Kodak Box 620 - First 8 Photos

Here are my fist photos with Kodak Box 620 and comparison photos taken with Sony A6400. All the photos are as they were, film photos as the camera store scanned them from the film they developed and digital comparison photos as the camera chose the jpg version to be.

When I got the 120 size and ISO 400 film for my Kodak box from PhotoStella, the store owner gave me several advises and three very good ones: always use the widest aperture option, photograph in bright sunlight only and the sun behind you.

And as you can see from this photo, I almost followed all the advises. Well, what can I say, I'm such a huge fan of back light photos, always like to face the sun as I'm a shadow hunter. And the tram was conveniently coming so I couldn't resist taking a photo.

The camera and the lens is about 80 to 90 years old, the camera looks like it has been used a lot and I suspect, never cleaned inside, so the lens has a bit smudge on it. The sunlight brings it all out. But nevertheless I love this photo! I happen to think this is the best one of this 8 photo series. I usually don't like grainy photos but this one I do because I took it!

The first two comparison photos with Sony I used 16-50mm lens but soon realized that it was too wide and switched to 55-210mm lens. I stood at the same spot where I was when I took the first photo with Kodak box. Only about 3 minute wait and the next tram came.

Okay so just making sure to make the same mistake twice. Facing the sun although I got a clear advice not to do that. I suspect you can clearly see what is caused because of the lens being a dirty old thing (inside) and the sun just pointing it out and which is grain because of the ISO 400. Also when I pressed the trigger, the camera moved a bit although I thought I had a good grip of the camera.

Also there's some light leakage on the left.

Wide angle lens problem if you don't do anything to it and I didn't. The lamp pole is straight but the Näsinneula in the back isn't. Well the Näsi needle was slightly tilted in the first photo so why not in this one too.

Continuing with the tilted tower theme. It was unbelievable hard to see what I was photographing as the viewfinders in my Kodak box were so dirty and also in the bright light the sun always reflected my shadow and the clouds above to the glass too. So now that I switched to not facing the sun but sun shining over my left shoulder and from the side, and me still being in the sunlight, I could hardly see what I was aiming at.

Lookout tower and cafeteria where you can get the best big doughnuts, munkkis ever. Actually munkki tastes better than ordinary doughnut. It's softer and more like a bun but made like donuts and of course fresh from the frying oil.

Cloudy but I wanted to try anyway. I chose of course the largest aperture which is f/8 or f/11 depending on which source you believe. Here's the F/Stops And Shutter Speeds info I found but the Brownie site box camera list doesn't have my bulk camera at all. Here's an exact match.

With shutter speed I have only two options, Z or M. Snapshot, which is something between 1/35-1/50 and has probably changed during the years, or the other one which is as long as I want to hold the lever down. Yes, lever, not a button. So many ways to fail and get some motion blur. Or jolt blurriness.

Somewhere in the internet abyss I found the info that the 620 film ISO in the mid 1930's when my Kodak box camera was made is equivalent to 125 ISO nowadays so I could have started with 200 ISO. But the 400 was a good film to start too, not complaining. If there's no bright sunlight, the 400 ISO is of course better. Although I think the next time I photograph with this, I will choose ISO 100 film.

Anyway, here's Kodak Brownie Box camera manuals if you're missing one or interested. My Kodak boxes manual is in the fifth row: Brownie Target Six-20 and Six-16 4-37-CH-5. And what do you know, on page 24 there's a table where you can check out how long exposures you need in different conditions indoors with large stop and on page 30, outdoor exposure guide. Awesome I say!

Sun shining behind my back and again trouble seeing anything other than the shadow of my head and the clouds in the viewfinder. Light leakage.

Better take a similar weird photo of the two otters fishing statue. I bet you would have not know what this statue is supposed to be from this angle if I hadn't told you. And don't complain about the missing seagulls. Here they are.

Double exposure photo. Cloudy, so largest aperture available. Looks like a reflection!

Here's kinda similar made in photoshop, upper layer 60% opacity. Cafeteria worker missing.

So 30's theme.

Or is this shade more like 1920's?

Sunday, sunny day. Managed to get myself and the camera to the shade so no sunlight shining straight to the lens. Sun on the right. But alas, couldn't keep the camera stable.

And a comparison photo of the demonstration in Sorsapuisto (Duck park). Well living pet animals in cages compared to animals we humans breed to be sick, grown in poor conditions, and killed young, before they have had the chance to live a full life.

And here's my last photo of the 8 picture roll. This is, in my opinion, the second best photo. Right after the first photo I took. All the other, except for the double exposure photo, are so-so.

The film stuck after the last, 8th frame and I couldn't roll it all the way to the other spool. When I got the camera and the developed film back from the photo store the photo expert guy said that it was because the 120 film spool is a tiny amount too big and it didn't roll well so it started to go askew. So although I did make the roll discs smaller by clipping it with nail clippers as advised in one of the YouTube videos, it wasn't enough. The 620 spool is also a little bit shorter than the 120 spool so either I have to bend some metal thingy inside the camera so that the spool fits better, sandpaper the 120 spools discs thinner or roll the film to a 620 spool in a dark place. Two 620 spools are on their way here from China, let's see which month the spools are here. They promised August 24th but will it be this year, don't know.

What did this all cost me?
Camera: 4€
Fomapan 400 Black and white 120 film: 5,50€
Film developing: 17,90€
Film scanned to TIFF images: 20€

Finally, below my Kodak Box 620 chilling on the lookout tower cafeteria windowsill with a new spiky friend.

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_{Film cameras
Kodak Box 620
1
Cosina Flash 35E
1, 2}

_{Digital cameras
Sony A6400, 16-50mm
1
Sony A6400, Laowa 25mm f2.8
1
Comparison: Sony A6400, Canon EOS 550D, Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ7, Sony Cyber-shot DSC-P32, Canon PowerShot A550
1, 2}