The Leica R7, a Flawed Diamond /
The Leica R7 was the last in the line of electromechanical SLR cameras descending from the German-Japanese collaboration that produced the Leica R3 in 1977. That camera, which shared much of its DNA with the Minolta XE (released in 1974 as the XE-1 in Europe and the XE-7 in North America), was the lighter, smaller, and less-expensive-to-manufacture successor to the famously over-engineered and unprofitable Leicaflex SL2 that was produced by Leitz from 1974 to 1976. The partnership between Leitz and Minolta culminated in the release of the R7 in 1992, twenty years after the two companies had signed an agreement of technical cooperation. In 1996, the R7 was succeeded by the R8, which was designed exclusively by Leica and was a radical break from the R3–R7 line.
Fall Tedium, London, Ontario, 2009 /
Top left frame: Rolleiflex Automat 3, Zeiss 75 mm f/3.5 Tessar. All other frames: Rolleiflex 6006 Model 2, 80 mm f/2.8 Planar.
Film and developer: Fuji Acros 100, Kodak D76.
I have added these images and others to my Retrospective, a growing collection of photographs shot on black-and-white film using Rolleiflex cameras over the last 15 years.
Looking Glass /
As I continue the process of re-examining the 15-year archive of my negatives, I am not surprised to discover recurring themes among the photographs. Occasionally, one of these emergent themes demands closer consideration. To that end, I am now curating a collection of photographs called Looking Glass. In these images, I peer from the street through ground level windows into buildings (and occasionally vehicles) to glimpse the people inside. Often, my reflection is captured in the glass, and sometimes the inhabitants look back, quizzically and disapprovingly. Over the coming weeks and months, I will enlarge this collection as I unearth old photographs from the archives and take new ones on the street.
The photograph above was shot in Gastown, Vancouver, during the summer of 2018 using a broken Voïgtlander VF 135 point-and-shoot rangefinder loaded with Kodak Portra 400 film. I owned this camera briefly: neither the rangefinder nor the point-and-shoot appeals to my way of shooting, so there was a two-fold reason for letting go of it. While I don’t regret selling the VF 135, I regret the loss of its Zeiss 40 mm f/2.3 Sonnar lens, which is sharp and contrasty—as this photograph beautifully attests. It is a surprisingly good lens for such an inexpensive camera.
Main Street Portraits, 2011 /
Nikon FM2N, Nikkor 50 mm f/1.4 AI, Fuji Pro 400H.
What beautiful skin tones! I wish that I had shot more Pro 400H while it was available. I have only a single roll left in my refrigerator. It expired more than a decade ago. I had been reserving it for a special project, but I think I should just go ahead and expose it before it becomes unusable.
My friend RJR and I met the young woman featured in this pair of photographs on Main Street in Vancouver while we were out shooting one Saturday morning—our regular weekend activity for about two years in 2010-2012. She is holding my Rolleiflex Automat Model 3, built in 1949, which I purchased in rough condition from a used camera shop in Valparaiso, Chile, in 2009.