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Mike Graham
Dorina Graham

Photography:

TLRs:

 Yashicamat      

Rolleiflex T

Mamiya C330 

Rolleicord IV 

127 Film

Yashica 44

Rangefinders

Yashica Electro 35

Olympus 35 ECR 

Rollei 35S 

Nikon

Nikkormat FT3 

Nikon F3 

Nikon EM 

Exposure meters

Lenses

The 50 millimeter 

The Lab

Repairs?

Dinosaurs

FAQs

 

Aviation:

There I was...

Melli Beese Project

Guest Book

My TLRs: Yashicamat    Mamiya C330    Rolleiflex-T    Rolleicord IV   Yashica 44 

TLR Tips

 

1. Very old TLRs can suffer from the front silvering flaking off the mirror. This can make the viewfinder almost unusable. Buying a new mirror from Rollei, Mamiya etc. is heavy money. But inside just about any old Polaroid camera of the type that has the film pack on the bottom, you'll find a perfect front-silvered mirror. It may need to be trimmed, but you can either do this yourself or take it to your local hardware store and have them do it. On a bad day, expect to pay $5 for the Polaroid camera at a junk sale or flea market, and you get a $100 mirror!
   
   

2. Always use a lens hood. The front element of a TLR lens isn't well protected, and stray light from the side can cause flare. Oddly, having the sun directly in the picture doesn't cause nearly as many problems as if light strikes from the side. The Rolleiflex-T and the Yashicamat 124-G, like most 60s and 70s TLRs, use Rollei Bay-1lens fittings, unlike most regular cameras with  their  screw thread for filters and accessories.
   
   

3. Never leave a TLR on the front seat of your car when you're driving. In its leather case, a TLR will roll around like an oiled baseball. Even a moderate braking maneuver will cause it to fly off the seat onto the floor, a full stop will smash it against the dashboard or the windshield. Been there, done that! If you want your TLR handy beside you, hang it around the passenger headrest by its strap.
   
   

4. Trying to focus a TLR on a rapidly moving subject is like trying to land a helicopter on a North Sea oil rig in a gale! (Not that I've ever landed a helicopter on an oil rig...) Let's say you want to shoot competitors at a bicycle race, and you're able to get close enough to get good shots. Use the sportsfinder! Using the pre-focus method... pick a spot on the ground where the bikes will be in the right position when they come past, focus on it, and leave the focus set at that. Now flip the sportsfinder down, ignore the fact that you feel silly looking through an open gun sight, and use it to frame your shots. Keep both eyes open to avoid eye strain. Believe it or not - and I didn't till I actually tried it out - what you see will be pretty close to what you get.
   
   This is because although the parallax error is now greater than through the normal viewfinder, you're probably at least four meters away from the subjects and the four inch error will be negligible. If you stay in the same place, all your shots will be sharp. Trust me, it works!
   
   

5. Make sure the flip-up magnifier is absolutely parallel when you use it. If it's not, you'll have a hard time focusing. After years of heavy use (abuse...?) you may find it's no longer flat. Most TLRs allow you to bend the frame of the magnifier up or down, but don't go crazy and break it by accident! Having your magnifier parallel with the focusing screen is the single most important factor in getting sharp pictures with a TLR! Also, if you wear glasses, any good optician should be able to supply a replacement magnifier lens customized to your prescription. This can make life very much easier for you ( but hell on anyone else using your camera! ).
   
   
   

6. Don't leave film in the camera for too long. With the exception of the Mamiya C-range, most TLRs cause the film to go around a very tight 90 degree turn once it's left the roll on its way to the film gate. If you leave the camera sitting around for a long time, the frame behind the current one can form itself into a strange shape. When you shoot that frame, you may find it won't be as sharp as the rest. Now don't get frightened - I'm not saying you should shoot the film up within three minutes of loading it! Just be aware of it. A few days shouldn't hurt it, but if you had to scrape cobwebs off the camera...
   
   
   
   

7. Finding  accessories for the Rollei Bay-1 nowadays can be awkward - twenty years have passed since the last Bay-1 camera was built.. Here's a link to a company selling lens hoods, filters, close-up lenses, end even a conversion plate allowing you to use 49mm or 52mm filters to your Bay-1 TLR: Camera Depot . They also supply adapters for the bigger Bay-2 and Bay-3 cameras like the Rolleiflex 3.5F, Rollei Magic  and Rolleiflex 2.8F.

 

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