Oh ... and I forgot to say, that I messed up my test film today

I had the fantastic chance to shoot some test pictures with the Canon T70 and a Canon FL 135 mm F:2.5 lens, because there was "Yabusame" in town. Yabusame is the traditional japanese horse archery and does always look quite impressive. My FL 135 mm is the perfect lens for that and the fastest telephoto, I have. I used it in the recommended "stop down mode", because I wanted to use it just full open anyway ( because I needed the fastest shutter speeds possible for those pretty speedy horse riders ). I think, I got awesome shots ... and then, I messed everything up during the film rewind
I forgot to read the manual about it, but I found some button and lever on the bottom of the camera. I tried to do something with it and yeah ... the film rewinded ... but ... the "rewind sound" hasn't been really long, which should have made me become suspicious ... but it didn't. I opened the camera for removing the film ... and it hasn't been rewinded at all
I tried the procedure again and the film rewinded again ( obviously just another little bit ) and some "peep peep peep" sound detected an error. Stupid ( and probably a little bit angry and impatient ), I opened the camera again ... and certainly destroyed a few more frames until the guy in the camera shop gave me a dark bag to re-spool and remove the film manually and safely ... or better, the rest of it

I should stay away from these "modern" cameras

Rachel, it did not let me in peace, why your result has been different from mine. I think, I was just lucky. The Canon FL 58 mm lens shows ( accidentally ? ) the same readings as a FD lens in manual mode ... BUT you are also right. I tried other lenses and made the same experiences as you. However ... technically still hard for me to understand, why all this is so At least my favorite FL 58 mm 1.2 lens seems to work, for others, I might be able to adjust the difference simply by changing the ASA.

I am not familiar with this English expression. Does it mean something like: "I make you crazy with this" ? If so, I have to apologize



And that should actually be ... impossible ? I tried a few readings with different FL lenses today. What I did as some kind of hardcore test before waisting a roll of film was, taking pictures with my digital GH1, using the settings ( aperture, shutter speed ), given by the T70. The readings have been quite precise.



But you have been talking about FD lenses, right ? So there shouldn't be anything, messing something up, because the manual mode on the T70 is made for FD lenses, isn't it.

I also couldn't verify your experiences yet. I tried an exposure metering on a FL 58 mm F:1.2 and a FD 35-70 mm lens ... no difference. The readings have been exactly the same, even the lenses are totally different.

Aaaaaaah ... very strange all this

Nice

Rachel,

first of all, thanks a lot for your quick reply and digging up your T70 again

It's not, that I want to be right ... I would be just happy if I could understand, why I am wrong, but I still can not fully understand, why the "manual mode" wouldn't work.

In manual mode, you can set the shutter speed, right ? So, what the camera is measuring, must be the aperture, which is required to get a well exposed picture. Stopping the lens down at this point, wouldn't make any sense to me BUT IF the lens is fully open, the camera should be able to do just what it is supposed to do in that mode ... measuring the required aperture. If this will be set manually on the lens, no communication between lens and camera would be needed.

This is basically the procedure, described in the chapter "Manual Mode" on page 48 of the camera manual. "Remove the aperture ring from the "A" setting." is written there, which would actually turn any FD lens into a FL lens, wouldn't it. Ironically into a FL lens in "AUTO" mode though, because in AUTO mode, FL lenses do close the aperture to the set number just in the moment, the picture will be taken.

I still can not see any logical reason, why the manual mode on that camera wouldn't work with FL lenses ( without stop down metering ) too ... and that would be the way, I actually want to use the T70. I have many beautiful Canon FL lenses ( the 19R, the 58 mm, F:1.2, the 85 mm, F:1.8 and the 55-135 mm for example ) and have been searching for the perfect body for them. I tried an AE-1 and FTb, which are not really convenient to handle with FL lenses ... but if the manual mode would work on the T70, this would be the best solution for my "body problem", I think.

So, where is the node in my mind ?



That would be the suggested stop down metering mode, which is actually an "aperture priority mode". There are other techniques on other Canon SLRs, also working with FL lenses, where you can also set the shutter speed, stop the lens down and adjust the aperture in a way, that the needle in the viewfinder has to match a certain point on the scale ... but that doesn't work on the more electronically designed T70.

My personal recommendation for a personal film stock would be the Kodak E100VS, which will be discontinued at the end of the year. Good 120 B/W- and color negative films are still many around ( and even new ones became released ), but 120 slide film is slowly dying.

The Kodak E100VS has always been my favorite. Brilliant colors ( and not as greenish/bluish as the Fuji ones ) and slide film can have its benefits, especially if people are not scanning by themselves like me. I need to pay the scans per frame and then, it makes sense, if I can preview the pictures after processing. The colors on slide films are also more "real" then on many picture films and if using old cameras, we often need to measure the exposure anyway - so the tight tolerance of slide film isn't much of a lack.

But if you need or want to go for a color negative film, I would vote for the Lomography 120 color negative film, which is available as 100, 400 or 800 ASA. The cheapest 120 color film around, but much better than those chinese Lucky films. I used the 100 ASA one a few times and it didn't came out bad, I think:
www.lomography.com/homes/berndtotto/photos/13229613
And ... I also attached one more snapshot from a wedding.

Cheers, Berndt