Neanderpundit

in Jena may not have been the only people making glass, but they might just as well have been.

Arvid Hasselblad began by selling George Eastman’s cameras, and when Victor took over the business from his famous grampa, they were still using some Kodak lenses. In fact the first Hasselblads you might recognize as blads, used the old Kodak Ektar lens design for a few years. It was a good lens.

The Hasselblad was to cameras what magazine fed firearms were to firearms. You could park a Blad on a tripod, put a polaroid back on it, use a polaroid to check your lighting and color balance, and then switch to a fine grain black and white, take a few color slides, and move to a negative film. In the field you could change film as easily as changing lenses, and as often, or more often. At the time it was the only commonly commercially available camera that could do that; otherwise, you had to carry several cameras. And most of it was interchangeable; you could swap lenses, backs, finders, other accessories, and they all played nice together.

Except the Super WIde C, of course, It can use other backs, but little else. That’s because the Super Wide had a single dedicated lens, the magnificent Zeiss Biogon.

The Biogon, designed by Bertele while working for Zeiss. Correcting for astigmatism and retaining a flat focal length throughout the field is difficult with a few elements in the lens, Bertele did it with NINE pieces of glass, all in perfect balance, optically. The focal length of the one used for the Super Wide C is 38mm, which is close to a 21mm on a 35mm camera. Most manufacturers of lenses just give up, let the lens pincusion like crazy, and call it a ‘Fisheye”. The Super Wide C has a spirit level built into the viewfinder; so long as you hold the camera level when you touch off the shutter, the field of view is perfectly flat, and perfectly observes three point perspective. This is an interesting article that describes this camera very well, I think. “it takes magical pictures”.

I may have the worlds shortest attention span. I have not yet fallen asleep during sex, but I can sense that day might just be on the distant horizon. I get interested in things very easily, and then acquire a lot of stuff related to them, then something else shiny catches my attention. So I’ve never gotten too seriously knowledgeable about single subjects, but I sure have had a good deal of fun getting to know a little about damned near everything.

Photography is a classic example. I love cameras and gear, and now that they;re so dirt cheap, I collect. My one desire is to have one of every model of the Argus C cameras, beginning with the C2, and all 11 of the C3’s. I figure I ought to be able to do this for, say, $200.
I also got heavily into reloading. Now, the only thing I am even remotely interested in loading is the 500 nitro and the 45-70, just because of the cost of new. And I will still use new when hunting.
I also got into darkroom work. Model R/C cars. Model railroading. Glassblowing. Pottery. Brickmaking. Gardening. Leatherwork. Astronomy. Trainspotting. Old cars, old trucks, old motorcycles, old guns, old farm equipment, yadda yadda yadda. I literally have so many interests that I am surprised I can ever get anything done.

well, actually, I kind of don’t, outside work. So I am trying to focus my geekery on a few things and not spread msyelf so thin, but even that has become it’s own kind of geekery. At the end of the day, I can safely say I am qualified to say almost nothing about absolutely everything.

has every damned episode of a lot of old TV sitcoms, and I have been enjoying them a good deal.

One of my favorites has always been Nanny and the Professor. Only on for a couple sesons, it was outshone by the Partridge Family and the Brady Bunch.

Still: Juliet Mills always wore blouses that allowd a glimpse of her undergarments. And that accent- to this day, a woman with that kind of accent talks to me, even briefly, I just take out my wallet and give it to her. Juliet was a lot easier on the eyes and a lot less shrill than her sister Hayley, and she was all over the place- she won an emmy for a soap opera, she was the doctor in the TV series “Born Free”, where you occasionally got a glimpse of her well turned backside in a pair of khakis. I’d know that haircut and cheekbones anywhere, and if she showed up here wearing that inverness cape and matching deerstalker, I would be on that like white on rice.

Thankfully, she’s not studying me, and that’s a good thing. But the Ogwife has gotten into the series and is bingewatching them. Worse things have happened. I just passed by the room a moment ago; and Hal (the 12 year old)is trying to chase off a neighbor girl who is sweet on him.

Hal:”Now get out of here, Francine, This is only for guys”
Francine: “It’s a free country”
Hal:”Good. Why don’t you go see the rest of it”

Forty years later, this thing still has it’s moments. And Juliet. Yow.