u/florian-sdr

Developed in 510 Pyro, 1:100, 13 min dev time, 60 minutes initial agitation, and then one inversion at 10 minutes.

Pentax 69, Portra 400, 105mm Micro-P “lens”

“Censorship” to escape the Reddit algo ban of nudity 🙄

The one that looks best, is the one that confirms your bias.

Second time I’m taking out my freshly CLA’d F3, and it is such a joy to shoot with.

The 80/20 exposure meter together with AE-lock is a very precise way to meter.

Shooting 200T in the F3 with a 85B and a B+W C-Pol filter and Kodak Gold in the modified Holga

Somehow when I traveled to Germany (Cologne, Berlin), I was never lucky enough to actually find this damn thing in the local DMs there.

Now finally found a triple pack at DM in Austria 🇦🇹

I am launching a three-element Correction Filter PRO-420-FI

FI stands for Fractional Illumination, and DOES NOT stand for the 6th and 9th letter of the alphabet. Those are unsubstantiated rumours.

A laminated three-layer glass filter designed to shift the colour response of Kodak Portra 400 toward the tonal profile of a discontinued reference emulsion Pro-400H.

A filter on the hardware side to shift colours of a film, which you could easily do in post? The irony. 2010s Brooklyn hipsters - now solidly in their midlife crisis - will love it and will not be able to help to buy it to reconnect with their glory age where peak irony was their primary directive.

Construction:
Layer 1: rare-earth doped glass, notched to attenuate reflectance in the 540–560nm range. Like a bedroom of a cringy teenage movie: this is where the magic happens. Or not.

Layer 2: low-concentration cobalt correction glass, calibrated for a mild overall cool shift. Not enough to make you look like a Smurf. This ain’t Harman Azure. Just enough to align with your aloof attitude towards d1g1tal photographers, and possible to give you the air of somebody who owns a Scandinavian summer house.

Layer 3: thin-film interference coating, stabilising notch edges across focal lengths. Nobody has ever asked to explain this layer at a party. Let’s keep it this way.

Launch and pricing:

I am launching this on Kickstarter. Price doesn’t matter because you will pay it anyhow and you will never get the product.

This is my third professional SLR camera that has been fully CLA’d (previously: Pentax LX and Nikon F6). Really looking forward to using it now!

I haven’t shot a new roll through it yet, so my report is based on the interaction and information I received about the CLA itself.

Overall a great experience with Alex from South West Camera Co. (UK), who specialises in Nikon F3 and FM2 cameras. Including original Nikon servicing tools (no idea how important that part is). He is very thorough in communicating what he will do and when, what is included in the device, how the costs work, when to expect the service, etc… so everything around the experience is very transparent and professional.

I asked for the modification to the shutter speed before zero counter (normally it’s locked to a single speed), and get the grain-of-wheat lamp working again that illuminates the shutter speed indicator in the viewfinder, and a routine CLA

He took the camera apart completely, cleaned it out, including finding and removal of small fungus spores (the camera was imported from humid Japan), took it apart completely, tested shutter speeds and light meter, adjusted everything and reassembled it.

He also send me a detailed report, including very detailed photos of disassembled parts and problem areas (e.g. where the light fungus spores were sitting, or the faintest possible hint of delivering in the viewfinder), and a list about the condition of everything he found.

Here is a summary of that (not verbatim!):

On inspection:
- Fungus spores scattered throughout the interior – common on cameras of this age
- Mirror had accumulated dirt, dust and light fungus, with a few faint scratches typical of the F3’s soft mirror coating (marks that don’t affect exposure)
- A faint line inside the prism suggesting very early, rare de-silvering – cosmetic only, no impact on performance
- Eyepiece optics had fungus and general grime
- Evidence of a prior disassembly – not unusual on a camera of this age
Work carried out:
- Full clean of interior, mirror, prism and eyepiece optics
- Shutter speeds, light meter and aperture-priority mode calibrated
- All light seals and internal foams replaced, including a correctly specified mirror bumper foam
- LED indicator repaired and now working properly
- 1/80th shutter speed restriction removed (fully reversible, non-destructive)
The result: a properly calibrated, clean-running F3. This is the standard of inspection and work that goes into every CLA we do.