These past couple months I've invested a lot more of my efforts into learning a bit about photography. I was inspired by a lot of my friends who often take amazing photos while they're out and about doing their daily tasks or visiting places. I end up getting pretty jealous how they can transform simple things you'd usually see into such a beautiful image.

In ~2023 before I went back to university I told myself I'll get into this hobby, but with how difficult it was to get into a hobby while studying; I told myself I'll start getting into it nearer to the end.

Yet, here we are! A few months after spending my time with a camera and the rabbit hole which consumed my bank balance soon after!

This blog talks about how it started, the good, bad and the ugly, and what I plan on doing for the future!

My prior knowledge

I absolutely loved watching channels like Smarter Every Day, who a while ago made a video on how film photography worked. It was really inspiring to watch his video as he captured a sequence of the moon eclipse stages during a lunar eclipse. It just looked stunning, I wanted to try to have a gander at that some day.

I knew the fundamentals, how a shutter exposes the film to light which the tiny silver grains oxidise and become more “transparent”, where C41 film uses polarising layers to filter colour wavelengths to produce a matrix of colours in the film.

First set of film pictures using the camera

These were a combination of two rolls I used, in hindsight, I should've only tested with only one roll first before getting the two developed; but I was so eager to get into this! Despite the awkwardness, I absolutely love the red colour bleeding into it, it gives the images these “recovered film” look which kind of added a unique aesthetic I really enjoyed.

I didn't actually know how rolls ended and only realised I reached the end of my spool with the magpie image. This was my first experience into double exposures, which is very interesting, and I do think of some ways to manipulate this for interesting low exposure shots.

After these, I bought a few more rolls and went on quite an expensive shopping spree for vintage lenses, fixing the foam which just rotted away due to the age of the camera.

The main problem with the Pentax MG I got was that the viewfinder had this annoying piece of metal loosely flapping about. I had to open it up to remove it, only to realise it was a plate for the screws to clamp the viewfinder's glass to the frame of the plastic. As it's been dropped in the past; the plastic shroud around the viewfinder split, so I had to glue it together.

You can see in the image that the shutter didn't close either. From what I read online, Pentax camera shutter mechanisms don't close due to the lack of battery power, because the timer can't trigger it to close again. You can fix this by setting your camera shutter to B mode to close it (Though you really need to change that battery!).

When I fixed the viewfinder, I did two main mistakes. I cleaned it using the wrong chemicals and permanently damaged the viewfinder lens, this isn't a huge issue cause as long as I can see an image from it and make sure it's not blurry it's fine.

The second issue was when I fixed the viewfinder, it stopped the film caddy from closing. Which I knew for sure at that point the light leak will be inevitable. Lord forgive me, but I ate a yoghurt before attempting to fix and decided to make improvised 1M washers using tin foil. Layering it on top to make the screws holding the viewfinder down slightly further away to give enough clearance. You can see the problem in this image.

Technically, you could say I fixed the camera with tinfoil from a yoghurt wrapper. Anyhow, I managed to get some amazing pictures with this Pentax MG, I took these pictures using black and white film after those repairs, and they came out absolutely perfect.

During all this, I focused on finding a nice prime lens I can use for general photography, I came across a cheap Pentax P30N which has the exact lens I wanted for £10, I threw an offer in for £8 and score! I've got a new camera, and with my prior experience with old cameras, I cut some new foam for it and gave it a clean-up.

Unfortunately, I couldn't replace the foam as well as I could with the MG, the bottom shell which hides the screws to take the hinge of the film caddy off was impossible to remove. Instead, I decided to scrape off as much foam as I could, which in the end worked out really well; as you'll see in the pictures below!

What was different about this camera was the holder for the film to transfer to was a rubber cylinder which it wraps around. The ISO selection was automatic using the metal contacts on the film roll. I read online that this likes to slip, and it's not as secure, but the cylinder felt pretty grippy and decided to try a roll.

Photography is really cool in my opinion, I like tweaking and adjusting things and the technical aspect really makes it engaging for me! It's an entirely different experience shooting with this camera compared to the Pentax MG because of these slight mechanical adjustments, though fundamentally they do the same thing, open a shutter for a set amount of time for the film. But the sound and feel and weight are completely different.

I can't decide which one I prefer, but I really like the rugged feel of this P30N in my hands, the weight feels satisfying. I like the slick black colour to the design more than the aluminium frame of the MG, but that's a preference.

Anyhow, enough rambling; here are the first set of pictures on the P30N!

I fell in love with film photography after this. There was this strange effect happening on a few shots with a side of darkness, but I actually think that was a fault with the film perhaps, as it never appeared again after sliding between those two images.

Mistakes learnt during the initial rolls

Film is expensive!! It may cost ~£10 a roll, but it can cost up to £18 to get it developed and scanned! Using the Tesco film processing will not scan the film directly, they get the film printed first and scan it. It's not a direct scan of the film, and it can be slightly more expensive than the mail-in film processing services you can buy online.

I made a mistake with one roll by not setting the ISO correctly, such an easy mistake to do, and I need to practice by making sure the ISO is set correctly each time I put a new roll in. Mistakes can be expensive! Try to treat the camera like a baby to prevent problems.

Advice I can give to newcomers

Don't be scared of buying that weird £5 camera you find on eBay! Just make sure the shutter is working and the way to fix it is usually straightforward! Buy some 3 mm sheet of foam with adhesive at the bottom, it's really important to replace the foam of an old film camera to prevent light from leaking in.

If you can open a laptop and clean it, then getting into a camera is just as straightforward! The more finicky stuff is with lenses; I had actually bought a broken lens and had managed to fix it, which is going to be a later blog on what a pain in the butt that was.

When buying vintage lenses, look out for fungus in the pictures. Fungus can be cleaned off with deionised water and a tiny drop of alcohol. The problem with Fungus isn't the cleaning, but it can leave a permanent scar on the glass due to it eating on the filter.

One of my friends had a yellow-tinted lens, which he was able to untint using a specific LED he got from IKEA. So be aware you can buy some lenses, just be realistic if you can/can't clean it or repair it and don't risk spending a lot of money on vintage cameras, I usually put towards £10 per lens.

Don't overthink pictures, there are a lot of guides and professional photographers. But the cameras I got are designed to make photography easy for beginners, try to aim for those kinds of cameras which include their own light sensors, and it can really make photography an inclusive experience.

And yes… A phone camera in the correct conditions and if you tweak the pictures correctly can look better than a DSLR picture… But it doesn't capture that feeling, the adjustment of the lenses, choosing the correct posture and everything. It doesn't give that sense of feel. Also, phone cameras cannot apply “depth of field” which is done via adjusting the aperture on the camera to a higher value than what you would typically take in close-ups.

Conclusion

Other than my complaints, I learnt to calm down with the pictures as film photography is extremely expensive. I even picked up a DSLR which works with my vintage lenses to itch the craving I've developed on this hobby. I'm currently messing with some expired film, and I've put a rule to only use so little film pictures in a day to keep a roll lasting.

My next plans are to experiment with multiple forms of photography like astrophotography, macro shots and more landscapes. Not only that, but I've purchased a variety of ND lenses from AliExpress, ranging from £2-4 ND64s to a really affordable ND1000 filter, which I'd love to try capturing some beachside images with this. I'll be posting more about my experiments in the future.

Photography is extremely fun and despite the digital cameras having such an expensive cost. Film photography is surprisingly really easy to get into, and I think it's worth learning a bit about it, it helps keep the film community alive and film development labs running. Plus you get amazing real pictures you can keep forever. Unlike a digital image being printed, it just gives a sense of analogue, which is really rewarding. Especially as you cannot see the image instantly.

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