By some miracle and pinch of coincidence, my boyfriend found a passport camera in one of his cupboards at home in Swansea. It's believed that it belonged to the Post Office which his Aunty purchased a few years ago. We're not entirely sure the age on the camera, but there is a year date ['04] written on one of the booklets.
My last minute boyfriend, wanted to use the camera, which we didn't know if it was functional or f we had any paper, in order to take pictures for his new passport he was applying for, so he brought it up to Cardiff for me to have a look at.
Here are some information booklets we found with the camera:
I was so fascinated with the camera! I read through all of the information booklets, so that if I did attempt taking a photographs, everything would be right. What I found fairly creepy was the old passport image that was stuck on the back of one of the booklets, we're not sure who this girl could be, or who even took the picture, but it's still very interesting to find an image like this. At least I know that the camera has worked in the past, but if it works now, we're still not sure. Just by looking at this, it's fairly obvious that using this camera will be very useful for my project! Instead of taking individual photos, it's possible to take multiple ones, instantly on one image!
So the camera was given to me to attempt to take passport photographs of my boyfriend, ready for the new passport he applied for. There was some paper still in the camera when we got it, so when we attempted to take some photographs, we used what we had.
The paper was out of date.
Which is how I got no results from the paper I had. Even though there is no clear image on the paper, I was still fairly fond of the results I obtained.
After a little research, about the camera and paper etc. I managed to find a replacement paper which should work in the M403R.
I managed to find this Fujifilm FP-100c. I managed to pick up a pack of 10 sheet for around £12 on Amazon, which I thought was quite reasonable for what it is. Plus it was very much in date!
I have attempted to use the camera to photograph objects, to try a technique which reassembles Thomas Kellner's. I have only one attempt at this given time, which is shown here on the left hand side. As you can change the settings of the camera, to either shoot four individual images, or have the same image repeated four times, I decided to go for the four individuals. After I took the first image I realised that the mirror was still between the lens and the paper, which is why there is a black square, ruining my attempt. The two images at the top, I felt worked well, even if the rest was a failure. Yes the images are slightly over exposed, I feel this might be due to the very powerful flash.
Well, I knew the paper was the problem. After loading the newly bought paper, I began to get some images! Above are the first few attempts, but after very briefly reading over the instructions, I failed to acquire the correct distance between subject and camera, the flash was also on the incorrect settings.
I'm fairly happy the camera is in working order, but I also cannot believe how useful this might be for my Digital Project!
Finding this camera is pushing me towards the portraiture side of things, as much as I hate portraiture, but it is something I am ready to try.
I have attempted to use the camera to photograph objects, to try a technique which reassembles Thomas Kellner's. I have only one attempt at this given time, which is shown here on the left hand side. As you can change the settings of the camera, to either shoot four individual images, or have the same image repeated four times, I decided to go for the four individuals. After I took the first image I realised that the mirror was still between the lens and the paper, which is why there is a black square, ruining my attempt. The two images at the top, I felt worked well, even if the rest was a failure. Yes the images are slightly over exposed, I feel this might be due to the very powerful flash. |
| Excuse my ridiculous face |
Here, I have attempted to double expose the paper. It was only a quick test, to see if I could make anything of it, but I feel it worked very well, for the first attempt. I have only double exposed the first two images. I took one single image to print four times, then I tried overlaying individual images. If I had known the results, I might have tried something a little better, or at least making it so that my face overlapped more, perhaps the images would have been better then.
It's a start.
No comments:
Post a Comment