diana + test report

I became the geek that I am by others assuming that I would be interested in things primitive and plastic and telling me about what they have found – so I am not so much a source but the cheapo primitive photographic version of the Utne Reader – a clearing house.

I had heard about the new Diana + but thought it an affectation, what coming from Lomo, and decided that having the real thing I could do without it.

I did want questions answered though and no one was forth coming with them.

I wanted to know if the images were biased toward the Holga or Diana. If there were 16 small images or 12 large ones, if it had the Diana fog or the Holga fall off.

The people I knew with one – from the Macmannie WGAS paroled writing grad through Nance’s deep extra cover – chose to ignore me.

The misplaced Tanzanian was flaunting his while I was at Sewanee, saw no images though, but the last straw was when some BFA student brought one into Manipulated Pretensions. It wouldn’t be long before photo hating –albeit users of the latest in high tech digital cameras - fibre grads would find a justification for having one.

I bought one the next day – no BFA scum is going to out geek me!!!!

It came over packaged but looking remarkably like the Diana of old with modifications for the younger generation “N” instead of “I” pictograms as well as distances, options for the old puny Diana neg or the new holga like size and the new notorious pinhole setting.

Keeping to my rule of finding film as bad as the camera I am using got some outdated Fortepan 400 from the camera shop and went out making snaps.

It is a pain to load in comparison to both Dianas and Holgas. In an attempt to not have fat rolls the area where the spools go is fiddly as a notch from the base has to go through the piece that holds the film in place. It has to be perfect before the back will shut and in the frozen tundra of the north with gloves it was quite slow. There were no fat rolls, however, the camera is harder to wind on – there is a definite resistance. I am torn about this for it means that the camera doesn’t move to the next image simply by my carrying it about like the old Diana but I did develop callouses.

It doesn’t leak light – I used no tape and no fogging nor the old Holga thumb print.

I was looking for a camera which had definite f stops something that the Holga doesn’t have, that work. Changing apertures on the old Diana would result in fogged images. I was also looking for the Holga clarity fall off.

It was a mauzy day on my first outing but a lot of snow. I treated the camera as if it were the original Diana – making snaps on the sunny setting. Everything was horrendously underexposed – images that would have been fine with the original Diana were not there at all. The only image that made it was one with a pronounced shadow and even that was only barely printable.

Reading a Maldito blog out of Tennessee, it was stated that maybe the f-stops were off and more closed down than they stated so I did the unthinkable. Pretending that I was a real photographer I used a light meter to measure the scene then bracketed.

The second outing was during a bright sunny EV 15 day, still mountains of snow, I took it to Lake Michigan to give it a work out.

-20c day only exacerbated the problems with loading and unloading but developing the images they were all fine. Funny thing bracketing between sunny and cloudy bright didn’t really show that much of a difference.

I like the camera, I like the images they are smaller – barely – than the Holga but have the Holga fall off I was looking for. Even better at close range there is the circle vignette. I like - even though my fingers don’t – the stiff wind on as there will be no unintentional overlap – been carrying it in my bag for a fortnight now and the frame hasn’t budged.

Although it is double the price of a Holga and still think it an affectation – especially now that ‘designer’ models are being made – I would choose he Diana + over the Holga.

I also like that the viewfinder is directly over the lens making it easier to compensate for parallax, i simply move the camera up a bit.

I am not all that wowed by the pinhole as no information was given about where to begin exposure wise – tried it twice and there was no image. Also don’t like it as I fear that the aperture ring will slide from sunny to pinhole without me noticing – obsessively compulsively check it as I don’t want to have happen with it what happened in Petty Harbour with the bulb setting Holgas – moved to bulb without me noticing it. I notice a looseness already with the bayonet that holds the lens on when not using the pinhole although I have only taken the lens off three times.

This is a relief for while the images from this don’t look like tradition Diana snaps – which varied from camera to camera anyway – it means that I don’t have to hoard my old Dianas. It may mean that for those snobs amongst us the traditional Diana price may drop on e-bay.

My frugal ways initially saw $50 as a bit much but inflating 1960’s prices the original would have been about the same.

This winter has been out of the ordinary. It has snowed every other day dumping around 4 inches each snowfall – except for last week where it dumped 16 inches then turned bitterly cold.

So far I have had the machine jumped as the battery simply gave up in the cold, helped push out other machines as they helped push mine out due to the ploughs of Winthrop Harbour trying to clear the commuter car park after all the spaces were filled with cars.

I get my exercise not shovelling the driveway but trying to clear the entrance to the driveway after the crack street crew of Peasants Pissoir block the driveway with heavy wet snow.

The temperature has not made zero F twice in the last fortnight.

Madison has broken the snowfall record for the city and it is only mid February.

I am aware of this not by going outside but because it is the talking point of the winter. People are complaining about the cold and snow. The primaries have been relegated to the second spot on the 10 o’clock news as the weather man comes on and tells us how horrible it is outside and how it is not going to end. This is then updated three times during the half hour broadcast signing off with check in to-morrow at 5am for further updates on the weather.

I kind of like it. we are dealing with a real winter, there is snow there is cold - a bit more than usual but it effects those who complain how?

I came to the realisation that seasons are pretty much superfluous during the Superbowl. Here were the finals of a sport played in late autumn and winter by manly men in an enclosed stadium of a southern city of choice. The only time it will be played where there may be something approaching winter will be in an enclosed stadium. I used to hope for rain as that would be as close to actual weather one could hope for.

It is no different with us lesser mortals. It is a race to the machine, or maybe a long wait on for the bus. Only two die hards are doing their walking exercises. Most of the kids are driven the block to the bus stop where they sit in their parents car until the bus arrives. This isn’t due to the cold it is common practice.

What I find strange in all this complaining and warnings during the newscast is no consideration of the poor and homeless who don’t have the option of living in a weather-less state. There has been no mention of warming stations – unlike the summer when cooling stations are reported.

Sure it is cold out. Sure my feet are drenched due to the deep snow but when else will I see cities form on the lakes around here, see slob ice on Lake Michigan, try to deal with the unrelenting white – not being in Chicago the snow doesn’t turn grey as quickly – photographically.
It seems to me that winter people are more friendly perhaps due to having made the decision to be out in the cold and finding those few like minded people turns them into comrades by default.

This has been a long winter as it did snow heavily in December but even forgetting the warm spell that brought tornados in January, even in the worst of years this will be over with by mid April when there will be that short window of opportunity before people start the summer heat panic where once again due to modern technology one will only have a minor brief contacts.

The ritual began, I think in grad school where after listening to DOWN YOUR WAY with Brian Johnston and reading The Guardian, I would head out on an awayday to some village to wander and make snaps.

During the wandering I would stop buy some postcards and, especially in winter find a pub to have a pint and write them after the sun set and before the return train to London. I would post them on the way to the station and when taking the night train back, think it neat that I was also on the train that my cards were on. I would obsess on the post mark, check the dates, run for first day issues and couldn’t understand why people insisted that I date them when the post office did it for me.

This continued to be part of travelling no matter where I was. It was the way that I stayed in touch with some people. I corresponded by postcard with an ex-Beloiter back in Maryland for some 25 years before running into her at the Ram’s Head. I would exchange postcards with another ex-Beloiter – there was something about Beloit and postcards - where the exchange became so fast and furious that we couldn’t even think up messages. She had the advantage as she would winter in Florida and thus had no shortage at all of weird cards. The ones from Annapolis were usually had from restaurants and bars.

At Goldsmiths’ we used postcards to communicate about the next class meetings and had set up an etiquette – no museum cards no reproductions of paintings they had to be the John Hinde type picture postcard. This continued after we finished the course.

I would try to choose the postcards carefully – but wouldn’t spend more than 10p in GB and 25¢ in North America. I'd look for the quantity price. Suitable for framing postcards weren’t interesting at all. I would find that after all my deliberations, I would choose the incorrect amount for some, those that I liked when they were on the rack weren’t as interesting when I was writing them. I would buy them with certain people in mind and found that there was a better match on further reflection.

In Sewanee, thinking that this would be a perfect environment for their writing, stirlings, quickly before I got the caffeine shakes, I went looking for some. In 1998 there were som great ones – of the university and the surrounding area, even think that I found one of the airport on the other side of US 41A.

This time it was all religious except for one of Stirling’s and I realised that this part of travel had gone by the wayside. Thinking back I tried to see when the decline became so pronounced that it had really stopped being a habit.

I did notice that it was harder to find postcards – the last time in Baltimore I only got them at BWI/Marshall although the Natty Boh shop had them – I am sure that Horror Place had them. I also found it harder to find stamps. I do remember looking for them, though. I think that I bought some in Burlington Vermont. I simply didn’t remember it being such an effort.

I realise that with the rest of the world post cards are dead as there are e-mails, digital cameras and…blogs, I thought that I was pretty much immune to modern technology and had it pretty much under control.

It seems that I found that I am wrong, those Sewanee picture postcards are around the house somewhere awaiting to be written.

THE USPS

Trying to catch up on the books of wander, I head over to the post office in Bristol to post the one that was supposed to go out in November – was hoping for one a month.

Hand over the pile to Soens, after they have been divided into country. She picks on up asks what’s in them.

Say snaps, and they should be thin enough to fit through the template slot. She bends them and says but they don’t bend. We also debate whether they slide “freely” through the template slot. All of this will determine the cost of the postings.

She pulls out a flow chart to determine what to do and determine that they are “large envelops” and the cost will be $1.35. they weigh two ounces and in the past they would have been roughly 69¢. I am relieved as if it was considered an unbendable item it would have been more.

The postings to the states done we then move on to the European Union where the cost is a mere $2.00.

Now ready for the true north strong and free, an envelop is placed on the scale, Canada is typed in and the cost is…$1.00. both of us flummoxed, we realise that the silliness of the structure of the envelop doesn’t matter only weight.

Nevertheless those of you who want continued postings, should move to a place where the postal code starts with a letter.

Things one can do with a 104F fever:

1-Clear the driveway of snow – simply drop and roll a couple of times.
2-Likewise defrost the freezer.
3-Control the temperature of the paper developer in the 60F darkroom – but don’t hold the tank while developing film.
4-Keep hot glue viable longer.
5-Aid in the liquefying of Liquid Light photo emulsion
6-Likewise keep argyrotype solution warm enough so that all the ingredients will go into solution.
7-Develop Polaroid film more quickly.
8-Catch up on all the making of books and postcards as supposedly rest is required.

Deciding not to make any snaps digitally on the return trip so that I could illustrated the entries was an excellent choice. In choosing not to the snaps made were not a reiteration of what I thought or did but have become a remembrance.I stated that map-less, I was unsure what small town I was in specifically knowing that it would have been less of a problem digitally as all would be in order. With the extended wait until I could develop the film – Carol breaking her arm and school starting – I thought that it would be even rougher but with the lesser images made, there was of my memory to fill in the gaps.It seems that the outing was worth it. I am not sure how good the images are as I was photographing things that, while I didn’t mean it, scream souther. I was more in search of sense of place habitation - so steering clear of the Wal-marts and generic suburbs that one runs across – an irony with a stereotype as what can be more southern than Wal-mart and any big city has a suburb.I was hoping that I was looking for the same type of specifics as when I was wandering the North-East in Minneapolis and fixating on taverns, or the taverns in Baltimore. The conveniences when I was in Vermont anything that wasn’t a chain. I realise that it seems when one aims a camera when one isn’t on the interstate it is hard not to scream nostalgia but nevertheless, I was curious and was photographing the objects of my curiosity.The computer is to flying as the darkroom is to driving. While awaiting the particular task to be done one can surf youtube, check e-mails, update their facebook site. In the darkroom one pretty much has to concentrate on the task at hand.As the darkroom is meeting in the glim, driving is meeting on wheels needing to concentrate only so much one might as well put one’s life in order.

I also liked riding about with a camera, and while, this time having a place to go, not really having a time where I had to be there.
This wasn’t a particularly long trip, but this was one when I never really had to “make time.” The Great Trek North (and East) to Bonne Bay and Beyond had me nervous on making the ferry reservation in North Sydney, even so we risked stopping a couple of times along the way.I was relieved on how easy it was for me to stop and if my brain was working slowly, turn around to get back to a point with potential although at times I wondered if like on the rock, I could stop anywhere and walk. When there was light, I couldn’t have “made time” if I had tried.
All my geriatric cameras performed admirably, no light leaks and except for the lethargy in the cold no ruined negatives – I caught the refusal to work in the cold so one neg was blank on the trip.I don’t know if I liked black and white so much as I didn’t miss colour. 36 rolls of film to develop in a day is manageable. I think that I do like the distance that black and white implies.

What this does is open up new destinations. Forget about US12 to Minneapolis, am thinking Winnipeg, then through the lakes. Then the mythical town of Flin Flon on the Saskatchewan border, Provincial Route 2 to it terminus way up in black fly country. I head to a map to find roads that not only connect places but are the only connexion.