Olympus 35RC review

This was my first "real" camera. My dad helped me select it, replacing my Kodak Instamatic. I knew very little about cameras at that time. Not sure really how he got to recommend this one, maybe talking to the camera store or to his photography friend, a German man in our village.

Pimped Olympus 35RC

First of all my appreciation of it has actually grown over time. When I first got it, it was just a camera to me, nothing more nothing less as I had very few perceptions of what it could do or what I wanted.
I dabbled with with black and white in our ad hoc darkroom that we setup in our sauna from time to time.

Today I think the camera is over rated and under rated. Let me explain why.

Over rated

It is often raved about as having a very sharp contrasty lens. I don't think this is the case, the lens is sort of sharpish but not very sharp. Let me put it in my order of 35mm rangefinders that I have owned or been able to test.
Sharpness in falling order
1) Voightländer Vitessa with Ultron 50/2.0
2) Yashica Lynx, Yashinon 45/1.4
3) Fujica Compact deluxe, Fujinon 45/1.8
4) Olympus 35 RC, Zuiko 42/2.8
5) Yashica GSN, Yashinon 45/1.7
6) Ricoh 500 38/2.8

With 1,2,4,5 I and my friend Zheng Li did a target test on tripod 10 years back so I know the order between them. The others are more of my feeling on where they belong based on results.
Given some of the very upbeat web reviews about the lens I was for a while wondering if my sample was a lemon but having browsed 100s of Olympus 35RC photos on Flickr , I have come to the conclusion that it is not. Do not despair though, while not the sharpest of the sharpest it is good enough to enjoy and better than many other same era rangefinder lenses.

The lens itself is 42mm f2.8 using 5 elements in 4 groups. So somewhere between a normal 50mm and 35mm. I do prefer this slightly wider focal width vs 50mm

Under rated

So to the under rated part. Two things stands out as I see it, the size of the camera and the ease of operation.
While it is not the smallest camera on the market it is still pocketable in a overcoat which is a big plus, avoiding to drag a camera bag around

The camera can operate with or without battery. Without battery you must manually set shutter and aperture. A feature while may seem simple should not be under estimated. I have several times found myself with fully automatic cameras having the battery fail on me, not fun at all.

Operations & metering

When operated with a battery the camera can be set in shutter priority mode.

Shutter speed selector

While I would have preferred aperture priority the operation in reality is not that different. Try out what you think is the correct shutter speed for the light and film speed and half press the shutter. The in viewfinder dial will show the selected aperture. If you are happy press the trigger if not turn the shutter speed wheel on top of the camera to the wanted speed. You can see the speed and aperture in the viewfinder so there is no need to take the camera from your eye just turn the shutter dial or the aperture dial when you want to go manual.

Viewfinder with shutter speed at the top and aperture at the bottom

There are two quirks with the Olympus 35RC shutter priority program that you may want to watch out for.
a) You cant press the trigger very fast. Slow/Moderate speed is the way to go. If pressed too fast the program will not select the correct aperture. The system is partly mechanic and need it's time to move the parts.
b) If you are at the edge of the aperture range you may want to switch to manual. Even if say 1/60s shows f5.6 and you then decide to move the dial to 1/250s in order to go to f2.8 the camera may refuse to release the shutter. The reason is that the aperture is not only in full stops in automatic mode. So the camera block you as you may actually need f2.5 which you don't have. The solution is simple when heading for f2.8 then switch to manual mode. The above case would be turn the dial to 1/250s and turn the aperture ring on the front to f2.8 and press the trigger. A little awkward, I know, but if you need to be sure it triggers this is the way to avoid frustration. 

The light sensor is right next to the lens and will be covered by any filter attached, this removes the need to manually compensate for this.

Light sensor inside the filter ring

The ISO range goes from ISO 25 to ISO 800 beyond this you need to use manual mode. 

ISO selector

Focusing, the focus ring has a short swing and the rangefinder patch is relatively easy to line up. Making it quick to focus with, if one now can say that for a non AF camera.

distance scale

One feature that you may encounter, while reading up on this camera, is Guide Number automatic flash exposure. While it is a nice feature to have that simplifies flash photography, it seldom comes to use. I bought a small flash, for the time, with the camera when I acquired it but used it only a few times.
A) Simple head on flash seldom makes nice photos.
B) The camera is small. This is beauty of the camera! Putting on a normal flash and it immediately becomes unbalanced and bulky.

I guess the flash was more useful when the camera was introduced on the market and most films were slow. With ISO400/800/1600 films it seldom feels justified to work with the flash.
Either way here is how to use it, you set the GN number of you flash on the small lever on the lens. Then just focus and the camera will automatically calculate which aperture you need. Could not be simpler.

GN selector

Battery

Talking about batteries, the camera is designed for a PX625 mercury battery which is long out of production. One can replace it with Wein Cell MRB625 but I have so far using another cheat, hearing aid batteries (zinc air) that deliver 1.4V. They drain quite quickly and cost a fraction of the Wein Cell but as I have many camera that need to have film run through them from time to time it is an adequate solution for me. I have also tried normal 1.5V button cells and it also works but the metering is not correct and one need to use the ISO dial to compensate which is not so difficult, as almost all of us has a smartphone where a light meter app can be downloaded and used for calibration.

It is also possible to calibrate the sensor by unscrewing the bottom of the camera and turn a dial to compensate. See Rick Oleson's drawings.

And oh , don't forget to set the aperture ring to off when you don't use the camera to avoid draining the the battery

Samples

As usual no tool is better than it's master. I am not claiming I do the Olympus 35RC justice but here are a few samples from my private collection that I like.

Hangzhou, China
Olympus 35RC, Kodak Tri-X 400

The Vyne, foggy morning,
Olympus 35RC, Afga 400 (V34)

The Vyne, foggy morning,
Olympus 35RC, Afga 400 (V34)

California, USA,
Olympus 35RC, Fuji Astia

California, USA,
Olympus 35RC, Fuji Astia

Manhattan, NYC, USA, 1980s
Olympus 35RC, Fuji ISO100 film

Me at Suzhou, China
Olympus 35RC, Fuji Astia

Quick Three from Penang

Despite annual leave I have not had much time for photography.
I bring the camera with me where ever we go but light seldom seems interesting.
Sigma DP2 Merrill with post processing in SPP and Lightroom.

Morning in Pelita, Roti Bawang on the menu
ISO 500 1/40 f6.3

One of many Arcades
ISO100 1/400s f2.8

Morning deliveries
ISO100 1/160s f5

Pushing Kodak Vision3 250D, IE500

OK so I finally got round to it. I got myself some more Kodak Vision3 250D.
This time I decided to shoot it at IE500 on a trip to Oxford.

I was quite happy with Vision3 250D when I first did the five motion picture film review last Summer (that were all developed in RA4). Since then I have returned to shoot Vision3 500T and developed it in proper ECN-2 developer. So for this push +1 test with Vision3 250D I also used ECN-2 developer.

The shots were all taken with Tair 11A (135/2.8) on a Minolta 7000i body.

Outdoor, overcast summer day. Well balanced colours. No real issues except for camera seemed to underexpose a few of them, like the second one below.

 

Indoor, mixed lighting. University of Oxford.

My thoughts: A slight disappointment. The poping colours from Vision3 250D IE250 are gone. Left is a well balanced but muted result with increased grain. I also feel that some of the lattitude was lost in the push. Maybe best shoot this film at IE250 and use Vision 3 500T for the low light situations. 

Experimental color reversal (partially successful) without E6 chemistry

I have done E6 processing at home in the past with good success but the kit did not lasting long and I shoot slide film quite seldom so it is not worth investing in E6 chemistry. Send away to AG Photolabs have been the standard mode of operation for the last few years. That though became more inconvinient when I went back to processing C41 and ECN-2 at home.

A few years back I remember reading about people trying out home color reversal using film B&W developer and C41/E6 color developer with from what I could tell various success. I have also kept an eye on the Negapos method from Japan with negative film used for color reversal in a method B&W paper developer and C41 color developer. Now I wanted to see if it was possible to replicate the E6 process at home with a paper B&W developer and RA4 color developer.

The basic recepie should be

- Take paper B&W developer add some KCSN

Processing as follows

- Pre heat with 38degC water

- Process in the above hacked B&W paper developer

- Wash

- Take film out 

- Re-expose

- Back into processor

- Develop in RA4 

- Wash

- Bleach

- Wash

- Fix

- Wash

- Stabilize

How difficult could it be?

It turns out quite tricky to the dillution and processing time of the hacked B&W developer correct.

In the past I read somewhere that it was important for the first developer to be aggressive. I tried to study recepies of color reversal first developers and compare it with the B&W paper developer I choose to try with - Ilford PQ universal. I selected this one as it also can double as B&W film developer. After looking at the FD receipes online comparing with the Ilford PQ I decided to go for 1+4 dillution and add approx 0.5g of KCSN and give it a go of 6min. I selected the 6min as I wanted a process that was timing wise similar to the "proper" E6 process.

Film used to experiement: Agfa Precisa CT100 (bought fresh in 2014 stored in freezer ever since)

First try was a disaster - film strip of four shots came out with a slighly yellow orange base and resemblence of a negative. Rexposed under halogene light which I had calculated to be equivalent to  800 footcandle-seconds. Scratching my head not knowing what went wrong I did the process with only one frame, this time using a strobe (as I read someone had success with it). No real change.
I though realized after this that the hacked B&W developer seemed way to strong for the film as even the sprocket borders where blank.
Next increased dillution to 1+9 and 6min. After this one could see sprocket border started to become darker but not black and there was some color residue as well.
Next stayed with 1+9 but went for 3min, result a little dark and a little cold greenish blue colors.

On the rigth track but I wanted 6min.

Next increased dillution to 1+19 and 6min, still dark and colder.

Left 1+19 6min, Right 1+9 3min
Neutral point selected in silverfast during scan at window frame on right slide part

Next 1+15 and 6min , half washed away, black sprocket frames more like gray.

Next about 10 shots in 1+15 at 4min. Way too dark and still cold. My cheap PF3650u cannot get anything useful from them but using either the slide copier on the camera or the Microtec M1 could actually get some results from it. Just for the reader to understand how dark the slide was, with ISO100 on the DSLR camera and lens set to f5.6 on a overcast summerday, camera pointed to the sky during day time the exposure time was 2s. The first two are scanned with Microtek M1 and post processed in lightroom. The darkness really pushed the equipment to the limit and technical artifacts are clearly visible such as banding on the original scan. The last is with slide copier on a Sony Alpha A55, the color temp slider (warm/cold) maxed out at 50000 in lightroom.

  

I have read somewhere that the pH value of the color developer will create the color cast. Too acid = magenta cast, too alkalic green cast. Maybe the RA4 developer is too alkalic.

Revisiting Kodak Vision3 500T with proper ECN-2 developer

I found an ebay seller that had bought a 100L kit and partitioned it up in smaller quantities for resale so I picked up 1L kit from him. The kit was composed of three small bottles A,B and C to which water was added to make 1L. I decided to make 1L in one go and then split it over to 500ml packages of working solution. Nowadays I use foiled spout bag to store working solution and mix up all chemicals at one. The foiled spout bags are oxygen tight and they can be compressed so that no air is at the top when closing the cap. So far this method has worked well for me with C41 developer. Lets see if it works for the 2nd 500ml bag of ECN2 I have.

Back to the topic, I decided to write this small piece up as I still wanted to get the Kodak Vision3 500T to work to my satisfaction. If you read my review of different motion picture films developed in RA4 I was not so impressed with Kodak Vision3 500T but I wanted to give it a second chance with the proper developer.

After two rolls through my Fuji DL-200, I can say my apetite for this film has grown. Colours are better when developed in proper ECN2 developer than with RA4. As I shoot it in a P&S I have no 85A/B filter on for daylight photography.

The film is very tolerant and you will be able to shoot it at a wide range of scenarios but it is clearly optimized to warmer light. Bright daylight does not render the best colours with it.

Lets have a look at some samples.
Indoor, Vision3 500T looks great to me:

 

Darker settings. Note that that these are taken with Fuji DL-200 with fill-in flash pressed and flash supressor on so they should be 1/40s f2.8.

Evening light, why not:

 Overcast in the woods:
 

Bright day light (without filter), less impressive ...

The Vyne woodlands with Sigma DP2 Merrill

The Vyne woodlands with Sigma DP2 Merrill

Fuji DL-200 - review

How did I come to review the Fuji DL-200? I was a little tired with my 35mm rangefinder cameras, the focusing and the poor or non functional metering, yet interested in the smaller 35mm as opposed to medium format that I shoot most of the time.
I love the my Fuji GA645 point and shoot. What a stellar lens and the ease of shooting with all manual controls when so needed, but yet it is a little bulky and heavy to carry in the laptop bag for occasional film photography when around and about.

So I looked for a 35mm P&S, Fujifilm Klasse, Contax T3, Leica Mini, Konica Hexar, Nikon 35TI all very tempting with full control of the process when so needed, but dropping £500+ on a used camera with many of the models having users witnessing challenges with electronics in these cameras just was not justifiable. The basic idea was to have something always hanging around in the laptop backpack, but expensive gear is not ideal for this.

Next level was premium lens quality P&S like well renowned Yashica T3/T4/T5 fetching £250 on Ebay or Olympus Mju-II for £150 also felt wrong.

Back to square one need to look for a sleeper , Minolta TC-1, Fuji Tiara, Konica Mini Big oops hardly sleepers hmm

All the Fujinon lenses I own have been of good quality, from the truly stellar Fujinon 60/4 Super EBC on the GA645 to sharp Fujinon 50/1.8 EBC on the Fujica Compact Deluxe and the fantastic color rendering of Fujinon 50/1.4 EBC in M42.

There must have been a Fuji/Fujica P&S that was good from that time period. Back in the 80s Fuji was well known for film in the west but their cameras and lenses had little mindshare.
After some research I found a few interesting models Fujica Auto-5 (Fujinon 38/2.8), Fujica Auto-7(Fujinon 38/2.8), Fujica DL-100 (Fujinon 38/2.8), Fujica DL-200 (Fujinon 32/2.8), Fujica DL-300 (Fujinon 35/2.8). There are not many reviews of these models on the web as they are not that common. I browsed the of photos on Flickr for these models still unclear which one to select. I cant say I found the flickr samples very encouraging but then I know that it is not only the camera, it is equally much your skills as a photographer and the knowledge of tools for scan and post process that creates the final picture. Most users seemed only to shot one test film and then giving up. After a while I had decided that a DL-300 would probably be my preference as one could turn off the flash, with DL-200 being second choice because of the interesting TTL metering and the lens of four elements in four group (ie not a tessar clone) but no suitable samples of DL-300 came up so I eventually became the owner of a DL-200 for £9.

Technical spec.
Lens: Fujinon 32mm f2.8, 4 elements in 4 groups
Exposure: Through the lens, EV8.5-18 for ISO 100 film
Shutter: 1/40s to 1/400s
Minimal focus dist: 60cm
Flash: Automatic, Guide Number 10
Film speed: ISO50 to ISO1600 through DX coding. Non DX coding interpreted as ISO100


Enough elaboration on the choice.What about the camera?

First of all it has drop loading meaning that you drop in the film without the whole back opening. Once shut the rear door the camera winds all film and the film counter show how many shots you have left. So the shots are done in reverse order on the film. Each shot protected from accidental opening of the rear door as it is rolled back into the film canister. This was a new thing back in 1983 when the camera was released.

How about the lens?
It is interesting to note that this is not a triplet nor a Tessar clone. There are four elements in four groups. I read somewhere that this was supposed to be an Unar like design.
To be honest when the first film came back I was not impressed because I maybe wrongly had GA645 quality in my mind. The Fujinon 32/2.8 is no Fujinon 60/4 Super EBC but it is still contrasty.

How sharp is it? about the same as Olympus 35RC. Having said that I dont consider the Zuiko 42/2.8 to be very sharp , wide open it is a little soft in my mind, stopped down to f8 yes it is sharp. (Reference calibration for the reader, very sharp lenses in my own experience are the Sigma 30/2.8 on Sigma DP2 Merrill or Fujinon 60/4 Super EBC on Fuji GA645)
There is of course no scientific way of comparing the Zuiko with the Fujinon as one cannot control the aperture on the DL-200 Fujinon 32/2.8.

While the lens has not EBC marking, I bet it is EBC coated though. The shimmer from the coating reflection has the same characteristics as the Fujinon 50/1.4 EBC lens. I tried to shoot into the light and it handles it quite well.

Lets look at some samples. This one shoot straight towards the sun coming from behind St Paul speaks for itself.

St Paul's Cathedral
Fuji DL-200, Fuji Superia 400 (CH-25)

Upper Thames street
Fuji DL-200, Fuji Superia 400 (CH-25)

Next one done under less light and as you can see the aperture has opened up so one can see some background bokeh.

Vauxhall VX220
Fuji DL-200, Fuji NPZ800 (expired 10y+, shot at IE400)

 Next one is under exposed, shot in dusk.

I guess this would be with aperture fully open and the longest shutter time of 1/40.
As you can see there is vignetting, an issue in a pure chemistry work flow but with the hybrid chemistry and digital work flow it is not really an issue and maybe even could be described as character.

Green park, ecotricity
Fuji DL-200, Fuji NPZ800 (expired 10y+, shot at IE400)

 

Fuji DL-200, Fuji Superia 400 (CH25), IE400

Straight into the Sun
Fuji DL-200, Fuji Superia 400 (CH25), IE400

Exposure,  I must say the negatives looked very correctly exposed when shot inside the camera parameters. The issue is as usual that fully automatic is not always correct in terms of what you may want to have lit in your composition. As the exposure measurement is done TTL by reflection off the film there is no way of tricking the camera before hand by first pointing at something darker or brighter and half pressing the shutter button. All that does, is lock the focus but it does not lock the exposure. This is also why this camera cannot have a flash-off switch, the only way to determine if flash is needed or not is to open the shutter.
What I don't fully understand is how it actually works.I get the reflection off the film and the basically integrating the incoming light and once enough light is captured the shutter is closed. The part that I don't fully understand is at what stage the auto program selects the aperture. To measure the light the shutter must be opened and the aperture must start in some position. At some stage the aperture need to be changed. My speculation is that it start with a very small aperture say f25 (corresponds to EV18 ISO100 and 1/400s) opens the shutter for the minimum time of 1/400s integrate the incoming light, after that assesses what aperture is needed inside the maximum of 1/40s minus the 1/400s already consumed = 9/400s. This would also explain why the minimum EV is 8.5 instead of 8.33 as it should be with ISO100 f2.8 1/40s. Apart from curiosity this maybe be important to allow some control of the exposure.
There are no direct controls for exposure except for a flash fill-in button.
My guess is that when the flash engages due to low light the aperture is based on the distance measured, however if the fill-in button is pressed the exposure program should assume that the available light would be controlling the aperture and the fill-in just assists with additional light. Now if one tapes up the flash with electrical black tape it should be possible to push the camera to open up the aperture without being compromised by the flash program. So after all a flash program switch off using the fill-in button and tape. Of course now it is up to the photographer to determine whether the light conditions are sufficient for this.

Fuji DL-200 in stealth mode w the flash suppressor mounted

Flash fill-in button to the upper right on the camera

Despite the awkward feeling to press the flash fill-in to avoid the flash and flash program it seems to allow a large aperture in low light conditions.

 

Fuji DL-200
Kodak Vision3 500T, IE500, no 85 filter,
fill-in pressed, flash suppressor mounted

Fuji DL-200
Kodak Vision3 500T, IE500, no 85 filter,
fill-in pressed, flash suppressor mounted

Fuji DL-200,
Kodak Vision3 500T, IE500, no 85 filter,
fill-in pressed, flash suppressor mounted

 

Fuji DL-200
Kodak Vision3 500T, IE500, no 85 filter,

fill-in pressed, flash suppressor mounted

The camera likes to flash. I guess that the Fuji engineers have put in some sound margin  to avoid underexposed shots on this consumer camera. This test shot was purposely orchestrated to see how a larger aperture would look like. I metered with my phone before which called the scene F5 @ 1/40s  ISO400. Guess what, the flash fired. With GN10, ISO400 film in the camera and I guess about 3.5m to the wall the aperture should be about 5.7, if the camera measured correctly and my eye measure from memory is reasonable.
.

Fuji DL-200, Fuji Superia 400 (CH25), IE400

f25 - not so sharp?
Loaded with fast film (IE500) the camera seems hanging on small apertures. The shots in bright light with fast film is nothing to write home about. The diffraction seems to take the best out of the lens.

Fuji DL-200
Kodak Vision3 500T, IE500, no 85 filter,

fill-in pressed, flash suppressor mounted

Handling

The camera start-up is nothing short of SLOW with the battery I have in it. The battery measures 5.5V (should be 6V) so it is probably nearing end of life. As the flash needs to be ready due to the TTL measuring it needs to charge the flash, this takes about 20s on my camera when it has been off for awhile. I guess the capacitor is discharged and requires to be recharged, maybe my battery is on the edge. From photo to photo it is not that bad. The "decisive" moment may quickly be gone if you need to reach for the camera from your backpack and then get the charging going. If you are on alert mode with the camera open this is not an issue. If one just close the lid for short while say a few minutes it is instantly ready to shoot when opened again. I am thinking about replacing the battery which is easy on my DL200 as it is version2 with the battery changeable w/o soldering.
[Update: I hacked the battery and replaced the cells with 2x3.2V rechargeable ones and now the camera starts from completely discharged capacitor in 11s]

Conclusion
This is a technically interesting camera. It takes reasonable sharp photos.
Who is/was the camera for?
Consumer: It was as consumer film camera and still serve as one P&S film camera quite well.
Advanced amateur: With some tricks as described one can get some control of the process. It does seem to have a reasonable lens.
Professional: I never done photo shoots for money, and i probably never will, but I would not select this camera if I had a paid jobs. Not enough control of what it does. For some art work where experimental is allowed maybe it can be used.

Will I use or sell it. Actually I have not bought any camera for about 3+ years despite always looking. I introduced a piece of self discipline a few years back not to buy more cameras unless I also sold a camera. The problem is each time I am thinking about selling a camera I always think about the reasons I got it in the first place and some good photos with that camera. With this one only costing me £9 I skipped that rule of selling.

I doubt this will be my main camera but at £9 it stays on my shelf and will probably see a few rolls pass though it.