Yesterday I went out with yet another old film camera, this time a Noblex 135U panoramic camera. For those unfamiliar with this beast, it uses 35mm film and each frame is 24mm x 66mm. The film is held against a circular frame, and when the shutter is released, a drum containing the lens and two slits 180° apart rotates in front of the film. One wider slit lets the light into the drum, while the smaller one, directly opposite, one acts like a focal plane shutter. The drum builds up speed for the first half of the rotation, then exposes for the 2nd half. The speed of the rotation depends on the 'shutter speed' - 1/500 takes 1/4 seconds and 1/30 takes 4 seconds. They appear to be available on ebay for £450 to £700. There's also a 120 version.
All very well, but mine had died (or so I thought) in about 2000 and been sitting in a cupboard ever since. Anyway, on Sunday I put some batteries in to see what would happen and lo and behold! the frame counter LCD lit up with 00 and the 'ready' LED shone bright green. However, pressing the shutter release had no effect. After several more tries I heard the motor trying its thing, but nothing moved. The drum was stuck fast. I tried to force it from the front and then from the back, but it was if it had been superglued. Eventually I succeeded in shifting it by pushing hard simultaneously at the front and back, but it still wouldn't rotate under its own steam. By 'encouraging' it round and pushing when it jammed, it became a little freer, and eventually rotated 360° - but only at 1/500 sec - I guess the greater momentum was pushing past whatever was causing the jam. I tried the same with 1/250 sec and got that working, then with ever lengthening speeds until I had the whole range of 1/30 to 1/500 working.
So yesterday I went out along the canal and used up a whole (nominal) 36-exposure film (or in this case actually 19 exposures). But because it's film I'll have to wait for the results.
