The Film Retriever

Back in the mid-90's i read an article about the importance of light meters in photography. I had no idea how to use them and i was getting very nice results from my Praktica's lightmeter but still i felt like i wanted to have one. And so i did, i bought this little gossen sixtino 2 lightmeter. I went out shooting a slide film on my vacations and when i developed it i was really disappointed with the results. No wonder of course, since i had no idea how to use it in the first place. I threw it in a drawer and kept it there for almost 12 years. A couple of years ago, when i bought the Zeiss Ikon Nettar, i realized that it wasn't very convenient to carry with me the digital camera just to take some reading so i thought that i could buy a new one since the little Gossen was left in Greece. And i did, i bought the Seconik Microlite from a charity shop which worked well for a year until it started giving erratic readings. I had to call my parents to post me the old gossen. The G...

I really want to like Prakticas. I really do. But it seems that no matter how hard i try, Prakticas don't like me. I'll try to explain that a bit more. But first some history. In 1992 - if my memory serves me right - i decided that it was about time to buy a camera. I went with my brother on a camera shop and i was trying to bargain a Praktica MTL-5. Eventually I couldn't afford it and i went instead for the much cheaper BMS. I learned the basics with that camera and it served me well for 5 years until its shutter started becoming erratic. The quote for repair was as high as the camera cost me so I decided to save some money for some time and buy another one (I bought the EOS 5 finally). A couple of years ago, i took my Zenit 12XP to the local repair shop to change the light seals and while i was waiting, i spotted an MTL-3 (or was it a MTL-5?, not sure) and i asked him if i could take a better look. He handed it to me and while i started winding up the shutter and fi...

Back in 1992, I came across one very popular photography magazine which had a review of the brand new Canon EOS 5. It was the time when I was getting obsessed on what camera I should buy (I ended up buying a Praktica) and the canon was the number one on my dream-camera list. Six years later, my Praktica had suffered a damage beyond repair so I was thinking that it was time to buy a new one. I went into the shop to buy a Nikon F50 and i ended up leaving with a Canon EOS 5 paired with a cheap plastic Sigma 28-80. At that time it cost me one and a half salary to get it but I was thrilled with the prospect of using the eye control focus. It's been twelve years since then and I think that it is about time to write a short and biased review based on my experience working with this camera. So I suppose the main question is : How good is it? It is simply amazing, even after 12 years i am still amazed of what this camera can do. The EOS 5 lived under the shadow of it's own ...