When I was at art college in 1978 there were half a dozen Zenit E's and one old Spottie in the photography dept. The Spottie's film door was broken and held together with tape. The first and last time I used one of the Zenits it chewed the perfs at the end of the roll and I couldn't rewind it!
>From then on I ran (did not walk) for the Spottie every time, taped back door and all. It was a dream to use which was fine by the other guys as they preferred the Zenits (which were all brand new). Hence how I grew fond of Pentax. Once, upon returning to the college to process in the darkroom, I was waiting my turn in line when the door on the Spottie popped open of its own accord and the (rewound) cassette flew out at warp ten. These cassettes were re-usable and loaded from a bulk loader by the lab tech every day. They were old and tired (the cassettesm not the lab techs). As soon as it hit the floor, both ends of the cassette parted company with the main body and the film was thoughtfully exposed to ambient light for the second or two it took for me to rugby-tackle it to the floor. I collected it up in my shirt and (claiming emergency rights) sprinted into the darkroom. I recall that only a few frames were ruined, and in fact in seeing the interesting effects of double-exposed perfs on adjacent frames, started me on an experimental kick with all sorts of weird shit. -- Cheers, Cotty ___/\__ || (O) | People, Places, Pastiche ---------- http://www.cottysnaps.com _____________________________ -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
