I’ve got a junk camera I bought for $2 at an estate sale a while back. I LOVE shooting with it; it’s a total piece of junk, but actually gets some really interesting shots from time to time.
The problem is that it leaks light. Badly. Here is an example; it doesn’t do this all the time, but as you can see, the leak can be pretty awful at times.
The easy solution, of course, is to cover the leak with black electrical tape. But how do I find it? If a bike tire is leaking air, you just hold it under water and watch for the bubbles; but how do you find where your camera is leaking light?
This seems like a perfect solution; I’ve even got a little tiny light that I keep on my keyhain. Unfortunately, I just tried it, and the light is just barely too big to fit in there and still close the camera.
Incidentally, here is a photo of the camera; note that it boasts a “color optical lens,” whatever that means.
Wrap everything up except the lens in thick black plastic then take a few pictures. Uncover various parts of the camera while taking other pictures, note which areas are open when you took the photos. Develop and see where the ghosts start to appear.
I know that a lot of the stores that sell “party supplies” or some of the “cool shirts” for teens around here sell teeny tiny “glowsticks” that are smaller than AAA batteries - you like put it in your mouth when you’re at a rave or something (the package shows it on your tongue ??!??!).
Get one, break it to activate it, stick it in, etc.
Load the camera with film and advance to the middle of the roll. Take one picture of a blank wall, exposing for a moderate grey. Then without advancing the film, put the lens cap back on, take the camera outdoors in bright sunlight, and gradually turn it over and over in your hands, exposing all parts of the body to direct sunlight at all angles.
Now develop the negative and put the section with the exposed wall image back into the camera, aligning that frame with the image plane of the camera, stuffing the rest of the negative into the roll areas. Look for clouded spots on the negative, and see what they are against inside the camera.
Consumer Reports tested a bunch of cameras a while back, and they found that many of them leaked light. All that leaked, leaked at the back. Here’s how to find the leak: Load film in the camera. Lay the camera face down, outside, on a sunny day. Cover half the seam around the back with black tape, and shoot one picture. Take off the tape, and tape the other half. Shoot another pic. Continue shooting pix with smaller parts of the seam covered, and write down which shot covered what parts. When you get the pix back, you should be able to tell where the leak is.
Cover the leaky part with black tape, and snap away.
You do realize that trying to fix that POS is like taking a hampster to the Vet. The cost of repair will out strip the value of the unit in about 30 seconds flat.
Access was denied on the link, so I don’t know what kind of camera it is.
First, open the back and visually inspect it. See if the felt seal is damaged or rubbed off. If you see a suspicious spot, try covering it with black camera tape. (Or electrical tape; I have lots of camera tape, though.)
If that doesn’t work, then do as AskNott says.
Rick is right. It may not be worth fixing. I bought a very old barrel-shaped Bardwell 1K fresnel movie light at a garage sale back in the '80s. It worked (it came with a 750w lamp), but the power cord was not in the best condition and the inside had some surface rust. The finish was worn, too. A few years ago I had it refurbished. New power cord, new crinkle-finish paint, rust removed. I was also able to get a set of barn doors for it. The light cost me $2 at the garage sale, but it cost about $250 to have it refurbished. I could have gotten a newer light from eBay for less. (Indeed, I picked up a couple of 2K Colortran fresnels for a very good price.) But I had some extra money and I splurged on it.
Or take my '66 MGB. I got it for just a few hundred dollars two years ago. It’s still being restored. (The body guy isn’t working very fast.) For what it will cost to complete the ground-up restoration, I could have bought an already-restored '66 MGB and could have been driving it around for the past two years. (OTOH, it will be a fresh resto and will be in the colours I want and will have the rare-for-the-time overdrive.)
The point is that I wanted to restore the Bardwell regardless of the cost, and I wanted a '66 MGB restored to my specifications (although the whole project got rather out of hand). If you want this camera and you have the extra money, it would be nice to have it restored. It’s fun to use old stuff that’s in great condition. But if you’re looking it from a practical standpoint, it might make more sense to just pick up a roll of camera tape.
I can tell you right now the leak that is responsible for the main vertical stripe is at the right edge of the camera, where the back meets the body. The seal is not tight enough, and is letting in light.
You need to find a way to seal it tighter, or find an opaque sunstance that you can fill the leak with.
Y’know, I think Gunslinger is on the right track; I’m just going to cover the back seam with electrical tape. Actually, after reading Napier’s suggestion, I thought about the photos I’ve taken and how the ones I expected to get light leaked on them often didn’t and vice versa, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s almost certainly the button-latch on the end of the camera. It doesn’t have one of those latches where you pull the crank upward until the back pops open; there’s just a crappy little button on the extreme right end of the camera.
Probably not coincidentally, that’s exactly where MrFantsyPants predicts the leak is. I’ll try a roll with that part covered over and see if that helps, and to be honest, if it doesn’t help I’ll probably just throw the thing away; it only cost $2.
Thanks for all the suggestions! I love this board.
Aha! Doing a quick google search, I found a couple of pages that have those cameras for $4.99. I think I’ve seen this camera on late-night TV commercials or as a give-away with another product. I’d say just use the tape, rather than trying to fix it.
Don’t use black electrical tape, the adhesive is thick, and gooey especially in a warm summer’s sun. Use black paper tape. Johnny LA or I can hook you up. One small roll will last you years, and it is what many folks use to black out things.
The adhesive is much thinner, and won’t leave thick residue on the camera back door. That could wind up being a sticky situation otherwise.
As long as you change the strips of gaffer’s tape every few months, that does work. But, remember- this person needs to draw that body open to change rolls of film.
Dunno. You may well be right, if I had to do it I might use black paper tape, or black gaffer’s tape and fold over a tab so that I could pull away the mask, open the body, swap rolls and close over the tab again when the camera is re-filled with film.
