Tuesday, 28 June 2011

Kodak Vest Autographic

I made some pictures with  my Kodak Vest Autographic back few weeks ago for the first time...this is a nice little folding pocket camera that takes the not so wide available 127 film. 

Very compact and beautifully designed  it was once advertised as the "Soldier's Camera" during WWI.


Note the old "Eastman Kodak Company" logo just below the shutter setting...




































The camera comes with a stylus that would allow the photographer to write notes onto to the film's back paper through a window located at the back of the camera, the film was especially developed to use with this camera and it was called "The Autographic System".




I ran a test  respooling some 35mm film onto a 127 spool. The procedure is obvioulsly done in the dark and can be tricky to do but it's achievable, I normally practice before with the lights on and a dummy film. 

As a result you have a kind of panoramic format image covering the full 35mm negative including the sprockets, .


Some of the shots are blurry in the midle and I don't know exactly why... I suspect either the camera wasn't opened to it's fully while shooting or the film pressure plate is not well aligned, interesting effect anyway...

Fuji Across 100 ISO processed with Rodinal 1:100 - 1 hour stand development




Here's an excellent source of information about Kodak Vest Cameras:
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4 comments:

  1. Mike28 June 2011 at 20:56

    Nice results from the VP Autographic. I'm inspired to give my 127 cameras another try.

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  2. m30 June 2011 at 07:34

    Oh, i love your blog. So inspiring.

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  3. Richard21 July 2011 at 22:02

    hi i've got a (slightly later) vest autographic - just ran a film through it but it's not developed yet. Did you find a use for the "autographic" part? I was frightened of opening mine in case of fogging. But there should be some camera mod that does justice to these somewhat crazy cameras. (I'm into mods as you can see from my blog!)

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  4. John24 July 2011 at 13:42

    I am always surprised when these old cameras work as well as they usually do. Is 35mm film the same width as 127? (which is easily available in the UK)

    ReplyDelete