Zeiss Ikon Contina 1a – still working

Just a quick update on the Zeiss Ikon Contina 1a which I blogged about a few years ago and enthused about the robust build quality of the camera. I hadn’t used it for a while so decided to take it with me on a family walk around Derwentwater (shortened slightly by a head start by boat).

Since this would be a family trip in the middle of the day during a summer heatware I wasn’t bothered about taking medium or large format gear with me, so I just carried the Contina itself and an iPhone, which I used for metering.

I’m not claiming any artistic merit for these snapshots but it was good to see that the Contina was still working (camera gear which has been working for decades does have a habit of rapidly deteriorating under my care) and I also liked the slightly vintage colours.

The film was “Poundland” Agfa Vista 200 which I developed at home in the Fuji Hunt C41 kit. I was worried that the  chemicals might produce poor results because I went to mix a new batch of colour developer and the developer “B” solution had gone black – but there was no obvious adverse effect.

Click on any image for a larger view.

 

Now to finish on a mono image, almost unrelated except for being taken with the Contina. The film stock was Ilford XP2 Super, developed in the Digibase C41 kit, and the location was Dunstanburgh Castle in Northumberland.