade.
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Really impressed with the quality of the pictures given its age. Also, the quality of the developing from Caffenol. I must try your formula. Can you point me to some instructions on how to mix up Caffenol?
Really nice Ralph, what a fun way to spend the day. 👍