Dog's Best Friend

Posted by Mike Cash (Kiryu, Japan) on 19 May 2008 in Miscellaneous and Portfolio.

Over the recent Golden Week holidays I visited the home of a friend in Nagano Prefecture. While there I showed his wife one of the antique cameras I had brought along with me and she mentioned that she had an old camera that had belonged to her father and which had been stashed away in a closet unused for about thirty years.

She went and fished it out so I could have a look at it and it turned out to be a 1956 Ricohflex VIIM twin-lens reflex camera. Mechanically it was as good as new and was in outstanding cosmetic condition as well.

Like so many of the general public here in Japan, she had the mistaken notion that film is no longer available for these old cameras. I informed her that I had two rolls right there on the table and that one was about to go into that camera.

It was the last few hours of my visit with them and my light meter was in a room where a visiting couple was still sleeping, so I had to both finish off a roll quickly and set the exposure based on (educated) guesswork.

Before leaving, I gave my host full instructions on how to use the camera and left it loaded up with a fresh roll of film. Based on good results I got back from it, I hope this camera doesn't get relegated back to its old place in the closet for another three decades before it gets discovered again.

Ricohflex VIIM twin-lens reflex
Fuji Reala Ace 100 film

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