Journal

Thoughts from my daily life

Journal

I post notes about imaginaries, music, photography, technology, my travels & everything else that comes to my mind. Posts are not necessarily connected to my work.

Polaroid SX-70 Land Camera

POLAROID SX-70 LAND CAMERA SONAR AutoFocus

I started testing a Polaroid SX-70 instant film camera with sonar focusing, which Polaroid advertised as the ultimate in one-step photography. Polaroid implemented an active autofocus system into the instant film camera with ultrasonic sound waves. The distance to the object is calculated by measuring the delay between emission and reflection of sound waves. Therefor this system can also be used in darkness. To my knowledge, it was the first consumer autofocus SLR system. Various SX-70 models were available between 1972 and […]

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Toto live in Poland

TOTO – 35th Anniversary Tour – Live in Poland

Toto announced the release of 35th anniversary tour concert film: 35TH ANNIVERSARY TOUR – LIVE IN POLAND. It is available on CD, DVD, and Blu-ray as well as digital download since April 29th 2014. The band members in this tour are Steve Lukather (guitars, vocals), David Paich (keyboards, vocals), Steve Porcaro (keyboards) Joseph Williams (vocals), Simon Phillips (drums), Nathan East (bass, vocals), Mabvuto Carpenter (vocals), Amy Keys (vocals). That’s quite a setup with Williams and Porcaro rejoining the band. I enjoyed this setup for the past few years. Unfortunately […]

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Leica T and Ur-Leica

Leica T System

Leica introduced a new camera system with interchangeable lenses and a new Leica T mount, the Leica T. It is supposed to be positioned between Leica’s X lineup and the M System and is priced at 1.500 €  for the body and about the same for each of the two lenses available at launch, a Leica Summicron-T 2,0/23mm and a Leica Vario-Elmar-T 3,5-5,6/18-56mm. Of course, many reviews have been published over the internet already, most of them praising the new […]

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Kodak 8mm cartridges

My Super8 8mm Experiment – Digital Intermediate

As explained before, I have to choose between various options to digitize my 8mm film. There are some things I can do myself. I could capture the film playing on a projector using a digital camera or I can try out manually scanning every frame with a flatbed scanner and reconstructing the movie from single images. There are many people who tried already, with some nice results. Some even built their own homemade Telecine. Homemade 8mm Telecine – First Scan […]

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8mm - developed 8mm film material - 1

My Super8 8mm Experiment – Telecine and motion picture film scanners

After shooting and developing 8mm motion picture film, one might want to transfer it to a digital format. This is quite complicated actually, since there are no consumer or easy solutions available. Most people just capture their original film playing on a projector with a digital camera. Although it looks quite nice in most cases, clearly this can’t be the best way to do it. There is one project I could find, trying to utilize consumer flatbed scanners with transparency units […]

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Kodak 8mm cartridges

My Super8 8mm Experiment – Getting film material

Unfortunately the variety of 8mm film material still available has decreased over the past years. The popular Kodachrome was discontinued in 2009 and even its processing ended in 2013. Although points of sale are increasingly difficult to find, there are some dealers left, Wittner Cinetec in Germany for example. One can choose from the current Kodak Vision3 lineup (500T, 200T and 50D for color negative film and Kodak Tri-X Reversal Film for b/w. Currently, there are some Kodak Ektachrome films left, which have been discontinued in […]

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8mm - developed 8mm film material - 2

My Super8 8mm Experiment – 8mm motion picture film format

8mm film is a motion picture film standard developed by Kodak in 1932 to create a cheap “home movie” format. Its most famous filmed sequence undoubtedly being the Zapruder film, capturing the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963. Super8 was released in 1965 and quickly adopted by amateur film-makers providing better image quality and picture size. With its innovative cartridge-loading system it became an easy to use system and inspired millions of people around the […]

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Leicina Special

My Super8 8mm Experiment – LEICINA SPECIAL

Last time I visited my parents, I took the LEICINA SPECIAL with me. It’s a Super8 8mm film camera produced by Ernst Leitz GmbH in Germany between 1972 and 1977. Ernst Leitz GmbH is the former corporation of Leica Camera AG. The LEICINA SPECIAL records on 8mm film cartridges up to 50ft in length at frame rates of 9,18 25 and 54 as well single frame with automatic exposure (Leicinamatic) with manual focus and macro ability. It comes with a Optivaron f1.8/6-66mm lense. There […]

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intophoto

intophoto gets it’s 360° photo box for product photography

intophoto – intosite’s new photo studio – gets it’s 360° photo box for automatically cropped product photography. The setup took quite some time, but now it’s ready. The technology is provided by Fast Forward Imaging, a Berlin based technology startup that is part of the portfolio of companies the Ganske Media Group invested in. To give an idea about the potential of the technology developed by Fast Forward Imaging, the team at at intosystems – the IT department of intosite […]

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