A little bit about the film...

Photographic film has come in a variety of shapes and sizes and although the first flexible photographic roll film did not appear until 1885, thanks to George Eastman, it wasn't until 1889 that the first transparent plastic roll film arrived. Even then this was made from highly flammable nitrocellulose.

However, this is not meant to be a history lesson!

There are several types of film, including; print film which when developed, yields transparent negatives; and, color reversal film which produces positive transparencies, also known as diapositives. Reversal film is often marketed as "slide film".

Film also comes in a range of Film speed which describes a film's threshold sensitivity to light. However, more on that in a later post I think!

I have three particular favourite makes of film, each yielding a very different finish.

• Neopan 100 Acros - achieves the finest granularity for a 100 ISO Black-and-White Film due to Fujifilm's Super Fine-Grain Technology. 
• Lucky SHD 100 - a very cheap black and white film from China which produces some stunning results. 
• Fujifilm Fujichrome 64T - a slide film for use under tungsten lighting. Rich, balanced tone scale and clean, faithful color reproduction.  Excellent for shooting in bright daylight and cross-processing.

Cosmic 35 - The first candidate to run

I love my little Russian Cameras. And the Cosmic 35 is exactly that!

The Cosmic 35, or Smena-8, was a small viewfinder camera made from 1963 to 1971 in Leningrad by Lomo. Made completely of strong plastic this camera has a Triplet lens. The 40mm f./4 glass lens produces great contrast, detail and tones and can be nicely sharp.

The Smena-8 was the camera USSR tried to enter the international market.

I bought mine for the princely sum of £12 from a thrift store and it is in almost mint condition. Included was its original brown leather Lomo case.

Here are the specs of the Cosmic 35:

• Shutter: Leaf, manually cocked 
• Pop-up rewind knob 
• Shutter speeds of 1/15 to 1/250 plus B with synchronizer 
• Lens: T-43 (Triplet) 40mm f/4 
• Aperture: f/4-f/16 
• Focusing ragne: 1m to infinity 
• Hot-shoe 
• Self-timer 
• Film Transport: manual, without double exposure safety.