Instant Instax inspiration: in-camera contact print

Even after three decades of photography I love experimenting with new or rediscovered techniques. In the old wet darkroom days contact sheets were common and to me they have their own aesthetic appeal. I also like that toy-camera sprockethole thingy, as well as I like instant film. Why not bring these things together? Some weeks ago I asked myself if it would be possible to create some sort of in-camera contact print by masking an istant film sheet with a 35mm or medium format film strip and then expose it. Today I got around to test it. It is a bit fiddly but it works.

Here's the process: I prepared the 35mm film strip by using an exposed Instax picture from my stock, holding the strip over the picture in the desired angle and cutting away the protruding edges of the film (ouch!). Once the film was trimmed, I put the 35mm strip, together with a pair of scissors, adhesive tape and my loaded Instax 100 into a changing bag. Now came the tricky part. I opened the camera,  took out the pack and ripped away the the light seal. The light seal is the strip of thin flexible video tape-like plastic (some of you might remember video tapes) that covers the slot on top of the film pack. Removing the seal made it a lot easier to slide the film sheets in and out. Then I carefully pushed out the first sheet. Now the 35mm film was positioned over the light sensitive side of the Instax film and taped around the edges. I shoved the sheet back into the pack and reloaded the camera. Piece of cake, isn't it?

Ready for the first shot. The camera was pointed at a white background and fired. The picture with the taped-on film strip was ejected without jamming. Whew!

Art or rubbish? Art. If you ask me.

Oops! Totally messed up. What happened?

Seems like I accidently flipped the Instax film sheet in the changing bag and taped the 35mm film over the picture side of the sheet. In addition I didn't handle it careful enough, so the pod with the chemicals broke open and the picture developed in the cosy darkness of the changing bag. That's why the picture is unevenly developed and mostly black.

Ok, back to the changing bag.

This time I taped the negatives to the correct side and handled it more carefully.

Blue wisps of fog.

Again the picture was ejected troublefree. But the added 35mm strip caused problems on spreading the developer evenly. The image also has some blue-ish areas in the center. Caused by a developer overdose???

Back to the bag. Once again.

This time I wanted to remove the negative strip before developing the picture. Fortunately the Fuji Instax doesn't eject the picture until you release the shutter button. So I exposed the shot, but held the shutter button pressed until the camera was back in the changing bag and the pack was unloaded. Now I had to slide the sheet out, remove the 35mm strip and slide it back into the pack. The camera was then reloaded and fired in the complete darkness of the bag. This is what came out:

Almost there.

Much better. Now it is evenly developed.

By the way: The pictures above were intentionally overexposed. The shutter of the Instax 100 tops out at 1/200 s. All shots were exposed in bright sunlight (EV 15), So a film speed of ISO 200 and an aperture of f/16 (or an equivalent setting) would have been recommended. But the Instax system is fixed to ISO 800 and f/14. That's two stops overexposure due to the faster film plus one third of a stop for the larger aperture. But I think the Instax wide film handled the 2.33 stops overexposure quite well. Taken note of and noted.

For the last shot I added a Cokin polarizer filter that decreases light by 2 stops. And of course I removed the 35mm negative before ejecting the shot.

Contact!

Ta-Dah!!! Evenly developed, well exposed negative strip and still a white background. Looks good to me.

Today's yield. The entire process was done in about 45 minutes.

I hope this article inspired you to play with this technique (maybe adding a coloured background, using slides, b&w film, medium and 110 format or any transparent and semi-transparent stuff one can imagine...). I will certainly do.
Have fun and stay tuned.

PS: Just in case someone cares: the 35mm negatives were taken from the test roll I recently ran through my Leica mini.

Photo Essay: The Ihagee EXA 500

Let me introduce you to my favorite 35 mm camera these days. Very basic, very simple. A small SLR camera from the 1960s made in eastern germany. Enjoy.

And some pictures from the inside:

I have an expired (03/2007) and redscaled Jessop's Everyday 200 loaded and will post the results as soon as possible.

expired Polaroid 600 extreme: failure

Bought this pack of Polaroid 600 extreme (expired 12/99) on a flea market for 1 €. I didn't expect much. Loaded it into my Polaroid 636 closeup and fired a test shot. The battery still had enough power to run the camera but the chemistry was dry and the picture came out mustard coloured,. And so did the other nine shots. I didn't expect much and I have not been disappointed;-)

You might think: why is this guy boring us with useless informations? Hey, I am a kind hearted guy, and I just want to save you from spending loads of money in the e(lectronic)bay for buying packs of film that turn out to be packs of crap. I heard more than once that Polaroid 600 is quite sensitive to expiration. So twelve years out of date is definitely too much. Save your money and buy some other analog stuff.

Toycamera review: TAN LA SU-204

Toycamera review: TAN LA SU-204

The SU-204 is a 35mm camera produced by TAN LA from China that is sold in chinese supermarkets here in Portugal for € 2,50. It is very cheaply made (as expected) and mostly (if not completely) made from plastic. It has a fixed shutter speed and aperture, a manual film advance with a thumb wheel and a fixed focus lens.

It comes in silver matte. No surprises on the general layout: The film rewind crank, hot-shoe, film counter window and the shutter release button are on the top. Film door and film advance thumb wheel on the back. Film door switch and wrist strap (yes, it's included) on the left. Film rewind button on the bottom. There's a slider under the lens on the front for the lens cover. The shutter can't be fired until the cover is open. The shutter is cocked while advancing the film – no double exposures possible. The viewfinder is bright and clear. And though it is placed right above the lens it has a strong left/right parallax error.

Everything is lightweight and cheap. Especially the film rewind crank should be handled very carefully.

Everything is lightweight and cheap. But compared to other small plastic cameras like the Diana Mini that costs at least 20 times (!!!) as much, the SU-204 is quite sophisticated and well built.

The user's guide is in chinese language and gives no information on shutter speed or aperture (at least not for me). I assume it's f/11 and 1/100 second or such. There is a print under the lens that says '35mm Focus Free' while the box says '28mm Glass Lens'. We will see...

Summary: More than I expected from a € 2,50 camera.

Now let's take this little darling out. The film is a fresh 'dm Paradies Action 400' - a cheap (less than 1€ for a 36 exp. roll) print-film sold by the 'dm Drogeriemarkt' a big german drugstore chain. It's probably an older Kodak emulsion. As I am focused on testing the capabilities and quirks of the lens, I sealed the film door with electrical tape. No lightleaks allowed at this point in time.

I like the SU-204. This camera is a real cheap-as-a-toy-camera and as that it is just great! The lens is bad – and I mean it's REALLY bad. I know that even disposable cameras deliver decent results these days, and so I expected average (and boring) pictures from the SU-204. But no! The lensblur in the corners is spectacular and crazy and you will only get your subjects sharp (haha!) if you keep them centered and in a distance of 1-3 m. This is definitely not a glass lens.

Here are some results from the first roll of film.