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| The Kodak Brownie Model 2A |
Several years ago my dad gave me an old Kodak Brownie camera that was found in the personal effects of his uncle, Crilly Marshall Lunsford shortly after his death. Until recently this antique curiosity sat on my bookshelf collecting dust.
From the Brownie Camera Page, we find the following specifications:
Introduced: April 1907
Discontinued: 1936
Film size: 116
Negative size: 2 1/2 X 4 1/4"
Lens type: meniscus
Shutter type: rotary
Units made: over 2,100,000 before 1921
Original price: $3.00
After doing a bit of research, I soon found that these old gems may still work. While the original #116 film no longer is available, I found a source for adaptors that allow the use of modern #120 roll film. So after a bit of cleaning, I decided to give it a try.
Each roll allows for six pictures. And unlike a few decades ago where every drug store offered film processing, this film can only be handled by a few specialty labs across the country and its a bit pricy (around $20 per roll). So far I've had good success with this lab although it can take several weeks to get digital scans back.
Here's an outdoor shot on a snowy overcast day using Kodak B&W T-Max 400 film. This used the middle stop opening and the internal shutter speed.
Whereas this is a two second exposure of an indoor scene. It was taken by placing the camera on a table in a room with a western exposure on a sunny day. There is a small tab that can be pulled out on the camera to allow for manual shutter speed control.
Overall, this is a fine little box camera that produces a respectable picture. And the picture clarity is not bad for what is essentially a card board box with a single lens and very basic shutter mechanism. And after years of digital photography, it was nice to once again experiment with film.
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